Vampiress TV review: First Kill

First Kill is a Netflix original series which debuted in 2022.  The story revolves around two teenage girls.  One a vampire named Julliette and one a monster slayer named Calliope.  Both are going through a kind of puberty for their kind in which getting their first kill will launch them into adulthood.  

By chance they end up targeting each other for that but botched it during a round of spin the bottle. 

In the throws of passion Julliette bites Calliope leaving herself open for Calliope to stake her but neither get the kill as Calliope runs away before confirming the kill. 

To make matters worse they fall for each other when Calliope begins questioning her clans blind hatred of vampires when Julliette goes out of her way to save her from the rest of the vampires.  This leads to a rift between the two girls and their families launching a supernatural Romeo & Juliette story. 

Julliette is one of those "vampires that really doesn't want to be one and just wants to be a normal girl" vamps.  She comes from a line of first generation vampires which is why she can walk in the daylight and wasn't killed when staked through the heart. She tries to hold back her vampire urges through taking blood pills but much like regular puberty she has issues keeping her fangs in in emotional situations. 

Thow everyone in her family are vampires with the family being described as a matriarch (vampire leadership being passed from mother to daughter)

 there is only one in the family that falls into vampire in the traditional sense (meaning she openly stalks and feeds during the series) and that's Juliettes older sister Elinor.

Elinor is the prototypical upper class debutont Barbie.  While she does come off very cold overall everything she does is in an effort to protect her little sister including seducing, biting then hypnotizing townspeople to cover up a murder she believedJulliette did. 

Then when she found out Juliette hadn't had her first kill doing everything in her power to help her sister kill while covering it up to the family that it hadn't happened. 
  

Though at the end of the day her motivations are all selfish as she's only truly thinking about how her sister being shunned would affect her standing in the family. 

Final Opinion:  I don't have too many complaints about season 1.  When I first heard the premise I thought it would be a bit corny and overwhelmingly teenage girl angsty ala Twilight or the web series Carmella but was pleasantly surprised to find a well balanced horror drama. I definitely recommend it. Unfortunately in August of 2022 even with a very loyal fanbase Netflix announced the show would be cancelled after only 1 season.

 

Vampiress TV Review: Dracula (2020)

The Gist: The story of the Transylvania count from the time he meets Jonathon Harker in the 1800's and has a confrontation with a vampire hunting nun to him arriving in modern day England.

Female Vampire Factor:  Despite the fact that this is loosely based on the Bram Stoker novel this three episode mini series adaptation severely lacks any female vampirism as that seems to be the portion where the most liberties are taken. 

The only real female vampire moment is during the portion in episode one where Jonathon Harker inadvertently finds and gets attacked by one of Dracula's brides.

Outside of that in Episode 3 which takes place in modern times Dracula does meet Lucy Westenra who he feeds on and she eventually dies. 

Unfortunately she chose to be cremated resulting in her being a charred mess when she comes back as a vampire.

Final Opinion:  This gets a Vampire Beauty Rating of 1 out of 5.  The first two episodes which take place in the 1890s are pretty entertaining but also rely heavily on sarcasm and graphic imagery.  The final episode just kind of falls flat even though there was a lot of potential.

Vampiress TV Review: "V Wars (season 1)"

The Gist: An arctic virus is unearthed which turns anyone exposed to vampires.  A doctor is then caught up in a war between government agencies and the victims of the plague

Female Vampire Factor:  Dr. Swann and his best friend Michael were both exposed at the same time while investigating the disappearance of a colleague.  Both became ill but only Michael turned.


Jess

It's later found that only people with a certain gene could turn into a vampire which explains why Dr. Swann recovered and Micheal didn't.  The first femme vamp of the series ends up being Dr. Swanns wife Jess who was exposed to both.  At the end of episode one she goes completely feral and attempts to attack her stepson.

note: None of the other female vampires of the series are feral.  It's pretty much spelled out that whether a vampire kills or not is based on personal preference and as long as they feed on some type of human blood once every 3 to 5 days they can live normally.


Danika

A party girl who was exposed to Micheal shortly after his perceived recovery.  Her first feed ended up being her own sister Mila. 

Her in vampire form is the stereotypical vampire vixen who uses sex in order to seduce victims into volunteering blood.  Once the vampires unionize she is eventually saved by the group from both the government and freelance vampire hunters who raid her home and reunits with Micheal where they get romantically involved.

Mila

Danika's estranged sister.  It's made clear in the beginning the two don't get along so once she's turned by Danika her hate for her sister just gets worse.  Laura Vandervoort who I've featured on this page MANY times is pretty much typecast as monsters now.  She's played vampires before but this is the first time I believe she's actually fanged out as a vampire on screen.  Her character is very anti-vampire and she spends her nights hunting them with the ultimate goal of getting to her sister.  Her character is barely a factor in season one though and is seemingly being built up for a major role if there is a second season. Because she's anti vampire she doesn't fang out much with the most significant one being when she accidentally exposes what she is to her then girlfriend who sneaks up on her to surprise her with flowers in the opening segment of the season 1 finale. 

Ava

A nineteen year old farm girl who was saved by Micheal when vampire hunters were coming after her family.  When the vampires unionized she takes a second in command position under Micheal.  Once Danika comes into the picture she gets jealous of his time with her and begins to go behind his back and sabotage any progress the vampires and humans have of living together in harmony which is something she does not want as she only sees humans as the people who killed her father and as food.

Amelie

It's never explained how the young daughter of pro human vampire truce senator Giroux got exposed but she tries to play it off for awhile but when it gets too bad and finds out feeding on animals won't cut it she confesses to everyone and is treated without incident.

Final Opinion: I was a fan of the Fox show "The Passage" and was very disappointed when it wasn't given a second season.  This show has practically the same premise but The Passages lead female vampire is better than any of the ones presented on this show. If you're going for quantity over quality though this one is definitely the better of the two but the bulk of the vampirsm is in the shows first few episodes before they know what the problem is.  Once it's identified it becomes 95% politics and 5% vampirism.