BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: Vampire Hip Part 4 – Buffy vs. Dracula
January 17th 2010 01:11
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“I saw as a vampire (…). It was as if I had only just been able to see colors and shapes for the first time. I was so enthralled with the buttons on Lestat’s black coat that I looked at nothing else for a long time. Then Lestat began to laugh, and I heard his laughter as I had never heard anything before.” - Anne Rice, Interview with the Vampire
The cinematic Dracula is the perfect epitome of style over substance, a pure image: “This vampire is above all a monster to be looked at, or gazed upon, with his slick black hair, eloquent hands, handsome top hat, dazzling shirt, and magnificent cape” wrote Cynthia Freeland on Bela Lugosi as Dracula. When Dracula himself appears in Sunnydale in an episode called “Buffy vs. Dracula” (5.1), it is comparable to a visit from an undead superstar: in terms of vampire hierarchy he is the crème de la crème and arrives to Buffyverse in grand style, complete with traditional Dracula garb: a long, flowing black cape with scarlet lining, a coffin, ominous music, and a Gothic castle with thunderstorms.
Buffy’s Dracula is everything we expect him to be, only more so: he is handsomer and more sophisticated than any other vampire we have ever seen on the show. Being a visitor from another aesthetic dimension, he creates an effect comparable to Bela Lugosi showing up in a Hammer film. He represents the original ideal that everyone copies and aspires to and consequently a vampface becomes unnecessary: it is not required because Dracula represents the essence of vampirism of mythic proportions, there is no need to hide or pass for a human. Subversion of that ideal happens by extreme tongue-in-cheek comedic exaggeration. As the definite star of this episode, Dracula gets the classic Hollywood close-up treatment, with shots making an homage to old creature of the night features, campily exaggerated in saturated colours, similar the Hammer movies aesthetic. All that said, in Buffyverse Dracula has to convince everyone he is the real thing.
Camp Dracula, or how to wear a cape
The ‘Dark Prince’ is chivalrous, assured and charming and has a distinct foreign accent, which Buffy immediately parodies, mimicking it perfectly. He introduces himself: “I apologize. I assumed you knew. I’m Dracula”, but Buffy’s reaction implies that to her this might be just some old guy pretending to be Dracula: “Get out! I fought more than a couple of overweight, pimply vamps that call themselves Lestat”. This undercutting approach serves to subvert both the stereotypes of horror and awe that the monster usually induces, and viewer expectations: the audience immediately knew who he was. Dracula is not shaken by this non-response, his attitude is of amused superiority and refinement. He hovers over the Sunnydale scene, dominating it with his undeniable tongue-in-cheek presence, elegance and old world sophistication. His mannered attempts at flattery bore Buffy at first, but after her fighting skills turn out to be ineffective against his shape-shifting “gypsy tricks” she eventually gives in and is swept off her feet: “Count Famous heard of me!” After all we are in California and fame becomes a new attribute of the vampire in Buffyverse.
Buffy and the Scooby gang are familiar with the vampire theme from the cinema, but they research him to separate fact from fiction, diving into and revamping the lore (pun intended). This aspect of the vampire narrative is partly what invites cult following of the series, which engages in an interactive dialogue with the viewer. In Buffy it is Buffyverse that is new and needs to face up to Dracula. The show analyzes itself in relation to the classics and Dracula gets a history inbuilt into its world: he apparently shared an erotic episode with Anya and was Spike’s “rival”: “Pansy bugger owes me 11 pounds for one thing.” Everyone refined, including Dracula and of course Angel, is a ‘poofter’ to Spike, who exhibits classic working class homophobia as part of his persona; he claims to be Dracula’s old rival, yet he has no intention of getting his money back. In addition, he blames Dracula for selling out and betraying subcultural secrets to the general public: “That glory house has done more harm to vampires than any slayer. His story gets out and suddenly everybody knows how to kill us. The mirror bit?” Dracula however does not share the frame with other vampires, as they tend to keep their distance.
