Hemlock Grove Review

Intro/Overview

So apparently I didn't have as many episodes of Hemlock Grove left to watch as I thought. I pretty much blew through those yesterday and so I have a review for you today. So much for slowing down, eh?

SPOILER WARNING

If you have not seen the entire first season of Hemlock Grove, please leave the blog, watch it, and then come back. I'm horrible at keeping spoilers out of my reviews.

Hemlock Grove - Review

What. The. Fuck.

I sincerely have no idea what I just watched. Or rather, I have no idea what the hell that was. I'll attempt to explain.

I completely understand the werewolf stuff. That all made sense. It was twisted, but it made sense. All of the werewolf stuff was explained within the confines of the universe.

I understand the upir stuff... mostly. I don't get the purpose of the baby or even what happened to the baby. I thought the way they handled the whole upir thing was interesting. It reminded me of the living vampire vs dead vampire thing from Kim Harrison's Hollows novels. I'm not sure where the caul thing comes in exactly, but it was creepy, weird, and gross.

The parts I have problems understanding circle around the science-y stuff. That's never explained. They didn't even attempt to explain it. I get that it was supposed to be a kind of magic/science melding thing, but I don't understand in the least. I thought the scientist guy was attempting to make another "Ouroboros" child, but then that was sort of dis-proven by the upir reveal at the end. Still not sure exactly what was going on with the "Ouroboros" thing and that bugs me to no end.

As for the rest of the show... I liked it. I'm glad it was portrayed in a more realistic fashion than other supernatural shows. Sure it was gross at points, but I didn't mind that given the context. The supernatural has been gross since its inception, I'm just glad someone decided not to sanitize it or overload it for once. I thought keeping the audience in the dark as to what exactly was going on until the end was actually pretty brilliant. We were kept completely in the dark just like the Roman and Peter were. It was frustrating at times, though it was awesome to get a payoff when things were revealed.

I'm not sure whether or not I would actually recommend Hemlock Grove. I'd say you have to judge for yourself whether or not you want to watch it. It's not a show that explained itself right away. It's not a show you should watch if you're squeamish. It's a show you have to stick with for payoffs. Not fore everyone, but if you're interested, I'd say check it out.

Love ya, Jessie.

Raiding Netflix

Yesterday, I spent time in Downtown Iowa City with my cousins. My camera decided it didn't like me and so I had to trash a good chunk of my pictures, which pissed me off when I got to uploading them to my computer. The majority of my day, however, was spent watching Netflix. Beware spoilers for season 3 of The Vampire Diaries.

The Vampire Diaries Season 3

     I'd gotten into The Vampire Diaries in the middle of season 2, however I didn't really get a chance to watch due to scheduling and whatnot. It was understandably exciting for me to find the first two seasons sitting on Netflix. I watched those, was caught up by the time season three rolled around, but I missed a week and never caught up. This week, however, Netflix finally put season three up.

     Anyway... I really enjoyed the second half of season 3. I did, however, keep getting annoying with Klaus being around. I found him ridiculously annoying and messed up. His issues are even worse than the problems I have with vampire politics. I found I was quite attached to Alaric, his death made me cry. I did not like how they brought him back, though. That was just... wrong on so many levels. The witches who stood for "good" apparently aren't as black and white as they want to believe...
     The plans at the end of the season were too many all at once. It was hard to keep track of who was doing what and why. I'm glad Elena wasn't a Bella-alike but disliked that everyone apart from Stefan seemed to think she needed to be treated like glass. It's obvious the girl wants to stay and help, let her do it, it'll turn out better.
     Anyway... if you're not watching The Vampire Diaries or are thinking about watching, I strongly encourage you to do so. Don't worry about not reading the books. In fact, avoid them like the plague. The TV show and the books have next to nothing in common and the books are so poorly written I could not get through the first one.

Ringer

     Ringer, for those who don't know, was a new show last season starring Buffy: The Vampire Slayer herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar. She plays twins who... have drama in their own lives and, because of circumstances in the show, each others. I'm going to leave it at that because the story is just too complicated to go into or follow unless you're watching the show. Although I can't really talk about it, Ringer is fantastic. I'm not normally into Ringer-style shows, but this one has me hooked. The characters are well written, well fleshed-out, and well-acted. I'm extremely happy to have Sarah Michelle Gellar back on the small screen, she's awesome as both Bridget and Siobhan.

Eerie, Indiana

     I... didn't like it. I only watched through half of the first episode, but... Eerie, Indiana is so camp it's ridiculous. I'd originally been telling myself to at least watch through the episode, thinking it would maybe get better... It didn't. That said, I think I might have liked this show had I seen it when I was younger. Which is good, because Eerie, Indiana was kids programming. Now that I've seen the likes of Buffy, Angel, Warehouse 13, Grimm, Once Upon a Time, etc. ... I just couldn't get into it.

All links in the post lead to Wikipedia pages. That's it from me for today.

Love ya, Jessie.