It's rare LivingTV have anything on worth watching, unless you still think Most Haunted isn't a farce and get spooked by night-vision séances, but I recommend you catch their new US import Moonlight. Tonight @ 10pm. Repeated 22 Feb @ 8pm, and 23 Feb @ 1am and 9pm.It's another ironic purchase for LivingTV, as their schedule is full of reality shows about contacting the dead, and Moonlight only stretches that predilection to the "undead". The show concerns a vampire detective solving cases in Los Angeles, but it's also marketed as a supernatural romance (indeed, one of its creators worked on Beauty & The Beast).
Moonlight had a very interesting development and initially-bad response when it was shown in the US. The original (unaired) Pilot was leaked to critics and badly reviewed, leading to it being totally recast (except for lead actor Alex O'Loughlin) and quickly re-filmed.
Then, David Greenwalt came onboard as the showrunner in May '07 – a writer who had worked on Angel, the Buffy The Vampire Slayer spin-off with a near-identical premise! However, Greenwalt left the show a few months later, citing personal health reasons, and Chip Johannessen (who ran Millennium's hated third season) took over as showrunner...
The show began airing in the US on 28 September '07, and response from audiences was generally quite negative, although over the course of its 12-episode run it began to turn things around. It actually ended up winning the People's Choice Award for "Favourite New Drama" in 2008, and it was just recommissioned for another season by CBS.
I'm very interested in seeing it, if only to chart how the episodes improve and it managed to avoid the infamously ruthless US network axe. The premise might not be terribly original, but it has an interesting supporting cast; including beautiful Sophia Myles (Thunderbirds) as the love-interest and sexy Shannyn Sossamon (Dirt) as the ex-wife.
And I'm always willing to give anything with vampires a try.
Check back for my review tomorrow...
