#watched VAN HELSING S1, Eps 1-2

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!

What Van Helsing has, is a whole lot of blood. That, and characters that are cliched and not to mention pretty unlikable, at least in the first 3 episodes I’ve watched so far.

The dedicated marine. The deaf mute giant. The young spunky African-American kid that can read deaf-mute-dude’s signs. The paranoid women. The uber paranoid and obnoxious older dude. The betrayer. Even the Vampires in charge. All borrowed characters from numerous medias seen through the past 20 years.

The only exception among the whole lot? The turned vampire called “Flesh” (which the other vampire also called “Flesh” too hammy?). Here’s hoping the turned Doc Vampire will turn out to be better than being the former “screaming-vampire-in-the-cage”.


Although I have to say, the force feeding of Vanessa to caged-Doc was a nigh interesting and refreshing event to unfold, in Ep.3!

The pain protagonist? “Vanessa” (played by actress Kelly Overton) was not too much interesting as she is a feisty deer in headlights, that I hope, in time, she’d blossom beyond her current state of unlike-ability, as of Episode 3, for me anyways…

ONE sole thing I liked about the entire ensemble? None of them are “pretty” women, or men - seen thus far anyways. No “token” visual candy, as it were hahaha


The “vampires” depicted here, tend to be a meld of zombie-sque feeding tendencies, pack hunting, not standing upright and animal-crouched when feeding etc … they actually ended up looking like “homeless folks” on the street too (which maybe they were/are…)

The difference between being a cliched “zombie” here, is that here they retain some semblance of intelligence - being able to communicate, talk to each other.


The vampires burn under the UV light, and most probably sunlight, but that has since been “resolved” in this series, with the skies permanently blocked out of the sun’s rays by a perpetual cloud created by volcanic eruptions (see Ep.2), blanketing the entire show in a twilight magic hour sepia hue.

So vampires roam the streets, in dim-light daylight, rampaging in the day instead of just cowering in shadows like previous incarnations. “Daywalkers” all! hahahaha


The story of how everything started going downhill is shown in Episode Two. Vampires had existed before then, in shadows, scheming and sucking, dressed Goth-black, because vampires only like the black color of the undead-rainbow … but the epidemic spread happened because the evolved climate provided a suitable environment for wonton abandonment … yes, the parallels to the real world’s current state of climate is not too subtle here, facing only to scream it in your face hahahaha

One nice touch here was how the “spread” happened from a (probably) junkie vampire, and as interesting was how he took blood from humans, as linked to the scene where he appears in, in Ep.3.


Funny tho, in hindsight, if the scenario and characters are a commentary of the world right now, then every other human and vampires are the products of fictional media?

I cannot stop harping on the “characters”, as the premise is nothing original, and not seen in numerous media before, so it falls to the humans/vampires to provide the motivation to move forward with the series, IMHO.

And in VAN HELSING, the slang for vampires are “Feeders”. I’d not dislike the term but for the extra effort in enunciating the word overtime it is spoken! hahaha And you KNOW they’ll find “Dylan” (Vanessa’s daughter) alive later inn the series right? They’ve CONSTANTLY hammered in the “I need to look for Dylan!” and “She’s probably dead in this world!” all too often in 2 episodes, fhanks.

Stop trying to “sell” the world, just “build” it, and people and either jive with it, or be turned off.


In amongst the buildings, the mood is dismal and dank, as if they’ve been blanketed by a virus epidemic and things laid to waste (confusing design aesthetics to me, anyways), while up on the rooftop, things tend to play out pretty nicely, methinks.

Indoors is ironically shades of greys and black, blanket UV blues, and a desolate hint of warm in the area where the survivors are holed up in.

Everyone dresses like the homeless, in extremely muted colors, dark hued and grimy, and is sometimes conflicting in their use … they’d be up top on the roof in minimal wear, and jacketed while running thru the streets … maybe that’ll be addressed in future episodes …


Having just mentioned that, I will probably see beyond Ep.3, as I sorta do like the notion of “Vampires” (and “No”, I’ve never truly wanted to become one) and am interested to see a lore evolve in this day and age, IMHO. Will VAN HELSING deliver? Or continue to disappoint? Can it all hinge on “Flesh”? hahaha

Episode One showed the here and now, where Vanessa wakes up after a few years of sleep, being attacked and bit by Vampires.

Episode Two was a flashback to before when it all started, laying out the premise of what happened and “who” the players are.

Episode Three went back to the here and now, and has changes brought forth from both Eps One and Two. I like the story-telling motion thus far, just not too convinced about the cliches tho hahahaha

If ever you need to acclimatise to this series, watching Eps.1 and Ep.2 should feed you the info enough to move forth, IMHO.

WHAT-IS: "Vanessa "Van" Helsing, the daughter of Abraham Van Helsing, is resurrected in a post-apocalyptic world, three years in the future, to lead a resistance against the vampires that plague it.” (Wiki)

”Vanessa Helsing, distant relative of famous vampire hunter Abraham Van Helsing, is resurrected only to find that vampires have taken over the world. She is humanity's last hope to lead an offensive to take back what has been lost.” (IMDb)

VAN HELSING is an original SyFy series, consisting of 13 listed episodes. Head towards www.syfy.com/vanhelsing to watch earlier episodes and more. Time for Ep.4 with a ”F**k-n-Suck” to come hahahaha