3 Swirlies

www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0npWnyK9rQ

“I’m selling all my sunglasses online. I won’t even tell you how many pairs have.”

Living with his mother-in-law is about as bad as Don thought it was going to be. And it turned out that his “business” isn’t as recession proof as he had hoped.

From YouTube Description:

Closed-captioned for the hearing-impaired.

Episode Five - “You can’t choose your family” Starring: John Colella, Reamy Hall, Marcia Wallace, Chris Mulkey.

Support Season Two! http://www.VampireMob.com

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Vampire Mob S01E05 “You Can’t Choose Your Family” | A Web Series Review on The Watch List

3 Swirlies

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBx-8lrmcL0

“Moving in? Oh, I would just stake her right now.”

More troubles for our vampire hitman as he gets ready for his mother-in-law to move in.

This is very serialized show. Many web series are. I wonder if maybe that’s one of the reasons that web series in general have a hard time breaking through to the mainstream - they’re too short for a real self contained story, but they are often released on a TV schedule.

Just musing. Thoughts?

From YouTube Description:

Available with closed-captioning for the hearing impaired.

Episode Three - “Castle on the left” Starring: John Colella, Reamy Hall and Andrea Cansler. More about Vampire Mob at http://www.VampireMob.com

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Vampire Mob S01E03 “Castle on the Left” | A Web Series Review on The Watch List

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Starring: John Colella, Reamy Hall, Kirsten Vangsness, Jim Roof

Written & directed by Joe Wilson
Assistant director – John Vargas

4 swirlies

Click here to view the embedded video.

“I’ve lost weight.  I feel good.  I was always trying to stay out of the sun anyways!”

If that’s not a compelling enough reason to become a vampire, I don’t what is.  “Vampire Mob” is the kind of web series in which it’s perfectly normal to argue with your (human) sister about turning your mother into a vampire.

And it’s actually pretty funny.  In a safe, supernatural sitcom kind of way.

Plus, Kirsten Vangness, the always awesome Garcia from “Criminal Minds,” is in it.  How can you not love Garcia?!

In fact, you’d have to be heartless vampire mob hit man—which is exactly what her brother-in-law Don is—and the source of all the tension between the sisters (one vampire, one human) at a very awkward family dinner.

Kudos to the actor playing the very uncomfortable human brother-in-law– who was careful not to go too over-the-top and risk making things seem… unreal.  In an obviously very unreal social situation.

But the main reason why the show succeeds is because the comedy is always driven by character.  And the actors do a great job underplaying certain moments and lines—in that mockumentary style—which somehow makes things funnier.

As for the story, yes, there are long scenes of family dysfunction (think Everybody Loves Raymond)—and it does seem odd that we never see the vampire mother that everybody’s arguing about—but we do get a hint at the end that things may be getting more complicated for our vampire mob hit man Don.

Without spoiling anything, I actually found myself wanting to know how things are going to turn out between this bickering vampire couple.  (Yes, I have a thing for marital discord.)

And as storytellers, that’s the goal: making the audience care.

But most importantly, they’ve got Garcia!  Come on, how can you not like Kirsten Vangness?

Vampire Mob S01 E02

http://www.VampireMob.com

3 Swirlies

“Don? You’re waking me up to make a sex tape?”

This is another very well known web series in web series circles.

Think Sopranos meets True Blood, with a strong mockumentary style. The series really focuses on characters and relationships, which is nice. The comedy is very subtle and dry. And the production, while obviously meant to look gritty and real, is nice. There’s a lot of “B roll” under the dialogue, which is an interesting choice. It certainly keeps the pace up.

This series surprises me because it takes what could be a very silly concept – a vampire mobster hitman – and plays it real straight. It’s still clearly a comedy, even if it is more about quiet chuckles and knowing smiles than belly laughs.

It’s well done, but it didn’t really ‘click’ with me. There was lots of backstory and set up, so I look forward to the next one.

FROM THE ‘THIS IS JUST ME’ DEPT. — I’m not a fan of the “next time” clips being at the end of the actual episode. I think they are important, but I would rather have them be a separate video. In a past series, we actually uploaded two different versions of the episodes, one with “previously on” clips and one without. What do you guys think? Should all web series include TV esque “next time” clips and “previously on” clips in the actual uploaded video? Should they skip them altogether?

Vampire Mob S01E01