Vampires, get off my lawn!

[lesbiassparrow]

Is there some sort of new internet law that every time someone mentions a vampire film/book/theme park/whatever horrific contribution to vampire fetishes someone is coming up with next, they have to say 'Forget Twilight'? And then they go on to describe things that if you read Twilight there is no chance that you'd be interested in?

And much as I think Twilight is filled with the WTFness of the first degree, most of the other stuff that is touted as amazing and entirely the way vampires should be depicted sounds almost equally dreadful. And, sadly, more boring (say what you like about Twilight it keeps me endlessly entertained). That may be because I am ready for vampires to be retired as a way to explore the human condition or whatever else people say they are exploring. Seriously, they're not that interesting: They eat people. They live forever or a really long time until some rightminded person comes along and stakes them. That's it, people. They're like human shaped, long-lived, man-eating lions. Who may or may not be able to go out in sunlight, depending on what crappy vampire novel they're in.

Also, introducing a more manly, killer vampire doesn't make your character necessarily better than Edward (though I will admit the odds are surely in your favour). It just makes him more manly and killer. That, in itself, is not inherently interesting and better.

Comments

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

Mitchell is WOUNDED at your indifference. :)

I think vampires in general are fascinating. I'm just not usually very impressed with how they are depicted these days. Obvious exceptions excluded, of course.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Weeellll. I do sort of make an exception for Mitchell. Mainly because I rather like the mundanity of his life: working as a hospital orderly, making cups of tea (though that is really Annie), trying to get on with the neighbours, etc.

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

It's funny because I just now watched the original pilot on YouTube, and they had a different actor playing Mitchell (and Annie, too). And he just didn't work for me at all. One of the things I love about Mitchell is how he is so believably ordinary but can switch so easily to look dangerous and predatory without really even moving. The original Mitchell never seemed able to pull off the ordinary part. And he really did look like he'd gotten thrown out of the Bauhaus for being TOO goth. I didn't like the original Annie, either. The whole tone of it was a lot more....goth. It was interesting to watch, though.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I saw the pilot first and I have to say that I didn't at first like the replacements for either Mitchell or Annie. Though with Mitchell they didn't seem to have rewritten the character for the new actor, I thought they had a bit with Annie. But by the end of the series I was very much on board with the actors. (Though I think they took a fair while to sort out what they wanted to do with Annie. Longer than with the guys.)

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

I do feel like Annie just sort of floats along for awhile. I persuaded my aunt to watch it, and she's undecided on the show because she isn't sure she likes Annie. I'm glad that they didn't make her quite as agoraphobic (agraphobic?) as in the pilot.

They didn't change Mitchell much but it felt to me like they did because honestly I'd never see the first Mitchell without feeling like he's a little creepy. They play the role so differently.

Just as an aside, have you noticed that Mitchell eats all the time? There's got to be a reason for it, no one on tv ever eats unless there's a specific reason for it, like they're being a slob or depressed and chowing down, or it's a specific dinner scene or something. Mitchell is ALWAYS munching on something. His first scene in the house, he's eating pizza, and then all through the series. Even down to the last episode, he's scarfing down cereal in the last scene.

[lycomingst.livejournal.com]

It could be worse; it could be a fascination with werewolves. There'd be an endless parade of stories about how they smell, and grooming stories and about venture capitalist werewolves trying to corner the market on silver mines.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

venture capitalist werewolves trying to corner the market on silver mines.

*snort* You know, that might be a welcome relief. SciFi should totally make one of their crappy movies about that.

[chelseagirl47.livejournal.com]

Even the New York Times, which surely ought to know better, ran a piece the other day on the enduring appeal of vampires and blah, blah by Guillermo del Toro and his co-author. Blah blah Polidori . . . blah blah Stoker . . . blah blah contemporary phenomenon.

Although they did NOT mention Twilight at all, which was rather a relief. M. and I are being separately peer-pressured about True Blood but . . . we'll see.

Stay strong!

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Although they did NOT mention Twilight at all, which was rather a relief.

While it is a relief, it strikes me as a bit, well, incomplete. Even if you don't like Twilight it does have a horrifically popular presence and shows how flexible the whole vampire appeal is. Though I guess as its primary audience is female then maybe it is not considered important enough for discussion.

(What I do find amusing is the amount of people who keep thinking that if only Twilight fans could be introduced to X vampire story they'd realise how crappy it. Sorry, I don't think it quite works like that.)

Re: Stay strong!

[chelseagirl47.livejournal.com]

But the article contains so many obligatory references as it is, I actually found it a relief to find one missing . . .

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

I confess I've loved vampires since I first read Dracula, and I think some of the appeal for me is because they're immortal man-shaped people-eating lions (hee) - and it's the same explanation for the popularity of Alpha heroes in romance: if you can tame this guy, you're one hell of a woman.

That said, the one really and truly different vampire I've come across in the last few years is Constantine in Patricia McKinley's Sunshine. He's really gross in so many ways, but he's also (imo) incredibly compelling and even sexy.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I like Dracula because it's a rip-roaring story. And there is some effort at showing how really quite distasteful on a visceral level Dracula is; Stoker makes him inhuman because he's doing what humans aren't supposed to - eat other people.

I know you're right about the whole ultimate alpha hero thing, but I always come back to wanting to say to the heroine "you know you're in love with a serial killer, right? Odds are not in your favour, lady."

