Last night, The Vampire Diaries, a TV adaptation of LJ Smith’s early-90s YA vampire novels, premiered on the CW. The subject matter is familiar to anyone who read Twilight (though given the timeline, it seems more likely that Twilight lifted from this series), and the show doesn’t pretend to be anything but Twilight: The Ongoing Adventures. This is an undeniably smart move on the part of the showrunners and the marketing department, who did all they could to put viewers in mind of the bestselling book.

What this means is that the show did everything it was supposed to do: in doing so, it provided an hour of hilariously awkward television.

Let’s break this down, from start to Somerhalder.

We open with a young man and woman in an SUV; he complains that the musician they went to see was just another James Blunt, and “one is more than enough.” They are both swiftly dispatched by a vampiric force, but since he’s the most sympathetic character in the entire pilot, he deserves a mention. Good night, sweet pop-culture commenter; may flights of angels sing thee to they rest.

The rest of the premiere stumbles along in the usual maze of exposition. Elena sits in her picturesque window seat writing in her diary about how her parents are dead; her brother is Using Drugs instead of his Feelings; Elena’s best friend Bonnie greets her with a joking, “So, I’m psychic now!” though of course it turns out not to be a joke at all. Stefan, the broody vampire who’s new to school, is smitten with Elena to the point of waiting outside her house at all hours. She thinks it’s sweet; the audience, having heard his manful diary entry already, knows that he’s got his Stalker Sense turned up to 11, and that if she didn’t happen to like him it wouldn’t deter him in the slightest. In case anyone begins to realize how creepy this is, they introduce another vampire in the third act: Stefan’s evil brother, Damon, who a century ago loved the same woman Stefan loved—who looked exactly like Elena. Well, well, won’t THIS eventually be a totally unforced love triangle!

This run-of-the-mill teen story might have been watchable. Unfortunately, it exists against a backdrop of camp horror elements treated with absolute seriousness. Fog rolls in to herald Damon’s arrival as the string section plays Worried Music; Stefan’s attack on his brother looks like a high school theatre special effect but is treated like a declaration of war. It’s the sort of show in which the town’s “promiscuous” teenage girl (she’s had sex with two whole boys!) is almost date-raped by a classmate, then promptly exsanguinated by Damon. As the show goes on, she can probably look forward to investigating a lot of strange sounds while in a state of undress.

And as the final nail in the coffin (I know, I know), the actors march through the frame with their best Concerned Faces on. When their acting isn’t enough, indie rock hits are shoehorned into the soundtrack to highlight the moment. To be fair, the actors could use the help, since they have their hands full attempting to lend meaning to lines like, “I have to write things down, or I forget them. Memories are too important.” (Poor kids.)

The blissful exception to this rule is Ian Somerhalder, whose involvement in the show at first seemed inexplicable. However, it’s clear from the pilot that he plans to take this opportunity to hone his Tim Curry impression. He spends his scene twirling an invisible moustache and gleefully gloating, “You should see what I can do with fog,” in a tone that suggests they had to cut away from him before he winked and gave finger guns directly into the camera.

Sadly, not even Somerhalder is not enough to make me tune in again. (Nothing is.) On the other hand, if you’ve ever wanted to see a bunch of mediocre actors solemnly delivering ridiculous lines as the fog machine roars in the background, have I got a show for you!

[This piece originally appeared at Tor.com.]

You guys, that was HILARIOUS. (More coherent review at Tor.com.)

I did a little research into the books on which it was based. I didn’t want to make Twilight comparisons uninformed; since these books came out ages before Twilight, the eerie similarities can be safely chalked up to the showrunners. (Hint: Virginia never looked so much like Vancouver!) (I don’t know if they film in Vancouver. I’m just saying.) (They film in Waste-of-Everyone’s-Time-ville.)

In checking up on the books, I found a wiki with synopses. Now, I understand that a good synopsis is nearly impossible to achieve. I also understand that one can take a weird concept and execute it beautifully in a way a brief summary just can’t capture.

That said, I have some choice quotes.

I must be the only person who didn’t read these books when they were in junior high, by the way. Everyone else mentions them the way they mention Flowers in the Attic. So for those many people, I’m sure these plot points have a depth and drama that the synopsis just can’t convey.

Okay, enough disclaimers. Let’s get to the gold.

These are spoilerrific, but presented without context so they can be taken as the prose poetry they are.

Meredith comments that it’s odd that yet another supernatural evil has arrived, and Stefan explains that evil is attracted to Fell’s Church because blood soaked into the ground during a Civil War battle.

Of course! Because of all conflicts, the only one that has left a mark on history is the Civil War, nexus of all supernatural evil.

Stefan then comes up with a plan that the rest follow. Meredith and Bonnie stage a loud argument during graduation. Meredith says she will go alone to Elena’s grave that night to lay a flower there. Their argument is overheard by the party intended to overhear it: Tyler Smallwood, who shows up and changes into a werewolf to attack Meredith.

I don’t know why they need this plan, but it is now my default plan for anything, ever.

Suspicious of Caroline, who claims to have been raped by Klaus, Meredith and Bonnie require her to sign a blood oath that she will not hurt Elena, and they threaten to tell her future sorority sisters if she betrays Elena or Stefan. A crow appears and vomits blood on the paper they all sign. The blood-vomit is in gothic script and reads: “D. Elena is mine.”

…no comment.

Have some Mary Sue Action:

Elena finds within herself a power she identifies as Wings of Redemption. Rainbow-colored wings open on her back and enfold her and Damon, who screams as he is redeemed from all his sins. He also forgets everything, so Elena opens up her violet-blue Wings of Remembrance, which allow him to remember. Damon realizes that he has been possessed by Shinichi and that he’d been playing the villain, and he calls himself an abomination, kisses Elena’s foot, and vows to be her slave. Elena then opens up her white Wings of Purification.

And one more, offered without comment:

Elena watches hidden from the trees and wonders if Damon has betrayed her while the others are herded into a clearing. Bonnie is tied spread-eagled to a makeshift altar by the ambulatory trees, and another walking tree with a penis approaches her.