Moonlight CBS

May 14, 2008 Update: Moonlight is now officially cancelled. You can read all about it on Deadline Hollywood Daily. I first wrote this page when Moonlight was only a few episodes old. I promise I'll update over the next week or two with some new photos and episode details and such. Shame the show is over, but it was certainly fun while it lasted.

Moonlight is a new tv show on CBS, airing on Friday nights at 9 p.m. between Ghost Whisperers and Numb3rs. It's pilot episode was thoroughly slammed in the media, and quite frankly, I didn't care much for it myself, but since I love vampires I was willing to give the show a chance to improve and I'm happy I stuck it out. To date, four episodes have aired and each one has improved on the previous significantly. So if you took a look at this show initially and thought Eh, it may be time for a revisit.

Mick St. John is our vampire protagonist, wonderfully played by Australian actor Alex O'Loughlin, who makes up for many shortcomings in the writing with his excellent acting and wonderfully expressive face. While Mick has plenty to brood about since he considers himself a monster and unworthy of his favorite human and potential love interest, Beth, he's actually charming and funny and smiles a great deal. O'Loughlin has created a really appealing persona and I adore this character.

Most of O'Loughlin's previous work is in Australian film, so he's probably unfamiliar to most of the US audience, but he did appear in six episodes of The Shield last season and did a great job there as well in a criminally under-written part.

For television writers, vampires and private eyes must go together like peanut butter and chocolate since Moonlight is the third vampire show to feature a vampire as a private detective -- starting with Forever Knight, featuring tortured guilty blood-sucker Nick Knight; Angel, featuring another tortured brooding blood-sucker named Angel; and now we have Mick St. John, who thankfully is a lot less tortured and brooding than the other two, but he has his own melancholy and again, he's a vampire who refuses to prey directly on humans. He gets his blood from the blood bank. Shall we discuss the ethics of stealing? *g*

The the genre confluence between vampire and detectives makes a certain amount of sense. In the P.I. genre, private investigators spend a lot of time on their own working with the seedier side of life and the noir aspects of the genre lends itself to a lot of night-time shoots, which is perfect for vampires because they tend to have problems with the pesky daylight.

Beth Turner is played by British actress Sophia Myles. She's a likeable, curious journalist that Mick has been keeping an eye on without her knowledge ever since he rescued her from another vampire -- his ex-wife! -- when she was a child. But now they've met and in less than two episodes she's managed to discover that he's a vampire. Sophia and Alex have great chemistry. Sophia's additional film credits include "From Hell," "Mansfield Park," "Underworld," "Tristan and Isolde," "Thunderbirds" and "Art School Confidential."

Coraline is Mick's ex-wife. She's the vampire who turned him into a vampire without checking in to see if he wanted that first. Things did not go well. Played by Shannyn Sossamon, Coraline has, so far, only appeared in flashbacks, but you can expect a contemporary appeance sometime soon and I'm sure it will liven things up considerably. Not only did she turn Mick into a vampire against his will, but she also kidnapped Beth when she was a little girl and would have turned her into a vamp too if Mick hadn't rescued her.

Shannyn has also appeared in "40 Days and 40 Nights," "The Order," "A Knight's Tale," "The Rules of Attraction," "The Holiday," "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang," "Chasing Ghosts" and "Undiscovered.

Josef is Mick's best friend. He's also a 400+ years old vampire. He doesn't share Mick's scruples about drinking blood either. It's straight from the vein for Josef. He's played by Jason Dohring, who just came off a three year stint on the tv show, Veronica Mars.

I personally think the actor is far too contemporary looking in appearance to be playing a vampire of that age, but thankfully we haven't seen him in any flashbacks further back than the 80s. I think as long as they stick to the 20th century, we'll be fine. I was never a fan of Veronica Mars so I wasn't familiar with him before Moonlight, but he's definitely won me over.

Moonlight is treading new ground with its vampire mythology, so its vampires can actually go out during the daylight without exploding or finding themselves set on fire, but the daylight is still bad for them and in the fourth episode of Moonlight, titled Fever, Mick nearly dies from his own over-exposure to the sun in the blindingly sunny and hot California desert.

The following photos are from the episode, Fever, as Mick tries to combat the effects of sunlight by climbing into a tub in a skanky deserted motel in the desert.

As part of the new vampire mythology, the creators of Moonlight have come up with a completely different look for their vampires in vampface. It is subtle and sexy, eerie rather than repulsive and off-putting. The best thing about it, I think, is the whited out eyes. They still allow the actors to express emotions with their eyes which is really huge in terms of emotional connection with the characters. I imagine too that the subtle changes in appearance make for far less time in the make-up chair.

The following photos are of Alex O'Loughlin in full-on vamp mode. He's delicious *g*

There are more great photos of Alex O'Loughlin in my other hub.