Bela Lugosi did not have sparkly skin when he played Dracula.
Spoiler alert: The subject of this story has been entirely parodied, heckled and ridiculed over the past seven years, so you probably know it all by heart.
Girl meets boy. Girl realizes boy is a vampire. Girl falls for said vampire. Vampire has a tough time restraining himself from eating girl (totally normal). Eventually, girl and vampire get married. Girl gets pregnant with vampire’s baby, and vampire turns girl into vampire.
We’ll miss Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson’s estranged blank stares at each other for minutes at a time. We’ll miss the indie music somehow intertwined into every movie. We’ll miss the inconclusive Team Edward and Team Jacob fights.
But the conclusion of the Twilight saga with the release of the fifth film The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 2 is bigger than the end of a franchise — it marks a turning point in what has driven the evolution of the bloodsucker from Dracula to Edward Cullen.
Historically, vampires have been regarded in several cultures as mythic, frightening creatures. Bram Stoker’s Dracula, published in 1897, broke ground as the first mainstream vampire novel with Professor Van Helsing battling Count Dracula. German silent film Nosferatu was the first on-screen Dracula depiction, portraying a terrifying yet enthralling monster.
That juxtaposition between fear and attraction impacted future vampire reincarnations, including television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, said Oliver Gaycken, a professor in the film studies department.
The fascination with vampires comes with their evolved sexuality and shifting social norms that make human-vampire relationships permitted, he added.
“Monsters have become accepted as kind of normal,” Gaycken said.
Then came Twilight – the first book in 2005, the first film in 2008.
English professor Jonathan Auerbach, who has taught classes on the novel Dracula and the film versions of the novel, wrote in an email that the menacing nature of the vampire seen in Nosferatu is mostly lost in Twilight movies, where the lead vampire is defined as a hot crush.
Sophomore English major Zoe DiGiorgio said Twilight’s message of abstinence adds a layer of society’s wills to the “romanticized monster” and sexuality of all vampire culture.
“It’s a culture where we desire open sexuality, but we can’t have it,” she said.
Instead, the series has latched onto the universal female daydream: Bella Swan is the awkward girl to whom every teen can relate, said freshman psychology major Casey Patterson. Naturally, her relationship with Edward – who looks flawless and loves Bella indefinitely – is the fantasy of millions.
The films have transformed the meaning of vampires in this generation from one of terror to one of sexuality, Patterson said.
“When we were kids, it was always about Dracula,” he said. “Now, it’s about sparkling sex monsters.”
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