YMMV / First Kill

• Actor Shipping: Many viewers were so taken by the chemistry between Cal and Juliette that they found themselves wanting Imani and Sarah Catherine to date in real life. This also applies to Elizabeth (Margot) and Aubin (Talia) to a lesser degree.
• Adorkable: Cal's attempts to come off as a stoic badass, in conjunction with those moments where she's head over heels for Juliette, make her this. Compare this to Juliette, who is more definitively Endearingly Dorky.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Is Elinor a somewhat controlling but well-meaning sister who's trying to help Juliette find her path or a manipulative monster who ruins people's lives just because she can?
  • Is Juliette ultimately an innocent pawn in a game she never wanted to be part of, who just wants to be normal? Or is she complicit in the pain and destruction her family causes and lacking the self-awareness to realize it?
  • Does Cal really love Juliette? She clearly has a soft spot for her, but all it takes is one miscalculation, one accident, and she immediately stopped seeing Jules as a person. How can you love someone if your recognition of their personhood is so conditional?
  • Was Oliver always the menace his parents fear him to be? Or did being betrayed by his sister and abandoned by his parents and legacy society at large cause him to take on a Then Let Me Be Evil path? There's also a theory that Carmen had something to do with it.
• Awesome Moments:
  • Talia taking off the shambler's head with a pair of daggers.
  • Juliette and Cal beating Cook down.
  • Juliette secretly sleeping over at Cal's house.
  • Elinor getting everything that's coming to her after Juliette sells her out to Oliver.
• Catharsis Factor:
  • After spending the last part of 1x03 and a large part of 1x04 hounding and even attacking Cal (as well as Ben who wasn't even involved), it's so satisfying to see Juliette mop the floor with him.
  • Watching Elinor be forced to face the consequences of numerous murders and face Oliver for framing him and getting him exiled, however much one may enjoy her character, is all too worthy of praise.
• Cliché Storm: Many critics called the show predictable, especially given it's a campy story about Star-Crossed Lovers that ultimately plays out just as one would expect such a story to.
• Crack Pairing: There's a small subset of fans that ship Juliette with Tess, despite them never even meeting. Funnily enough, the actresses themselves have voiced support on Instagram for the idea of a love triangle.
• Critical Dissonance: 61% Critical score vs 89% Audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. Fans appreciated the lore of the world and campiness of the show, while critics didn't like it for the bad CGI and what was felt as unfinished worldbuilding.
• Director Displacement: V.E. Schwab is credited as "Created by", but she only wrote the short story the show is based on. While she was present in the writers room she did not contribute much, and the showrunner proper is Felicia D. Henderson.
• Draco in Leather Pants: Elinor is a sociopath who manipulated her brother into committing gruesome murders and then manipulated their family into excommunicating him (all for the fun of it),and tries to goad her sister into forsaking her humanity and becoming a ruthless killer. But her fans tend to downplay her dark deeds and even blame Oliver for being "stupid" enough to be manipulated (at such a young age).
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Tess isn't a major character and disappears after 1x04, but many fans enjoyed her presence and hoped to see her make a big impact on the story in later episodes.
• Fandom Rivalry: A minor one with Heartstopper, another queer Netflix series released in the same year. Some have argued that Heartstopper getting more promotion from Netflix and lots of media attention doesn't seem fair when you compare it to First Kill, which got very little attention before its premiere and didn't even get official social media accounts. Others pointed out that Heartstopper was adapted from a very popular comic series and was aimed at younger audiences, meaning that it was always going to be more popular than First Kill, which is based off a little-known short story and won't appeal to audiences who don't like horror.
• The Firefly Effect: While many people found the show's premise to be enticing, Netflix's recent cancellation record had been cemented by the time of its premiere. As a result, some avoided checking the show out altogether in order to avoid being disappointed again. What didn't help matters was that the story and lore of the show got more complex over time, which signaled to many that they needed to be intellectually invested to some degree in order to really appreciate it, something that tends to get shows cancelled. This is but one of a few reasons why less than half of viewers completed the show within the first month, however.
• Foe Yay Shipping: While Cal and Juliette are the main couple, their mothers Talia and Margot get plenty of attention as well, despite them hating each other. All the scenes with them together are very tense and include many held gazes and forced social niceties, and many viewers like to interpret that as attraction.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • There are plenty of people who like Heartstopper and First Kill equally, sometimes for the same reasons there's a rivalry. Both are queer shows on Netflix that debuted in 2022, and many hope the positive buzz from Heartstopper can carry over to First Kill. There's also an appreciation that there can be two notable queer shows in two very different genres, instead of them all being pigeonholed into a single concept.
  • With The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself, for sharing POC queer lead characters, as well as a joint bitterness against Netflix for cancelling both shows after a single season.
  • With Warrior Nun as well, with both shows having supernatural elements centering around queer characters. The shows being cancelled by Netflix probably helped too.
• He Really Can Act: For his first acting gig, Jason Dylan Allen does a pretty good job of portraying realization, revulsion, confusion, fear, curiosity, and disbelief all while maintaining a comedic undertone while Ben watches Juliette kill Cook and learns that she's a vampire.
• It's Not Supposed to Win Oscars: Multiple critics panned the show for it being a vastly unserious and campy show with a low budget. The most common response is that it's more of a Spiritual Successor to projects like The Twilight Saga and that it knows it's supposed to be entertaining as opposed to life-changing. Schwab has also said herself that it was meant to allow newer audiences to finally experience tropes, dynamics and archetypes that so many before have already seen a thousand times and take for granted. It's also brought up that the low budget is not the show's fault.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: Double subverted. While anyone familiar with a Starcrossed Lovers story would've foreseen that something would ruin the relationship between Juliette and Cal, most were still saddened and disappointed that it happened anyway at the end and didn't subvert those expectations. The show clearly wasn't meant to end like this, but because it was cancelled, this disappointment is what it leaves on.
