Weird for the sake of Weird

(Warning: SPOILERS)

Started watching the new Netflix exclusive series Hemlock Grove. The advertisements portrayed the show as having a supernatural slant to it so I figured it would be right up my alley. While it does indeed have supernatural elements, they are not presented to us in a straightforward manner. To be perfectly honest, I have absolutely no idea what this show is about at all.

The show takes place in the titular Hemlock Grove, a small Pennsylvania town that seems to mostly consist of backwoods and a giant mansion. Within the first five minutes we’re presented with scenes of sex in a car, a lesbian flirtation between a teacher and student, and finally to show the program is bizarre and violent the girl involved in both the scenes above is horrible murdered by an unseen monster in a playground. So sex and violence have immediately dragged the audience into the world of the show. Who or what is the murderer? Why was that girl killed? Will we see more nudity as the show goes on? Etc.

As I’m watching I hope to have some answers given to me in the next scene.  Unfortunately no. Instead we are introduced to Peter and his mother who are Romani and are taking up residence in Peter’s deceased uncle’s trailer on the outskirts of town. A trailer that hap
pens to be on the borders of the previous mentioned Mansion. Peter and his mom are gypsies and are treated rather disrespectfully by any townsfolk they encounter. Oh and Peter may be a werewolf. Wait, I’m sorry. Peter IS a werewolf and he rather openly presents this fact to the only kid he has managed to befriend, Roman. Roman is the rich kid who lives in the mansion and was having sex with the dead girl in the previously mentioned scene.

It is with Roman and his family that most of the weirdness of the show takes place. As bizarre as Peter may be as a werewolf, Roman’s family has them beat. Apparently Roman’s mother (played by the still sexy though she’s almost fifty Famke Janssen) is an Upir, something the show hasn’t defined yet, and her son may be one as well, though he doesn’t know it.  And Roman’s sister is a complete oddity. She’s over six feet tall, has a bizarre fish eye, is mute, and her skin glows blue to the touch. Apparently her deformity is what caused the children’s father to commit suicide. Roman’s cousin, whose father is having an affair with his mom, might have been impregnated by an angel.

Here’s the problem with all this weirdness. None of it deals with human problems. And that is the key to truly good supernatural stories. Shows like Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Supernatural, The Vampire Diaries, True Blood, even Teen Wolf, are all full of bizarre creatures and situations, but at the core of the series are people with real identifiable problems. There is nothing about the characters and creatures on Hemlock Grove that I can identify with. I know what it’s like to be a High School student with a crush. I do not know what it is like to be a rich asshole who gets whatever he wants nor do I know what it is like to be a gypsy on the run with my mom. The supernatural elements don’t even enter into it.

Even the most fantastical tale has a human element to it. There is something identifiable and universal in all tales regardless of planet or realm they take place. Some themes are so a part of the human experience that they transcend the circumstances of our individual life experiences. We look for ourselves in the stories we read and if we cannot find ourselves then it is hard for any story to keep our attention.