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I've loved vampires ever since I was small. The vampire disguises on Scooby-Doo were the first to charm me, followed by its actual vampires, and then a relative's torrented copy of The Fearless Vampire Killers caused things to coffin-bobsled from there.
Vampires were confident in a way I couldn't be. They were allowed to take up space, bite necks, threaten to do so, and do it all with aristocratic flair. Yet they could turn into bats, disappear in a puff of smoke, and in a way, have a license to be absurd. They're inconspicuous, unlike dragons, kaijus and other things from 20,000 fathoms. They have more control over their lives than ghosts, and their intelligence stops them from being single-minded hazards such as mummies and zombies and most glaringly for me, werewolves. With my own monstrous visage and tendency to draw animalistic characters, I should like the werewolf more. This is where I deviate to some of you, particularly monster lovers on the spectrum. Seeing as vampires and werewolves originate from the same folkloric motifs, I find it important to elaborate as to why. This is somewhat of a detour, but I intend to rule things out before we resume. You will see the evolution of what I enjoy, but also what I feel apathetic to.
Why not werewolves?
There are some I do enjoy. Werewolves such as Reverend Lowe from Silver Bullet, using his beast form to obscure his crimes. Ted from Bad Moon, suffering from his lycanthropy at first but becoming a sadistic recluse over the course of years. The Uath family from Dog Soldiers, fully aware of their crimes and operating as a Sawney Bean-esque cannibal clan, picking off hikers and concealing human remains in their home for generations. They move with the grace of composed, experienced killers, completely at ease in their forms and relentlessly deadly, even to a fully armed section of soldiers. Ginger from Ginger Snaps, too young and nihilistic to comprehend what she's doing as her sister watches her collapse into an insatiable bloodlust. All of them do different things, but they feel like individuals with the capacity to choose, sparing Ginger for her relative age. She, addicted to the sensory pleasure from being a creature, succumbs to her urges and thus ends her story as a tragedy.
But even with these few examples, most werewolves I observe do not have agency as characters. This is a problem because the werewolf feels, as said, more like a hazard than an autonomous being with its own interests. To be monstrous should not mean a loss of agency, but a reclamation of it in the face of death and loss.
A monster's body is a fascinating thing, especially to be inside it. To even think of oneself as an animal, from the colour-blindness of so many mammals to the post-human rainbow seen by creatures such as the mantis shrimp. So many things humans consider benign can glitter in the eyes of a monster, so many things can reveal themselves in its extrasensory world. How even in your appearance, so fearful to the fragile bipedal apes that surround you, you see things that they can't. You are not so simple, and even if you cannot speak you can know it and have it. Away from these humans you can go somewhere they cannot, and stay there if you choose. To me, monstrousness is but another form of existing, not a shorthand for evil by default. Evil is chosen, monstrousness is to be born different, often hated for it and yet experience sensations that are beyond the veil, under the dusk and past the barrier of human comprehension. We can never know what a dog's nose knows, how it feels to have a cat's whiskers, a rabbit's soft feet, to breathe through your skin as an amphibian. We can never know but the monster can be our tool to communicate this wonder and grief.
The vampire, for all of the instances that fail to explore its sensory world, does not fail to show us what it feels like the way so many werewolves are let down. Even the most evil vampires feel like they have agency, and so vampires that choose to be goodly feel sweeter. I see the person in the monster and vice versa, in that a monster can be used to communicate human issues. When a vampire threatens me, I understand him as a being of immense power; his coolness comes from the fact he is in control, and this makes him feel satisfying as an adversary. To slay a vampire radiates with an awesome power, like slaying a dragon, another being of enormous grandeur and cruel wit. The werewolf does not give me this. The whiplash between a friendly person and a violent beast that cannot stop itself hits too close to home, and yet I am asked by werewolf narratives to sympathise with them and on some occasion, sexualise a being that when killed, radiates with the air of a euthanised dog. I am not charmed by the concept of imprinting, the idea that some biological tether keeps you bound to a partner whether you chose them or not, and especially not the prospect of reinforcing gender roles with a furry overcoat. Werewolves as caste systems of alleged Alphas, Betas and Omegas, each knowing their place without question. The constant imagery of canid anatomy rendered in lurid detail, alongside the ensuing insemination and pregnancy as narrative centrepiece. The sexualisation of controlling men that beat, kidnap and rape prospective mates, their appetites framed as biological necessity.
