The Bleeders: HBO's True Blood, FX's Sons of Anarchy

Isn't this all a little twisted "twilight"-ish?

True Blood - Lonely girl in a backwater town that can read minds falls for a vampire that can control his thirst.

Twilight - Lonely girl in a backwater town falls for a vampire than can read minds and can control his thirst. http://www.twilightthemovie.com/

What a paid for PR HBO kiss ass if I ever read one!Did Sue Naegle write it for you herself and sign the check?You should have started it out with"FLAWLESS".While it had the potential for all the cleverness you so eagerly so painstakingly describe,the execution is poor and hokey at best.You are one of the few reviews to give it anything above a C,let alone all your drooling!!!!!!!!Grab a hold of yourself,man!next time don't be so obviously in the pocket!

While researching the World War II film genre I asked myself “Why are vampire movies always big in America”, after reading your terrific review of HBO’s Trueblood.

Answer: Well I think it is a very sexual thing - drinking someone’s blood. But in terms of the horror/vampires genre you have to start by analyzing them as being the "other" just like Aliens was in the 80s film, other than us. Remember vampire movies started very early in the entire horror genre. Their sources were often portrayed as the dark barbarians of Eastern Europe from specific places like Transylvania. They were seen as ungodly and categorized by Western Europe and America, as the “other” to be feared.

They also have the power of conversion, which resonates at the core of American culture. In fashion, politics, religion, consumerism, entertainment we all want to be part of something larger and more powerful than we are. The actual conversion, this act of intense initiation is satisfying to the viewer because it is both sexual and violent. They insert their fangs into you and you become part of a greater evil.

Frankenstein is different, because he a monster created by science on the screen with roots in western literature. Still he is a monsters but with less cinematic staying power than vampires and zombies because he is missing a sexual component. Even though he has faded, he may have links to criminal robots like in the ones in Blade Runner. Maybe? They were synthetic and Frankenstein was made from human parts.

I think Frankenstein was sort of a mirror or ourselves, and just combine that with the concept “sometimes we are our own worst enemies” and you have something interesting. But still they are not as interesting as vampires.

On the other hand there seem to be plenty of zombie movies today though they are not as sophisticated as vampires. The American viewer has a hard time dealing with zombies. It is its edginess that producers think will sell the movie but what I think they are selling is the Frankenstein nature dressed as a zombie. The modern zombie does not just appear, we create them and then they come back to punish us. In the beginning there were just random zombies from an unknown origin with no reason to exist. Then science steps into the later movies and we get science fiction mixed with horror. There was even an attempt to remove sex as the normal reproductive process in “ Village of the dammed”

But in the end vampires are still kind of cool. They can even be sad and loving like Gary Oldman in Coppola’s Dracula, a sort of good guy just like the fallen angel Satan before he went bad.

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