[S3E8] The Wellness Center
The unpaid union fees bring Nandor to a suspiciously bright vampire wellness center, in which everyone has rejected their bloodsucker lifestyle. This place has serious Scientology vibes. They have even resorted to forcefully removing their fangs from their mouths even though they grow back the next day. At the head of the cult, I mean wellness center, is Jan (Cree Summer), who leads the former vampires like an inspirational yoga instructor. I would recognize one of the most prolific voice actors of my childhood anywhere.
[S3E8] The Wellness Center
Kimberly has worked in youth and community development organizations for over 20 years. Today, she also serves as founder of Family Foundation Initiatives, a therapeutic private practice dedicated to mental wellness and family strengthening.
This week we sit down with Sami Mansfield to discuss exercise as it relates to cancer treatment and survivorship. Sami is the founder of Cancer Wellness for Life, which focuses on developing, implementing, and enhancing oncology wellness and exercise resources. Her consulting efforts serve cancer centers, hospital and health care organizations, pharmaceutical companies, non-profits, and individuals impacted by cancer.
April is the Oral Oncolytic Nurse Navigator at Indiana University Health Ball Memorial Cancer Center in Muncie, Indiana and is nationally certified in oncology. Along with a multidisciplinary team, she developed a nurse navigation program that patient-centered and focuses on appropriate monitoring and support for all patients while on an oral oncolytic. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Ball State University, Muncie and has over 18 years of nursing experience.
Dr. Mussallem has over 25 years of patient-centered clinical wellness experience with national recognition in the field of breast medicine, lifestyle medicine, integrative oncology, cancer prevention, and cancer survivorship, and a unique personal experience as a stage IV cancer patient diagnosed 3 months into medical school, as well as a heart transplant recipient. She shares that her journey as a patient cultivated her boundless energy and deep purpose to help guide patients toward renewed vitality.
Michael Reff, RPh, MBA, is the Founder & Executive Director of NCODA. NCODA is the first patient-centered organization dedicated to shaping the value proposition for medically integrated oncology practices. NCODA supports a membership of over 6,000 healthcare practitioners employed at over 1,000 practice settings. Michael established The Patient Rx Center at Hematology/Oncology Associates of Central New York, a medically integrated oncology pharmacy service focused on positive patient experiences with oral oncolytics.
Cree Summer, the voice of our collective childhoods, guest stars as Jan, a charismatic cult leader whose center pushes vampires back toward human normalcy. Assuming human culture stopped evolving somewhere around when Patrick Nagel paintings blew up.
Tropes Blatant Lies: Jan claims that she is able to eat and drink human food to try to lure Nandor into joining the "wellness center." She immediately vomits up the water she drinks outside of Nandor's view. Later, Nandor claims that his "new friends" were living as human and not going to hurt Guillermo, despite Jan explicitly ordering them all to kill him.
Call-Back: When putting up the decorations for Nandor's Ascension Day party, Guillermo mentions that he used Nandor's favorite, "creepy paper"; this calls back to the pilot episode, where Nandor kept mispronouncing "crepe paper" as "creepy paper".
Cult: Jan's Wellness Center has a bunch of cult-like attitudes, including a mass suicide at the end.
A Day in the Limelight: This episode focuses primarily on Nandor's time at Jan's wellness center.
Fan Disservice: Colin Robinson really gets into celebrating Nandor's Accession Day, so much so that he puts on a topless belly dancer costume to dance around.
For Happiness: Nandor argues that it doesn't matter if the Wellness Center is ridiculous. It has made him friends and made him happy for the first time in centuries.
Frozen Fashion Sense: In his endeavor to live like a human, Nandor wears the last clothes he wore as a human, a full set of body armor. Members of Jan's Wellness Center also dress in '80s fashion, which Nandor switches to when he joins them.
Gasshole: Colin Robinson takes Nandor's room after the leaves and marks it with his scent by farting on everything. According to him, every energy vampire is capable of flatulating at will, for obvious reasons.
Scam Religion: It's clear that Jan's "wellness center" is brainwashing depressed vampires into thinking they're on a path towards becoming human again (while most likely bilking them for their money), when in reality they're no closer than before they joined.
Special Guest: Jan is played by guest star Cree Summer.
Suicide by Sunlight: Jan tricks her cult into killing themselves via letting them run onto the roof in the morning.
The Stinger: A mid-credits scene reveals that Jan disposes of her followers who start to question her because of Guillermo getting in by claiming that they're ready to embrace sunlight, only for them to all immediately burn to ashes as they run out into daylight. Naturally, Jan stays back and shields herself behind the door, and once they're all dead she simply says "Back to the drawing board."
The Tooth Hurts: As part of their transition to being human, members of the Wellness Centers pluck their fangs, something witnessed as part of Nandor's initiation. It's stated that they grow back every morning, necessitating repeated extractions.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Sandwich: Members of the Wellness Center act as humans by cooking food in the kitchen, only to immediately throw it out after barely prepping it.
Variations on a Theme Song: The normal opening credits song is replaced by a Middle Eastern remix sung in Al Qulondarese.
Who Wants to Live Forever?: Nandor is going through a depressive episode, which according to Nadja happens occasionally to every vampire, because at his age he feels all the events over the centuries are repetitive and just run together. When Guillermo pleads with him to at last be turned before he leaves, Nandor states that he cares too much about Guillermo to inflict the curse of vampirism.
Community first responders are repeatedly exposed to trauma, and that trauma can take its toll. Dan Willis, retired police captain and author of Bulletproof Spirit, talks with us about proactive wellness strategies for first responders. He explains the cultural shift needed to emphasize emotional survival as well as physical survival, and how promoting a heart-centered approach to work can help keep those in public safety motivated, inspired, and connected to the true nobility of what it means to be a first responder. 041b061a72