As an alternative to continuing the "Twilight" series, I decided to try out a recent television show that I'd seen described in a few places as "Twilight" for grown ups. "A Discovery of Witches" features an alternate world where witches, vampires, and demons live among us, hiding in plain sight. The heroine, Diana Bishop (Teresa Palmer), is a historian from a witch lineage, but has never developed her powers. Her love interest is a vampire biochemist, Matthew Clairmont (Matthew Goode), who she meets when visiting Oxford.
The worldbuilding of the series is promising at the outset. This is a world where "creatures" are slowly losing their powers and dying out, and there's a long history of animosity between the different species, the only exception being a nine-person Congregation of leaders from each group. Of course, interspecies relationships are forbidden. Diana sets off a new round of political intrigue when she discovers a long-lost magical book, known by its catalogue designation Ashmole 782, that everyone wants for various reasons. She attracts the attention of Matthew, the bigoted witch leader Peter Knox (Owen Teale), and many others. This also starts to awaken her dormant witch powers, and sets her on a journey of self-discovery.
The series quickly establishes the patterns of a typical melodrama. The romance between Diana and Matthew is fairly rote stuff, and there's not much chemistry between Palmer and Goode. Goode makes for an excellent vampire, but is much less interesting as a romantic lead. Palmer is a little flat, as the academic side of her character disappears almost immediately, leaving her to be yet another generic Chosen One who has to uncover mysterious things about her past. The big cast of supporting characters, fortunately, offer some welcome distractions. As a centuries-old vampire who is part of a powerful family, Matthew has loads of baggage, including a protective mother, Ysabeau (Lindsay Crouse), an evil ex, Juliette (Elarica Johnson), and a brother on the Congregation, Baldwin (Trystan Gravelle). The witches are a machinating bunch, and Knox has recruited a new Congregation member, Satu (Malin Buska), who is set up as a rival to Diana, and is using Diana's gal-pal Gillian (Louise Brealey) as a spy. More helpful characters include Matthew's lab minions Marcus (Edward Bluemel) and Miriam (Aiysha Hart), and Diana's lesbian aunts, Sarah (Alex Kingston) and Emily (Valarie Pettiford).
Still, while the Venetian setting is lovely, and the ensemble is generally more talented, I had a hard time seeing "A Discovery of Witches" as anything else than "Twilight" with more complications. The story beats are largely the same, and Matthew Clairmont practically has the same dialogue as Edward Cullen regarding dire warnings of vampire bloodlust. Diana Bishop, though a mature adult with a lot more on her mind, is prone to making the same rash decisions and pronouncements of love as any lovestruck teenager. I have to wonder if this is just what comes with the genre territory at this point. The historical fiction elements are nice, and some of the show's mythology around its supernatural creatures is fun, but these are ultimately disappointing. The references to figures like Ashmole and Gerbert D'Aurillac are very surface level and unremarked upon. The mythology is very incomplete, and after the first season I still have no idea what distinguishes a demon in this universe. I also find the series much too quick to get into wilder concepts like visions and time travel.
In the end, I think that straightforward fantasy romances like this just don't have much appeal for me. I was waiting in vain for some meta-humor, or really any humor at all. Though set in the modern day, it doesn't feel like the characters are part of the modern world - which I guess is by design - and they come across as very flat and distant. The weaker actors are unable to keep the material about prophecies and curses from sounding silly, and it didn't help that I had a hard time telling some of them apart. Even if the usual makeup effects have been dispensed with, you'd think that demons, witches, and vampires would at least have different fashion sense.
"A Discovery of Witches" has been renewed for two more seasons, but I think this is where I leave it.
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