Post by burrunjor on Mar 17, 2022 9:41:22 GMT
Not literally of course LOL, but I've noticed that there is a subgenre of vampire fiction that actually explores the same themes as a lot of Dinosaur fiction.
There are many vampire and Demon stories where we have an ancient, prehistoric, reptillian monster, or monsters that ruled the earth eons ago until it/they were banished or destroyed. (Usually by higher powers, but sometimes by something else.) However just before its defeat the monster or one of them was able to corrupt a human and turn them into the first vampire/Demon who went on to create the rest of their race. The goal of the vampire/Demon species is therefore to try and find a way to free their creator, or bring him back to life and restore the natural order to how it was eons ago when the Demons ruled the earth and humans were prey.
The following franchises feature this as their origin story for vamps and Demons or both.
The Evil Dead.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.
Supernatural
Blade films
Being Human (sort of in that vamps and werewolves are the Devils way of restoring his strength, but they are not his servants so to speak.)
Also two Doctor Who stories State of Decay and Curse of Fenric follow this trope beat for beat. The Great Vampires were giant monsters who were once the big cheese, before being wiped out, and now the last of them wants his creations, the lesser vampires to restore him, whilst Fenric was once an all powerful Demon who was sealed in a flask and orchestrates the creation of the Haemovores to free him from his flask.
Many Dinosaur films, books and tv shows meanwhile obviously deal with the idea of Dinosaurs being brought back, through time travel, cloning etc and taking over the earth and restoring things to how they were eons ago, when giant reptillian monsters ruled the earth and us, mammals were tiny creatures hiding in the shadows being preyed by them.
Hell the real life situation between us and Dinosaurs mirrors that between vamps and humans in a lot of these series. At one point giant Demons/Reptiles ruled and we were forced into the shadows. (Again by we I mean mammals not humans.) Then they were banished, and we were only able to take over for that reason. However their lesser descendants, vamps and birds are still around us, and are now living in OUR shadows.
Again the fact that a lot of these ancient Demons are reptillian in nature (Like the Old Ones in Buffy who generally take the form of giant snakes like the Mayor or the Hellmouth Spawn, which even roars like a Velociraptor in JP, or the Kaiju like Dark One from Ash Vs Evil Dead, or even the Great Vampires which have green, scaly skin.) Suggests that the creators/writers of these series were maybe drawing from Dinosaurs, even in an unconscious way when creating these monsters.
Sadly this subgenre of vampire fiction is often overlooked, despite containing arguably the most celebrated vampire series of the past 40 years. As I have said before when it comes to vampire fiction, all anyone ever talks about is how sexy they are or how this vampire story made vampires appealing. (Which is one of these things, much like strong women in DW, that everyone seems to think they're favourite did. IE much the same way as there were no strong female companions before Zoe, Liz, Jo, Sarah, Leela, Romana and even Ace according to their actresses, then Hammer Horror, Anne Rice, and Buffy were all the first time vampires were romantic.)
There are many vampire and Demon stories where we have an ancient, prehistoric, reptillian monster, or monsters that ruled the earth eons ago until it/they were banished or destroyed. (Usually by higher powers, but sometimes by something else.) However just before its defeat the monster or one of them was able to corrupt a human and turn them into the first vampire/Demon who went on to create the rest of their race. The goal of the vampire/Demon species is therefore to try and find a way to free their creator, or bring him back to life and restore the natural order to how it was eons ago when the Demons ruled the earth and humans were prey.
The following franchises feature this as their origin story for vamps and Demons or both.
The Evil Dead.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.
Supernatural
Blade films
Being Human (sort of in that vamps and werewolves are the Devils way of restoring his strength, but they are not his servants so to speak.)
Also two Doctor Who stories State of Decay and Curse of Fenric follow this trope beat for beat. The Great Vampires were giant monsters who were once the big cheese, before being wiped out, and now the last of them wants his creations, the lesser vampires to restore him, whilst Fenric was once an all powerful Demon who was sealed in a flask and orchestrates the creation of the Haemovores to free him from his flask.
Many Dinosaur films, books and tv shows meanwhile obviously deal with the idea of Dinosaurs being brought back, through time travel, cloning etc and taking over the earth and restoring things to how they were eons ago, when giant reptillian monsters ruled the earth and us, mammals were tiny creatures hiding in the shadows being preyed by them.
Hell the real life situation between us and Dinosaurs mirrors that between vamps and humans in a lot of these series. At one point giant Demons/Reptiles ruled and we were forced into the shadows. (Again by we I mean mammals not humans.) Then they were banished, and we were only able to take over for that reason. However their lesser descendants, vamps and birds are still around us, and are now living in OUR shadows.
Again the fact that a lot of these ancient Demons are reptillian in nature (Like the Old Ones in Buffy who generally take the form of giant snakes like the Mayor or the Hellmouth Spawn, which even roars like a Velociraptor in JP, or the Kaiju like Dark One from Ash Vs Evil Dead, or even the Great Vampires which have green, scaly skin.) Suggests that the creators/writers of these series were maybe drawing from Dinosaurs, even in an unconscious way when creating these monsters.
Sadly this subgenre of vampire fiction is often overlooked, despite containing arguably the most celebrated vampire series of the past 40 years. As I have said before when it comes to vampire fiction, all anyone ever talks about is how sexy they are or how this vampire story made vampires appealing. (Which is one of these things, much like strong women in DW, that everyone seems to think they're favourite did. IE much the same way as there were no strong female companions before Zoe, Liz, Jo, Sarah, Leela, Romana and even Ace according to their actresses, then Hammer Horror, Anne Rice, and Buffy were all the first time vampires were romantic.)
