CW"It's like the Lost Boys: Party all night and sleep all day."
We're not in high school anymore! Unlike The Vampire Diaries,The Originals wants to make it clear that the highly anticipated spinoff doesn't have time for first loves or brooding over being a vampire as they are busy having too much fun. "This is a show that is not about struggling to be a vampire, it's about embracing vampirism, it's reveling in it," executive producer Julie Plec said during the show's panel at the CW's presentation at the 2013 Summer TCAs Press Tour. Cue star Joseph Morgan comparing the series to the classic '80s vampire flick The Lost Boys. Yes, please!
Plec, Morgan and Originals stars Claire Holt, Phoebe Tonkin and Charles Michael Davis also talked about what fans can expect from the new drama, including scoop on the romances, potential for crossovers with The Vampire Diaries and how much of fan favorite Elijah (Daniel Gillies) we'll be seeing...
Speaking to the differences between The Vampire Diaries and The Originals, Plec said, "[The Originals] is about the power of the family community and the power struggle over the family community and the supernatural community of an entire city. We like to look at it as we graduated from high school and went to college and are getting our master's degree in The Originals."
But we aren't out of Mystic Falls just yet! Rebekah (Holt) will still be in town when The Vampire Diaries picks up, with Holt explaining that Rebekah and Matt (Zach Roerig) "traveled together over the summer to Europe and I think she realized the bond with her family is stronger than anything else and any fantasy she has about marrying the high school football star. I hope we'll be able to go back and forth and I can still have a dalliance in Mystic Falls every now and then."
But could a romance with Marcel, her brother's enemy, be in the works? "I wonder if there's a history there...they shared all those years together in New Orleans," Plec teased.
Speaking of Klaus and Marcel's "incredibly complex" relationship, Morgan insisted Klaus, who is arguably the most powerful creature in the world, sees his protege as a viable threat.
"We're used to Klaus coming in with a bull-in-a-china shop mentality and dominating like a one-man army, but Marcel has an army, he has the numbers and he's running the city," he explained. "He has the witches under control…[Klaus] is going to have to employ more of his manipulative, backstabbing methods to get where he wants to be, to take back the throne."
Davis, who actually knew Morgan before he was cast in the role as they played poker together, added, "Marcel is a pretty popular guy in New Orleans. I don't think you earn any points for killing the most popular guy in New Orleans." It was also revealed he'll get to learn Marcel's backstory in early episodes, with flashbacks to 1815.
Originally set to be on the panel, Daniel Gillies was unable to make it as he was working on his Canadian medical drama Saving Hope, which is shooting at the same time as The Originals. Does this mean we'll get less Elijah in the beginning of the series?! (We shudder at the thought!)
"We actually switched while there's an overlap to a Wednesday-Sunday shooting schedule," Plec says of working around Gillies' jam-packed schedule. "It certainly hasn't been easy, but we've found some fun and clever ways…we're making it work."
The Originals premieres Oct. 3 at 9 p.m. on the CW.