Ian Somerhalder, a.k.a. Lost’s Boone, has landed himself a starring role on the CW pilot Vampire Diaries. According to Variety, he’ll play Damon, “a smug vampire who can go from playful to evil in a split second.” The show is based on a pre-Twilight series of young-adult novels by L.J. Smith in which a female high school student falls for a vampire named Stefan (of course, he’s named Stefan), who has bad blood with his older brother Damon (of course, it’s over a vamp they both bedded in Renaissance Italy.) The show will be exec produced by Kevin Williamson (Dawson’s Creek, Scream), so we’re counting on the human to be articulate and pop-culturally proficient and for there to be some image that will make me us pee our pants.

I think this could be the role Somerhalder was born to play. Just look at that smirk face.

Yes?

P.S. Somerhalder is going to age well…like Rob Lowe well.

…more Robert Pattinson »

TV Viewers may find themselves with another Robert Pattinson to feast on when Ian Somerhalder – of Lost fame – joins the cast of Warner Bros’ Vampire Diaries.

The actor – who made a splash (literally) as Boone in the first season of the ABC show – will play Damon, “a smug vampire who can go from playful to evil in a split second”, reports Variety.

He will star alongside Zach Roerig (Friday Night Lights), Kayla Ewell (Entourage), Nina Dobrev (Degrassi: The Next Generation) and Steven R. McQueen (Minutemen).

Like our Rob, Ian is also fond of keeping his pretty locks under a black wooly hat

Last week when we wrote about fan furor in Vancouver around the shooting of vampire sequel “New Moon,” we suggested another production could sneak in under the radar and get a lot of work done while local teens were distracted. And look, someone was listening! Specifically, the CW, which is moving in with its own vampire show.

The network behind Gossip Girl recently ordered a pilot called “The Vampire Diaries,” based on a ’90s YA series by L.J. Smith about a girl in a small town who falls in love with the mysterious new guy in town only to discover that he is a, say it, vampire. “Dawson’s Creek” creator Kevin Williamson is executive producing and “LOST”’s Ian Somerhalder has been cast as one of the vampires. And guess who was just spotted hanging out in Vancouver this week? So the network isn’t just jumping on the bandwagon, it’s biting the scene too.

The latest locations for “New Moon” — which will probably have to switch high schools after news of its setting up in one suburban school hit the internets — probably haven’t already been added to Vancouver Movie Tours‘ three-hour backlot tour, but the minibus-based group pairs footage from movies like “X-Men” and other CW project “Smallville” with their real-life locales. Bonus: Way fewer screaming teens at each stop.