So, I’ve been thinking about this off and on about writing in general, but thought it would be fun to pose the question here with the specifics of vampires. What are some of your pet peeves in vampire literature and movies? Is there something that tends to get done over and over that just rubs you the wrong way? A certain portrayal? A power or handicap that doesn’t jibe.
Personally, I find what irritates me is not so much with the writing itself. It has more to do with rules of one book’s universe used to judge all other books of the genre which are unconnected with that book. An example is “The Three Laws of Robotics” being used to suggest someone else who writes about robots MUST apply the three laws rule to stories about robots even if it is not being written about that author’s universe. I see the same with vampire stories. A vampire “can’t” do this or a vampire “won’t” do that. You’re writing vampires “wrong” or something like that. The truth is, vampires are not real. They’re fiction and while there are certain myths about them, the author can play with the base mythology as they see fit.
I think that’s what first attracted me to Love is in the Blood. It doesn’t follow the European vampire lore, so it can escape all of those trappings. If someone tells us we’re doing vampires wrong, we can tell them these AREN’T your normal vampires. They stem from a completely different mythology and why not give it a look!
Yeah, so, looking forward to hearing your thoughts!
I like your comic’s approach regarding Laila’s opinion of humanity, but I question whether humanity’s opinion of vampires is well-portrayed in media at all. All we’re ever told is Fear the Vampire, Evil and Live Forever with Romance and Blood and Soul-sucking. Whatever. Even the esteemed Lestat couldn’t get a fair shake, but why? What part of humanity (strike that) what moral or ethical arguments can be made against vampires? A guy’s gotta make a living, you know.
Should a vampire, not having average needs, fall into special needs categories? Special provision for parking or food supply? I don’t have the answers, but treating these questions could be interesting.
Agreed. The extreme hypocrisy of humanity’s attitude toward vampires has bothered me for a long time. Humans will subjugate other species and raise them under cruel conditions specifically to be slaughtered for food and materials, and claim to be morally justified in doing so. Yet, as soon as something slightly higher on the food chain comes along, everyone’s all torches and pitchforks and ready to slay the evil monstrosity – even if, as is the case in your basic vampire mythos, this new species can coexist with humanity, need not kill or even seriously wound in order to feed, and can often find willing ‘victims’. Remind me, who’s in the wrong here?
On a less philosophical note, I recently beat Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, and was irked by the fact that although the game subscribes to the common idea that vampires are nocturnal and harmed by sunlight, it does not give vampires night vision.
I’d like to submit my two cents, if you’ll indulge me.
First of all, I appreciate the fact that you have made an ethical determination consistent with your morals and beliefs that precludes you from the consumption of meat. It takes a great deal of discipline, study and introspection to base your actions on an internally consistent framework of ethics, and you should be commended for those qualities. Furthermore, I can very easily understand holding a belief or determination that most other people do not, and how frustrating it can be to see what can be interpreted as mass-indoctrination of a contrary belief or determination anathema to your own.
However, you should keep in mind the fact that just because other people don’t have the same framework of ethics as you does NOT mean that their framework is completely invalid or that they have no framework at all, and that insulting and belittling them generally does little to further your own cause.
As to the issue of Vampires and morality: This depends on your interpretation on the moral worth of animals vs. Humans, since if you equate the two then my following argument is moot. However, I personally maintain that THERE CAN BE NO MORAL EQUIVALENCY WITHOUT BASIC ANATOMICAL EQUIVALENCY. This is not to say that a species anatomically dissimilar to Humans has no inherent worth, or even that there cannot exist a species with greater moral worth than Humans, just that their worth can not be *equaled* to that of Humans. (Also, no, I do not consider people with amputations or different skin colors or different genders or whatever other stupid distinction you want to make to be anatomically dissimilar, so long as our brains all work on the same basic level.) Thus, with this distinction made, there are some further distinctions that must be made between different kinds of Vampires and the inherent morality of humanity’s attempts to exterminate them.
In fiction, there are three basic categories of Vampires, each of which have a different inherent moral worth: Human-like with moral reasoning, Human-like without moral reasoning, and non-Human.
