Throng

It was TVNZ's turn to show off which series they'll be screening in 2010 at their new season launch today in Auckland.  As you'd expect, there's a fairly solid line-up.

TV One has a new goal:  to be a little edgier.  One might assume: a little less safe.  It will be interesting to see how this transcribes into ratings.

TV One should dominate Mondays with The Pacific, an HBO series from the makers of Band of Brothers.  This will be followed by the multi-Emmy award-winning series Generation Kill. However, as it aired in the US in 2008, it can be bought on DVD here for about $40.

Earlier today, The Vampire Diaries premiered on the CW in the US. Is this just yet another thing cashing in on the vampire-supernatural-horror craze (Twilight, True Blood, Buffy, Supernatural)?

Based on a series of books (actually written before Twilight), the show is full of teen angst, love triangles and good versus evil.

The show stars Nina Dobrev (Mia on Degrassi - not that we get that here?), Ian Joseph Somerhalder (remember Boon from Lost?!) and Paul Wesley (Tommy on Everwood). Judging by the buzz on Twitter, the show may just convert quite a few "I love Edward" groupies into "I love Stefan" or "I love Damon" ones.

The general consensus was that it was better than people expected but you definitely have to be in the right demographic - I guess I'm just a wee bit too old for broody teens, "scary" scenes in the dark and smoke machines hard at work.

Here's the first nine minutes of the pilot: