Editor's Note: Bloodsucking Freaks

Russ Pitts

The Boss of You
May 1, 2006
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Bloodsucking Freaks

The recent rise of vampires in popular culture can be traced back to that hottest of hot topics: sex.

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Astoria

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Oct 25, 2010
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I think vampires are so popular these days because they're portrayed as seducers rather than monsters. I think it would take one really good horror flick including vampires to put all these teen fantasy flicks to rest. As for zombies I don't get why they're so popular. These vampire movies are similar but every zombie movie seems to have exactly the same plot.
 

Falseprophet

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Jan 13, 2009
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So vampires have come full circle, since Stoker's Dracula was also about sex, or Victorian society's fears concerning it.

I think Romero has been pretty upfront about his zombies originally representing consumerist culture. That's still a pretty good metaphor for today. I also agree with the observations of Yahtzee and others who say zombies are popular because they're the same human beings who irritate and annoy you in everyday life, only now you have license to kill them in horrible ways without guilt. They're the dartboards and punching bags of fiction.
 

Something Amyss

Aswyng and Amyss
Dec 3, 2008
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Pararaptor said:
What?

Half the stuff you wrote in there is just trollop. Zombies aren't scary because they represent Islam, they're scary because either a) they're running at you or b) there's a lot of them & you can't really escape. Those are two really, really basic fears & apply to any horror film.

The popularity of vampires has always been steady, the recent boom is simply riding off the ludicrous success of Twilight.
The primary appeal of the zombie really does seem to be the status of the zombie horde, which is a faceless terrifying mob, I agree. It's one of the easiest ways to apply the fear of survival.
 

gphjr14

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Aug 20, 2010
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What is means is hollywood has ran out of ideas and is going back to dated ones in an attempt to make money. Thats why we have Adam Sandler, Martin Lawrence, and Will Smith making movies that they've done already. There's nothing on basic television now that we haven't already seen in previous decades and the "reality" shows are just stupid people who we'd avoid in real life.
 

Sabrestar

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Apr 13, 2010
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What I always found terrifying about zombies was less the horde, per se, but more the version of the myth that's more in the style of TVTropes' The Virus, where the victims become part of the horde. That whole sense of "your loss is their gain" and/or "they can make you one of them" is frightening on its most basic level - it's the corruption of you into something that is not you. That scares me in ways I can't even describe.

There's a similar sense of that around vampires, too, though it's tempered, I think, by the knowledge that in most (but not all, of course) variations on vampirism, you may change, but you still keep your own mind. But in truth, yes, vampire mythology is inexorably intertwined with sexuality. I didn't really come to understand this until I was in college, but yes, speaking as someone who had an ex-fiancee who was way too into this stuff, it's a big part of the vampire mythology. I don't know how much it plays into the current explosion, given that I've avoided Twilight (the source of the current outbreak) like, well, the zombie plague, ever since trying to read it made my wife weep at the heinous massacre of literature that it was.
 

The Random One

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May 29, 2008
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No, no, Ross. The zombie represents the loneliness of life in the big city. Being surrounded by all these people, who look human but strike no emotion in our hearts, and therefore are not human. You have to stick with your friends, who of course are completely human, but sometimes you stray apart, and one of you gets bitten and becomes one of the monsters. And sometimes it's you who strays apart and you lose what makes you human yourself. Then, your friends are meaningless to you, just faces that you stare at in confusion, unable to remember what exactly they are. I mean, it's so simple, I don't know why I have to tell you that.
 

LadyRhian

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May 13, 2010
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Vampires are rapists, with effects in reverse. Part of their body enters yours (fangs), but instead of leaving something, they steal your blood and possibly your soul as well.
 

whitewing

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Sep 7, 2010
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I would suggest that perhaps vampires and the vampire culture has become popular with teens and young adults because the focus of the vampire stories of the modern age has become that of transformation
The weaker, slower, often less intelligent human being baptised in the exchange of blood and becoming something more powerful, more unknowable, unique.
This ties in with many of the basic pubescant beliefs and fantasies, changes occurring withing one's body, transition between the social circles of children and that of the adult, and all the responsibilities that come with age.
The vampire mythos presents a method of escape from the changes of puberty, a way of existing both within and apart from the world of the adult, remaining forever youthful and invincible, with the inherent recklessness and sense of adventure that comes with youth, but still very much the adult, romantic overtones with closeness of being and the exchange of bodily fluids.

You could suggest that the western myth of the vampire has evolved to become quintessentially pubescant.

But hey, what do I know?