Final Blogtastic Reflection (#4)

For my final blog reflection for 4th quarter, I chose "Blagojevich on 'Celebrity Apprentice'" as my favorite blog post. The reason I like this one so much is because I feel very strongly about the subject. This usually characterizes my favorite posts. When you're really passionate about what you're writing about, it just makes it a lot more fun to write. And when I saw that Blagojevich was on a reality t.v. show and not in jail, I was just outraged. I was also able to incorporate a bunch of sources in this post, which I think adds depth and more credibility to a post. And from those sources, I used direct quotes and dissected them to prove my point even more. It just had more substance than some of my other posts.
This year I have really developed as a blogger. Not that I blogged before this class, but my style has changed since the beginning of the year. I started my blogging career by mostly writing about certain issues that I encountered in my everyday life, but didn't necessarily connect to class. But as the year continued, my posts started to become extensions of class discussions, which is what I think Mr. Bolos and Mr. O'Connor intended them to be. And when I could not extend the discussion to my blogging, I wrote about prominent issues in the news. Not always, but I tried to.
I have really enjoyed blogging this year because I do like to write, but essays can often times be laborious and they take a long time to do. On the other hand, a blog post doesn't have to be long. You can write a little about a lot, and that's what I've really liked about blogging this year.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Vampire Is The New Black

     The other day I was complaining to my mom about how next week's episode of "Vampire Diaries" is going to be a re-run, (Don't make fun of me, I already have people to fill that job). Anyway, that's when I realized, and I seem to be the last person in the world to realize, that the entire media, whether it be books, magazines, movies, television shows, whatever, has been completely taken over by vampires. There's the notorious Twilight series including the movie franchise, the HBO series "True Blood," the new CW series "Vampire Diaries" and its entire collection of books, not to mention the new movie The Vampire's Assistant hitting theaters this week. There are so many vampires in Hollywood right now, that in Teen Vogue's November issue, the star of "Vampire Diaries," Paul Wesley, remembers a vampire run-in with the cast of Twilight: "the cast was staying at our hotel-- we saw them everywhere and hung out all the time," while New Moon and "Vampire Diaries" were being filmed in Vancouver at the same time. Two vampire families, one city... Great.
     Vampires have made an incredible transformation from the days of Dracula. Vampires were once seen as scary creatures of the night who went around killing people without mercy. Now, vampires have a positive connotation. People see them as sexy, emotionally disturbed, and caring beings who will love you forever (in the literal sense), which are particularly attractive qualities when it comes to teenage girls. Take Edward Cullen of the Twilight series, for example. Edward practically embodies every women's dream guy, and that's what makes him so popular with every age group from young girls to older women. The entire image of a scary vampire is almost non-existent these days. Of all the vampire books, movies, and t.v. shows I've seen, the only truly scary vampire is Nosferatu from the classic silent movie.
     But what is the cause of this transformation from scary to sexy? What caused this boom of a whole new generation of vampires? Is just simply the popularity of the Twilight series that set everyone off? Or does it say something deeper about American society? Americans are no longer afraid of the vampire. They could even be your soul mate. Hell, I want to be a vampire.











                THEN VS NOW                 
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2 comments:

  1. Anna.SOctober 25, 2009 at 6:37 PM

    I agree with your blog. I saw a newspaper (I don't remember which) along the same lines-- vampires in the media.
    There's also beef between the Harry Potter fans and "Twilighters." Having read all of the books in both catergories, I can say that, though very briefly and embarassingly a Twilight fan, I have steadfastly been an avid Harry Potter fan. My friends and I often watch the movies and test each other with trivia. It's very cool. Anyway, the two biggest similarities--Robert Pattinson who was gorgeous in Harry Potter 4 as Cedric Diggory, and who now plays Edward. Abilities aside, Pattinson seemed decidly less sketchy in Harry Potter, and cuter (not being completely pasty helped). Twilight's just weird.
    Harry Potter has its vampiric moments too, however. In the sixth book, at one of the Slug Club parties, a very entertaining vampire is present. Rowling puts him in for comedic relief, as he stares at the partiers hungrily. But did Rowling do this intentionally, to make fun of Stephenie Meyers?

    And as for the last few sentences-- I want to be a vampire too. thanks to facebook's vampires vs. werewolves, I am a vampire (haha... Juno!)

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  2. S. BolosJanuary 18, 2010 at 10:20 PM

    Love the contrasting photos, Zoe. I think it would be wonderful to elaborate more on this quote: "Edward practically embodies every women's dream guy, and that's what makes him so popular with every age group from young girls to older women."

    What makes you say that? Is that uniquely American?

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