Is it enough already with the fangs?

Eclipse is out, True Blood is back and there’s a veritable smorgasbord of undead hotties floating around right now in all their pale, gorgeous glory. Vampires, much like leggings and giant purses, have pretty clearly been the trend of the past couple of years with rip-off series’ and cash-ins than you can shake a stake at, but now I’m starting to wonder, is it time to say enough is enough?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m an unashamed vamp fangirl from way back in the Buffy era (Spike, *sigh*) and have read more than my fair share of vampire novels from Dracula to Anne Rice to Twilight. Likewise, I’m not going to debate the artistic merits of the recent incarnations of the vamp craze. What I’m asking is, is it time to say our blood-sucking appetite is sated and maybe give something else a crack at the limelight, or are we still desperate for all things “children of the night”?

On one side, vampires are a part of our cultural heritage. Practically every culture on the planet has some version of the creature in it’s lore, and people have always been almost inexplicably drawn toward the idea. Since the birth of vamp fiction, readers have been pulled to the idea of the taboo, the danger, and yeah, the hot hot (or, you know, cold, undead) sex. Vampires have everything it takes to make for a theme that will always be in our psyche’s so to say that we’ve had enough of them is like saying we’ve had enough of handsome, heroic male leads – sure, it’s been done to death (ha!) but that doesn’t mean we’ve stopped loving it. Read More »

“I always feared there was something wrong with me. You know, because I couldn’t make it [relationships] work. But maybe I’m not supposed to,” Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) explains her decision to stay single in the brilliant last episode of Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. “I’m cookie dough,” she says. “I’m not done baking. I’m not finished becoming whoever the hell it is I’m going to turn out to be.”

After seven seasons of relationships with on-again off-again boyfriends Angel and Spike, show creator Joss Whedon let his heroine ride off into the sunset (or really, run off into the sunset), alone. I remember watching the episode and finding the idea shocking and refreshing. It wasn’t a happily ever after ending, but it also wasn’t a tragic ending; it was completely realistic. The show ends with Buffy at age 22/23, and what girl at that age has relationships all figured out?

I remembered this scene today while I was talking to my friend Rocky* about our friend Veronica’s* current relationship. I was expressing a few things that were bothering me about it, nitpicking at the things that have bothered me when she was in previous relationships and continue to bother me now. Rocky gently reminded me that Veronica doesn’t have it all figured out yet, and she pointed out that neither do I. I’d somehow expected Veronica to learn all that there is to learn about relationships between the one she was in last and the one she is in now, but the only thing that has really changed is that we’re not in college anymore. Read More »