All vampire stories are romantic fantasies. Even Dracula was, at its heart, a romance novel. If you want to go earlier, you can look to Carmilla, by Sheridan Le Fanu, or even to the first acknowledged vampire story, The Vampyre, by John William Polidori. I can list more.
Twilight just takes the basis of nearly every vampire story ever, especially the classics that defined the genre, and takes out everything that made them scary, thrilling, or dangerous, and then replaces all of that with weird Mormon fetishism.
Dracula may have been a romantic novel in a sense, but the character of Dracula was NOT romantic. His taking of Mina was never out of love but was an act of rape and out of revenge for the destruction of Lucy, who he saw as his property. He had a beastiality to him that has never really been portrayed correctly onscreen from Lugosi onwards.
There was a romance in Dracula, but it wasn't a romantic novel. It was a techno-thriller pitting the modern world of typewriters and dictating machines and blood transfusions against the old and superstitious.
Back before Anne Rice? Or before Dark Shadows? Or before Carmilla? Hm...I think there have been romantic fantasy vampires as long as there has been vampire literature.
Notice he said NOT JUST romantic fantasies. They were never exclusively a romantic fantasy for fat mormon middle aged housewives and their tween daughters. Dracula like other vampire stories had romantic elements but at it's core it was a horror story about a monstrous bloodsucking undead creature. That element is largely missing from popular culture today.
I would love to see another shot at making WHite Wolf's VtM into a miniseries (or movie). While there are romantic elements, there is quite a lot of truly horrifying stuff going on in the World of Darkness. Personally I am still rather fond of the VtM miniseries (Kindred: THe Embraced); sure it was loosely based on the game bit it was still decent.
TLDR version; Vampires can be scary & 'romantic', sometimes both at the same time o.O
Kindred: The Embraced was an OK show, except for how they did the nosferatu. I understand why TV usually only puts on beautiful people, but the nosferatu are supposed to be hideous, not just bald.
I agree that there has always been a romantic side to vampires, but they were still monsters. Many of today's vampires are just bad boys when bikers are not bad boy enough.
Deserves the "Its true" label more than anything. I shudder to think which classical horror creature will me f*cked up next. Cuddly werewolves? How about a Frankensteins creature that is not afraid to show its feelings? Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains. Eeeech... I sickend myself, gotta lay down.
Far predates any of the twilight stuff too. For that matter the paranormal romance subgenre as a whole predates that by ages and ages. A particular work just happens to have penetrated the mainstream popular culture recently. Somebody went and filled a niche. There just wasn't all that much supernatural smut being produced for women before that. Apparently what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Go figure.
"Cuddly werewolves?" You mean just a step down from the "action movie werewolves" where one hunter takes down a whole pack of them, as seen in movies like Underworld? Hardly scary anymore. "How about a Frankensteins creature that is not afraid to show its feelings?" You mean like in Mary Shelly's Frankenstein? The Frankenstein monster was all about sharing its feelings. It just turned into a killer because every time it tried to make friends people ran in horror at his grotesque sight. "Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains." I have a feeling not many people will warm up to romanticizing dried out or rotting corpses.
I wonder if people felt this way about aliens in Star Trek: "Have people never heard of War of the Worlds?! Aliens are supposed to be menacing, not just another thing for Captain Kirk to seduce!"
I have a feeling that few people actually care about whether these things are "scary" or not, and are just worried about their "cool" factor.
>>"Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains." I have a feeling not many people will warm up to romanticizing dried out or rotting corpses.
It is closed-minded, well-adjusted people like you, Joe, that keep the readership of Girls and Corpses magazine so limited.
I kind of agree with this guy, though.
ReplyDeleteHere's hoping Del Toro's The Strain gets green lit for a tv series!
ReplyDeleteOh my, really?! They're pitching it?
DeleteSO HAPPY!
The fat, unshaven, slob is right everyone. Scary vampires are great.
ReplyDeleteAll vampire stories are romantic fantasies. Even Dracula was, at its heart, a romance novel. If you want to go earlier, you can look to Carmilla, by Sheridan Le Fanu, or even to the first acknowledged vampire story, The Vampyre, by John William Polidori. I can list more.
