“No Country for Old Vamps” takes us back to October 1987 when Fred and Deloris are high school students, Deloris dealing with the death of her dad at the hands of a monster and Fred dealing with the death of his brother, at his hands. We see what will become the loving couple as youngsters out on their first kill, they started out hunting solo but, when Fred finds himself in a bit of a jam and face to face with a monster and Deloris killing the beast with her to save him. Then, in a twisted act of romance Fred reaches into the monster’s stomach and pulls out Deloris’s father’s badge and hands it to her, which in my opinion was way better than flowers for such an unconventional first date.

We then get transported back to the future as the Allen family works out the details of staying in Barrington for the twins senor year and Fred’s mother moving in with them and get to meet this seasons big bad who is the newly released from the water female monster we met at the end of the first episode who seems to be just fine and hunting down Presidio agents and headed straight for the Harlow House where they’re staying. The kids are working at fitting in at their new high school and adjusting to spending their senior year in a Tim Burton town.

WHAT WORKED: The family and high school dynamics are realistic and rung true, everything about the family was authentic and well thought out, including the callbacks to Deloris and Fred’s past and the way that they each chose to deal with it. The kids come off as bratty but, also respectful and loved and they’re acting age-appropriate without resorting to the one-dimensional teen archetype formula that most shows use as a statement of fact.

I also really liked the humanization of the “monsters” that was a continuation from the pilot episode where the Ad Vamp tried to appeal to Fred’s humanity. In a world where Presidio kills all monsters, you have to believe that just like when it comes to humans, not all of them are evil and some of them might just be trying to survive. This humanization continued in this episode as we are introduced to Alice Harlow, the lady from the lake, and while we don’t have the full story we can see the pain on her face which makes me wonder if Presidio created the monsters that they hunt by treating them all the same.

WHAT DIDN’T: The “outing” in the lunchroom. Don’t get me wrong, I am sure that small towns are notorious for this type of thing, calling someone a “homo” and having it be a sting but, in this instance, it was a weird jump to go from him knowing personal stuff about a teacher having an affair to calling him gay in the cafeteria. Those two don’t mesh and there is no line straight, jagged, curved or circular that would lead to that happening in that way. I kind of felt like the writers wanted to drive home Geoff’s gay reveal that they slid in the pilot and chose the sloppiest and laziest way to do it and if that wasn’t their intention the alternative logic is worse because that would mean they used his sexuality to add tension to the story which is lazy and offensive. While I acknowledge small-town prejudices, I can’t accept that that was what made Geoff an outcast like his social awkward sister when there was no lead up to anyone appearing to care about his sexuality. I also didn’t get why a video of Geoff being called a skin peeling monster would end up on the internet and why it would upset him.

BEST MOMENT: (There’s a spoiler in between the two pictures so if you haven’t seen the episode yet, you might want to scroll down)

The big reveal that dear old dad/grandpa Sam is ALIVE and being held at a Presidio Guantanamo until they can find out more details of what he was hiding in Seth’s room and what is coming to kill them all!

EPISODE’S MVP: This episode introduced a new character named Cathy (“Cat”) and she is EVERYTHING. She’s an awkward nerd girl who alternates between spouting super nerdy references and philosophical observations and I am all the way here for it. She acts as a high school sensei for Viv and helps her find a “fortress of solitude” in an abandoned room where they can hang out and start, for lack of a better word, coven on students who are done with the high school hierarchy. She is headstrong, smart, quirky and her true self at all times and she’s written in a way that makes her seem real and authentic. They didn’t make her the cliched nerdy best friend or comic relief, she’s a well fleshed out character who holds her own and is something for all the “weird” girls to believe in so, while she wasn’t a monster slayer or a badass in the traditional sense of the world in this kind of show, she was a treat and a welcome addition to the cast.

Overall: 8.7