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The half-decent yet ultimately failed show comes to DVD.

Since the days of Bram Stoker, we’ve all known the story – in the night, they lurk. They look for prey. They thirst in a way that only centuries old creatures can.

Not quite.

These vampires may lurk, but sometimes it’s done in the daylight. As for thirst – well, the man who works in the morgue hooks them up. And these vamps have laws. Enter Mick St. John, turned in the 50’s and now a private eye with a fondness for the mortal coil. He mourns his humanity, stolen from him by his new bride on their wedding night. There’s no doubt that Coraline was a monster – she even abducted a little girl, Lestat style, to make a happy family. Mick not only refused, he torched Coraline and left her to burn to a crisp while he valiantly rescued little Beth.

Which brings us to today. Beth (Sophia Myles) is full grown, beautiful and brazen, a reporter for Buzz Wire, an internet news source. Through the course of an investigation, Beth and Mick come face to face. Mick, who has kept an eye on Beth all these years, is taken with Beth’s vivacity – Beth was drawn in by a feeling of familiarity, a connection.

And so the show goes: the two team up to solve mystery after mystery, drawn to each other but kept apart. Beth has a boyfriend, a district attorney. And though he serves a purpose insofar as the plot goes, the information casually shared between him and and his reporter girlfriend is so patently ridiculous that I find the concept of vampires more plausible than what can only be described as unethical prosecutorial behavior.

Not to mention Mick is a vampire. The duo make it work, though. Time and time again, she proves that his life deficiency doesn’t bother her (too much) and he lets her into his life, bit by bit. Of course, all of the hot sexual tension is aided by the action, the crime fighting, and the near death experiences.

This isn’t Sophia Myles’s first foray into the supernatural – she played a vamp in Underworld and Madame du Pompador in the Doctor Who episode “The Girl in the Fireplace” (she also shacked up with the Doctor in her private time, the lucky strumpet). Alex O’Loughlin, however, is mostly known for the fact that he lost out the role of Bond to Daniel Craig. There are frequent moments in the show when the only way to describe the Australian O’Loughlin is just (for lack of a better word) dreamy. Aside from the main two, there are a few actors in the show that I always enjoy seeing work, if only for a few episodes of a failed television show. Kevin Weisman, who has been seen in J.J. Abrams projects like Alias and Felicity. Jason Dohring, who was the very moody Logan Echolls in Veronica Mars (and in Moonlight Dohring’s character donates to Hearst College, which is the very same college that Echolls attended in Veronica Mars). Lastly, there’s Shannyn Sossamon (A Knight’s Tale, Dirt) who has a kind of eerie beauty.

So what’s the verdict? The networks obviously didn’t have much faith in the show, canceling it after only sixteen episodes. Though the show didn’t have time to find closure for the universe, there is a kind of closure for the characters. If you’re looking for bonus features, you’ll be highly disappointed. But then again, I guess fans should be content with the fact that this show made it to DVD at all.

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