September 13th, 2009 9:14 pm

The Vampire Diaries

On the back of the success of ‘Twilight’ and ‘True Blood,’ another vampire series has hit the screen, based on the series of novels by L.J. Smith.

From the moment, I first heard The CW would be commisioning ‘The Vampire Diaries,’ I have been holding out with bated breath for the pilot of this show and judging by its premiere, I will definitely be back for more blood.

From the creator who brought you ‘Dawson’s Creek’, Kevin Williamson returns to the scene for this decade’s smash theme, vampires. There have been numerous similaritires between ‘The Vampire Diaries’ and ‘Twilight’ and the similarities do not just stop at the vampire theme, from love interests and teenagers, right down to the physical appearance of the two leads. The similarities can not be more pronouce.

Like ‘Twilight’, ‘The Vampire Diaries’ is based on a series of novels, by L.J. Smith. After surviving a car accident which killed both her parents, Elena (Nina Dobrev) and her brother Jeremy (Steven McQueen) move in with their aunt in Mystic Falls. When Elena isn’t mourning over her parents or listening to her BFF, Bonnie, tell her she may be psychic, she has to cope with her whining emo, pill popping brother Jeremy (Steven McQueen).

In comes Stefan (Paul Wesley), the pretty boy who gets all the girls talking as he walks down the hallway. Like Edward Cullen, Stefan is a vampire who has been 17 for centuries, apparently. Before long, Elena and Stefan embark on the sort of cheesy love, you expect from all high school flicks, she secretly looks at him, he secretly smiles at her. He begins to appear outside her window at night, she typically dreams of him every night.

Here comes the twist, Stefan may be the good vampire, but his long lost brother, Damon (Ian Somerhalder) is the evil one who is capable of killing anyone to stay alive and he has his eyes on Elena. Ian does a good job of portraying the evil brother as everything he does looks evil, from his dark stare right down to his evil voice.

The special effects are limited, but there is a lot of blood. The bloodlust eyes in the sight of blood are really cool and the final fight scene was dramatic and exciting. Here’s hoping we see more fight scenes like that.

Overall, despite the similarities to a lot of vampire flicks – vampire falls in love with a sweet teenage girl, teenage girl is threatened by another blood sucking vampire, good vampire does his best to protect her – the pilot was a good start to the show and set the characters up nicely for hopefully a good season of blood.