VC Andrews’ Dawn Review: Part 1
The end of this Lifetime limited series leaves you wanting to tune into the next part, but that’s after a lackluster beginning and middle. You want to continue to see if it gets better. VC Andrews’ Dawn Part 1 offers some familiar elements but feels almost like a parody of the other movies.
Lifetime and the VC Andrews library have created a successful franchise full of staple elements, such as melodrama, light gothic, and tons of incest. They are soapy fun.
However, VC Andrews’ Dawn Part 1 has all these aspects but none of the fun.
In fact, you may often find yourself checking how much longer this episode has left. Frankly, it’s boring at times.
The fact that this feels like a copy and paste of other Lifetime VC Andrews limited series and movies is the main issue with VC Andrews Dawn Part 1. It doesn’t add anything new or necessary, but instead capitalizes on a familiar format.
Lifetime has been so successful with this franchise because fans of them enjoy the familiarity, but they may also not just want carbon copies of the same story.
And they’ve been successful many times in the past, just recently the Flowers in the Attic: The Origin limited series manages to utilize the winning formula and still add compelling entries into this franchise.
Dawn doesn’t offer anything fresh, new, or captivating because it feels like someone collected parts of every other VC Andrews book and put them in a blender. It may look the same but doesn’t have the same taste or satisfaction.
This is the first VC Andrews book series that is written entirely by VC Andrews’ ghostwriter Andrew Neiderman, and that may be why this story feels more like something inspired by Andrews without quite feeling true to the author.
Neiderman also entirely wrote the Ruby series, but they work better as a Lifetime limited series. This could be because the series comes after he becomes comfortable writing his own version of Andrews’ novels.
Whatever the reason, VC Andrew Dawn Part 1 doesn’t offer enough interesting elements to justify the adaptation of this story.
Perhaps this story doesn’t work because the motives of the characters aren’t known yet. Lillian’s cruelty feels unreasonable because we don’t know her purpose or background.
With Olivia, we can understand the motive of her wickedness and later learn her origin.
Additionally, Dawn has not one but two incestuous romances. They both seem pointless and dull.
Incest is never necessary or romantic (in my opinion) but in Flowers in the Attic and even Ruby, you come to understand how it could happen — not knowing related/being trapped with someone during the vital hormonal years.
Philip’s obsession with his sister seems way out of the realm of believability, especially when they dated only briefly. Then Jimmy’s attraction to his adopted/kidnapped sister feels creepy. He immediately switches off thinking of her as a sister to wanting to pursue a romance.
You don’t want her to end up with either of her brothers. Additionally, you end up wanting Philip thrown in prison.
Also, it’s hard to believe the entire Cutler family lacks a spine. Lillian doesn’t elicit enough venom to warrant the amount of fear and control she has over her family.
The payday from following her rules doesn’t seem big enough for all that.
VC Andrews’ Dawn delivers the same tropes, themes, but without enough substance to make it work like the other films in this Lifetime movie collection.
However, the other three parts may offer something different that makes them worth watching, but, for now, it’s a cheesy, carbon copy that’s not that interesting, fun, or even extremely bad in an entertaining way.
Lifetime has done better many times before, so let’s hope it can turn things around for the next parts. If not, this is going to be four long episodes.
What did you think of this episode of Dawn? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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VC Andrews’ Dawn airs Saturdays at 8/7c on Lifetime.
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Jerrica Tisdale
Jerrica Tisdale is your favorite neighborhood pop culture junkie. She will annoy you with random TV and film facts, while complaining about whatever is the hottest new book. She has been a TV fan all her life but writing about it for over a decade. You may find her work all over the internet especially reality TV rants. She is a senior writer at Tell-Tale TV.
3 comments
Horrible from start to finish. People do not behave the way these characters do and if they did somebody would get slapped really quickly. It’s just ridiculous!!
I’m watching the rebroadcast of Part 1. They already cut some scenes. The tube scene and the attempted rape scene. Did they already get flack from the FCC? The plot thickens.
The main problem with Lifetime’s “Dawn” for me was the rushed plot. The storyline didn’t even have a chance to develop. It was presented in fast foward and made little sense. It was boring the way it was presented as well.
In the first scenes, you are introduced to the Longchamps and they are a happy sing-a-long family. Umm, no. That’s not the temperature of the family in the book. They are poor. They are on the run. They are hungry. Ormand frequents bars, he scowls often, he gets hot under the collar quickly, and he wastes the family’s grocery budget. Who is Ormand in this on-screen version? Much sobered, much nicer, and off character. Also, the man playing Ormand is far too young to be a father of a 14 and 16 y.o. I don’t remember the author mentioning a NYC (Brooklyn) accent for someone born and bred in Georgia. Casting director, what happened?
Why, for what purpose is Clara Sue renamed Clara Jean? Did the screen writer even read the book? Why is there such a 1990 vibe in the dialogue and acting? The plot takes place in the 1970’s. And why is Sally Jean’s hair blond and Jimmy’s medium brown, when the book states, “Momma and Jimmy had the same shimmering black hair and dark eyes?”
The actress who plays Dawn is not a convincing 14 y.o. and her professional singing voice overrides the nature-given talent Dawn is described as having. The song she sang was supposed to be “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” by the way. Donna Mills does a decent job playing the grandmother, but because of the lack of backstory of her jealousy of Laura Sue we don’t understand her strong character.
All in all, this version of “Dawn” is a pass. I am not even looking forward to the other parts of the series. I think I will skip the rest and just read the books over.
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