Vampiress TV review: "The Big Easy"

Vamps Like Us

Season 1

Episode 20

The Gist: The detectives receive a case where an author is found dead and drained of all her blood after going to meet the leader of a vampire cult.

Clarification: The Big Easy is a television series that aired in 1996 and 1997 on the USA Network for two seasons.  It was based on a 1986 film of the same name.  It followed a detective named Remy McSwain and his female partner Anne Osborn solving cases around New Orleans. 

Female Vampire Factor:  One of the suspects in this case is a woman name Valeria (Fabiana Udenio).

Valeria believes herself to be a vampire and attacks Remy upon their first meeting seemingly trying to bite him to drink his blood.

Because the victim had two puncture wounds on her neck and was completely drained of her blood this act immediately makes her a suspect.  The finger further gets pointed her way when it comes back that the victim wasn't bitten and that the blood was artificially removed since it's found out she works at a blood bank but like most shows of this type the obvious person is never the culprit so it of course isn't her in the end.  

 I give this episode a Vampire Beauty Rating of 4 out of 5.  While the Vampires here aren't supernatural they believe they are so it's close enough.

Update on upcoming Underworld movies

MOVIES...  That's right that is not a typo.  A few weeks ago I reported that Lakeshore Entertainment had confirmed a reboot of the Underworld series but this past week much light has been shed on this story and a reboot is just the tip of the iceberg. 

In fact it looks as if Underworld is going the way of the X-men franchise which had spinoff films (The Wolverine franchise) and whose reboot "X-men first class" ended up being a part of a much bigger universe which included the original franchise. 

In this case the next film in the franchise which is currently untitled will spin off from the last film Underworld: Awakening with the character "David" who was played by Theo James as the lead character with two female leads yet to be cast.

On top of this news Screen Rant is reporting that at the New York Comic Con Len Wiseman aka Mr. Kate Beckinsale says his wife Kate is attached to play Selene for at least one more film.  On top of that he also reportedly revealed that plans also call for what he describes as a "soft reboot" along with an Underworld television series.  So it looks like we're going to get at least one more look at Kate Beckinale in a shiny catsuit after all.


Related
Sexy Female Vamps of the Underworld Saga

The Vampiress Episode: "Relic Hunter"

"Possessed'

Season 1

Episode 20

 

Relic Hunter was a Canadian syndicated TV show that ran for 3 seasons between 1999 to 2002.  The show starred 90's sex symbol Tia Carrere as a professor who traveled the world looking for ancient and supernatural relics ala Indiana Jones.

In this episode from the shows first season Sydney (Carrare) gets a message from a sick friend in Brussels who believes his girlfriend is a vampire who is trying to kill him and in order to break her spell needs an artifact called the Sacred Sundial of Zeus.

After some investigation Sydney confirms that Eric's girlfriend Suzanne (Jane March) is a part of a vampire cult but she is not a full member and isn't aware that she is draining her boyfriends lifeforce away.  When she overhears Syney confront the cult leader about her plans for Suzanne she ends up helping Sydney fight her way out of the cults lair with the Sundial in order to save her boyfriends life.    

Zeta Graff (Emanuelle)

Emanuelle is the cult leader.   Upon meeting Sydney despite her constantly beating up her minions Emanuelle is friendly and inviting to her.  She admires Sydney's strength and wants nothing more than to have her join the cult.  Being the leader she is also the only vampire to fang out in the episode which happens in one quick scene at the end of the episode.

Side Notes...
- The show deals with vampires again in Season 3: Episode 7 "Vampires Kiss" but no females with fangs in that one.
- Show regular Lindy Booth played a vamp in the 1999 film "Teenage Space Vampires".

SyFy cancels "Being Human"

After four seasons SyFy this past week has announced that they have pulled the plug on the North American version of the series Being Human.  This almost a year to the day of the final airing of the British series.  While the show has had it's ups and downs this marks another blow as far as vamp media on TV and this year also marks the end of True Blood this upcoming summer.  For more about the female vamps who've appeared on the series check my review HERE. 

