One thing I dearly love about genre fare is the way it can tackle social and political issues through an allegorical lens. Rod Serling made a career out of it, and oceans of ink have been spilled to pontificate on the deeper meaning of George A. Romero’s zombie movies. And in a similar vein, the new eight-part series Firebite looks at all manner of Indigenous issues, while telling a tale of renegade vampire hunters waging a covert war against the undead in outback Australia. Sound good? You’re not wrong, and here’s why.
Rob Collins as Tyson in ‘Firebite’. Credit: Ian Routledge/See-Saw Films/AMC+
Created by Warwick Thornton (Sweet Country, Samson and Delilah) and Brendan Fletcher (Mad Bastards) and set in South Australia’s beautiful but barren opal country (Coober Pedy subs in for the series’ fictional Opal City), Firebite posits that vampires were introduced to Australia by the British; 11 bloodsuckers being carried in the holds of the First Fleet for use in a kind of supernatural biological warfare against the Indigenous population.
In response came the rise of the Blood Hunters, a secret warrior society dedicated to wiping out the undead threat. When we come into the picture, they’ve done a pretty good job of it; only one of the original 11, the Vampire King (Callan Mulvey), remains at large, and is plotting a big comeback from his lair among the abandoned mineshafts and caves that dot the landscape around Opal City.
Tyson (Rob Collins) in a hidden cave. Credit: Ian Routledge/See-Saw Films/AMC+
Unluckily for him, he hasn’t counted on renegade Blood Hunter Tyson Walker (Rob Collins bringing plenty of larrikin charm to the table) and his ward and assistant, Shanika (Shantae Barnes-Cowan, once again fighting monsters after the recent Wyrmwood: Apocalypse), who have been picking off stray vampires and protecting their community for ages. And so, the stage is set for a bloody – and bloody funny at times – battle between good and evil.
While the subtext is sombre – the 11 OG vampires are a direct parallel to , allegedly used to cull the Indigenous population – in tone, Firebite draws more from the likes of The Lost Boys, Near Dark and From Dusk Till Dawn, delivering a rollicking, action-packed horror comedy that genre fans will lap up like fresh-spilt blood.
Shanika (Shantae Barnes-Cowan) and Tyson (Rob Collins) on the hunt. Credit: Ian Routledge/See-Saw Films/AMC+
Tyson and Shanika hare around the desert in a hotted-up Subaru, dispatching bloodsuckers with a boomerang and occasionally butting heads with Tyson’s old mentor, Jalingbirri (Kelton Pell), who disapproves of their reckless approach to undead extermination.
It’s all tremendous, gory fun – Firebite doesn’t skimp on blood or gore gags – with the relationship between the cocky Tyson and the tough but vulnerable Shanika comprising the emotional core of the series. Tough-talking Tyson may be a dab hand at vampire-slaying, but he struggles with being a mentor, while the orphaned Shanika is still traumatised by the death of her mother, a victim of a vampire back in the day. Generational trauma and the severance of family ties, painful issues among Indigenous Australians in the wake of the Stolen Generations, is a key theme here, giving considerable heft to Firebite’s propulsive action.
Shanika (Shantae Barnes-Cowan) and Tyson (Rob Collins): a crack vampire-slaying team. Credit: Ian Routledge/See-Saw Films/AMC+
Which isn’t to say that Firebite treats great matters lightly, but rather that Thornton and Fletcher have brewed up a perfectly balanced genre potion with this one, giving us a crackerjack monster-hunt that nonetheless is rooted in the Indigenous experience, infusing the ages-old vampire legend with – dare we say it? – fresh blood. Come for the vampire-slaying action, stay for the allegorical history lesson: Firebite is an absolute banger.
Firebite premieres at 9.30pm, Thursday 6 July on NITV with episodes available to stream after broadcast. The eight-part series continues weekly.
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Firebite - season 1 episode 1
