Are True Blood and Vamp Diaries real Vamp programmes?

[Earl Gray]

I'm a great fan of vampire movies, have been since I was a kid. And it's great to see more vampire stories on the TV. But do series like Trueblood and Vampire Diaries really stay within the rules that we've grown up with?

These days they go out in the light (or lighter times), live with normal people and are at war with Werewolves. From what I remember they are evil, foul breathed and went around at night.

At least Buffy the vampire Slayer kept within most ofthe rules, so have modern vampire stories lost the plot or is it time for anything goes where these fanged creatures are concerned?

[mack]

anything goes these days. plus you are right - they are re-imagined as sexy beasts. i, too, cannot wait until they make them monsters again. ;)

[honeykid]

I don't know that vampires have been monsters since 1922.

I've not watched either of these programmes, so I can't comment on them from experience, but isn't Vampire Diaries a teen market thing, in the Twilight mould?

I'd also point out that, in Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula can and does go outside in daylight, but his powers are weaker.

I think there are rules and lore that we feel confident with and, as with other conventions in this and all genres, we often don't like them to be messed about with. If they do, a film/tv programme really has to win us over in order for us to accept it.

Are they real vampire programmes? As much as any programme about vampires can be. For me, I really liked Buffy and Kindred: The Embrace. Buffy was very much in the traditional Hollywood monster mode. Kindred I liked because it was something different, that I hadn't seen before.

[Caitlyn]

I don't think there are too many "rules" where vamps are concerned... other than they are all supposed to crave and need blood to survive. Some of the oldest vampire legends around state they can go out during the day but, as HK said, in Drac's case, his powers were weaker... per one legend though, the more blood they feed on, the stronger they become during the day... there are also legends about vamps who only feed on animals... so I don't think it's really a question of "anything goes" as much as they're mixing the actual legends to evolve the vampires we grew up watching into something a bit more...

[will.15]

Whatever the rules are, they aren't scary anymore. Blame it on Dark Shadows which first introduced the sympathetic even heroic vampire, but Barnabus, played by Jonathon Frid, was still pretty creepy looking (because he started out as a traditional vampire), then decades later that Lestat vampire completely sexed and romanticized him up so now the vampire has becone a gothic cool thing to be. Barbabus at least wanted to be cured and be mortal again. He also didn't have other vanpires to hang out with at the local pub.

[Earl Gray]

I think my problem is that I was bought up on Hammer and Universal vampires, these movies had rules for our fanged friends. This is probably why I liked Buffy, it may have been aimed at the teen market (but finished up all ages) but it kept to what became established rules, Lee & Lugosi would never have walked in the light without a 2,000 sun block:)

[will.15]

This was the most highly rated TV movie of its time, telling the story of a vampire in contemporary Las Vegas like a docudrama. It still sticks to the vampire rules and was scary as hell and even funny at times because of Darren McGavin and Simon Oakland's interplay.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2H3xuhkZuY

[honeykid]

Not just The Night Stalker movie, but the whole Kolchak: The Night Stalker series is worth watching. There was also The Night Strangler, which was a TV movie made the following year (I think) and was pretty much the same.