Vulture: Vampire Culture

Have you been bitten by the vampire bug?

Leave your garlic at home, you're not going to want to miss these vamps.

In the last five years, America has seen a wave of vampire series obsession.With multiple genres of vampire tales including books, television shows, and movies….the infatuation of sucking blood has infiltrated the mainstream.

It’s nearly become a culture. People dress like vampires to Twilight

premieres and put bumper stickers on their car that say,

"I drive like a Cullen"

It is known among the avid vampire series the certain words and phrases that are used, and the “rules” of living in a vampire world. For instance, vampires can’t reveal themselves in the day time, and they can only be killed by wood and silver.

What is it that draws in the masses? Do us Americans love the gore and guts of a person sucking another persons’ blood? Quite frankly, the thought is kind of disgusting if it occurred in the real world. I

s it the sexy male vampire that sweeps the mortal human off of her feet?

It all began in 1997 with Buffy the Vampire slayer. Yes, I know, centuries ago it seems. Vampires made their debut when we were still in elementary school!

Since then, the Twilight Saga began in 2006 with novels, then films to follow. The three Twilight films that have been released thus far have grossed almost a BILLION dollars in ticket sales. That’s right, a billion. With a B. It's a combination of the passionate romance and mysterious plot that keeps the masses flocking.

But before Twilight came a more “mature” spin on vampires, True Blood. True Blood is a series on HBO with similar plot lines to Twilight. The series began

in 2001, based closely off a southern mystery series by Charlaine Harris. Unlike Twilight it’s a deep-south rural Louisiana setting, making things a little more raw and less repressed. The main character Sookie Stackhouse falls in love with a 200 year old vampire, Bill Compton, an act which is highly unaccepted in the small town.

The two series vary in the content but the plots are each the same. The beautiful cast, forbidden relationships and…well…drinking blood. There is the sense of unobtainable, wrong, illegal love in each series. In the film Twilight, Bella, the damsel in distress falls madly in love with the town mystery hunk, Edward Cullen. They have a prohibited romance..he could kill her and transform her into a vampire at any given moment.

Obviously vampires aren't real....or at least let's hope so...

So, where is the root of this crazed obsession? The phenomena isn’t so much to do with vampires as it is with lustful fantasy. These characters are all insanely attractive, many of them rich and coveted after by many. People like to escape from their realities temporarily to lose themselves in the fantasy world that contains vampires.

This vampire mania has only begun – there are more seasons of True Blood and more Twilight films to be had in the saga. Drink up, folks!