Below is a video of the stars of the series thanking their fans. 

The Sexy Female Vamps of "Sanctuary"

Sanctuary is a Canadian television series which has aired on Syfy since 2008.  The show follows the story of Dr Hellen Magnus (Amanda Tapping) who runs a Sanctuary for beings with extraordinary powers called "Abnormals".  Most episodes of the series has her along with her staff hunting down the more dangerous "abnormals" which are normally you standard run of the mill horror creatures.  A big part of the folklore of the show revolves around vampires (with vampire blood making Dr. Magnus immortal) though in the universe of Sanctuary the vampire race is pretty much extinct.  Here are some of the exceptions of the fairer sex.

Ashley Magnus (Emilie Ullerup: Season 2, Episode 1 "End of Knights")

Ashley is the monster hunting daughter of Dr. Magnus.  In the premier of the second season she is given vampire blood and transformed into a vampire/transporter hybrid along with 5 others.  This results in her becoming evil and turning on the members of the Sanctuary including her mother.  Eventually she comes too long enough to kill herself along with the last hybrid in order to save her mother.  What a shame.

Meghan Ory (Laura: Season 2, Episode 10 "Sleepers")

 A vampire beauties fan favorite after the blogs on "Supernatural" and "Vampire High" Ory this time around plays a young drug addict who gets sent to a rehab facility in Mexico which promises to take only a week to clean you up.  The catch is that the facility is run by Nikola Tesla who happens to be the last vampire in existence and the treatment used at the facility is an altered form of his blood.  All is fine with the treatment until its found out that upon the death of those who get the treatment they come back as vampires (starting with Laura's boyfriend who gets in a fatal car accident).  Once the privileged young drug addicts find out what they've become they embrace it and attempt to bring the vampire race back. Ironically it would be Tesla himself who puts an end to it by providing a cure which he accidentally gets himself as well.

Adrienne Carter (Season 2, Episode 10 "Sleepers")

Another one of the spoiled brat drug addicts from the episode "Sleepers". She just kind of hangs out in the background while all the cool kids talk but is good for several fang shots throughout the episode.

Aliyah O'Brian (Afina: Season 3, Episode 16 "Awakening")

In this episode Dr. Magnus along with now former vampire Nikola Tesla stumble on her tomb on an expedition.  As they explore the inside a booby trap impales Tesla who is now in danger of bleeding to death.  With his final wish he asks for Hellen to read to him the characters on the wall of the tomb but in doing so she ends up unlocking a hidden door which housed Afina's body encased in crystal.  She ends up drilling a hole in the crystal and extracting her blood to give to him turning him back into a vampire but due to the hole, the crystal ends up shattering and Afina comes back to life.  Much to the dismay of Tesla the only other vampire on the planet is a total bitch who wants to enslave everyone resulting in Tesla and Magnus having to work together to stop her.  Afina had a lot of lesbian tendencies (lots of lightweight hitting on Hellen) but the real star of the episode was her cleavage.  I would have LOVED for them...I mean her to become a regular character.

 

Unfortunately it doesn't seem like vampires will be apart of the shows future but I will continue to hold out hope that Afina is truly not dead.

The Vampiress Episode: "Big Wolf on Campus"

"Everybody Fang Chung Tonight"

Season 3

Episode2

Big Wolf On Campus was a Canadian television series which aired from 1999 to 2002 including a run on the ABC Family Channel in the United States.   It revolved around a young man named Thomas Dawkins who after being attacked by a wolf during a camping trip becomes a werewolf as a result.  Most episodes then follow him as he uses his wolf powers to protect the town he lives in from other various supernatural creatures who show up to wreak havoc. One of the stars of the series Rachelle Lefevre went on to vampire fame as the original "Victoria" from the first two Twilight films. 

