SGRoA: Blood Ties, S1 E1: Blood Price, Part One, Triumphant Return Edition

Yo yo yo yo! How are you bitches? I took a little vacation from the recapping scene to recover from Moonlight, which I think we can all agree was extremely warranted. But I'm back! I'm recovered! I'm ready to get back in the game with our newest offering: Blood Ties!

Blood Ties is a 2007 series that aired on Lifetime, based on the series by Tanya Huff, a fucking LEGEND in vampire fiction circles. I read a bunch of these, but honestly, might go looking for them again, since I don't own them. Our main character, Vicki Nelson, is a detective-turned-PI when she's diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa, which ruins her night vision first, and I believe she slowly loses more vision over the series? but I could be misremembering that part.

Anyway, she teams up with Henry Fitzroy, bastard son of Henry VIII and a vampire! And they solve crimes and have adventures and I loved, loved, loved this show when it first ran, so I hope it holds up. I had only a very vague recollection of Moonlight, and I think I understand why after a rewatch, so here's hoping my fond memories of Vicki and Henry aren't also misremembering! Let's get started!

you can hear it, can't you

We open with Vicki walking down the street, talking to her mom. Vicki is played by one of our very own recurring guest stars: Christina Cox!

You may remember her from her TWO appearances on Forever Knight, as both a traffic cop and Jeanne d'Arc, and IIRC she was in a Moonlight ep, wasn't she? (I'm already wiping it from my memory, with only this blog to serve as a grim reminder of what I must never watch again.) Anyway, she's talking to her mom and serving up some bad dialogue to let us know her mom is on her case about finding a husband. Boring, but it was on Lifetime, so, you know.

Meanwhile, in a basement somewhere, a dude is chanting in Latin in a candle-lit room. Seems to be summoning a demon, I think? I mean, nothing good is going to come of this, regardless of demonic existence. We cut to a dude walking down the street on his phone, and he sees a guy in a long coat, which he says is cool to whoever he's on the phone with. And then there's some super weird editing nonsense, but in a nutshell: Long Coat attacks Dude on phone, across the street from where Vicki is standing.

She darts into traffic because she wants to help Dude, obviously, but also because she hasn't really changed her life to deal with her RP. Long Coat is already gone, of course, because this is set up like a vampire attack, and Vicki is mystified as we head into our opening credits and rockin' theme. (All of these people have insanely chiseled chins, it's bizarre.)

Hokay, so! Vicki calls it in, looks like Dude is dead. Detectives Graham and Celluci have caught the case, and Vicki mutters about Celluci. My money is on former partner that will be a maybe love-interest, especially since he's played very handsomely by Dylan Neal:

Graham - Celluci's new partner - has heard a lot about Vicki, who is apparently a legend for running through partners like water. She fires back that she wonders how long Graham's going to last, so my money is now solidly on the "fractious ex-partners, maybe lovers" trope for Vicki and Celluci.

Vicki gives her statement, and then she and Celluci start fighting about it because we have to lean really hard on dialogue to establish character here, for some reason. We could have understood the bickering even if it weren't shouted like they were a football field apart. Shame no one let the audience do their job. But, turns out that this murder is "just like the other one", though Celluci refuses to tell Vicki any more about that, because she can't expect to be treated like a cop anymore.

At her office the next day, a goth girl comes in demanding to know what happened last night, because "you were there!" Turns out, Dude was her boyfriend, and she knows who killed him - a vampire. Her name's Coreen, his was Ian, and she wants Vicki to help her find the vamp who did it.

Vicki is obviously skeptical, but she takes the case - though she says she'll only put a few days into it unless something really pops. And she warns Coreen that probably, nothing will.

Meanwhile, a vampire is getting a woman out of his bed and out of his apartment with a little good sex followed by a bite and a little innocent hypnotism. Once she's gone - happily and alive! - he heads out for something. His doorman stops him for chitchat on the way out, mentioning the "vampire murders" he read about in the paper. Vamp Dude overreacts to that, yelling about how vampires aren't real and the people who write that kind of shit are "idiots!" The doorman is like, uh, yeah, sure boss, whatever, and then Vamp Dude walks out with his newspaper.