Their mocking attitude (“He totally looks shorter in person”) doesn’t protect the Scoobies from falling under Dracula’s thrall. He does not inspire outright terror and has a sexy, penetrating gaze and an erotic aura, which arouses excitement, nostalgia and jealousy among the Scooby gang, who are threatened by his allure and the visible effect he has, especially on the fair sex. The obligatory seduction scene is typical of all cinematic Dracula movies, up to a point of course: Buffy is sleeping all serenity and moonlight, when Dracula seeps in through the window in the form of blue mist, with the accompaniment of melancholy chamber music in the background: “Do you know why you cannot resist?” Buffy’s feminist image is played with here, we expect her to regain her footing any minute now, as she responds: “Cause your famous?” He’s slightly disappointed however at the unexpected fact, that another vampire had tasted her already: there are visible scars on her neck.
The ultimate seducer, master of mystery, manner and pose, Dracula uses self-assured, proven methods of seduction from the Anne Rice dandy vampire lore, which ultimately backfire on him: Buffy’s power turns out to be an exact primal antidote to his charms. He inadvertently puts her in direct touch with it by making her taste his own blood, but it disagrees with Buffy’s pink lipstick. Their fighting invariably creates associations with kinky sexual practices: after all they are wearing matching leather trousers and the weapons are mostly phallic. The fight is inconsequential, because Buffy simply cannot lose, her aim is to debunk Dracula as an authority figure, and he is impossible to kill: “You think I don’t watch your movies? You always come back.” Their romantic meeting can be dismissed as a trivial affair.
Joss Whedon admits that the show is “overwrought” and “over the top” (6.7, “Once More with Feeling”, DVD commentary). One of the reasons Buffy appeals to us is because it takes camp glee in itself. It is filmed through a consciously camp lens, inviting camp recognition. Self-referentiality, open-endedness, incongruity and intertextual awareness, which require pop culture expertise from the audience, are all part of the camp appeal, which contributes to Buffy’s cult following. The pervading aesthetic of Buffyverse is that of postmodern version of camp, comprised of nostalgic referencing of classic themes and characters from different genres and their simultaneous constant undercutting, thereby creating a subversive effect.
Stylistic excess is present in every aspect of the show, from the prevailing colorful kitsch aesthetic, the double entendre and witty repartee type of dialogue and Buffy’s ironic punning, to the tongue-in-cheek, exaggerated Gothic and Christian iconography of pseudo-medieval weapons, books and crucifixes. Last, but not least, the vampires, the transgressive superheroes with fangs and attitude, contribute largely to the element of gender ambiguity, polymorphously perverse desire and sexual transgressions. Buffy’s California outfits deserve a special mention, notoriously in the scene when she breaks up with Angel while wearing a matching blouse and purse in a ludicrous snake skin pattern, which diverts our attention and completely undercuts the pathos of the scene (3.20, “The Prom”). The show does not shy from the use of corny aesthetics associated with Harlequin novel covers to portray Buffy and Angel’s doomed romance: in “Band Candy” (3.6) for example, we observe Angel from Buffy’s desiring perspective, which focuses on his half naked, anointed body, practicing tai chi amongst fallen leaves and marble statues. This inherent cheesiness is played out for its humour and the camp objectification of the male body. In Angel the aesthetic approach is generally much darker, but occasionally the series camps it up, tapping into comic-book sensibilities, as when Spike parodies Angel from a distance, likening him to Batman, the classic camp icon: “Evil’s still afoot! And I’m almost out of that Nancy-boy hair gel that I like so much. Quickly, to the Angel-mobile, away!” (A1.3, “In the Dark”). The use of subcultural imagery and signifiers in the Buffy franchise is very clever; these aesthetics are employed unpretentiously, avoiding the audience’s eye rolling by undercutting serious emotion and sentimentality and parodying itself constantly, in short, by keeping its attitude in check.
Article by Patricia Bieszk
© Copyright P. Bieszk 2010
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: Vampire Hip Part 5 – Mainstreamed subcultures? (Coming Soon)
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