In this episode Thomas' best friend Merton gets a call on his radio show from a female who is interested in him and asks him out.  Thomas ends up going out on the date with them as the young lady has a friend who needs a date as well.  The catch is they are only interested in gothic guys which results in Thomas having to dress goth and go by the name "Asmodius".   It doesn't work out too well between Thomas and his date Kristina as he wasn't that convincing at being a goth by talking about his varsity sports background and watching basketball the whole time. On the other end Merton and his date Cassandra hit it off real well and she asks to be alone with him.  Once they're alone in the car she reveals to Merton that she is a vampire which freaks him out despite her repeated attempts to let him know she doesn't feed on humans.  

Merton though attracted to Cassandra is very paranoid about her being a vampire.  He tries to figure out a way to make her human again but she comes up with a plan to make him a vampire instead.  Though he's undecided about the whole thing it comes to pass anyway as Kristina ends up turning him in order to keep him from stopping the two vamps from going after Thomas (they only feed on werewolf blood).  The only way to turn Merton human is to destroy Kristina and even then Merton has to choose between his best friend and his new vampire girlfriend. 

Vampiress Cast

Jennifer Rae Westley (Kristina)

  Kristina comes off as very cold and unemotional and her only role in the episode is to lead the charge in retrieving the werewolf blood that the two girls need to survive. She's also the one who turns Merton through an innocent looking bite to his arm.  

Erika Rosenbaum (Cassandra)

Cassandra was just a lonely vampire looking for love that really didn't want to hurt anyone.  With her type of vampirism she didn't even feed on humans and only fed on the blood of werewolves.  It's questionable that had they not been low on a steady supply of the stuff, there wouldn't have been any issues between the two and they could have been happy together (though either way she probably would have turned Merton).  In the end Merton becomes human again but he does let her go (Kristina wasn't so lucky).  Just the thought of having to let a teenage vampire hoty like this go is pretty depressing.  

The Sexy Female Vamps of "Death Valley"

Death Valley is an American television series which aired on MTV for 1 season in 2011.  The premise was a combination of Reno 911 and pretty much any zombie killing video game created in the last decade.  The story followed a group of cops labled the UTF (Undead Task Force) who's main purpose is the control of any supernatural threat to human life (specifically Vampires, Zombie's and Werewolves all of which have been proven to be real and are a part of everyday life).  The cops of the group were all followed by a camera crew for a news documentary who (unlike shows like this) were often reoccurring characters themselves and part of the show.

The show combined several comedic, action and dramatic elements sometimes parodying other shows in the genre.  Sometimes the sudden change in tone made it hard to enjoy and halfway through the season the show seemed to take a more episodic formula (with ongoing storylines that continued from week to week instead of the more Reno 911esque formula of the cops dealing with different situations on each episode with the obsurdity of the case being the shows main selling point which the show started out being). 

The show was cancelled after it's first season leaving behind a cliffhanger story involving a weird alien creature killing one of the head vampires and Captain Dashells niece Natalie (played by Courtney Halverson) being turned into a vampire.  It's one of those things where you wish TV producers had the fore-site to make two episodes (one cliffhanger and one finale finale) in case the network they're on doesn't renew.  In this day where reality shows rule the world, episodic TV rarely lasts past one season.    

Vampiress Cast

Melissa Paulo (Sofia: Episode 1 "Pilot")

Sofia was the shows first introduction to the vampire hooker trade.  This is when female vampires exchange sex for the blood of horny "johns".  Apparently she is a repeat offender and this time around it results in her bodyguard (who I assume was waiting in the bathroom to attack the poor guy who thought he was going to get some) getting staked by the UTF.  This leads to big trouble for her among her social circles leading to her getting murdered in a hotel bathroom in the following episode.

