"First Kill" review: Romeo and Juliet again, now with vampires and monster hunters
A predictable first love story with a splash of bloody action.
High school girl Juliet (Sarah Catherine Hook) falls in love at first sight with newcomer Calliope (Imani Lewis). At the party, the girls kiss passionately, but the meeting ends on a minor note: Juliette bites her companion, and Calliope responds by thrusting a dagger into the heart of the quiet girl with the sharp teeth. The former belongs to an ancient and powerful bloodline of pure-blooded vampires, the latter to monster hunters. There can be no neighborly relations between the families. Juliet does not die, and Calliope feels a strong connection to the vampireess after her bite. Thus begins a story of forbidden love, spiced with blood, silver knives, scolding with parents, and adventure.
The series "First Kill" is based on the short story of the same name by fiction writer and The New York Times contributor Victoria Schwab. The short was published in 2020 in Vampires Don't Get Old: Stories with a Refreshing Flavor. Schwab also served as showrunner on the project. Among the writers on "First Kill" is Felicia D. Henderson, who worked on the original "Gossip Girl," the musical "Empire" and the sci-fi "Fringe." The series was produced by James Bigwood ("Naughty Betty," "Giant Jungle" and "The Double"), Jett Wilkinson ("How to Get Away with Murder," "American Gothic" and "Bull") and actress Emma Roberts.
The screenwriters of the postmodern "First Kill" don't shy away from suggestive comparisons to Shakespearean tragedy. In one of the episodes, Juliet and Calliope, who have run away from their parents, make their way at dusk to the deserted stage of the school theater: the company is preparing to stage Romeo and Juliet. The enamored heroines spend the night in the cardboard sets of Verona and quote the saddest tale in the world (in case anyone has forgotten the words). The confrontation between the Montagues and the Capulets is replaced by a battle of monster hunters and pure-blooded vampires. The warring parties converge in the American South - in the city of Savannah, Georgia. On the one hand, it is a tribute to the literary canon of the American Gothic, the action of whose works is developed in the southern states of the United States - Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. Savannah, on the other hand, is historically a classic slave city. The southeast was the site of the fiercest battles of the Civil War. The authors of "First Kill" unequivocally confront Julia's conservative white family with African-American monster hunters, which includes Calliope. The same-sex relationships of teenage girls from opposing social strata become a challenge to the long-suppressed old order. But you can't say that racism is new to American TV series, and the metaphor in "First Kill" is too frontal.
Showrunner Victoria Schwab considers the project a cross between "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Killing Eve. But there's not enough action in "The First Kill" to compete with those benchmarks. Much closer in tone to the series are "Dickinson" and "True Blood." The first project takes its sentimentality, central romance and eclectic soundtrack (when Juliet and her older sister eat another victim, for instance, Bury a Friend by Billie Eilish), while the second takes its cues from the mysterious killings in the Southern United States, vampires, rituals and shadowy government.
The show has an interesting and accurate title: For both Juliet and Calliope, the first murder is initiation, an opportunity to become a full part of the family. The monster-hunter must finish off a zombie, goole, or vampire, while the representative of an ancient pureblood lineage must "drain" the first victim. Schoolgirls lie to their mothers, assuring them that they have passed the test and said goodbye to childhood. Of course, it's hard not to see the show not only as a racial issue, but also as a story of extreme growing up. Both Juliet and Calliope try to live up to their parents' expectations and not disappoint their elders. After meeting her at a party, the vampire doubts that she wants to bite people, and the future monster hunter suspects that not all monsters are scary and dangerous.
The most hilarious scenes in "First Kill" are the occasional encounters with zombies and other evil spirits. The hunters deal with their poorly drawn opponents with playfulness and visible pleasure. But otherwise, the first love story is filled with repetitive obstacles. Juliet and Calliope want to spend all day and night together--the mothers are angry, the numerous relatives are judgmental. The talk is greatly outnumbered by the action. To keep the audience from getting bored at all, once per episode someone is brutally murdered to an arrangement of pop hits.
"The First Kill is not destined to be another Netflix hit, not in favor of the series due to low viewer ratings. Fans of teenage melodramas are frightened by the blood, and fans of horror and dark fantasy are bored by the long bickering about the purity of lineage and higher purposes. The project desperately lacks grit: there is neither the drive and depth of "Euphoria" nor the absurdity of "The End of the ***hole World." Teens (and they are the central audience) definitely have more interesting plans for the evening. "First Murder" is a secondary series bubblegum in which all the writers' sources of inspiration can easily be guessed at. Not every long-running story can be saved by vampires.
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