Tough call today, I’m torn between reviewing this and A Lily Blooms in Another World, but this has been on my “to-review on Sunday” list for a long time, so I’m sticking with plan. Tune in tomorrow, because l have a lot to say about Ameco Kaeruda’s newest LN.

Today I am, at long last, revisiting the entertaining finish to the entertaining webseries, Carmilla. (Season 1 and Season 2  have been reviewed here on Okazu.) At the end of the webseries, creators took their spin on Sheridan LeFanu’s vampire novel Carmilla, soaked in H.P. Lovecraftian-style dread horror and sprinkled lightly with post-Buffy, the Vampire Slayer humor and shenanigans to the big screen for one last adventure.

In The Carmilla Movie, after defeating the ancient horror that lay below protagonist Laura’s college, formerly-immortal vampire Carmilla, is now once again human.  Only…something seems to be up with that. The movie will explore Carmilla’s past, and also dredge up the fears of Laura, Perry and La Fontaine and will, predictably give Carmilla some good, gothic self-loathing time to consider her evil past, as they race to help unsettled ghosts pass through the veil, defeat an obsessed victim of Carmilla’s and decide, ultimately, whether Carmilla ought to remain a human, or return to being a vampire, forever.

Outside the video-log format of the original webseries, the story flails a bit. Once the camera is off, we get to see the running around and shouting that was previously assumed in the webseries…and I’m not sure it makes the story better. This is not a series that needs a bigger budget, or a larger screen, but the movie held together well, without losing any of the qualities that made the webseries fun to watch. We still see all the characters as we’ve grown to know and admire them, with gloating baddies, arcane rituals and items, and a fresh hell for us all to face.  I especially liked that Carmilla‘s undead reclaim their gothic roots. There are no sparkly vamps here, just the diaphanous shifts of modern Victorian cosplay.

A perfect watch for grey and gloomy Sunday in October…which it just *happens* to be today here as I write. ^_^

Cinematography – 7
Story –  8 Creative, if not brilliant
Characters – 9
LGBTQ – 10
Service – Not really?

Overall – 9

Honestly….I think LeFanu would have loved this series.

There’s a clear lineage here:  LeFanu and  Stoker have a baby called Buffy. Lovecraft has a fey child called Nightvale, Nightvale and Buffy have a very queer child…Carmilla. ^_^