This has to be Henry.

Vicki is back in the alley, scene of the attack, at night for some reason, but at least she has a flashlight this time. She takes a pic of what looks like some sort of sigil on the wall, and heads further down for clues. Behind her is Henry, right on time, to pass his hand over the sigil and Flashback for us ever-so-briefly, to being held down by men in black robes, chanting Latin. Vicki turns from collecting something out of a crack in the wall and hails Henry, but he uses a passing van to disappear before she can ask him anything.

Next stop is the medical examiner's office! Mysteries are nothing if not predictable, which is probably why Moonlight pissed me off so much. There's a formula! There's beats to hit! Blood Ties is certainly doing its job in that respect. The ME is more involved in solving the kid's murder than that Vicki isn't technically a cop anymore, so she lets Vicki sit in on her preliminary examination. She confirms that there was another murder just like this, victims punctured by something super-sharp, both drained of blood. Vicki gives her the stuff she pulled out of the wall; a quick test confirms it's blood. If the ME finds anything else, she'll let Vicki know.

Demon Summoner Dude - Norman - is hanging out at the coffee shop where, surprise surprise, Coreen works. He has a sketchbook full of her, and some friends trying to say hi. He brushes them off - no time to hang with undergrads, he's going through changes, he's going to end up with the money and cars and girlfriend. They'll see.

Coreen comes around and he settles up the bill with a huge tip. The friends wonder where he got all that money, but he just mentions again that "things are changing". It is clear that Coreen doesn't know him and isn't interested, and I'm annoyed that we have been writing incel villains for roughly forever and it's changed absolutely nothing about incel behavior. Delightful. Love it.

Celluci calls Vicki's office to bother her about her visit to the ME - who's actually a coroner, sorry, she didn't even get a name in that scene, so, y'know. Vicki suggests sharing their info on the case, and Celluci says sure, meet me for dinner. She's a little surprised, but agrees.

Norman goes home to an apartment full of arcade games and a jukebox, opens the door to his demon room, and summons his pet demon guy. Norman demands more of everything - more money, new clothes, a Porsche. His cockney demon says that he knows what it costs - "blood and souls". Norman says yeah, I know, go do your thing, and the demon scampers away.

Celluci and Vicki get Chinese takeout and Mike (Celluci's much-easier-to-type first name) doesn't want to give up the goods on the case. It's too hot, the info can't get out, she knows better! Then he starts telling her she should try yoga for her RP.

Not literally, but, like, he's telling her all about the latest research or some shit. She calls him out on it and he says he just "cares" about her, and if she'd just made some simple adjustments, she could have lived "a completely normal life!"

The fuck, dude?! No, for real, the fuck? I hope I'm not supposed to like this guy, because I really, really do not.

Mike makes her a deal: she tells him why she's on this case, he'll tell her SOME of what he knows. She makes him go first: they assume a perp on drugs, a razor for a weapon, the blood is ritualistic. Occult. Standard nonsense. Vicki gives up that she's working for Coreen, and that she thinks a vampire did it. Mike dismisses it immediately, but Vicki points out that the blood had to go somewhere, and she didn't see a blood vacuum at the scene when she was there. But then again, vampires are ridiculous, so clearly that's not a real option. Let's have another beer.

Our third victim gets into her car in a garage, and is promptly taken out by the demon - who stabs her with a sharpened fingernail. A claw?

Vicki had too many beers: she and Mike are making out at her cab. She says something teasingly mean, and he puts her in the cab without another word.

Henry is reading his paper at a diner; the waitress says vampires are a sign the city is world-class. She never mentions the city, but I remember this being Toronto, and in that case, girl, where have you been? That shizz is overrun with vamps. Vamps out the wazoo. Vamps out our ears. Vamps from here to the dance floor (to understand this joke, please see the 1990s Noah Baumbach movie, "Kicking and Screaming").

He leaves and heads to a club, where Vicki is waiting outside to get in. From the clubwear of the patrons, I'm guessing this is a goth hangout, and thus both our protagonists are here to check up on Ian and Coreen's friends and enemies. It is not, unfortunately, The Raven.