Vampires who are Human-like and have moral reasoning are basically otherwise-normal Humans in need of constant blood transfusions, and thus their inherent morality depends upon how they use their moral judgment to determine how they acquire that blood. Anyone with the moral capacity to recognize that killing is generally a bad thing will do whatever they can to avoid doing so, and similarly Vampires with moral reasoning will avoid taking blood directly from Humans unless emergency circumstances dictate otherwise, and even then only up to the point of exsanguination, never past it. These Vampires have moral and ethical worth, and pose no inherent danger to humanity (outside of the mistakes that can be made in judging how much blood can be safely extracted from a donor), and their persecution is almost wholly unwarranted. Laila would seem to fit into this category, which is one of the many reasons why I like her character.
On the other end of the spectrum are Human-like Vampires who need blood to survive and yet reject the concept that killing is generally a bad thing and have no compunctions about taking blood directly from Humans past the point of exsanguination. These Vampires have the anatomical CAPACITY for moral or ethical judgment, and yet hold no regards for the well-being of others and kill members of their own anatomical species for spite, amusement, sexual thrill, etc. More often than not, they also pose an additional threat by converting those they consume into similarly amoral killers. They are all supernatural versions of Jeffrey Dahmer, and present a clear and inherently amoral threat to humanity, and their extermination is ethically justified. The preponderance of Vampires in the Buffy universe seem to fit into this category.
Then we get into somewhere in the middle where your judgment would seem to have some significance: Non-Human Vampires. I’m going to borrow a lot of my thinking from Maevan’s review of “From Dusk Till Dawn” (http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/team-nchick/Vampire-reviews/35114-Vampire-reviews-from-dusk-till-dawn), but basically, non-Human Vampires are any creature that are anatomically distinct from Humans yet prey upon them for sustenance. Here we exit the realm of moral equivalency because non-Human Vampires do not have the same anatomical capacity for morality or reasoning as do Humans. Thus, a Human killing a non-Human Vampire is ethically similar to a Human killing a feral wolf: Since both parties have different anatomical standards of morality to which they are held, neither party is inherently ethically justified in killing the other, as both are simply trying to survive and their continued existences are mutually exclusive. In this situation where coexistence is impossible, only might makes right and the strongest should survive.
Having said that, we, as Humans, have an inherent biological interest in supporting other Humans who combat non-Human Vampires as much as those who combat feral wolves, since our survival as a species is reliant upon our interdependence for protection and production. If you want to point out that wolves are as ethically justified in existing as we are and that we should get along when possible, that’s fine, but when coexistence fails and it comes down to choosing between your life or the wolf’s, then either show enlightened self-preservation and kill the wolf or demonstrate total nihilism by committing suicide-by-predator.
I will grant that this type of moral reasoning will not necessarily apply to other situations, and I also admit that I haven’t really touched upon the broader implications of differing moral worth between species. However, I hope you now understand why I personally feel that the “torches and pitchforks” approach to dealing with most Vampires are more often than not justified. If the Vampires aren’t actually predators that rely upon human blood for sustenance and are instead symbols of some repressed minority, then that’s a different matter… but then at that point we’ve stopped talking about Vampires and instead have switched topics to mutants à la X-Men.
-Ry
I agree. One of the most freeing things about the Vampire genre is that the author makes her own rules (and then has to stick to them). I was in a daze for three days after I finished the last Twilight book (library, I DID NOT buy that s**t). Not only did Meyers break her own rules when she created a dhampir, she created a set of rules which while coherent within her universe, I found repulsive. I couldn’t help but think “she cheated, somehow she cheated.”
Other than that, my biggest pet peeve is when vampires are used as metaphors for rapists. It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
My pet peeve is the big, bad vampire who is planning to create eternal night or become/create a super vampire or do something else that must be stopped. It’s been done, so I’d much rather see something else.
vampires that don’t like sunlight. it’s been done to death, too, and it became a boring weakness fast.
plus Dracula could walk around in daylight just fine, he just couldn’t use his powers then. there’s something I’d like to see done a little more often.
yep that would be mine to totally Hollywood. The truth behind it is back in the day a writer wrote a movie about a Scandinavian myth about a Troll but realized it sound cooled so it was a Nosferatu instead only the title was changed “Nosferatu”. When they filmed Dracula the decided to “copy it”
All very stupid.
