Vampire fans eager to sink their teeth into a new series are in luck, as Peacock is developing a new show based on a 2000s classic. Vampire Academy is an upcoming TV series adapting Richelle Mead's novels of the same, giving the material a second shot at a good adaptation. The showrunner is none other than Julie Plec, who’s also behind The CW vampire romps The Vampire Diaries, The Originals and Legacies. With this pedigree of talent and potential behind the series, it’s certain to be better than the adaptation that came before it.
The Vampire Academy movie failed for a plethora of reasons, many of which stemmed from its being a poorly put together cash-in on the YA/Twilight craze. The show can easily be a much better take on the material, and with any luck, it can take advantage of the subtly revived interest in bloodsuckers. Here’s why the first bite at the material was such a flop, and the show can improve on it.
Why the Vampire Academy Movie Was So Bad
The 2014 movie version of Vampire Academy adapted the first book’s story, showing teenage runaways Rose and Lissa joining St. Vladimir’s boarding school. The former is a dhampir, or half vampire, while Lissa is her vampire best friend. The film was directed by Mark Waters, who’s perhaps best known for the film Mean Girls. Though that film is a classic in its own right, this milieu turned out to be a poor choice for Vampire Academy.
The movie was way too much like Mean Girls, turning the fairly serious books’ material into a snarky, quippy high school soap. On top of that, when the movie does bother to use the book’s story, it becomes an exercise in info dumping, simply vomiting exposition into scenes with all of the grace of an atomic bomb. It acts as if its the sequel to a first movie that doesn't exist, confusing those who never read the books. Add in the academic setting, and it also felt like a poor attempt at emulating the magic of the Harry Potter movie franchise.
There’s also the acting, which despite the caliber of much of the cast, was continually lacking. This made the movie feel almost like a parody of films like the Twilight movies, as well as being even more of a The CW production than The Vampire Diaries. Then there’s the matter of special effects, which despite the movie’s somewhat shocking $30 million price tag, look horrendous. The cinematography and general quality feel like a poorly done indie movie, and the lackluster attempts at charm, wit and style never work. To wrap it all together with a bow of failure, the movie came out long after the vampire craze caused by Twilight had begun to wane, with that series actually finishing only after it had become something of a pop culture punchline. Needless to say, Vampire Academy flopped with critics, fans, and the box office, with the intended sequel taking a stake to the heart.
How the Vampire Academy Show Can Be Better Than the Movie
It won’t be hard for the Vampire Academy show to be better than the movie by virtue of having a better medium for the story. Many fans of the books had long said that a show like The Vampire Diaries and its spinoffs proved television was the appropriate medium for such properties. For as much as the Vampire Academy movie was criticized for info dumping, there legitimately were a lot of jargon and concepts to establish. Thus, a TV series, by virtue of allowing for longform storytelling, can better and more organically bring these things to life.
Television, namely “prestige” streaming TV shows, has also evolved quite a bit in the past decade. The current technology of special effects is vastly improved from the poor showing in the film. When combined with likely much better acting, the result should be a Vampire Academy show that easily blows the movie out of the water.
There’s also the fact that vampires are a bit more in at the moment. Though it’s nothing like the craze when the first Twilight movie came out, it’s also an environment that’s a lot less hostile to vampire fiction than it was by the time society largely groaned at Twilight. With fewer YA adaptations as well, there will be a lot less of the feeling that Vampire Academy is one in a long assembly line of cheap cash-ins. Whether or not this will make the show truly succeed remains to be seen, but it should easily suck the blood out of the first failed attempt.