Moonlight review

I just finished watching the premiere of Moonlight and I have to give it a resounding ... that was awful. David Greenwalt is SO grateful that he is no longer connected with this show. The best thing about it was that it made me want to dig out all my Angel DVDs and watch them again.

Let's get the "oh no, we're not ripping off Angel in any way" issues out of the way. This is a show about a vampire private detective who lives in Los Angeles. The guy was turned into a vampire by a particularly vicious and beautiful female vampire with a thing for children. There are numerous swooping overhead night shots of L.A. in between scenes. The vampire detective drives a big old convertible. Yeah, nothing like Angel at all. (And as the cherry on the sundae: tonight's episode guest-starred Rudolf Martin, the actor who played Dracula on a Season 5 episode of Buffy, as a college professor who is obsessed with vampires.)

Other problems: Bad writing (the voiceovers are particularly trite), bad acting by everybody (even Jason Dohring who is doing Logan-as-a-400-year-old-vampire except his vampire does not have 1/10th the edge Logan had). The female lead, who looks like a Kate Winslet knockoff, has bad hair and her American accent is all over the place. The green screen shots with the male lead driving his convertible at night are extremely fake-looking. The "next time on Moonlights" were set to a Celine Dion song (ack! I think my ears are bleeding). And last, but certainly not least, it was just BORING.

Because I have a soft spot for television vampires (and for Jason Dohring), I'm giving it two more episodes before I clear it from my DVR. That's the best I can do.