Sun light weakens Dracula and steals his shape changing and teleport(ability to become moonlight) with out witch the Vampire hunters wear screwed.
my second is that some fool said till Dracula there were no myths of Vampires like that in Legend that they were all shambling rotting Zombies. Soon every crappy Writer and would be Psychic detective were saying the same thing. Just a bunch of misinformed moronic Plagiarists that could not be bothered to do there own research. Pure Lazy.
The Drauger, google it. Fits Bram Stokes Dracula to a T. Remember its Professor Van Hellsing opinion that Dracula was a mutant Smart Vampire. The Drauger go back a to lunar cults of Europe. Over 3500 BC and were still reported in Iceland to today, One story goes its the reason the Norse started Burning there Dead.
Since there actually Scandinavian and Romanian (ie Transylvania stoker describes) version of a vampire. Its not a stretch they were Bram stokers inspiration.As he goes to the trouble of describing a Scandinavian and Romanian culture filled Transylvania. Drauger even turn into bat like man sized winged lizards, wolves, and Myst just like stokers creation Dracula. (Dracula never turns in to a regular bat) So my point IS Dracula was a Drauger! And Bram Stokers was 100% Lore correct.
yep stupid thing to get worked up about but IT SO IRRITATES!
I agree that Draugr fits Dracula at least quite closely, though I don’t think it’s so exact a match. (I’ve never seen it spelled with the ‘e’ before, by the way. Looks like an anglicization of the original word to me. I’m not certain though, it could be a traditional cultural spelling difference.) For one, in the stories I heard, the mist was with Sea Draugr, which had a decent portion of sea monster in the mix that was absent in Dracula, and it was specified to be “sea fog”. Also, to the best of my knowledge, Draugr are a fully Scandinavian creatures, and if there are myths of them in Romania, I’d guess that those beliefs were imported with people from Scandinavia. The native vampire legends of Romania are mostly focused on Moroii and Strigoi, though with the high concentration of such myths in that part of Europe, it’s safe to say that other kinds do make at least a few appearances in folklore there.
Still, as an amateur mythology buff, I’m rather embarrassed not to have noticed the similarities between Dracula and the Draugr before they were pointed out to me.
bad typing ,(bad eyes bad spell checker sorry)
No idea it it reflects in REAL Transylvania but in Stokes story Transylvania He repeats several times Scandinavian influence in Transylvania. Witch stuck me as Odd hence me checking Scandinavian myths Draugr (fixed my spell checker) I believe Stoker did it So Dracula could be a Intelligent and Powerful creature instead of a Shambling zombie. Like I said VanHelsing confused as he believed All vampire to be child like and assumes Dracula to be a mutant that recovered his intellect,(apparently not Knowing the Draugr.) But as for Sea mist and mist and fog it would all look the same to the characters in the book particularly in England, From there originally we call are fog fog.And it would bee Van helsing telling them telling them it was Mist but then again his English was not supposed to be that good.And he was a nut.LOL
Also, as for my personal pet peeves, the biggest is firmly linked in my mind to an incident involving one of my favorite vampire legends, the (surprise, surprise,) yara-ma-yha-who of Australia. The Aboriginal analog to the European vampire is quite unique, being short, red, big headed and toothless, with suckers on it’s fingers and toes, and depending who you ask, may be furry. That’s just the tip of their weirdness, though. I won’t explain it all here, but I recommend doing a quick search on them. In any case, a Scooby-Doo movie was made about something they called the “Yowie-Yahoo” (not sure if they realized they were just stringing the two words for the Aussie bigfoot-parallel together with a hyphen or not, but it’s almost certainly intended to sound like yara-ma-yha-who), which they called an Australian Vampire, but was just a run-of-the-mill European Vampire in the legend someone was using for their own gain in the movie. Granted, there’s no way the yara-ma-yha-who legend could have worked for it, but if they want a “traditional” vampire in something, don’t try to make it something it’s not. Especially when that something is a unique type of mythical creature. special Basically, it cheapens a creature that should be notable.
