Review: “Carmilla” – Lesbian vampires make great stories
Popular among the LGBTQ community and its supporters, the new web series “Carmilla,” found on YouTube, is based off of the gothic novel of the same name written by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu. Taking place in Silas University, this light dramedy involves the mystery of missing students and gay vampires. The story begins with Laura (Elise Bauman), losing her roommate, Betty, to a kidnapping. Perplexed by the lack of a school response, Laura attempts to research the cause behind her previous roommate’s disappearance, while posting her findings online as a “journalism project.” Meanwhile, a girl named Carmilla (Natasha Negovanlis) replaces Laura’s previous roommate. Laura continues to research the kidnappings, and finds that Betty is not the first disappearance – there are a number of other missing students. Soon after this realization, her friends Danny (Sharon Belle), LaFontaine (Kaitlyn Alexander), and Perry (Annie Briggs) assist her in researching the disappearance of her initial roommate. They soon discover that Carmilla is a vampire and has a connection to the missing students. As the story unfolds, romance develops between Laura and Danny, as well as between Laura and Carmilla. The theme of this series is love and its ability to supposedly conquer evil.
The web series was filmed in a very short amount of time, yet the production quality is excellent. The entire series takes place in Laura and Carmilla’s room, while events that take place outside of it are described by Laura and sometimes other characters via Laura’s web camera. With this simple trick by the “Carmilla” creators, the entirety of the web series taking place in Laura’s room is justified and in fact adds to the ambience of the show, rather than detracting from the storyline. However, it would be slightly nicer if there was a greater variety in camera angles, rather than just the one view from Laura’s laptop web camera.
The actresses amazingly portrayed the characters. Negovanlis’s performance as Carmilla has the power to make one believe she is really a 300-year-old vampire. Her entire persona of a relaxed rebel, with her advanced level of laziness, splendidly fits the character. Bauman was also very fitting of Laura and performed unexpectedly well during the instance she was to be “possessed” by the surprising evil of the story.
“Carmilla” is refreshing because of the surplus of lesbians. Yes! How wonderful, a surplus of lesbians. “Carmilla” is the only place besides Home Depot one can find this! But really, a show about girls that like girls is a relatively new concept and one as high quality as “Carmilla” is wonderful to come across, especially with the addition of vampires. A show that finally contains female romance is super awesome to have, as most mainstream shows only contain gay men, and only include them for comic relief. The entire story of Carmilla and Laura is enjoyable and fitting of the modern age, and it’s less than three hours! I recommend this to anyone that enjoys romance oriented stories and doesn’t mind the romance involving gay girls. No negative points immediately come to my mind; therefore I rate this series 10/10.
Rating: 10/10
