Witches and vampires and daemons, oh my! That’s right, we have ended up back in that realm that dominated the mid 2000s, the supernatural teen romance! Yes, if you’re having Twilight flashbacks, you’re in the right mindset. However, as you’re about to see, this adaptation might be a little more adult than it first appears.
Based on the trilogy by Deborah Harkness, A Discovery of Witches follows Diana Bishop, a powerful witch and historian who comes across an incredibly important and sought-after tome in an Oxford library. She draws the attention of geneticist and vampire Matthew Clairmont. The two form an uneasy alliance to protect the book, but soon fall in love which is strictly forbidden by both groups.
There’s a very strong connected to this project, including Teresa Palmer, best known for her role in Warm Bodes as Diana; Matthew Goode, from The Good Wife as Claremont; and Alex Kingston, of Doctor Who fame, as Diana’s aunt Sarah. The rest of the cast includes Valerie Pettiford, Lindsey Duncan, Owen Teale, Edward Bluemel, and Daniel Ezra.
It feels like a weird time for a supernatural romance show, especially after the fatigue of the last decade of shows and films like Twilight, True Blood, and the recently finished The Vampire Diaries. Are they hoping to cash in on a market that is now becoming sparse, or were they just waiting to perfect the show itself and it just happens to come in at the tail end of the trend? Still, it does look slightly more adult (and with a modern Game of Thrones vibe) that other shows of this sub-genre, so one can only hope it rises to the occasion.
A Discovery of Witches is set to premiere sometime in fall 2018 in the U.K. No U.S. distributor has been announced as of yet.