I consider calling the sparking creatures in Stephenie Meyer’s works ‘vampires’ a similar offense. Every vampire-ish trait they possess is also prevalent in fae, and several things are more applicable to fae than vampires. Granted, no weakness against iron, silver or Christian symbols, but vampires have even more missing weaknesses. In this case, it cheapens the boundaries of what is or isn’t a vampire rather than the creature itself, but the point still stands. (Either way, I don’t approve of the series because it portrays an abusive relationship as an ideal one.)
Another pet peeve of mine is people claiming Dracula as evidence for vampires not going out at day. Read the book, doofus!
Stephenie Meyer made a point about never reading any Vampire storys, Want guess what Anne Rices really Powerful day walkers do ? GLITTER! Anne Rice wisely downplayed this as she realized it was stupid. throw in The Vampire Diaries by L. J. Smith. And she even stole the plot…
Stephenie Meyer wrote Host (rip off of the puppetmasters original bodysnatchers) but she did a good job of that.Well worth reading , Just wish she stop steeling or at least badly lieing. Over and Over. Host is great it shocked me , maybe she hired a ghost writer?
Side note it was Trolls originally not the undead that hated Crosses, both as a Sun symbol and later all Fae as a Christian symbol then all dark magic then later all magic including the undead.
I’m bringing these up because I didn’t see them in here.
Dracula 2000. Loved the idea behind that one.
Jim Butcher’s Vampires in “The Dresden Files”
It’s your story. They’re your creations. We call them vampires because its an easy way to get the gist of the character. A halfling doesn’t have to be short with hairy feet just because Tolkien said so. Its a word. The author is the one that defines it.
My biggest pet peeve is authors who try to combine the “vampirism is a curse” motif with the “vegetarian vampire” character. Let’s face it, if a guy is effectively immortal and has superpowers and is generally awesome, and doesn’t need to kill or at least hurt humans to feed, where’s is the angst coming from? If vampirism is a curse, let it be a curse. If your vampire character can get by without doing anyone any harm and suffers no great restrictions, stop telling me how much of a curse it is. Either trope works, but I hate seeing them together 99 times out of 100.
And by “great restrictions” I don’t mean the persnickety things. Let’s face it, most people would leap at, “You get to live forever, but you can’t go out in the daylight.” Sign me up!
If the curse is that the vampire is condemned to eternal suffering after being destroyed, that still qualifies it as a curse. I wouldn’t want to trade eternal peace for having superpowers. Even after accounting for immortality, eternity is a long time compared to the time being ‘up and about’. So I could see some angst coming from that, even if the curse doesn’t take effect until the vampire is out of the picture.
But this is a big “if”, because if no one really knows what happens after death, who’s to say that vampires end up worse off than anyone else? There would have to be a trusted divine authority who’s clearly stated that vampirism entails eternal suffering after the vampire has been evicted from the world of the living. I guess it works with Christian myths where vampires go to Hell, but mortal humans go to Heaven if they ask for forgiveness and/or accept Christ as their Lord and Saviour?
Going to Hell is quite a curse, so I could see some angst coming from that. And for the really self-conscious vampires, I could see some angst coming from just being different from the human majority. But that would have to be one seriously self-conscious vampire to value “being like everyone else” higher than having superpowers and immortality. Oh, and then there’s the old “everyone I’ve loved are dead” trope. “I’m so alone. And the only way to keep people around is to make them like me — cursed!” So much angst. 😉
Well depending on the legend & myth or fiction it’s more complicated. Vamprism IS a guaranteed ticket to heaven as the Persons body is possessed and they are there by martyrs Bc they suffered hell. According to Eastern Orthodox there in a state of Purgatory and will go to hell at the second coming like any one excommunicated. Still there are countless views, but truthfully as many for humans. Sorry there no Guarantee even for humans. There Even one Legend that God will get a apology and repentance from Satan and will on that day raise him up as the prodigal son Leave creation in his hands and retire… Effectively Scewing Mikael and Jesus.
