Moonlight

A short-lived Vampire Detective Series that ran from 2007 to 2008 on CBS. Some saw it as a shameless ripoff of several other vampire shows. It started to develop its own mythology, but was cancelled before it could really find its footing. It's notable that while critics panned the acting and dialogue, almost everyone was agreed that side character Josef Kostan was a real gem.

The show revolves around Mick St. John, a 90 year old private investigator (though thanks to vampirism, he looks pretty good for his age). Despite being turned well over 50 years ago, Mick still has some angst about being a vampire, and refuses to kill for food. He has no qualms killing bad guys or other vampires, though. He also has some surprising hang-ups regarding a pretty young blonde...

Not to be confused with Moonlight Lady. Or Moonlighting.

Tropes used in Moonlight include:

• AO Negative: Beth
• Back from the Dead: Coraline
• Badass Longcoat: Mick
• Black and Gray Morality: Evil definitely exists in the form of some brutal vampires and even humans. But our protagonists, even cute and innocent Beth, aren't afraid to kill...even humans.
• Can't Grow Up
• Deadpan Snarker: Josef
  • "Sorry, not questioning your loyalties. Vampire solidarity. Rah, rah, rah and all that."
  • "Hey, you have a soft spot for the mortal ones. A fascination with all the charming things they do, while listening to the 'tick, tick, tick' of their own looming demise. That's fine. That's good. Everyone needs a hobby."
  • "You seriously drink this stuff? What is it, like, non-fat, soy, vegan blood?"
  • "Hey look. I know you have morals and scruples and that's fine, sort of."
  • Hell, EVERYTHING Josef says falls in this category.
• Emergency Transformation: Mick refuses to do this for Beth's boyfriend, saying "It's not life." She calls him on this at the end of the episode, pointing out that, obviously, he seems to find it preferable to being dead. (Note that we'll never really know for sure whether he does or not, as he was never offered a choice.)
• Flash Back: To Mick's past, all the time.
• Fleur-de-Lis
• I Hate You Vampire Wife
• In Medias Res: Multiple episodes
• Immortal Immaturity: A teenage vampire was featured in one episode.
• Killed Off for Real: Josh
• Mayfly-December Romance: Mick and Beth
• Moral Dissonance: Mick murders people throughout the course of the show.
  • Beth also let vampires kill a paparazzo because he threatened Mick.
• Murder by Cremation: In the episode "Doctor Feelgood", a newly-turned vampire goes rabid and kills a lot of random people (including his wife). Being a doctor, he goes back to his hospital, where Mick tracks him down and stakes him (which only paralyses vampires). He then feeds him to the cremation oven at the morgue downstairs.
• Never Found the Body: Coraline
• Older Than They Look: Most of the vampires are in their 20s and 30s. Their actual ages are occasionally measured in centuries.
• Our Vampires Are Different: They can become human again with a specific drug, though the effects don't last. While they mention an aversion to sunlight, Mick is often seen in daylight. It seems as long as he shades his eyes, he's fine. In reality, as long as he doesn't stay out too long, he'll be fine. Sunlight acts more like a poison than an incinerator.
  • Vampires also and have a pulse. Staking them causes paralysis, but burning and beheading seem to be the only ways to eliminate them.
  • Ironically , the sunlight and the paralysing stake is actually more "true" to the Vampires of the original Dracula than any other of the modern vampires.
  • Vampires are allergic to silver, which is actually a neat way of reconciling the whole silver bullet thing with the vampires' lack of reflections in mirrors (which are, or at least used to be, backed with silver) and that you can't take a photograph of them (silver salts in film emulsion).
    • Which apparently means you can take a digital photo of a vampire with no problems.
• Recycled in Space: Forever Knight...in the United States.
• Silver Has Mystic Powers: Film and mirrors made with it can't picture vampires.
• To Become Human: Mick and Coraline take the steps towards this.
• Shout-Out: Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeroooooooooooooooooooooooy Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenkiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnsssssss!!
• Unexplained Recovery: Coraline
• Vampire Bites Suck
• Vampire Detective Series (obviously)
• Vampires Are Sex Gods: At least Josef is...
  • AND HOW!
• Vegetarian Vampire
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Josef and Mick rag on each other quite a bit
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: averted, as humans are killed too
• Your Vampires Suck: One of the first things mentioned in the first episode is that many of the stereotypical ways of killing vampires don't work. Crosses don't kill them and, in Mick's own words, if you were to spray Holy Water on him, the only thing that would happen is that he'd get wet.