Modern Vampires Have Been Robbed of Their Bite
The Creatures of the Night Have Genuinely Lost all Direction
Nov 5, 2009
True Blood, Buffy Season 6 and Bloodrayne have all fallen into the trap of bringing humans and vampires engaging in unnecessary sex into the light of day. Vampires are always going to be mysterious and erotic creatures to many people who love the idea of being seduced into darkness and enjoying various pleasures of the flesh. But all these shows and films have done is robbed vampires of their teeth.
The Modern Vampire
In recent years vampires have gone from being the vicious, cold blooded killers seen in films like Blade and Vampires to brooding immortals haunted by impossible love (think Twilight) or sex mad men and women who bounce from bed to bed (think True Blood).
Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles gave audiences immortals that were haunted by their lingering humanity and were seen as romantic bisexual creatures who roamed Europe seducing those who crossed their path. Some of the Anne Rice vampires may have been clinging to their humanity, but Rice was also able to portray cunning and evil vampires like Lestat. Since then vampires have been losing their menace as they have slowly become synonymous with sex. No longer are people afraid of vampires. Instead, if confronted by a vampire, the best thing a person can do is have sex with them because if they do the vampire won't need their blood anymore. There is a scene in the 2006 film Bloodrayne in which Rayne has sex with Sebastian whilst in the grip of bloodlust. The lesson here seems to be that vampires crave sex or blood, one or the other will keep a vampire’s thirst at bay because after they have sex Rayne’s bloodlust is satisfied. This scene also serves to show that when it comes to vampires and humans interacting directors cannot let them keep their clothes on.
Angel’s Legacy
The brooding immortal has also become a well-recognised figure on television and in the cinema. When Robert Pattinson played Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire he was overshadowed by Daniel Radcliff’s Harry Potter. However, when Pattinson was cast to portray the brooding immortal Edward in Twilight suddenly he become a massive Hollywood star, could this be because girls love a bad boy?
In Buffy the Vampire Slayer Joss Whedon gave the world the vampire with a soul: Angel. In the Buffyverse there was no such thing as a ‘good’ vampire and the forbidden love between the immortal vampire Angel and the school girl Buffy (sound familiar) became the focus for the first 3 seasons. Sadly it is clear that characters like Angel have become increasingly common, which means that Angel no longer unique. Indeed it seems that teenage girls adore the idea of loving gorgeous and brooding vampires which explains the popularity of Twilight. This is despite the fact that the love story between Edward and Bella is simply a rehash of Buffy and Angel. Perhaps the best way to describe Twilight is Buffy and Angel for the new teenage generation, except that unlike Angel, Edward doesn’t feel the need to kick some serious ass to protect the woman he apparently loves.
Vampires Crave Blood...no, wait, They Crave Sex
No one is naive enough to assume that if someone was immortal and there was no danger of sexually transmitted infections or diseases that they would not put it about a bit. What is becoming increasingly irritating is the fact that sex scenes between vampires and humans have become pointless. Season 1 of True Blood is essentially soft-core porn; the humans and vampires shed their clothes for basically no reason and gyrate against one another with little to no explanation about why. What is puzzling is why the makers of True Blood feel that the audience needs to see each sex scene, because essentially one sex scene is pretty much the same as another: pretty people pretending to have sex. So unless something necessary to the plot happens during the scene then why do they need to show the audience so much sex? Why can’t the sex just be implied? It seems the answer both questions are that the best way to attract an audience is to show beautiful naked women to get the men interested, and attractive naked men to hook the ladies. This raises the question of why a show was given a green light if showing sex and nudity is its key way of getting people to watch - why didn't the producers simply make a softcore vampire porn film?
Audiences that object to the endless and pointless sex scenes in shows like True Blood are not prudes that either never have sex themselves, or think that couples should only ever engage in sex after marriage, or that people shouldn't have sex unless they are in love. Instead they are people who tuned in to True Blood because they were hoping to see a vampire show which added some new dynamic to the genre, and instead all they ended up watching was sex, sex and more sex.
The Death of the Vampires
Vampires need blood to survive. If they don't get it they die or becoming living corpses. They cannot survive on sex and they need to be given back their fangs before great characters like Angelus (Buffy), Deacon Frost (Blade) and even Lestat (Interview with the Vampire) become nothing more than distant memories.
