It’s that time of year, I know: the spooky season. Goth Christmas, if you will. What kind of goth? That’s a silly question. Now where was I? Oh, yes, it’s the time of year when the world is full of ghosts and pumpkins, witches and spiders. When creepies are crawlingContinue Reading
The 1985 Fright Night has been one of my favorite vampire movies since college. I knew it was dangerous to see a remake of a movie I love-love-love, but after seeing pictures of David Tennant’s hilariously cheesy (and shirtless!) take on Peter Vincent, finding out that Marti “Buffy” Noxon wroteContinue Reading
Do you like werewolves better? Not really. Look at my book collection — I have a ton of vampire fiction but very about werewolves or other shapeshifters, except as adjuncts to vampires. But that might be another thing driving this book. I’ve tried writing vampire novels — believe me, I’veContinue Reading
[inspired by this Slate article: Mermaids are not the new vampires] The concept of something being the “new vampires” is almost exactly like the concept of something being the “new black” — it’s a joke. There is no new black. There is never a new black. Black is black forContinue Reading
or, Ethan Hawke, Vampire Slayer An entertaining vampocalypse movie that still misses the chance to be really good. It begins beautifully. We watch an apparent 12-year-old writing a note to her parents and then going to sit outside in the predawn glow. We cut back and forth between things likeContinue Reading
This Utne Reader article quotes Sady Doyle’s assertion that Critics Pick on Twilight Fans Because They’re Girls, while at the same time acknowledging that they are both stupid and unfeminist. Doyle’s point seems to be that 1. Twilight is stupid escapist fantasy for girls, 2. Things like Tom Clancy novelsContinue Reading
Really, I just wanted to make sure the "vampires" tag keeps pace with the "religion" tag. Tanya Huff ( on LiveJournal) was guest of hono(u)r at V-Con, so, after liking her on panels, I bought a book of hers in the dealers’ room (Blood Bank) and read it. It wasContinue Reading
The very first scene of The Vampire Diaries pilot showed a lot of promise, because it’s actually a horror scene. Country road! Night! Fog that comes out of nowhere! Raven! Then the boyfriend disappears out of the frame, up. When vampires can fly, I hate actually seeing them fly, becauseContinue Reading
For a while I thought I wanted to do a complete, detailed, Left-Behind-style smackdown of Twilight, but then I decided that I already read the darned thing once, I didn’t want to read it again. Anyway, I thought it would be corrosive to my soul to spend so much timeContinue Reading
So, last night I was complaining about Twilight. I reached a point in the novel (which, you ought to know, I am reading for science!), around page 300, where things started to be particularly tough going. I’m not sure why this is the part where it’s become such a choreContinue Reading
This season five episode where Buffy and Riley split up gets props for having the same name as a Stephen Sondheim musical, but otherwise it’s one of my least favorites in the entire series. There’s something deeply unpleasant and icky about it. (And I say this as one of theContinue Reading
I previously saw one episode from the middle of the first season, and found it interesting but kind of oddly B-movie-ish. That is, it had a lot of bloody, sexy energy but people said and did ridiculous things and were prone to overacting.Continue Reading
Although Jezebel is how I came to the brilliant Buffy vs. Edward clip, I disagree quite a lot with this analysis of recent vampire trends which concludes women play a supporting role. Basically, it’s confused about what it means to "play a supporting role." It doesn’t mean you’re not theContinue Reading