The Vampire Diaries, or, Buffy/Angel was bad enough the first time around

[rusty_halo]

Just finished episode 13 of The Vampire Diaries. Thoughts so far:

This show really doesn't work for me. Nothing that it considers deserving of narrative focus is actually interesting.

I don't want to say that I'm not a fan of romance, because I spend a lot of my time reading romantic fanfiction and would consider myself a fan of various pairings (Dean/Cas, Ten/Rose, Remus/Sirius, Brian/Michael, Peter/Neal, Doctor/Master etc etc). I am definitely interested in stories about deep, intense, profound relationships (actually regardless of whether they're technically romantic or "just" intensely platonic). But the stories I love are about how those two unique individuals connect, grow together, challenge each other, change each other, complement and provide meaning and connection to each other. It always has to start as a story about the characters first, with the romance as something that grows organically from the intensity of their connection.

The Vampire Diaries takes the opposite perspective. "Romance" in this show is chemical infatuation--when two hot people spy each other across the room and feel a "spark," and various awkward sexy things that happen afterward. It's not actually about who the characters are or how they relate to each other as people. It's a surface, visual, chemical thing. It's not real. The show just repeats this premise over and over (sure with different results--sometimes it leads to sex and sometimes it leads to one partner staking the other) and it expects this incessantly repeated premise to be interesting for its own sake.

So in addition to that there's the problem that every single male character on this show is utterly fucking creepy. They all commit varying degrees of manipulation, violence, possession, or flat-out rape against women. And then the narrative expects us to be sympathetic! WTF is all this "OMG don't kill Damon!" and the narrative expecting the audience to be invested in and sympathetic to Damon's story? This is a 150 year old man who gets his kicks raping and murdering teenage girls! It's like they want us to love him the way people love Lestat or Spike, without giving him any of the charm or wit or redeeming qualities those characters had. And Stefan is hardly better, with his creeptastic stalking and seducing of a teenage girl (clearly, despite his protests, because she looks like his ex from 150 years ago), and his endless descents into whiny self-pity and ineffective patheticness.

Ok, I will give the show credit for the quality of the female characters. Yes, there are many and they often pass the Bechdel test. I appreciate Elena's gravitas and sense (at least she wasn't happy about Stefan's creepy stalking or that he turned out to be a vampire) and ability to know what she wants and stand up for herself. But actually the only character on the show so far who's actually seemed interesting to me was Vicki, and of course they killed her off to give the guys extra manpain. >:( >:(

So in conclusion, the endless "Stefan and Elena break up and get back together and angst at each other" that drives this show is driving me mad. Buffy/Angel was bad enough the first time around!

(Sorry, Cindy! Thank you for the rec--I really wanted to like it, but it's just not for me.)

Originally published at rusty-halo.com. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[cindergal]

No need to apologize! Sorry it didn't work for you. I completely disagree about pretty much everything you say here, but that's okay! *g*

[chase820]

Thanks for the review. I've been wondering if I should give this show a shot, but now I'll save myself the trouble.

There's such a dearth of good fantasy these days. Especially good fantasy with interesting female characters who aren't in love with jerks. *Sigh*

[rusty_halo]

I wish it had been better. It's so rare to find a fantasy show that I actually like in terms of worldview/story/characters, and then whenever I do the gender politics are gruesome. :(

[cindergal]

So in addition to that there's the problem that every single male character on this show is utterly fucking creepy. They all commit varying degrees of manipulation, violence, possession, or flat-out rape against women.

You know, I wasn't going to address anything specific in your post because I don't like to debate much and I didn't want you to think I was trying to change your mind about the show, but I do have to take issue with this particular statement. Every single male character is this way? Damon is this way. But he's, you know, a vampire and pretty much a villain for the first half of season 1. Tyler is not a nice guy. (We eventually learn a lot more about both of them and why they act the way they do, although you probably aren't interested at this point. ;-)) We will just have to agree to disagree about Stefan.

But Matt, Jeremy, Alaric are all creepy and manipulative, etc.? Nah, I don't see it. They are all pretty good guys who try to do the right thing, and I had to come back and defend them. :-)

[rusty_halo]

LOL. I'm sorry the post bothered you enough to come back!

All the male characters have creeped me out in one way or another. Alaric's whole "vengeance for my dead wife" backstory is just another take on the fridged woman trope. Matt's behavior toward Elena is passive-aggressive and stalkery. Jeremy's probably the most sympathetic but I thought Vicki was right when she said that Jeremy was just another guy who wanted to use her for his own needs more than to actually know her as a person.

Most of all I'm horrified that the show apparently thinks rape is not a big deal. After Tyler tries to rape Vicki and Damon does rape Caroline, the show still treats both as characters who are worth sympathizing with and ~understanding~, and doesn't acknowledge the significance of what they've committed.

[cindergal]

LOL! Don't worry, I'm not bothered. :-) I was just happened to be watching more episodes today and reading some meta from other fans on my FL and it reminded me of your post, so I came back to see if there was any more discussion on it.

I completely disagree with you about Matt, Alaric and Jeremy, and I think I'll mostly leave it at that, except to say that IMO they are complicated characters who do things for a variety of reasons, sometimes selfless and sometimes selfish, and that's okay with me.

I do agree with you regarding the show's treatment of rape, and I wish they would take Damon's "compulsion" in particular more seriously. But Damon is, again, a vampire. And he doesn't even particularly want to be good, but finds himself on the side of good more often than not because he keeps developing these annoying feelings for various people. So while I certainly don't like everything Damon does... I still love the character.

I have lots more to say about the show (and especially it's numerous, awesome female characters!), but I will save that for my own journal as I'm sure you're not interested. ;-) Mostly, I just find this show completely entertaining and I hope you find something to watch that you like as much.