I just finished the (first? only?) season of Hemlock Grove on Netflix. My assessment of it in the first episode remained accurate all the way through: the lovechild of Twin Peaks and Twilight, as written by Bret Easton Ellis.
The shooting was gorgeous, the pace was perfect for my attention span and the cast was unbeatable. But jeez, do I have beef.
*SPOILERS ABOUND*
First there are basic storytelling and continuity errors and unanswered questions:
- What ever happened with the teacher-student lesbian love affair story with the first victim? What a waste of an awesome setup.
- Why does everyone know Peter is a werewolf?
- What crawled up Dr Chasseur’s ass? She was clearly going through a breakdown, but what was so strikingly different about this case than her previous experiences that included killing a pregnant teenager as she transitioned to a werewolf? She’s supposed to look all badass (with her USMC tat that randomly moves from her right to left arm and back again), but this case sends her to alcoholism and resigning her post in an order she literally killed to get into.
- Why does Peter seem romantically interested in Shelly at first and then suddenly drop her when Letha decides she’s interested? And why isn’t Shelly upset by that?
- Seriously, what happened to Christina in the Bessimer?
- Why did JR Godfrey kill himself and leave everything to Roman? He was leaving his son alone with Olivia. Or he knew that his son already was evil. In which case: why not leave everything to Shelly or Norman or Dr. Pryce or a charity or something?
- How does the Sheriff possibly think Shelly is the serial killer? He either saw Shelly kill Christina, in which case she would have been in wolf form at the time and he would know who the real killer was, or he didn’t see it happen, in which case he showed up late and just randomly fired at a girl standing near the naked body of another girl.
- Why, with all the amazing CGI and makeup thoughout the rest of the show, does Christina have to wear the most brokeass blonde wig in the world?
- If Magdalena is Olivia’s daughter and also Peter’s grandmom/great-grandmom, what does this say about the genetics of vampirism, werewolfism and prehensile tails? And also: how is Olivia able to live for hundreds of years without aging, but then dies when her tongue is removed? That’s weird immortality.
But beyond that, why is every single victim a female? Literally every female character of note died or is seriously injured/raped except Peter’s mom and cousin. Male characters are threatened with violence, beat up and drugged, but that’s often somewhat self-inflicted or part of a mutual fight. And is the moral of the story that every female who engages in sexual activity must die? Cause that’s the other common thread.
