Vladimir ending explained: If the fire was real and the Netflix series' huge changes from the book
The Vladimir series is similar to the book... until it isn't
Vladimir, Rachel Weisz’s steamy new Netflix series, has an unexpected, shocking ending – but was the fire even real, and does the show change the book? Well, you’re in the right place for some answers.
Does Vladimir (Leo Woodall) actually want to have sex with our protagonist (Weisz), or is it all in her head? That’s the biggest (but not the only) question from the outset of the Vladimir finale.
By this point, he’s chained up at her remote, romantic cabin after she drugged him. Meanwhile, her semi-disgraced husband (John Slattery) is seeing his daughter (Ellen Robertson) lose faith in him in real time at his hearing for sexual misconduct. Also, what is actually going on with Cynthia (Jessica Henwick)?
The ending of Vladimir ties up a lot of loose ends, but it also concludes on a strange, ambiguous note that’s quite different from Julia May Jonas’ original book. So, let’s get into it.
***Warning: spoilers for Vladimir ahead***
How does Netflix’s Vladimir end?
The Vladimir finale opens with Vlad – understandably – panicking as he wakes up chained to a chair. The protagonist tells him he wanted to be dominated, but assures him that he passed out from being drunk and nothing happened between them.
Of course, we know that’s not actually what went down. She stole clonazepam from the college president’s wife’s bathroom, crushed up the pills, and put them in his whisky.
She also says she told him about John and Cynthia having an affair. However, she didn’t: she texted Cynthia from John’s phone and asked her to stop contacting him. Sneaky!
Vlad asks to stay, and while the protagonist expects him to leave in the morning, she returns from the store… and he’s still there.
As it turns out, he knows exactly what she did. But, for some reason, it doesn’t bother him; after all, his wife cheated on him, her husband was unfaithful, so what’s the big deal?
John walks free… and it finally happens with Vladimir and the protagonist
Elsewhere, Lila (Kayli Carter) testifies in John’s hearing.
While she doesn’t throw the protagonist under the bus for her retaliation (which she denied), she accuses John of taking advantage of her when she was vulnerable. “I don’t want to ruin anyone’s life… him doing that, it wasn’t kind,” she says.
Sid leaves before the verdict. “You don’t need me for that part,” she tells her dad, and it’s clear she’s disappointed in him.
Back at the cabin, Vlad and the protagonist write together. That night, after dinner, Vlad makes a move – but when he initiates role play (“I need to tell you something. I did something bad. I didn’t hand in my paper, professor.”), she excuses herself and walks outside.
She doesn’t want to be his high-school fantasy, basically. He asks if he should get ready for bed with her, and she tells him to stop asking her questions.
Moments later, he takes charge in the bedroom, and they have sex. Soon after they’re done, she starts scribbling down an ending to her novel. John arrives… and that’s when things take a turn.
Vladimir ending: What was going on with John and Cynthia?
When John shows up at the cabin, he isn’t angry. They have an open marriage – if anything (as he says), he’s impressed.
She sets up some portable heaters (this is important for later), and they hash it out about John and Cynthia. The protagonist may believe they caught them in the act, but there was something else going on.
“Cynthia’s finishing her memoir, and I’m writing an epic poem,” he explains.
They weren’t hooking up. “We take drugs and then we write. It’s fun,” he adds.
This makes Vlad angry, given Cynthia is an addict and she previously tried to take her own life.
While Vlad calls Cynthia, John tells the protagonist that the allegations against him were dismissed. He’s no longer permitted to teach, but he got to keep his pension – unfortunately, Sid probably won’t speak to him for the foreseeable future.
He asks the protagonist if she’d be interested in “recommitting”, because it’s starting to “feel rather sad”.
When Vlad walks through, he says Cynthia told him that John made her feel like a “normal human”.
Before the show’s big finish, Vlad asks the protagonist to meet him at the cabin once a week. John asks if she’s coming to bed with him, and she says, “I don’t know.”
“I think it could give me a whole new life,” she says of her new book. “I want choices, I want options,” she says.
Was the fire real, and did John and Vlad die?
This is undoubtedly the biggest question by the end of Vladimir. In the closing scenes of the finale, the protagonist narrates that both John and Vlad see her as a character in their story, and “they both have an idea about how it’s gonna play out”.
“But there are forces beyond anyone’s control,” she says. At this moment, a heater catches fire in the living area, and the cabin goes up in flames, “just like in a gothic novel”.
While John and Vlad argue and fight about trying to open the back door, she chooses to grab her novel. A line of fire then separates her and them.
“I understand… that I have to make a choice. As she leaps across to grab her notepads, they ask her what she’s doing.
“A whole new life, and this is how it plays out,” she says, as she stands outside with the blazing cabin behind her.
“I finish my book about a woman’s obsession with her younger colleague. Vlad writes a book about a tender affair with an older professor. Mine does much better. It speaks to a certain need,” she continues.
“Oh, don’t worry. I call 911, and everybody gets out. You don’t believe me?”
We don’t see Vlad or John leave the cabin. The fire worsens, and an upstairs window shatters. We do hear the sound of sirens in the distance, so it’s possible they were saved – but anyone could fairly interpret that both men perish in the fire.
Of course, there’s the question of whether or not the fire is even real. The protagonist is an unreliable narrator, and considering we see her personal fantasies throughout the series, this could all be in her head, and John and Vlad are actually alive, safe, and well.
Vladimir ending explained: How does the book end?
Julia May Jonas’ Vladimir ends similarly to the Netflix series… until it doesn’t.
In the book (specifically, chapter 19), John turns up at the cabin after Vlad and the protagonist. He talks to her about resigning from the college, and how they could move to an apartment in the city or go to Mexico.
John, Vlad, and the protagonist largely talk about the same things, including the true nature of Cynthia and John’s relationship.
Here comes the first major change. Vlad storms out and takes the boat out on the lake in the middle of the night. Meanwhile, the protagonist and John go to bed together.
The fire unfolds in a one-page chapter (20), with Vlad returning to drag John and the protagonist out of the fire engulfing the cabin.
The protagonist is left with third-degree burns on 20% of her body and stays in the hospital for 20 days, followed by four months of rehab. John is hospitalised for a while longer, and spends six months in rehab.
Remember how Sid told her mother about having sex with a guy on a train? Well, by the end of the book, she’s pregnant with his child, but still with Alexis. “We know nothing about him, so it’s like he doesn’t exist.”
Unlike the show, the protagonist doesn’t publish her book. It perishes in the fire, as the only copy was held on her charred computer.
On the upside, they get a hefty settlement from the company that produced the heaters, as they were responsible for the fire. John and his wife end up buying a Manhattan apartment and live a peaceful life.
Vladimir publishes his novel “about a younger man’s tender affair with an older woman”. Unfortunately, as well-written as it is, it’s deemed too bleak and it doesn’t do well. And that’s how it ends!
Read more: Why Vladimir never reveals Rachel Weisz’s character’s name