• Jerks Are Worse Than Villains: Say what you will about Oliver planning to overrun Savannah with monsters or Elinor being a gleeful serial killer, but Jack choosing to kill Theo after he was turned seems to resonate with many more viewers, reminding them of what it's like to have loved ones turn against them just for turning out to be different, especially queer. He even tells Talia that Theo is not his son.
• LGBT Fanbase: This is a given, considering the story centers around a lesbian pairing, but what really helps is that this is established from the very beginning, is treated as perfectly normal, is allowed to develop, and, most notably in the case of Cal and Juliette, has nothing to do with why a large portion of the other characters are/would be against their romance. This tends to garner notable praise, especially from queer viewers. And that's without even mentioning Ben's escapades with Noah or the Foe Yay Shipping of Talia and Margot.
• Like You Would Really Do It:
  • Cal staking Juliette was a surprise that many refused to believe actually happened unless the show were to introduce some sort of crazy resurrection methods, as to murder one of the romantic leads within the first episode would be unwise. As it turns out, Juliette is simply too hardy for a wooden stake to be the end of her.
  • Many called out the staking of Margot and Sebastian in 1x04, as to murder Juliette's family early on was highly unlikely. Once again, legacies are just too difficult to kill after all, though Sebastian has a much more difficult time recovering.
  • When Talia agreed to let Jack kill vampire!Theo near the end of 1x08, many viewers called that she wouldn't actually do it. Sure enough, the next time we cut to the Burns family, Jack is realizing that she's driving Theo somewhere safe.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "You ate... my mother...?"^ExplanationMargot's hilariously awkward and confused response to learning Sebastian ate Davina
  • "Who's the vampire here?"^ExplanationFans often ask this, usually by 1x06, in reference to how Cal is always the first to give Juliette kisses on her neck, even though Juliette is the vampire
• Moe: Juliette.
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • Cook. Attacking Cal? Bad enough. Attacking Juliette? Technically his job. Attacking Ben? Crossed the line.
  • Elinor revealing that not only did she betray her brother, she did it just for funsies made it clear that she's beyond hope.
  • Many view Jack deciding Theo no longer has the right to exist simply because he's a vampire now as a step too far, displaying just how much he prioritizes his personal hatred of monsters over the life of his own family.
• Narm Charm:
  • Sebastian eating Davina comes out of nowhere, but the sudden nature of it, over-the-top nature, and Margot's deadpan response when finding out have pushed it into the realm of camp for a lot of people.
  • Fans of the show readily admit that it's campy as anything, but they love it both in spite of it and because of it.
• Older Than They Think: This isn't the first time a popular work of fiction has depicted vampires, especially a heroic one, as descendants of Lilith. One older example is Vampirella back in 1969, a vampire who is strictly on the side of good and was the only vampire child Lilith ever had.
• Portmanteau Couple Name:
  • Cal and Juliette are referred to as "Calliette" (or "Caliette" with a single l) by shippers.
  • Those who ship Margot and Talia together often call them "Marlia".
  • Telliette is used for Juliette and Tess.
• Shocking Moments:
  • Juliette killing Cook.
  • Cal and Juliette having sex in the middle of a forest.
  • Sebastian eating Davina.
  • Apollo accidentally staking Theo.
• Signature Scene: Cal and Juliette's Seven Minutes In Heaven in 1x01. The scene spends a minute and a half establishing more firmly than any scene earlier in the episode that queer elements will not be hidden.
  • Cal and Juliette going at it in 1x04, largely because queer characters rarely get love scenes at all, let alone, ones so in-depth.
  • Sebastian eating Davina alive is treated as either horrifying or the most hilarious scene in the show, not to mention Margot's reaction.
  • Talia standing against Jack's desire to kill vampire!Theo, showing stepparents in a beautiful light.
• Signature Song: "Tug O War" by Shameka Dwight, played during Cal's confrontation on Juliette in 1x02.
• Special Effects Failure: In case it wasn't clear the show was given a low budget, the CGI used in the show is painfully obvious in every scene it's used in. CGI creatures like the "Shambler" monster from the first episode or the Queen Serpent have an awful cartoony quality to them. The CGI Queen Serpent doesn't even look like the live snake that's used as it in one scene - the shape of the head, the colors, and the pattern on its back are all wrong.
  • Special mention has to go to the CGI on the scene where Sebastian swallows Davina whole, as well as the editing of the moment in general. It seems as though post-production just wasn't quite sure what to do to make it look convincing.
• Spiritual Successor: The show is often compared to The Twilight Saga, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and even My Babysitter's a Vampire.
• Squick: When zombie!Ashley rips Noah's spine out.
• Strangled by the Red String: A common complaint from critics and some viewers is the lack of chemistry and development given to Jules and Cal, which is a problem when the show is marketed as a romance.
• Testosterone Brigade: The show mostly centers around women. Really attractive women. It's not hard to imagine that many male viewers would find interest.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: You'd think the show would've done more with Tess, Cal's ex and best friend, after finding out Cal sympathizes with vampires and seeing her parents murdered. Instead, she's taken away by the Guild and never heard from again in spite of a few mentions here and there. It doesn't help that we don't know if Cal ever found out that Tess' parents were killed. It's possible that she was going to return in the second season, but then the show was cancelled after the first.
• Unpopular Popular Character: Tess. While she disappears from the story halfway through after her parents are murdered, many fans enjoyed her character while she was around and found her story to be one worth exploring.
• Watched It for the Representation: Many fans immediately knew they were going to tune in upon learning that half of the more prominent characters were Black and the show would center around sapphic leads, one of whom being a dark-skinned African-American girl.

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