Ultraviolet: Excerpts from the article
      The (Un) Life

      From Starburst issue 244

      Genre Television has had a hard time trying to find its feet on British television over the last few years. There have been some valiant attempts, but nothing really caught the imagination until Ultraviolet. This six part series, recently seen on Channel 4, takes the vampire myth and places it in a dark, gritty modern setting to create a tense and compelling thriller.

      The Squad, which is sanctioned by the government to hunt down and destroy vampires, use carbon bullets rather than wooden stakes to bring down their prey, ultraviolet light to subdue their prisoners and gas canisters containing allicin which is a derived from garlic. Vampires still can't be seen in mirrors, as in traditional stories, but neither can their image be captured by photographs or video tape. It gives the series a modern look and a hard edge like the ban on the word 'vampire' which no character utters throughout six hours of television and mimics the style of a Cracker- type drama, which, in turn, enhances its believability.

      The Squad are an intriguing group, dedicated to the point of obsession. Because each of them has lost someone to the creatures of the night, the question constantly posed is whether they are ignoring the possibility that the vampires could really want peace with humanity. The search for the truth about the vampires' intentions and the increasing glimpses into the Squad's personal stories not only help sustain the series for six episodes, but also intensify the drama.

      The Squad

      The head of the Squad Pearse Harman left his work as a priest in the Catholic Church to pursue vampires which he sees as a threat to humanity. But he faces the temptation when he is diagnosed with cancer, knowing that vampirism offers the only certain way to conquer his disease. The scientific mind on the team is Angie March, who isolated the chemical in garlic that vampires find intolerant. Her husband crossed the line and took one of her daughters. Both lay neutralised in the ultraviolet chamber and could, she knows be regenerated.

      Vaughan Rice was a soldier who lost his company to vampires in the Gulf and hides his emotions behind an uncaring exterior. When Mike Colefield discovered his friend was a vampire and was forced to kill him, the Squad saw the opportunity to bring someone with police experience onto the team.

      In later episodes there are more grey areas involved in terms of what the Squad are allowed to do. It's one thing if the vampire looks scary, but what if it's a child? There's no easy answers. There's a tone to it, which is very grey, very morally ambiguous, that you're not always cheering when they blow a vampire away, it's slightly uncomfortable.

      That effect of blowing a vampire away is part of the impressive visual style that runs through Ultraviolet. It is not a show about special effects so they are used sparingly and that gives them a greater impact.

      The Leeches

      They are immortal, feeding on human blood to sustain them, but they are vulnerable. As the world has changed around them, vampires have been forced to adapt. For someone who lives forever, the threats to the planet are just on the horizon. So they have organised put together money making operations to combat their fears, and sought out scientists to help them offering financial rewards or a shot at immortality in return. Some scientists are working on global warming or nuclear winter, others on blood disorders. Maybe this is so the vampires can be at peace with their traditional prey, humans. Perhaps their research into synthetic blood is so they no longer have to kill to feed. Perhaps their work on environmental catastrophe will help save the planet where no human-backed initiative has been able too. Or perhaps, as Pearse suggests, the scientific knowledge they seek is to help them take control. They don't want to stop nuclear winter, but to encourage it. Twelve months without daylight will give them enough time to take over and once they have the power they will kill the humans and feed on synthetic blood.

      There is still an opening for a second series, as the last episode revealed. Lets hope that Channel 4 is wise enough to realise it has something special on it's hands and signs up Joe Ahearne for another six episodes of what some people have described as the best British genre offering to emerge this decade.

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