Blood Ties: Gifted
I'm glad this wasn't the first episode I saw, because I really didn't like it very much. I'm not quite sure why--the telekinetic girl was definitely creepy enough, and the banter continues to be very good. It cracked me up that Coreen is becoming the Cordelia Chase of Vicki Nelson Investigations, and I *loved* the fanboy geeks in the comic book store (and I'm choosing to believe that Henry is sucking their blood, too--not just random women in clubs).
But there were too many things about this episode that bugged me. First of all, they need to explain *why* Henry is suddenly Vicki's sidekick. He was helping her before she even knew it was a supernatural case, which doesn't make sense to me. He does have a job already, and they haven't been working together long enough for him to always be partnering with Vicki, so I'm confused. Or rather, I think the writers have set this up badly. I also was completely unimpressed with Henry as very violent vampire. In the books, sure, he gets his Prince of Darkness on every so often--but it's a lot subtler and he can usually make people forget. Vamping out in front of Celluci unnecessarily? That seemed way out of character for me, as did the extremity of his violence toward the director of the school. However, I'm glad they did tone down his vocal effects a little when he's being mesmerizing--a little goes a long way there.
And the whole Vicki overidentifying with the little girl because of her own deadbeat dad thing felt more annoying than character development. I don't know why--maybe because it seemed cliched to me? I did like her rapport with the little girl, and I continue to like the actress, but the plot seemed entirely predictable to me. I expect these plots will mostly be predictable, which is fine if the character stuff is good, but I wasn't too impressed with the character stuff this week. And what the hell is Celluci going to be arresting the head of the school for, anyway? Oh yes, your honor, he has little kids kill with the power of their minds?
And now that the little girl knows it was her, not her imaginary friend, isn't she going to be massively traumatized for life after killing her own mom?
I'll keep watching, but I hope these episodes get better. Next week's looks like it will be Henry-focused, which is good.
You know you watch too much TV when your primary feeling when all your main shows are on hiatus for the next couple weeks is profound relief that you can actually catch up on your life.