Madison Yu

I was so excited for this but it really did not live up to the book. the books were action-focused, intense, thrilling, and suck you in with a slow-burn of secrets unraveling within the vampire world. the movie, however, was WAY too fast-paced and rushed for the audience to really sit down and marinate with all the worldbuilding and new characters. it would've been way better if this was made into a tv series rather than a movie because the books go in-depth with the world, the characters, the antagonists, and the romance. and that's the major bone I have to pick with this movie; the romance. If you're not going to make the relationship between Dimitri and Rose believable, why even try? The same goes for Christian and Lissa. There was no basis for their sudden budding romance and both relationships were supposed to be slow-burn and filled with tension. The movie didn't create that tension at all. I WANTED THE GOOD SLOW ROMANCE NOT THE LOVE-AT-FIRST-SIGHT. lastly, I hate how most of the conflict in this movie revolved around high school drama. I trust that many would agree with me if I said we would forgo the Mean Girls drama for even a crumb more of action and blood, because the whole "don't steal my boyfriend, I need to be popular, who slept with who, who likes who" trope is so cringe and overused. I guess the only good thing I liked was the casting of Lucy Fry because she was exactly how I imagined in my head when I read the books. Zoey and Lucy did an amazing job. The others? Either average or didn't have enough screen time for me to feel out if they'd truly got their characters. AND DIMITRI OH GOD DIMITRI. absolutely no hate to the actor but I just expected more :'( oh and the last thing about the cast, but the most important thing, is that I would've liked more diversity. There were a few black women thrown in the mix (I honestly can't tell if they're lightskin black or mixed???help) and one asian guy with a single line thrown randomly in there. it was weird (and a little token-ish) :/ it was literally specified that the people of the vampire academy come from all different parts of the world, so it would be natural for the academy to be extremely diverse, right? but all I see are white and a sprinkle of spicy white people, so........