Image C+ Sound B- Extras C-
“Pilot,”
“The Night of
the Comet,” “Friday Night Bites,””Family Ties,”
“You’re Undead to Me,” “Lost Girls,” “Haunted,” “162
Candles,” “History Repeating,” “The Turning Point,” “Bloodlines,”
“Unpleasantville,” “Children of the Damned,” “Fool Me Once,” “A Few
Good Men,” “There Goes the Neighborhood,” “Let the Right One In,”
“Under Control,” “Miss Mystic Falls,” “Blood Brothers,” “Isobel,”
“Founder’s Day”

by Walter
Chaw You can
diagnose things like Kevin Williamson’s tween opera “The Vampire
Diaries” by
how much of the dialogue consists of peoples’ names. “Hey, Ben
is
with Carrie down in the tomb with Josie and Halley. Chris said he and
Caroline
would meet us there, but then Damon said that Stefan was going instead,
but
Stefan still has feelings for Elena…” OMFG, amiright?
Add
to
that a liberal use of music by the likes of Matt Kearney, The
Fray, and
Bat for Lashes, mix sloppily with
flavour-of-the-month genre fetish,
and, voilà!, the kind of thing everyone describes as a “guilty
pleasure”–which basically means they’re not telling you they
also enjoy “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo”. The
remainder of the dialogue is interested in secret parentage, secret
siblings, and this and that about lore to establish credibility
while simultaneously demonstrating that everyone involved in
this one has read more books
than Stephenie Meyer (a low bar) and is aware of Stephenie Meyer…and
Heath
Ledger…and Emily Brontë. Never mind, you wouldn’t understand.
Similarly
difficult
to understand are magic rings that allow vampires to walk around in
daylight,
ancient tombs sealed by Creole witches led by that bitch from “A
Different
World”, and a complex series of events that need to happen before one
of
this show’s vampires is able to turn one of this show’s hot little
nymphos into
a vampire. It’s a metaphor–not for abstinence, per se, but maybe for
embarrassing tumescence. That’s right, “The Vampire Diaries” is a
boner joke.