My truth about cats and dogs

After having watched three (?) episodes of Teen Wolf and one episode of The Nine Lives of Chloe King, I feel I can confidently pass judgment on these two new, supernatural-teenager summer shows*.  Or at least pass my judgment: Chloe is the vastly superior show (she said, only having watched the pilot).  I'm not entirely surprised by this because I've liked another ABC Family show quite a lot (GREEK).

While MTV's Teen Wolf is banking on the current werewolf upsurge in the wake of Twilight and True Blood, the acting is really pretty terrible, especially from the kid they got for the lead.  Sure, he's got this fairly attractive/geeky vibe going where you can believe that his post-bite transformation adds just enough charisma and strength that the hot chick (who looks like she's about 30) is going to notice him.  But dude cannot act.  Anything that calls for the slightest bit of emotion results in SHOUTING.

Chloe's ensemble is stronger, generally speaking (Chloe is played by the succubus chickie from The Gates, which saddened me by its utter failure).  The show is taking a risk by creating a new mythology and not falling back on vampires/werewolves/witches, which has all been done before, and I like that.  The pacing is fast: we had to listen to some exposition to pass along said new mythology, but we also got right to the parkour and fighting, and SPOILER our girl is already down one life as of the first episode - she's going to have to be more careful from hereon out.

I'm going to stick with both of them for the time being, especially since it's summer and my dance-card is not quite full (T:TSCC S1, Harsh Realm remainder and True Blood S3 on the horizon).  Hopefully TW will get better - let's not forget that BtVS was pretty shaky in the acting department when it started too.


*  Mr. Mouse is standing back there, shaking his head, wondering why it is that I am so compelled to watch supernatural high schoolers.  He thought it was over when Buffy went off the air.  Guess he was wrong.