There may be no more hilariously inspired character on television than What We Do in the Shadows’ Colin Robinson—a bald, bespectacled, blandly dressed dullard who’s actually an “energy vampire” that drains his victims by literally boring them to death.
Living in a Staten Island house with three traditional ancient bloodsuckers—Kayvan Novak’s Nandor the Relentless, Matt Berry’s Laszlo Cravensworth, and Natasia Demetriou’s Nadja of Antipaxos—Robinson is the odd man out, a new-world loser who’s the sort of tiresomely annoying drone that’s instantly recognizable to anyone who’s ever worked in an office. Monumentally lackluster, he’s a unique spin on the age-old vampiric archetype, a creature of consuming weariness whose every banal utterance is apt to put one to sleep, make one roll their eyes and groan, or flee in desperate search of alternate company. He’s the absurdly undead, and as embodied by star Mark Proksch, he’s the highlight of FX’s hit comedy—a figure so clever and amusing that it’s difficult to believe no one thought him up before.
Thus, it was with great sadness that Colin Robinson perished at the end of What We Do in the Shadows’ third season—only to then thankfully get another shot at life when a baby Colin Robinson crawled out of the deceased’s chest cavity, boasting the exact same face as its predecessor. An unexpected turn of events, to be sure, and one that pays immense dividends in Season 4, which partly focuses on Laszlo’s efforts to raise this monstrous tyke and, in the process, figure out if he’s destined to become as unbearably monotonous as Colin Robinson. For Proksch, it’s about as bizarre as comedic opportunities get, given that the show’s newest episodes feature his head CGI’d onto the body of a young singing-and-dancing child. Nonetheless, the 43-year-old veteran of The Office, Tim Heidecker and Gregg Turkington’s On Cinema and Better Call Saul makes the most of it, delivering what stands as easily the strangest—and most humorous—2022 TV performance to date.
