Vampire Academy

Warning: There will be spoilers in this here review. Maybe even lots of them... I don't know... but expect at least one spoiler.

Premise: Ummm, I believe it's about a school where young vampires go to learn magic and fighting skills. You have the Dhampir whose job it is  to protect the vampires and especially vampire royalty. That's where are two main characters come in. Rose is Lissa's dhampir protector. The two women ran away from the academy for a year for freedom, but all those fun and games are over with now. The school tracked their globe trotting asses down and brought them back for more training.

My Review:  Now, I know this is based off a book series. I also know that Hollywood has a real knack for crapping on good books and changing things around completely. From what fans of the book series have told me, the books are much better, more darker. I wish the movie would have stuck to the darker themes. This movie was such a disappointment. I sat there, waiting for something significant to happen, like the cool fight in the beginning where they were attacked by a gang of Strigoi, (the evil vampires).
After that excitement and actual danger was over with, the viewer was treated to serious vampire complexities such as: Jealousy. Gossip. Childish Pranks. Animal Slaughters Pranks. Blood Writing On the Wall Pranks. Classroom Bickering. and He Said, She Said Threes Company Misunderstandings. And who can forget the completely forgettable rivalry between the current vampire princess and future one. Why her snarky remarks against Lissa for not being cool enough on campus were unimpressive and pretty unimportant when you consider the grand scheme of things.

So this prompts our future Princess to use her powerful vampire abilities to set things in motion. Now, she doesn't use her abilities to try to figure out who wants to kill her. Nope, she has more pressing matters to be focusing on like hypnotizing the gossip mongers into liking her again. Getting back with her ex-boyfriend and being the cool chick on campus. This of course raises the heckles on the back of Rose's neck. She wants to protect the princess, so on occasion, when she's not flirting with the head security trainer, Dmitri, or frowning at the Edward lookalike who has the hots for her charge, Lissa,  she's doing some investigating into the situation.

Of course, the villain was pretty obvious and the princess was extremely weak. I can't imagine the vampire race surviving much longer with such pitiful excuses for vampires who are supposed to be fighting for good. Lissa didn't even like the word "vampire" to be used to describe them. What kind of shit is that? You're a vampire. That's like a human saying: "Don't call me a human!, by the way, I'm going to be your world leader and I will lead out race with pride and integrity!"

Question: How? You don't even fully accept who or what you are. Not only that, but you couldn't even handle a bit of torture, thus you gave into the villain far too easily and your priorities are all screwed up. I honestly don't see how the strigoi hasn't already taken over the academy when it's full of  these types of  vampires. Especially when they're stronger than them physically. The only one worth their grain of salt is Dmitri.

Grade: (D-) Dmitri being a bona-fide badass saves this movie from failing completely.