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, you're absolutely right on any logical level, and I'd never really want to meet/date/shag/marry one, but on some subconscious level it's a trope that works for me, the way the Bridget Jones-style heroine works for some people and is a total turn-off for me. It's the kind of thing that's not really defensible, it simply is.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I think it's like my current spies thing - I know on any sensible level one is surely screwed up in some way if this is your career choice and I find the politics of Spooks absolutely horrifying, but their manly anguish is immensely entertaining to me.

ETA: which makes me think I ought to do 'what would be the worst real life boyfriend but in fiction makes you 'oooh! that's attractive' poll.

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

Oh God I loved that book. Constantine was really interesting. The only thing that bugged me about that book was the main character's tendency to dwell on the philosophical implications of cinnamon buns every three paragraphs.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I didn't mind the baking. I did mind the insistence that I was never going to have cinnamon buns as good as hers which reach some Platonic ideal of bunness. It made me feel a) hungry and b) like there was no point of going out to buy buns because they would only be an inferior, shadowy sort.

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

It wasn't the baking, it was that she was always on about them. It was like "Oh for CRYING OUT LOUD you're thinking about fucking cinnamon buns again?! You're hanging out with a vampire that other vampires want to kill, isn't there something more relevant you could be pondering?"

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

Yes, me too. I got it the first time she told me she showed love by feeding the world, blah blah. But the overall world and the vampires were really cool. I wish she'd do a follow-up.

[fivil.livejournal.com]

I recently saw a Swedish movie you might've heard of called Låt de rätte komma in (Let the right one in) which had a pretty original, fresh take on the whole vampire thing. I've never been a huge fan of the vampire lore (apart from reading Der Kleine Vampir, a German book series as a kid) and something I'm sick to death of is the whole basic sexuality/sexual desire/control of sexual desires intertwining with vampires, whether it's Mormon abstaining vampires ala Twilight or something else (like Angel on Buffy turning evil post-sex). So to see a movie that was like "uhh, nothing sexual about sucking blood here!", it was really awesome.

I think why people say "forget Twilight" is because Twilight's messed with the essentials of vampire lore, and to those who like them, that's pretty blasphemous, especially when it isn't done well. Like, LTROI messes with some essentials of the lore but carries out others creatively and interestingly. So people are down with that.

I do agree with you vampirs aren't that interesting. But those who like them, I assume, would feel Twilight is an abodomation of their beloved fictional tradition.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I've heard of it, but as part of my attempt to do my personal bit in ignoring the whole vampire obsession I haven't seen it. Plus, I guess I'm just not that interested in vampires in general (probably why I don't get the outrage over Twilight screwing with the lore. It has sooo many other problems that getting upset over that would go pretty far down the list. Edward's sparkling are the least of his issues. :p)

Mainly, I just long for the old days when people killed vampires. Good times. Good times.

[salamandersam.livejournal.com]

Let the Right One In (though I respect your staying away from vampire flicks)is an excellent movie. For myself, it focused more on loneliness and bullying than vampires.

[kittenscurious.livejournal.com]

I actually really quite like the vampire trope, I always have for no discernible reason, but for me, the fact that SMeyer has messed with the essentials of the lore is VERY far down on my list of issues with the series (except, sparkling?! really?!?). A few years ago, I might have had a bigger issue with it, but when Troy came out and all the Classicists in the world were pissed off about them messing with Homer, one of the Classics professors at my school, said, "You know what? I loved it because I can accept that since the Iliad is really only a myth/legend/lore, someone who wants to tell this story can rework it any way they see fit." Which is a viewpoint that makes a lot of sense and allows one to enjoy all manner of books/movies/tv shows even if it isn't "canonical". (See: Merlin, X-3/Wolverine).

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

the fact that SMeyer has messed with the essentials of the lore is VERY far down on my list of issues with the series

Yes! I mean the books have so many other issues, it strikes me that whatever she has done with vampires comes wayyy down the list. Plus, vampire mythos or whatever you call it, has never been terribly stable or consistent as far as I know. (Do you know that Roman vampires were old women who turned into birds and sucked babies' blood?) I have to admit I do sort of cherish the sparkling for the hilarity and amusement it has brought to so many people.

As for Troy, while I didn't like the film, that was mainly because I found it boring and not a terribly interesting revision of the story rather than because it messed with the Homeric version. Plus, I sort of think that like Alexander they cut out a large amount of the stuff that made the story interesting in favour of rather boring exposition. But that's an issue of poor adaptation rather than adaptation in and of itself.

Read this article yesterday

[aikakone.livejournal.com]

I thought it was good. Don't know if you will, but it does mention Angel and Buffy.

http://www.slate.com/id/2223486/ [Vampires Suck by Grady Hendrix]

Re: Read this article yesterday

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Oh, that is excellent. Thanks for the link.

THERE ARE TOO MANY EMO VAMPIRES AND NOT ENOUGH STAKING.

[calixa.livejournal.com]

I have never and never will like vampire fiction. Unless they are evil in it. And get stakes driven into them. Then I'm for it.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

You know, I feel that there is a deep need to return to the honest, moral values of the past regarding vampires and the necessity for their staking.

That guy from Vampire Secretary could be first.

[calixa.livejournal.com]

I always feel the need to defend Vampire Secretary. Then I remember I don't actually like Vampire Secretary. So it's all systems go on the hating!!

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Well, if you want we can stake the guy in Vampire Secretary last. My gift to you.