March 31, 2013

• Zombies and Vampires

  There are only two kinds of threats in stories. Just two. A threat is either a Zombie threat or a Vampire threat. Period.

  Zombie threats are those where the monsters are numerous but CAN be defeated. The heroes are not powerless against zombies, just overwhelmed. The threat lies in the sheer numbers, the destruction of social norms people rely on, and the sense of endless draining struggle.

  On the other hand a Vampire, in the classic sense represents the big bad. It is a force so powerful the protagonists have little power against it. In order to defeat it you have to go through some ginormous quest or employ very obscure tools and special weapons and even then your chances of victory are slim to non-existent. The vampire is just sooo POWERFUL. The conflict comes from a sense of hopelessness, powerlessness, and despair. 

  The zombie style threats tend to be everywhere bugging the heroes, destroying society, unavoidable. Whereas the vampire threats honestly tend to be minding their own business except when they find someone they want to kill, or someone messes up their usual life. The vampire threats tend to represent a personal demon for the hero, haunting him in particular, whereas the zombie threat represents generic life suckitude.

  Of course there are rampaging vampires like in Buffy the Vampire slayer who are more of a zombie threat than a vampire threat. And there are super dangerous unbeatable zombies in some stories that are more vampiristic. But for the most part it holds.  

  The alien invasion trope is a Zombie threat because the humans fight back and kick their zombie/alien-ass ala Star Gate. But the Alien Terraforming or Alien-as-God stories tend to be flat out Vampiric. Basically the aliens are so far beyond humans it’s not really a fight.  Think something like Q from Star Trek. 

  Serial killers tend to be Vampires. Whereas mobster types tend to Zombie. And so on and so forth.

  You can also think of this a Dragon threats versus Goblin/Orc threats if you like. But I’m pretty sure that’s all that there is.

  • 6:00 pm
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