I understand the attraction to being wanted, however most actions are chosen and even with the veneer of animal instincts, the werewolf's individuality flattens into an eat/mate/kill triad. This does not do the wolf as an animal any form of justice. Ferocious for it is wild, but it is a social creature that culture misunderstands in both directions. In positive interpretations, the wolf is a pseudo christ-like figure of a mythical, utopian nature. This reaches its most explicit form in Werewolf: The Apocalypse, where shapeshifters of all species gather into racially-stereotyped warrior tribes for their matron goddess and spirit of the Earth, Gaia. Their primary enemy is an extraterrestrial force of death and entropy, oxymoronic as life cycles require death to function at all. Then there is the wolf we know, the symbol of hunger, the savagery of the wild, yet also of masculinity, sexual appetite and wanton violence. A lone wolf is an aspirational figure for some men, a she-wolf is a predator of other men, to be wolfish is to appear voracious and greedy. Further colloquialisms, to wolf things down, to keep the metaphorical wolf of poverty from the door, a wolf in sheep's clothing. The wolf is used to symbolise human malice, and this baggage follows through into many a werewolf, regardless of sex, orientation or identity. It embeds itself deep into the subconscious, and informs these depictions with the idea that the wolf cannot choose or think. It simply happens.
I attest however that there are far more positive examples of werewolves in contemporary internet art, ones using the monster as symbols of personal freedom. I have seen other autistic people use werewolves as communicators of being autistic, that for the capacity to do harm like anyone else, the wolf is ultimately a shy creature that wants to live like anyone else. I get that, I have feared things that were actually good for myself. I like that far more. I like the examples I listed. However my opinion has settled on the vampire as my choice, and I think at worst, that werewolves are dealt a bad paw.
As for the vampires: Resumed
Even as a comedy, The Fearless Vampire Killers was a landmine of world-building ideas that could never be dredged from the ground. The vampires could gather in a society, be visibly from different periods, show dry wit, homoerotic fixations, and even in their seriousness, demonstrate the absurdity of such power. This then continued with my childhood video-game, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, which let me play as one of these creatures. As a vampire, you retain your ability to speak, do quests, and generally exist. At the same time, you are now immune to diseases, and the longer you go without feeding, you gain new powers instead of starving. If you feel inclined, you can cure your vampirism, but this is optional. As with any supernatural disease, so-called Porphyric Hemophilia in this game, there are drawbacks. By default, you don't take damage from sunlight, until you try to stop feeding for the aforementioned vampire powers. With the stages of vampirism, this worsens, up to eight points of sun-damage per second. You take even more damage from fire, and more still if you chose "The Lord" as your birth sign. Regardless of what stage of vampirism you are on, other vampires remain hostile to you, and at stage four, the city guards stop negotiating with your right to live. They know what you are, hate what you are, and have no choice but to chase you across all of Cyrodiil. To play as the monster from such a young age, on top of the game's existing bestial Argonian, Khajiit, and Orc races, further defined my interest in the undead.
When Twilight became a phenomenon, vampires were not only trendy but apparently the expertise of everybody ever:
- Vampires don't sparkle.
- Vampires have fangs (which is why Bela Lugosi had that killer rack of teeth).
- Vampires shouldn't love people.
- Vampires shouldn't refuse to eat people, even with an abundance of easy four-legged prey.
It was in this swathe of discourse that I was having an inordinate amount of fun. I hated Twilight, but I loved to hate Twilight. I hated its characters for being vapid and melodramatic, its fans (Twi-Hards, derisively named Twi-Tards) equally so, and its ability to provoke such an intense fascination in me. I couldn't look away; I couldn't stop watching it, and I couldn't stop thinking about it. The girls in my class would delight about Edward, and I'd openly show my disgust, yet I'd secretly love that they brought it up at all. Hating Twilight was a hobby, perhaps even its own fanbase. As I vandalised the "Cullenism Wiki" under the name "Thunderblade", a new vampiric inspiration came to me in the form of demotivational images and parodic drawings. As meme formats common for the time, they proclaimed a similar hatred for Twilight, and they went something like this.