My biggest pet peeve with vampires- they never seem to act their age. Hundred year old vampires acting like teeny-boppers just doesn’t work in my mind. I’m not the same person I was five years ago because I’ve grown and learned from all the experiences I’ve had, I think after hundreds of years I’d have had lots of time to mature beyond high-school drama.
I took a screen writing class in college, which was a lot of fun by the way. One thing I took way from that class is that as long as you are working with fictional entities, you make the rules. Vampires, werewolves, fairies, elves, whatever you choose its all up to you. Since that class I’ve tried to keep an open mind with it comes to fantasy literature and movies. Anne Rice’s vamps (which newer vamps seem to get compared to frequently) didn’t have normal human bodily functions. They couldn’t eat human food cause they couldnt digest it, they didn’t use they restroom, and they sure didn’t have sex, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying Buffy and Angel or Buffy and Spike for that matter going at it like rabbits. Edward Cullen glittered like a disco princess and many people had problems with that. There are a lot of other vampire creators who have other rules that differ from what most people consider the traditional vampire or the “right vampire.” But lets face it, vampires arn’t real, there is no wrong or right way to do it. Make your own rules.
My biggest peeve is writers breaking their own rules in their universe. There is a wealth of vampire mythos from across the entire globe. The Romanian mythos evolved originally from the Romanni or gypsy myths in this twilight got it closer actually because the vampires would have a certain luminescence in sunlight. Also damphirs were comon in their mythology it was one of the only ways to tell a vampire was to have a damphir with you. A writer that I really like for vampire and damphir as well as other supernatrual beings Karen Chance.
I always thought vampires were the anthropormorphization of our fear of predation and domination, both psychosocial and physical, and that’s why they were inhuman monstrous sociopaths. They were literally everything evil, the perfect instruments of Lucifer on Earth. So really, I judge every vampire story by the fact that they are trying to humanize monsters that see humanity as nothing but mindless cattle, to be mutilated for entertainment, fed upon, and tossed aside. So really, giving them any humanity rubs me the wrong way.
So I guess it rubs me the wrong way when people try to write vampires that are actually vampires, and everyone’s like “oh, he’s not angsty and emo, what’s with this dude?” Edward has set some disturbing precedents.
However, it does make for interesting romance. I’ve always been a bit emotionally challenged, so it makes for challenging reading.
Louis de Pointe du Lac is the real Edward, Stephenie Meyer copies everything, But Louis was to offset Anne Rice’s Lestat and his manic nature and the Bipolar nature of Rice’s Vampires in general.I just reread the the puppet masters All the Characters from the Host are there!!! Its like she reads a story and just changes it to fit her tastes. The Emo Vampire is not new though, But it was done well in the very first few times,Varney the vampire in the end,Barnabas Collins(introduced as a happy Villain) it was used in both cases as a motive for redemption.I Vampire Andrew Bennett while not original did it best. But it has been done to death!!! I recently read a online comic (not certain I can say the name) Wear a Young Teen gets turned into a Vampire and her Reactions were as Followed. 1 Vampires are REAL! 2 I Have super powers! 3 I Will live FOREVER!!! 4 Yippie!!! So COOL!!!
We need more of that if you see what I mean. Less “omg I am damded by a God “maybe” that “maybe real”” and more ” I JUST WON THE DEATH LOTTO!!! I AM A IMMORTAL GOD!!!”
Vampire Cheerleaders. Story is… eh. Now under new management, the plot has… well, plot; but I mostly follow it because I’m a gigantic pervert. I suppose such a plot is the logical conclusion of a civilization that has shed it’s capacity to create and interpret metaphor in narrative through the materialization of philosophy via omnipresent commodification.
Redemption through suffering is a common theme in Western lore, and when done right, can tug at heartstrings and redeem even the coldest villain in the eyes of God and the reader. But when done by the likes of today’s dime-a-dozen authors, The emotional suffering of the soul of the anthroporphization of evil as a means of the vicarious redemption of the evil undercurrents that exist within us all becomes a parade of angsty goth-wannabees.
All your points are sadly true. To true.
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