Thursday, October 4, 2012
Cult TV
How do you think Buffy has influenced the contemporary vampire drama “True Blood” and the “Twilight” series of novels and films?
Buffy was on from 1997 to 2003 (6 years), Twilight was out in 2007 and True Blood is the most recent one. I have been familiar with Twilight series before Buffy, and at first I didn't notice similarity between two. However I soon recognised common factors that shows the influence of Buffy has affected the contemporary vampire drama "True Blood" and the "Twilight" series.
They all had good vampires who didn't want to kill people falling in love with human women, but the obvious factor is the characteristic of the main female character in the story. The main character, Buffy and Sookie, from True Blood, both are independent and intelligent girls who goes after danger, whereas Bella in Twilight is rather develops and changes to independent character as the story goes on.
They have common themes of love, jealousy and hatred. The common relationship between Buffy and Angel in 'Buffy', Sookie and Bill in 'True Blood', and Bella and Edward in 'Twilight'. Of course, since True Blood is aimed at older/adolescent audience, it more draws the sexual tension, and according to Braum, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer also demonstrates adult love quite well in its exploration of the aggression that often accompanies intimate love relationships." when Twilight series are less then Buffy and True Blood (Twilight is more aimed to a younger audience).
Personally, I think Buffy has more influenced in True Blood than Twilight, as both Buffy and True Blood are darker and draw sexual relationship between female and male characters.
Braum, B. (2000) The X-files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The ambiguity of
evil in supernatural representations. Retrieved 18 October, 2005 from: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0 412/is_2_28/ai_64688900
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Good start, Boyoung - although of course, the relationship between Bella and Edward was also eventually consummated in Twilight. You can draw the parallel here between how Buffy and Angel's relationship, which also involved some form of delayed gratification (i.e waiting till Buffy was 'of age').
ReplyDeleteYou could also say, of course, that all three series has female leads - though Buffy and Sookie are feistier than Bella!
Thanks Karen, and I totally agree with your comment. There are so many common factors in Buffy, true blood and twilight and yes female leads is definitely one of them.
Deleteyea, like you have written I think the characters between buffy and angel and also Bella and Edward have their romance which highlights the series too. Maybe the difference could be the focus of the movie and the drama series. For example, Twilight was focused on their romance whereas Buffy was more focused on her adventures and her fate of being a vampire slayer. Guess a lot of people are getting bored with normal people falling in love but vampires and demons falling in love with humans.
ReplyDeleteI'm one of those people as I'm getting sick of this 'true love' between human and the good vampire. There are many common factors in three series although Buffy is more independent and the story is concentrated on her adventures. Buffy going into a danger (on her own) whereas other two series are more romantic genre...
DeleteThanks for your comment :)
yea true,
DeleteI guess in Twilight, the girl being the human and the guy being the vampire has a major affect in their romance where people think that the girl is weaker and has no choice but to love the vampire who has other powers in the world. I guess after Buffy series appeared, many of the sci-fi world has been opened and movies like twilight and dramas about vampires are becoming a major hit :)
I like have you have compared similar themes within all three cult fictions. I was wondering Boyoung, do you think that the evolution of Cult TV is evident through these three vampire fictions? Not only recognizing the similarities between the three, but also recognizing how one point (or theme) has developed due to the earlier show.
ReplyDeleteThanks Holly. Your comments always make me think. There are many vampire-themed fictions, and if I was to only see the changes in these three, I think it's hard to see the evolution of Cult TV. Of course, there are changes in genre among vampire-themed fictions such as as what May commented above, Buffy series are more adventure genre, whereas both The true blood and Twilight series fall into romance genre. There are themes like hatred and action in true blood and twilight, but the mainstream of the story is love.
DeleteI think Cult TV has evolved over time (and I think it also has become mainstream in pop genre), but just by recognising how one point has developed within three series, it doesn't clearly show the evolution of Cult TV. To do that, i think we should also study other ones in Cult TV like Star Trek, Doctor Who, Lost and so on.
If your idea is different to mine, feel free to leave a comment :)