Guillermo del Toro's The Strain on FX

SPOILER WARNING

For the most part I enjoyed the series premiere. It's nothing mind blowing but it was a solid start. The casting is pretty good but a couple of the characters felt a bit 2-dimensional especially the goth rock star guy. David Bradley was kind of bad ass as Professor Setrakian though. Visually everything looks pretty cool. The practical effects are solid, the CGI looks good and the gore is brutal. The scene where The Master drank that guy's blood then smashed his head in was pretty crazy. I'm excited about the rest of the season.

A good first episode, with a particularly strong first twenty minutes, I thought. A fairly good cast, too, with David Bradley, (an old-looking) Jonathan Hyde, Sean Astin, and Corey Stoll as the lead CDC fella.

It's nice to see a vampire story where the vampires aren't all glitter or charm, and where the vampiric curse is more nature than magic.

I'm definitely going to keep watching.

Nearly finished the books. I hope the TV series is much better.

I've just watched the first episode and concur with everything Art School Dropout said.

This is definitely better than Dominion...

Is anyone watching this?

I'd dried up my usual go-to sci-fi and horror shows so I thought I'd give this a go.

At first I was ready to turn it off as soon as I realised it was vampires (Vamps begin and end at Salem's Lot for me) but it is just phenomenally awesome.

It's like Fringe does Vampires.

What does everyone else think?

pH

Is on my list to watch so glad it sounds like it isn't totally awful!

It's not awful. Not at all. The series is brilliant twist to the classical vampire story. And it's meant to be watched back-to-back as the timescale in the season is so, so short as in just half of the episodes they have merely got few days into the full blown infestation.

And by using a CDC doctors as point-of-view characters makes this story all so much more interesting, because if you really like apocalypse pr0n then this one is really meant for you. Those who love classical vampires might be frowning upon the master that seems to be coming from a hellish vision, but in the same time they are using the strain as a really interesting twist to end-of-the-world scenario.

Did you knew they have already renewed this series and that Guillermo has already given his vision on the next season?

PS. I love the old man, his cane-sword and his grand invention with the nail-gun. The second best character is EF. Actually I don't think Strain has any bad characters.

I've read the book and really enjoyed it and have the next two in my to-read list. I'd really like to watch the series and see how it compares. Does anyone know if it's being shown in the UK?

SPOILERS

The second episode was pretty slow with a lot of characterization and it introduces the exterminator character Vasiliy Fet. The only actual horror was during the last 15 minutes though. Still the end of the episode was gruesome.

Episode 3 The pacing was a little better in this episode than in the last. Eichorst putting his face on at the beginning of the episode was gross. Great use of a practical special effects makeup. Bolivar's transformation was also pretty graphic. Nice bit of horror at the end of the episode.

The fourth episode was much better than the last few. Gruesome special effects during the autopsy scene. Seeing Sean Astin freak out was kind of funny. I like that his character came clean to Ephraim and Nora. Plus it was satisfying to see Ephraim punch him in the face. I actually enjoyed the scenes with Gus and think he's starting to be a pretty interesting character. Nice to see Jamie Hector from The Wire show up. Some excellent and tense scenes with Annie discovering Ansel's transformation. Setrakian was pretty bad-ass once again.

Episode 5 "Runaways" was directed by Peter Weller and was pretty solid.

SPOILERS
Interesting flashback featuring Setrakian. I hope that's something that keeps up throughout the series. The developing mentor relationship with him and Ephraim also seems promising. The scene where they confront Ansel in the shed was kind of cool. The scenes with Bolivar are easily his best so far. The sewer scene with Vasiliy Fet was also decent. The preview for next weeks episode looks like all hell breaks loose.

SPOILERS

Episode 6 The pacing of this series is improving although I was hoping the eclipse would occur earlier in the episode. The Gus scenes are quickly becoming one of my favorite things about the show. The scenes with Vasiliy Fet were pretty good too. Nice to see Nora and her mother show up at Setrakian's pawn shop. Let the vampire hunting begi

I have seen the first few eps and really enjoying it. An interesting take on the idea I think. I also really loved the make-up special effects

I'm enjoying the show, great job on bringing vampires back to being scary, relentless killing machines rather than love interests! There is definitely some suspension of disbelief that the CDC would have so much evidence but take so little action - how far does Stoneheart's influence stretch?!

[edit - typo]

Idoru said:

I've read the book and really enjoyed it and have the next two in my to-read list. I'd really like to watch the series and see how it compares. Does anyone know if it's being shown in the UK?

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According to http://www.geektown.co.uk/tvairdates/strain/ it's starting next month on "Watch" channel

I haven't missed an episode yet. This is one of the best shows on tv . I haven't yet read the books but i plan too.

SPOILERS

Episode 7. The opening scene with the deserted bar was kind of creepy and the subsequent attack scene was gruesome. I was hoping the eclipse scenes would last a bit longer though. Glad they are continuing the flashbacks. Nazi vampires are a bit cliche but they do it here well enough. The revelation that Setrakian hand crafted The Master's coffin was interesting. I thought the build up to the confrontation between Eichhorst and Setrakian in the subway was also pretty good. Wan't expecting that ending!

Since the Nazi scene is already open I have to say it's one of the best and certainly worth of an Emmy. The Strain keeps improving every episode it goes forward while Guillermo has started carving out the new factions from the backstory. To me it's a surprising that we see clans taking an action while the Vampiric strain keeps spreading throughout the population. It will interesting to find out where the ending is going to lie for this marvellous first season.

Still watching, but it's not been doing enough to stop me browsing Reddit or playing Minecraft whilst I watch the episodes. That said, the ending of the newest episode was interesting enough to keep my attention.

Good episode this week - the new faction makes things interesting to say the least!

svalbard said:

Nearly finished the books. I hope the TV series is much better.

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I made it part way through the 3rd as post apocalyptic nazi vampires hits most of my buttons but had to give up for reasons such as I could no longer handle the female lead obsessing about keeping her hair stunning whilst starving to death.

I can't imagine the TV series can be any worse.

markpud said:

According to http://www.geektown.co.uk/tvairdates/strain/ it's starting next month on "Watch" channel

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Thanks!

SPOILERS

Episode 8: "Creatures of the Night" Nice to see Vasiliy Fet finally meet up with Ephraim's group, plus Dutch Velders too. Setrakian was bad-ass once again during the gas station scenes. Epic Rick Baker cameo! Can't say I felt bad about Sean Astin's character being infected. The gas station ceiling caving in looked pretty cool. I was hoping to see more of Mr. Quinlan in this episode. I hadn't realized at the time but under the vampire makeup is actor Stephen McHattie.