"Alucard is about to beat the glitter out of Edward"
This was the anime Hellsing, specifically its original TV release. I was shocked to see a vampire story set in England, one that was not a Dracula adaptation, no less. Its main character was the enigmatic vampire known as Alucard. Formerly Vlad Tepes, he served as the titular organisation's main assassin, a killer of rogue monsters. He wore a red trench coat, a matching hat, and round orange sunglasses. His hair was not like that of other vampires, not long like a Lestat, not clipped like a Lugosi parody, but shaggy. His gloves bore strange, esoteric symbols that I did not quite understand, a pentagram adorned in runes for each hand. With each, he carried two blocky pistols that shot explosive steel rounds, every bullet carrying a sliver of melted silver. He didn't turn into a bat, but took the form of a multi-eyed dog, which he can summon from his body like a symbiotic organism. He represents himself with clusters of eyes, in a form akin to Lovecraftian monsters, making him an especially unusual vampire. Alucard, despite these powers and unlike so many archetypical hired killers, was different. He wasn't cruel for the sake of it, unlike the artificially created vampires he hunted down. He hated sadists, despised thrill-seekers, and mercilessly mocked them to their faces. In the very first episode, he spares the life of a young policewoman, accosted by the very vampire he was assigned to kill. While Alucard has to mortally wound this woman named Seras, this kills her assailant, and he turns her before she can succumb to her injuries. But here, and this did not have to be done, Alucard cradles her as she lies inches from death on the chapel floor. Then, through the scarlet skies of the English countryside and that gaudy png of a moon, he carries her back to his human master, swaddled in a blanket. She, named Integra, is unamused by this, but Alucard doesn't mind; he's happy to have the company. I was obsessed, and even after watching its "Ultimate" adaptation, it stands out to me as a pivotal moment in my vampire fixation. Being a lonely and socially isolated preteen, I found Alucard comforting and empowering. He and Hellsing showed me that vampires didn't have to be campy imitation Lees, brooding bad-boys with a suspicious ability to mimic coercive control dynamics or oversized bats. Alucard was eccentric, eldritch, and unashamed of it. The story he lived in thrummed with atmosphere, and I could envision his world blending seamlessly into my surroundings during long car rides, in unfamiliar places, idle daydreams, and glimpses of the sunset that relieved my exhausted nervous system. When I'd find myself outside at night, the grime became stylistic and purposeful. The dark was always my canvas for creative pursuits, but Hellsing and its influence intensified it. Wherever I went, it followed. Hellsing would go on to inspire my current work, putting vampiric horrors into sleepy English moors and hamlets, set to the sounds of jazz and luxury cars patrolling the claustrophobic country roads. After all, the dead travel fast.
I find the vampire to be an enduring tool of conversation, storytelling and self-expression. The criteria is simple; it's an often parasitic hemophage that likes to play sommelier with the living. The ubiquitousness of an evil hungry spirit means almost any person can speak of Vampires, thus turning a seemingly-simple topic into a cultural wellspring.
A vampire can be the yearning husk of someone from times past, skin condensing in the heat of your fire. A vengeful echo of aristocracies past, desperate to keep itself glutted at all costs. In its opposite it can be a victim of circumstance, socially and spatially consumed by its elders. A human mind buckling under the implications of eternal life, only stopped by violent death or slow starvation. A slave to hunger, akin to the notion of a zombie that so many are depicted as. It can be a kitschy, neon-skinned caricature of the former groups with a thing for puns and interior design. Or it is a small, flittering thing that is eccentric at worst, and wants to be left alone to peacefully wiggle its ears and eat worms.
Admittedly I identify the most with the very, very, very last of this list. Though cartoon animal vampires like Nyanpire don't tend to have thumbs, and I need those.