Lately I've realised
that my taste in TV isn't as highbrow as I liked to think.
I'm not really
sorry, though, because I have a new crush, and it's The Vampire Diaries. Yes,
in all its melodramatic, angsty, trash-tv glory. I love it.
Why, you ask? Well,
for a start, it's just pure entertainment. Unlike most of the films I enjoy, it's never going to go down in
history as a work of art, but it's a pretty damn enjoyable way to spend 40
minutes. It's fast-paced, funny, suspenseful, and all the other adjectives that
every TV magazine will throw at you - but more than that, it has good
characters. And that's usually my deal-breaker when it comes to film and TV.
Are the people true to life? Larger than life? Are they complex, relatable,
human? That's what I really look for in film, and that's my favourite thing
about The Vampire Diaries.
Which is kind of
ironic, of course, because actual humans are in short supply among the
characters of TVD. There are vampires, werewolves, hybrid wolf-vamp freaks,
witches, supernatural vampire hunters, and various other forms of dead and
undead beings, but humans really are an endangered species. Only one of the
three main characters is human, and that is of course Elena Gilbert. She's the sweet
girl-next-door caught between Stefan, her virtuous vampire boyfriend, and Damon, his malevolent vampire brother. It's all very high school, at least at the start. Of course we find out sooner or later that the unthreatening girl-next
door might be a bit more complex than we bargained for, her hero boyfriend might be hiding a serial killer streak, and the brother who started
out as a homicidal maniac might just be her one true love after all. It gets
complicated.
I never expected
Damon to be my favourite character, not by a long shot. In the first season I
could see that he felt something for Elena, but I expected his love for her
just to be a device that would downgrade his character from 'nuclear-level psychopath' to 'charming and morally ambiguous bad boy'. I figured that after
three or four seasons of half-heartedly trying to be good, he would eventually
get his heart broken by Elena and usher in a revenge-fuelled armageddon that
would tie off the final season. He might even redeem himself by some final
selfless act that would ensure Stefan and Elena could be together (maybe
saving their lives or something). Inevitably, he'd die in the second-to-last episode and we'd all feel a bit
sorry for him but forget him soon enough in Stefan and Elena's
happily-ever-after. This wasn't pure conjecture, after all - how often does the
villain of the piece actually get the girl? Err...going on my knowledge of
classic literature, that would be pretty much never. We all know that Paris loved Helen of Troy, Vronsky loved Anna, Rhett loved Scarlett, Heathcliff loved Cathy, the Phantom loved Christine, Snape loved Lily (yes, I know that's not classic literature), but there was no happy ending there. Admittedly, I'm not much of a TV person and the narrative structure of TV shows is different. I'm sure there are some examples of villain-gets-the-girl in TV but I was missing them.* At any rate, I just assumed that whatever character changes Damon might go through, he'd never actually end up with the girl.
Slight problem. By
the middle of season 2, I wanted Damon and Elena to end up together just as much as I wanted Damon to redeem himself. I could still appreciate Stefan and Elena's
relationship, but there was no doubt in my mind that Elena and Damon absolutely had to end up together. Call me a die-hard romantic, but all that angst, slow character
development, and surprise revelations really did it for me. From a writing
perspective, I'm always fascinated to see how this pans out and how the writers
make it believable. The thing about the TVD writers is that they're just
inconsistent enough to make it really suspenseful. I always wonder if they
really know what they're doing and if they actually care about the characters
as much as the fans do. Some moments are pure genius, like the revelation that
Damon and Elena met first (boy was that a game-changer) but sometimes they
just screw with the characters too much, pushing them beyond the bounds of
what's cohesive and relatable. That kind of writing, while it might be
clever in a cheap sort of way, makes for tense and often infuriated fans.
Having said that, the writers have created some unforgettable characters.
They've taken an eye-wateringly terrible set of books and turned them into
suspenseful, engaging entertainment. The downside is that for Delena shippers
like me, it's a rough ride. Although I really believe they're endgame, the show is so unpredictable that part of
me is waiting for each episode to be their last.
So yes, I'm hooked
on The Vampire Diaries, and no matter how crazy it gets, I'm sure I'll keep
watching because I've never wanted a fictional couple to end up together-forever as
much as I do Elena and Damon. Until that day comes, I'll be writing away all my doubts and conjecture. So here's to many happy, suspenseful hours ahead.
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*For clarity's sake, Damon actually moves in season 1 from a villain role to an antihero role. He starts out the clear villain in terms of his relation to the plot and to other characters, but that doesn't last for long. He's a complex character who even takes on the hero role temporarily at many points, but overall he is an antihero as opposed to a villain.
