'Circle of Ei8ht' Trailer Freaks Us Out on MySpace

Paramount Digital’s Circle of Ei8ht just released a trailer on MySpace, setting up for the online premiere of the series on October 27. We took an in-depth look at the myriad of moving pieces that brought this project together in our Anatomy of a Deal feature on Circle of Ei8ht back in August.

The supernatural series stars stars Austin Highsmith as Jessica, a newcomer to the City of Angels, who just moved into a loft on the eighth floor of a spooky downtown building called The Dante. It sounds something like a haunted Melrose Place,

with her neighbors all being twenty-something good looking bohemians. Naturally, there are some gruesome deaths going down in this place and for some reason Jessica takes it upon herself, and her beefy neighbor Evan (Ryan Doom) to solve them. Joining her on the cast are Road Trip’s skinny man DJ Quall, Katie Lowes, Natashia Williams, Josh Kelly and John Bishop.

The show’s site on MySpace is custom built, and promises several levels of interaction with the story—hidden clues, mobile content, an online game and, most interestingly, a whole subplot where the audience directly controls the fate of the characters. “Find the clues, unlock the mystery and choose wisely… or people will die,” says the show’s tag line.

This is one of the first new web series made for MySpace in a while, following a management shuffle at the company that slowed down movement on that end. Sure, we lambasted MySpace last month for their reporting of auto-plays of BFF as views, but this one isn’t just a glorified ad campaign. It’s a full-on entertainment property, with no less than five companies actively involved in its creation, including lead sponsor Mountain Dew who was involved creatively from the beginning of the project.

The first four episodes of Circle of Ei8ht debut October 27 exclusively on MySpace, with weekly episode releases after that through December 8.