 Azure Parsons (Aurora: Episode 3, "Blood Vessels")

In an episode that revolves around zombies and vampires attacking blood mobiles around the valley the actress who has a striking resemblance to Drew Barrymore from "Scream" plays a nurse who takes blood at a blood mobile. We find out she's a vampire in the last scene of the episode after taking blood from Captain Dashell where she takes the full blood pack to the back of the van and drinks it  What better coverup for a vampire right?  Aurora makes her return in the season/series finale "Peace in the Valley" (episode 12) where she is the night nurse who takes care of officer Johnson.  Being the womanizer he is having a sexy flirty nurse was the easiest way to get to him. Aurora's placement in the hospital (along with 3 other vampire nurses) was part of a plot to turn all the patients into vampires through IV's infected with vampire blood.

 Kenzie Dalton (Claire: Episode 6 "The Hottest Day of the Year")

Claire is the guest of honor in what's called a "turning party" on this episode.  That is where a young girl is chosen to be turned into a vampire.  This happens as part of the ongoing storyline where officer Kirsten Landry is tailing captain Dashells niece who is getting caught up in the fang banger scene.  Bonus: One of the vamps that helps turn her is former Big Brother contestant and lingerie football league player Jen Johnson.

Tania Raymonde (Officer Carla Rinaldi: Episode 8, "Vampire Hookers")

In this episode the undead task force comes together to crack down on the problem of guys soliciting vampire hookers for sex in exchange for their blood.  As part of the operation officer Rinaldi goes undercover as a vampire hooker.  Seeing her looking sexy results in her partner getting real jealous. (who can blame him, she looks great in the getup).  The two have tons of sexual chemistry throughout the series but it is eventually revealed a few episodes later that Rinaldi is a lesbian. (the two still almost hook up but that is yet another cliffhanger that will forever be unrealized due to the shows cancellation). 

Yet another decent show with tons of potential that doesn't get realized all the way through.  It just might have been that it didn't find it's nitch until too late.  My guess is more along the lines of it being the right show on the wrong network.  If a show like "Blue Mountain State" could survive for 3 seasons on Spike TV, this show could have done just as well there if not better.   

The Sexy Female Vamps of "Supernatural"

Supernatural is a American television series which has aired on the "CW" network since 2005.  It follows the adventures of the Winchester Brothers who have been active monster hunters since they were young boys.  Every week they embark on a new adventure in which they investigate reports of different monsters around the nation.

The show is played out like a combination of the Buffy the Vampire Slayers series with the X-Files (there are new and different monsters to hunt every week like Buffy but a backstory involving the boys that is also followed from week to week).  Vampires for the first few seasons was a yearly subject that would show up around Halloween with one of the boys main antagonist being a rogue vampire slayer.  In the most recent seasons individual vampire related episodes have been replaced with an "Alpha Vampire" being a part of the shows main storyline.

Vampires in the "Supernatural" universe are different from your run of the mill vamps in that stakes through the heart do not kill them (only sunlight or decapitation works).  Also vampire fangs resemble that of a piranha (multiple rows of sharp fangs) more than it does a vampire bat (elongated canines).

Vampiress Cast

Anne Openshaw (Kate: Season 1, Episode 20 "Dead Man's Blood")

In the shows first encounter with vampires "Kate" is the main squeeze of the head vampire in charge (Luther).  Eventually the guys capture her (giving her blood from a dead body poisoning her hence the episodes title) and use her as bate to lure Luther and the rest of the vamps out of their lair (to rescue her) so that they can rescue the humans that the vamps captured.  There are actually two other unnamed female vampires in this episode but none of them including Kate actually fang out unfortunately.

