YMMV / Kindred: The Embraced

• Audience-Alienating Premise: The show blended Soap Opera with a cop show, leading Soap Opera fans to be turned off by the cops show trappings and overwhelmingly male cast and cop show fans to be turned off by the soapy melodrama. Additionally, many fans of the source material were turned off by the heavy changes in tone and setting. It's no wonder the show was met with abysmal ratings and lasted just eight episodes.
• Broken Base: Vampire: The Masquerade fans either loved the show or hated it. Admittedly, even the ones who liked it tended to view it as Camp.
• Complete Monster:
  • Eddie Fiori, the Brujah Primogen of San Francisco, is Prince Julian Luna's arch-nemesis for most of the show. A callous and power-hungry mobster, Fiori seeks to overthrow Luna by orchestrating a war between the clans, starting by executing the Gangrel Primogen and ordering a drive-by shooting against a crowded Toreador club. A Bad Boss to his own clan, Fiori is happy to throw his right-hand man under the bus and use the Brujah as Cannon Fodder in the war that he wants to ignite.
  • "Romeo and Juliet": The unnamed Ventrue pediatrician is the cruel head doctor of a children's hospital. Feeding exclusively on his own patients, he turns the hospital into his personal blood-farm, keeping the sickly children malnourished and in constant fear of him. When Prince Julian Luna—who tries to give a fair trial to every vampire—learns the extent of the horrible conditions at the hospital, he immediately sentences the doctor to Final Death.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Julian proved to be a far more popular character over Frank with viewers and critics alike. One of the major changes that were planned for Season 2 was having Frank written out and Julian made the lead. It is also the reason why Showtime didn't simply recast the character or write in a new one when Mark Frankel died.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Mark Frankel, the man whose untimely death prevented the show from making a Channel Hop to Showtime, played a member of the living dead on the show.
• The Scrappy: Frank. One critic remarked that his character felt like a transplant from a bad cop movie. Howell's less-than-stellar acting didn't help much either. Plans for the scrapped 2nd season largely involved removing him and making Julian the lead.
• What Could Have Been: Word of God says that had the show returned for a second season, elements such as the Malkavians, the Tremere, werewolves, and the Sabbat would have been gradually introduced.