Vicki gets in and Henry asks her immediately what she's doing there, with something like gloss on the words, but Vicki shakes him off and leaves. Henry stops a waiter next, and asks him about Ian; waiter says he had words with two guys, and Henry goes to talk to the guys. Real toughies, too, probably think they're going to rob him or some junk. Oh, Ian was a waiter here, too. Henry establishes that they didn't kill Ian - they aren't that kind of evil - and of course has to beat his way out of the situation.

Vicki asks at the bar about Ian, and gets the same story from the bartender. He calls over other waiter about the two guys, and other waiter says they all went outside, so Vicki follows. She finds the guys, but no Henry, and no memories.

Guys, this show is pretty good, I am digging it! It can't hurt that it's based on actual books that were actually edited and already made sense, of course, and some of these directing and editing choices are a little weird, but it's a pilot! I'm just so relieved that we're back on more Forever Knight-esque footing than whatever-the-fuck Moonlight was. It's like sinking into a featherbed after a long day of hard work.

Cate, overdosing on vampires

So it's late, and Henry gets caught by the sun just before he makes it home. The doorman comments on his hand being burned - "I was making a friend dinner" - and Henry flees upstairs. Pretty standard lore exposition, but I can't fault them for using a winning formula.

Graham and Celluci talk to the hot dog vendor who found the third vic, and the light is...bizarre. It's daytime, sun shining, but there's a blue filter over everything? Like, more than Twilight, even? It makes me wonder about day-for-night shooting: like, maybe they're making the daylight shots look purposely strange so the night stuff, when it's not really night, might not look bad? Or something? Because it continues into the next scene with Norman trying some PUA shit on a college girl, and it's just like

https://youtu.be/4iwHb189X84

Anyway, aside from everything being blue, I spotted a BMO Bank of Montreal, so yeah, we're in Canada. And Vicki's back at the coroner's. The blood in the crack was Ian's blood, and there was a substance on the victims' throats like saliva. And the cells under the third vic's nails is almost like batwing, but not quite. Seems like maybe a vampire - "Count Dracula on a bender?" says Vicki. Probably not, says the coroner - but then again, who knows?

I haven't really been covering the banter here, but this cast already gets along well with each other. Vicki and Mike, Mike and Graham, even Henry and his doorman - everyone gets some quips, some jibes, a little chance to show the relationships. These people get along with each other, they like each other. It makes us more likely to like them, too; even Mike and his stupid yoga.

Vicki pops into the station to talk to Mike about the coroner's report. He shoots down the vampire talk, but Vicki says she can't just dismiss that it might be something weird. She storms off to continue her investigation, and Mike is annoyed that she's not giving up.

Henry is at the scene of the third murder, where that same sigil is on one of the walls. Another brief flashback. This sigil is bad news bears, y'all.

Which is why Vicki is investigating it. She asks Coreen about the pentagram in it, because when she plots the murders, they could be three points on a pentagram. She calls Celluci to tell him she thinks she knows where the next murder could be - just as Norman starts to summon and Henry has drawn his own pentagram, so we can get everyone nearer to the big climax.

Slight problem, though: Norman needs a more powerful demon to get Coreen. Current demon tells him that he needs to do a couple more murders, and then a sacrifice right in the center of the pentagram, and they can get the big guy to get him the girl. Norman says to make it happen, no matter.

The fourth vic screams in the park where demon runs into her; both Vicki and Henry come a-running. The demon is scared off, but not before he tells Henry that his master is "coming for you!" Then he explodes into bats, which is pretty cool. Henry goes to the girl, but she's already been slashed and is dead. Too bad that's when Vicki finally gets there; she thinks Henry's her guy. She threatens him with a nightstick, so he charges her, and when she can actually see his vamped-out face, she faints.

Which is when the police show up, so Henry flees - with an unconscious Vicki still in his arms.

And that's Part One! I thought about doing both parts of the pilot, but I am old and tired, and I can't actually sit still that long. But! Perhaps! I will drop an extra recap this weekend, if you're all good little Snowflakes.

See you next week!