Amber Benson (Lenore: Season 2, Episode 3 "Bloodlust")

The guys second experience with vampires is much different than the first thanks to this hotty formally known as Willow's lesbian witch lover on the "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" TV series.  When investigating a case of people being found decapitated they find that one of the bodies (a female) was that of a vampire.  When going further in their investigation it leads them to a vampire hunter named Gordon Walker who's been tracking down and killing vampires since his sister was taken by one when he was younger.  The story takes a strange twist when Sam is kidnapped by a group of the vamps lead by Lenore in order for them to explain that they are different from other vampires and don't kill humans.  That leaves the boys in a situation for the first time where they question whether all monsters have to be killed and whether Gordon might be the real monster.  (She eventually gets offed in the Season 6 episode "Mommy Dearest" anyway)

 

Emmanuelle Vaugier (Madison: Season 2, Episode 17 "Heart")

 Ok so I'm cheating a bit with this one as Madison was actually a werewolf and not a vampire but fact is the shows budget is so cheap that their version of "werewolf" is just a regular person with vampire fangs and blue contacts thus making her probably the hottest werewolf ever (she looks more like the classic style vampire then the actual vampires on the show do).  This episode really tugs at your heart strings and you really feel for Sam who is forced to kill her after getting to tag that just the night before thinking she had been cured.
   

 Mercedes McNab (Lucy: Season 3, Episode 7 "Fresh Blood")

Poor Lucy, in an episode which would make a great commercial for not doing drugs Lucy was just a party girl who will apparently take anything a random guy at a club gives her.  In this case he spiked her drink with vampire blood turning her into one of the undead.  Upon turning, instead of staying put and waiting as she was told, she went on a blood hunt that lead the Winchester boys right to her.  After capturing and interrogating her Dean decapitates her.  This marks the second time a "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" alum appears as a vampire in this series as she played the vampire "Harmony" in both the Buffy and Angel series.

 Katie Chapman (Season 3, Episode 7 "Fresh Blood")

In the last hurrah of vampire hunter Gordon Walker he is turned into a vampire by a vamp named "Dixon" as a form of poetic justice.  Before Gordon would allow himself to be killed he wanted to first take out Sam Winchester.  In order to get the Winchester boys to come to him he kidnaps this women and tells them if they don't show up she dies.  Of course it's a trap and she's already been turned to keep Dean busy. 

 TwiHard Fans (season 6, Episode 5 "Live Free or TwiHard")

 In this episode real vampires are using the Twilight craze as a coverup to get easy victims.  Specifically they are turning handsome young men then training them to act like "Edward Cullen" types to lure hot teenage girls and turn them who would then go and do the reverse as hot vampiresses (above).  Dean being the "pretty one" of the guys gets targeted by the head vampire and turned (which Sam let's happen and leads to tension between the two for much of the season).  That lets Dean hunt the vampires from the inside, killing all of them before he is eventually cured (which leads to the question of why couldn't they cure the teenagers to?)

Paula Lindberg (Marlene: season 7, Episode 11 "Adventures in Babysitting")

OK...once again this is cheating as her and her partner (below) are NOT vampires but creatures known as "Vetala".  But just as I mentioned above when it came to Madison they're hot females with fangs and contacts who bite people so really what's the difference right?  Anyway Vetala's hunt in pairs and Marlene is the setup portion of the feeding ambush.  Working as a waitress at a truck stop her job is to find a guy that no one would notice if he went missing and drug him.

Meghan Ory (Sally: Season 7, Episode 11 "Adventures in Babysitting")

Sally is the other end of the "Vetala" duo.  Once Marlene has drugged the potential victim Sally takes them outside and finishes them off.  It's a great plan and it's a wonder we don't see more "Vetala" related media (by definition the movie "Lair of the White Worm" and the Beastmaster episode "Lara" could possibly be about types of Vetala).  As for Ory, she does play an actual vampire in the season 2 episode of the series Sanctuary entitled "Sleepers". As a teen she also starred in the Canadian teen drama "Vampire High".

Athena Karkania (Andrea Kormos: Season 8, Episode 5 "Blood Brother"

 In this episode Andrea was believed to have been killed when she got into a relationship causing a vampire pirate to leave his gang resulting in them wanting revenge.  By the end of the episode we find that not only was she not dead but she had been turned and was planning to find a way to take over crew of vampire pirates herself.