Michael Vlamis plays Michael Guerin on The CW’s Roswell, New Mexico. The series, which originally premiered in 2019, is now in its fourth and final season. New episodes of the sci-fi drama air Mondays at 8pm ET/PT. This interview will include spoilers for episode 4×02, “Fly.”
We discussed this episode’s big cliffhanger, Michael Guerin’s growth, representation, his favorite Malex moment of the season, and much more. Keep reading for everything he told me!
So I really love the content we’re getting in terms of Michael allowing himself to share and acknowledge his fears in his relationship with Alex. It’s one of my favorite things so far. What are those scenes like for you to show that emotion and be real rather than pretend everything’s happy and amazing?
Michael Vlamis: Yeah, actually I’m a big fan of those scenes. They’re some of my favorite scenes because they’re harder to do. They take digging a little deeper into my own personal past and any situations or feelings in my life that I can correlate to these moments, where someone is being so kind to you and you don’t think you deserve it. It took me a lot of years to realize that, “Oh, if I’m lashing back at someone, who’s been nice to me, why am I doing that? Why am I pushing people away that are loving me?” Maybe it was because I didn’t feel I deserved that love at that time and I think that is a really interesting thing to play now. As Michael Vlamis, I’m completely away from that — I mean, maybe not completely we’re all going to have pieces of it, right? But I can see and I’m self-aware of it, where Guerin isn’t yet. He’s becoming that, but it’s very interesting to go back to that state. It’s almost like I’m a bird watching above, but have to still embrace what’s going on on the ground and it’s fun. It’s a challenge, but I really like it.
We’re going to discuss this more later, but so many fans feel represented by your character and I feel like this is just another aspect that is going to drive that home even more because so many people feel that way in relationships.
I hope so. I’ve been very fortunate, the writers have given me so much. I know Michael Guerin is really loved by a lot of people and a lot of people say I do a great job playing him, the writers do a great job writing him. The reason people love Guerin are the little moments, not just me, but also like the writers wrote in this kid in episode one, his rocket didn’t launch and the fact that they gave me a scene where I help, that is beautiful, that is the writers.
That moment made me teary-eyed, don’t get me started. In this episode, we have one of my favorite Malex scenes yet, and I don’t say that lightly, but we have to talk about that cliffhanger with Alex. I know you can’t spoil anything but can you tease Michael’s reaction? Are we gonna see him go full rescue mode like he did when Alex was kidnapped in the past? What can you give me?
Oh my gosh, well, I think Michael Guerin is in a position in his life where he is entrusting that if Alex believes that he needs to go away for something, Michael is going to let him go. Michael’s not going to bother him, Michael’s not going to hover over him. That might be a bad thing at first.
But he goes, he snaps, and he makes sure that he goes after Alex. So he’s going after Alex in a way that I don’t even think we’ve seen him go after Alex before so everyone can be excited for that. I can’t give anything away, I really don’t want to give anything away, but Michael is deeply in love with Alex more than ever, like they are an item now. They’re officially an item! He’s not going to let that other half of him go anywhere else. I mean, he’s so corny, he gave him a half of a necklace. He loves the guy so much!
That was like straight out of a fanfiction.
Really?
People were predicting that he was going to give Alex some sort of alien glass jewelry. They were saying a ring, but I think that this necklace moment was pretty cute.
Everybody wants a ring. Everybody’s talking about how — I made a joke on Twitter saying I resized Max’s ring so quickly and they were like, “Yeah, cause you’ve been practicing on yours.” And I’m like, “Man, you guys just wait and see. Just wait and see, stop guessing.”
I’m not ready, we’re not ready.
No, nobody is.
One thing that I really love about you is how you engage with the fans. You are amazing with that. Were you shocked by how much the audience really resonated and felt represented by Michael and Malex’s relationship? Also, do you have any message for them about it being the final season? My heart is absolutely broken, but the show will definitely stay with viewers.
Well, thank you. Oh, man, I was shocked but the question that you asked I’ve thought about a lot. A lot of different people have asked me questions in this vein and every time it’s a similar answer, which is I am literally floored by the amount of people that we have spoke to, but I shouldn’t be because Tyler Blackburn told me that this was going to happen. It’s very similar to like our characters in the show, he tells me something and I just go do it, and then it’s like “Ah, alright. You were right.” That’s exactly what happened. He told me at the very beginning, “This is going to mean a ton to a lot of people. You’re representing something way bigger than yourself right now.” We were like drinking wine on a balcony of the hotel in Albuquerque, where we’re shooting the pilot and I was just like, “Okay, yeah. I mean, I’m up to the challenge. I’m just gonna fully commit as an actor.” But then all of a sudden, DMs start flooding in, the tweets start coming in, letters even, and you start realizing, “Oh my God, this is way bigger than me,” and it’s honestly made me so much more involved in the community. I’m not out there like — I don’t voice a lot of political things, I’m an actor, there’s other people for that, you know? But I do always support, especially when it comes to representation and love being love all over the map. I can’t stand that there are some people that are the reason for people being afraid to be who they are. So yeah, I mean, absolutely floored, absolutely honored. I know that we’ve been on lists before of top couples in this community representing, Guerin himself has been on lists with like Zendaya and Euphoria for bisexual representation, I was like, “This is really fun. This is cool.”