ReplyDeleteTwilight just takes the basis of nearly every vampire story ever, especially the classics that defined the genre, and takes out everything that made them scary, thrilling, or dangerous, and then replaces all of that with weird Mormon fetishism.
Dracula may have been a romantic novel in a sense, but the character of Dracula was NOT romantic. His taking of Mina was never out of love but was an act of rape and out of revenge for the destruction of Lucy, who he saw as his property. He had a beastiality to him that has never really been portrayed correctly onscreen from Lugosi onwards.
DeleteThere was a romance in Dracula, but it wasn't a romantic novel. It was a techno-thriller pitting the modern world of typewriters and dictating machines and blood transfusions against the old and superstitious.
DeleteI completely agree with this guy. More scary vampires please.
ReplyDeleteBack before Anne Rice? Or before Dark Shadows? Or before Carmilla? Hm...I think there have been romantic fantasy vampires as long as there has been vampire literature.
ReplyDeleteNotice he said NOT JUST romantic fantasies. They were never exclusively a romantic fantasy for fat mormon middle aged housewives and their tween daughters. Dracula like other vampire stories had romantic elements but at it's core it was a horror story about a monstrous bloodsucking undead creature. That element is largely missing from popular culture today.
ReplyDelete*insert dissertation on devolution from "Romantic" to "romantic"*
ReplyDeleteI would love to see another shot at making WHite Wolf's VtM into a miniseries (or movie). While there are romantic elements, there is quite a lot of truly horrifying stuff going on in the World of Darkness. Personally I am still rather fond of the VtM miniseries (Kindred: THe Embraced); sure it was loosely based on the game bit it was still decent.
ReplyDeleteTLDR version; Vampires can be scary & 'romantic', sometimes both at the same time o.O
Kindred: The Embraced was an OK show, except for how they did the nosferatu. I understand why TV usually only puts on beautiful people, but the nosferatu are supposed to be hideous, not just bald.
DeleteI agree that there has always been a romantic side to vampires, but they were still monsters. Many of today's vampires are just bad boys when bikers are not bad boy enough.
ReplyDeleteThings sure have changed between Nosferatu and Twilight...
ReplyDeleteDeserves the "Its true" label more than anything.
ReplyDeleteI shudder to think which classical horror creature will me f*cked up next.
Cuddly werewolves? How about a Frankensteins creature that is not afraid to show its feelings? Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains.
Eeeech...
I sickend myself, gotta lay down.
Already done for werewolves. Over in ebook land there's a whole bunch of romance/erotica titles that are all Alpha this, Pack that, etc.
DeleteFar predates any of the twilight stuff too. For that matter the paranormal romance subgenre as a whole predates that by ages and ages. A particular work just happens to have penetrated the mainstream popular culture recently. Somebody went and filled a niche. There just wasn't all that much supernatural smut being produced for women before that. Apparently what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Go figure.
Delete"Cuddly werewolves?" You mean just a step down from the "action movie werewolves" where one hunter takes down a whole pack of them, as seen in movies like Underworld? Hardly scary anymore.
ReplyDelete"How about a Frankensteins creature that is not afraid to show its feelings?" You mean like in Mary Shelly's Frankenstein? The Frankenstein monster was all about sharing its feelings. It just turned into a killer because every time it tried to make friends people ran in horror at his grotesque sight.
"Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains." I have a feeling not many people will warm up to romanticizing dried out or rotting corpses.
I wonder if people felt this way about aliens in Star Trek: "Have people never heard of War of the Worlds?! Aliens are supposed to be menacing, not just another thing for Captain Kirk to seduce!"
I have a feeling that few people actually care about whether these things are "scary" or not, and are just worried about their "cool" factor.
>>"Or a romantic mummy? Zombies hungry for a relationship, not for brains." I have a feeling not many people will warm up to romanticizing dried out or rotting corpses.
DeleteIt is closed-minded, well-adjusted people like you, Joe, that keep the readership of Girls and Corpses magazine so limited.