Vampire Diaries back with The Return

*Before you begin, need a refresher on the finale?  Here's my review from last spring.

     Tonight at 8pm is the long-awaited second season premiere of the CW hit, The Vampire Diaries.  In my press materials, I have been instructed not to tell you "who lives, who dies, who remains mortal, who vamps out, etc."  So I won't.  No major spoilers are below, although there are a few minor ones.  There are still a few things I can talk about without ruining the mystery.  For instance, this episode begins on the same night that the season finale ends, and goes through shortly after the mayor's funeral.

     When last season ended, a number of characters were in mortal peril.  Jeremy (Steven R. McQueen) had tried to off himself with a bottle of pills.  Caroline (Candice Accola) was in a car accident.  And Uncle John (David Anders) had been stabbed by the newly returned, but often talked about, vampire Katherine (Nina Dobrev).  I am happy and sorry to report that one of these three appears to make it through their peril, only to be apparently killed before the end credits roll, though I won't say which one.  I also, unfortunately cannot give the fates of the other two.  But I so want to!  Of course, with this show, even seeing someone get killed doesn't mean they are gone for good.  There are too many possibilities.  And the one whose death I referred to up above may not even really be dead, though I suspect that he or she is.

     Katherine is, of course, the focus of tonight's season premiere, and probably the season.  Nina Dobrev gets to stretch her acting skills, proving she can portray two different people in Katherine and Elena, although, you're not always sure which one she is when the scene begins.  Hopefully the writer's will keep it easy to follow.  Fortunately, the secret that Katherine is back is not kept a secret for long, and soon many characters know that she is in Mystic Falls.  Dobrev has plenty of fun, getting into physical fights with both Stefan (Paul Wesley) and Damon (Ian Somerhalder).  Katherine also tells one brother that she has comes back for them, while telling the other that she never actually had feelings for him.  Again, I won't reveal which is which.  But it's good stuff.  Oh, and she stabs one of them.  I will say that "The Return" is a very strong Damon episode, and fans of the bad boy will not be disappointed.  It's some of Somerhalder's best work.

     The other plot point that will surely have far reaching effects in the premiere is the quick arrival in town is Mason Lockwood (Taylor Kinney, Trauma), who has come to grieve his departed brother.  What this will mean for Mason's nephew, Tyler (Michael Trevino) is still up in the air.  And why Tyler and his father were affected by the anti-vampire device last season has not yet been explained, but at least one character seems to know why.

     The Vampire Diaries will be back tonight at 8pm on the CW.

Life Unexpected delivers better than expected

     Although Life Unexpected was expected to do all right for the CW, no one could have predicted it would do as well as it did.  It matched first season Gossip Girl ratings, actually improved significantly on the 8pm audience of long time drama, One Tree Hill.  Though it is merely a mid-season replacement, and hasn't surpassed The Vampire Diaries as CW's best new show of the year, it is well on its way to becoming a staple on the teen-focused network.

     The pilot deserves the numbers it pulled in.  The story was sweet, original, not too campy, and set up an interesting premise while introducing complex characters.  The series stars Brittany Robertson (Swingtown) as Lux, a girl given up for adoption fifteen years ago, but because of a series of surgeries to correct a hole in her heart, was instead bounced around the foster care system.  It seems no one wants to adopt a damaged three year old, or older.  Lux goes from one bad family to the next, and as she approaches her sixteenth birthday, she decides to seek emancipation so she can begin to live on her own.  There's just one small problem: apparently there was a paperwork snafu, and her parents never officially gave up all custody to her.  So she sets off to find them and get them to sign her paper.

     The said parents, who had a one night stand in high school, are bar owner Baze (Kristoffer Polaha) and the host of Lux's favorite morning radio show, Cate (Shiri Appleby, Roswell).  Baze has not really grown up, living with a couple of roommates above the bar, but immediately connects with Lux and wants to help her any way he can.  Cate, similarly is drawn to Lux, though she has her own issues, including a major fear of commitment and lack of communication skills.  This is best illustrated by her dysfunctional relationship with her co-host slash fiance, Ryan (Kerr Smith, Dawson's Creek).  The judge is reluctant to grant Lux her independence without a source of income or residence, so the two biological parents are awarded joint custody.

     All three of the main characters are well defined, and have their own interesting sets of issues.  Each parent steps up when asked, and Lux, though a bit bitter from her life thus far, wants what any child really wants - a loving family.  It is not too late for her, and obviously, through her, both of her parents will be learning life lessons as well.  As the series start, Lux is turning sixteen, and only two years away from being on her own anyway.  It will be interesting to see what turns the series takes to get her to adulthood, and how the relationships will change if the show continues past that point.  An intriguing, well written concept with a lot of heart.  Add it to your television lineup.

     Life Unexpected airs on Monday nights at 9pm on the CW.

Vampire Die-aries

     CW presented yet another teen-angst drama this fall, this time taking our resurgence in vampires into account.  The Vampire Diaries is steeped in old mystery, history, and the fanged ones, but it is also the type of hour soap you would expect from the network that airs 90210 and Gossip Girl.  The problem is, it's a little too into the teenage genre and less into the vampire one.

     The high school characters are largely flat and one dimensional.  The main girl, Elena (Nina Dobrev, Degrassi: The Next Generation), tries to have depth, dealing with loss of her parents, and dating a one hundred and sixty-two year old, but the actress just doesn't have the acting ability to pull it off.  Similarly, her best friend, Bonnie (Katerina Graham), is a descendant of a witch, who the viewer sees in flashbacks, but her emotions are displayed only at surface level.  And don't even get me started on the guys, who have much less back story to work with, but aren't any better at it than the girls.  The only one who really succeeds is Candice Accola as Caroline.  Perhaps that's because her character actually is ditsy and shallow.

     The vampires, however, are mixed.  While Stefan (Paul Wesley, Everwood) only occasionally shows glimpses of talent, Damon is played deliciously evil by Ian Somerhalder (Lost).  Damon's motivation has barely been made clear, but he is played in such a way that he seems likable, and every time he does something monstrous, I am surprised anew.  Intellectually, I know that the character is not trustworthy in the least, but I am still drawn in.  This is the way to play a vampire, all atonce seductive, tricky, and villainous.  Currently, Damon is the best thing the show has going for it.

     That being said, the mythos and history of the town where the show is set is rich enough to keep things going for awhile as the actors grow into the roles.  It's been done before on other shows.  Sometimes it just takes time for a show to truly find its way.  The series was developed and is currently led by Kevin Williamson, creator of Dawson's Creek, so it has that going for it.  While currently it is barely worthy as a guilty pleasure show, take a lesson from Williamson's history and realize that it could grow into something really great down the line.  Either way, the tween fans of Twilight will find plenty to obsess over in the meantime.  After all, it just won Favorite New TV Drama at the People's Choice Awards.

     The Vampire Diaries is currently on hiatus and will return Thursday, January 21st at 8pm.