But with it being the last season, I’m gonna keep doing my part for the community and that really is the best I could do is to support, be a lending ear, and just be there. That’s why I am so engaged with the fans, I want people to know that I am there. Little things like making sure that I’m donating to causes that I respect, The Trevor Project was a big one for us. We had a great donation last year to them because of a collaboration that me and Tyler did, and that makes me really proud. Things like that make me really proud. But yeah, for what’s next, I mean, I’m still going to be around, I’m doing so much. I’m really curious to see how that– you know, we created this fun little community called the Vlambase, which started off as a joke, like Vlambase fanbase, it was this fun pun, and it’s just become something, I mean, I got it on my AirPods. It’s become something so much more than a fun pun, it’s become a community of people that are meeting, making friendships over it, and people that are wearing merch and repeated customers because they’ve liked the quality and they like what it represents. I mean that has been so special, so cool. Honestly, I’m not trying to brag but like you said, I do think that my partner Jesa Joy and myself have done a great job marketing the show through this too. I didn’t even think about it as that at first, even me responding to tweets and stuff, I never thought about it as that. I just thought about it as “Oh, it’s good to be engaged.” If I was a kid or a fan of somebody, I would be floored if they responded. So I always think about it from that kid in Chicago, who wanted people to hit him back. So I’m trying to give that but I’m very curious of what I should be doing with the Vlambase as it goes on, if there are more Roswell-themed things I could do with it or if I should move on to the next venture, but keep the Vlambase or if it’s going to turn into something. I don’t know exactly yet, but I know that I’m always going to be here, representing, spreading the message, and being here for the fans. That is one of the most fulfilling things about the show, that the show gave me.
I can’t wait to see what you do next, you have some cool projects coming up and I’m definitely going to be covering them.
Thank you, I can’t wait for everyone to see the first movie I directed. It’s way different than Roswell, but it’s really fun and it’ll make you think, make you feel. I’m excited for that.
I’m speaking to you during Pride Month, which makes me so happy, and I want to ask what it’s meant to you to bring this beautiful bisexual character to life on television, see the effect, and how he’s evolved? He’s had a really great journey.
Yeah, it’s so interesting because first of all, it’s meant the world to me — obviously, that’s apparent, I’m doing tie-dyes with the bisexual colors and that’s not a mistake! I was looking up like how do I represent as much as I can? What can I do? I mean, I’m ridiculous but no, it means the world to me. The job is fun. The feedback and reactions are fulfilling. I mean, the job is fulfilling too, but connecting with people, I think that’s a big reason I’m in this business. It’s not only entertaining or just getting reactions out of people, but like spreading positive messages or spreading messages that most people aren’t thinking about and this is going to give them an opportunity to think about, an opportunity to go share what they’re feeling with someone else. So it’s meant everything to me. I think Pride Month is so important, I’m so proud to be in LA as it’s happening. I’ve talked about it so much, I think it just is everything, it makes me emotional. It makes me very happy, very proud. I’m more proud of that than any of the work I’ve done on the show, but the work is the reason for that so they go hand in hand. Yeah, I think that’s where I’m at.
Everyone is ready for Malex this season, we finally get to see them as official boyfriends! What can you tease about your favorite Michael and Alex moment this season without spoiling?
Oh, my favorite Malex moment without spoiling, well, I’ll go back to the second half of your other question, which was like not only did Michael Guerin grow in his sexuality, which he grew relatively quickly in that, didn’t he? He came out to Max in season one.
He was proud of it, too.
Yeah, he owned that pretty quickly. The things he doesn’t own are his problems with his family, his parents, how he felt from being abandoned as a kid, these are things he’s owning, but that growth has been really fun to play and really interesting, and taking us to the position that we’re in now with Alex. Now Alex is gone, Michael’s gonna go after him. I don’t know, I can’t say they reunite or what happens here but there will be a very special– it’s not the end of them, right? I think everybody will know that, that’s not some crazy spoiler, but there is as much truth as one can tell their partner is told in this season. That truth leads to, I think, some performances that I’m going to be most proud of and that I can share. The performances that we both did together in those scenes, I’m very, very proud of but you will never know what they are.