Next to zombies, vampires are the most common supernatural beings represented on television and film screens these days. And now, you can expect to see even more of them: banking off the success of The Vampire Diaries, the CW network has decided to launch a vampire-themed spinoff called The Originals, USA Today reports.
Really, though, is there room in this world for more vampires? Between The Vampire Diaries, True Blood and The Twilight Saga, there plenty of vampire-related series and movies to choose from. With so much blood being sucked, its only a matter of time before the fangs grow horribly dull.
What TV executives and script-writers need are some new monsters to work with. Heres a few that can offer fresh looks, weirder vibes and fun new ways of feasting on the innocent.
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Bankers
When it comes to writing on-screen drama, the vampire is a versatile creation. They can be scary, sexy or romantic (or all of the above). They can be good or evil or somewhere in between. And since theyre always thirsting for blood and quenching their thirst they serve as a never-ending source of pathos and conflict.
Vampires dont exist in real life, of course. But bankers do, and the worst ones are shockingly similar to their supernatural counterparts. Indeed, they might be even scarier while vampires tend to target individual victims, massive investment banks like Goldman Sachs (which Rolling Stones Matt Taibbi once called a great vampire squid) can wreak havoc on the entire world economy, as was the case during the financial crisis of 2008.
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Goblins
The best monsters are ones that terrorize and sympathize in equal measure. Theyre fearsome and evil, but they have lives, feelings and real motivations. Theyre human, in a sense, and theyre scary in part because they bring out the monstrosities of humankind.
Goblins are usually much simpler foes. Ugly, greedy, and utterly lacking in morals, theyre just bad period.
But maybe theres more to the goblin than meets the eye? In this chase scene from The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the grotesque little buggers look like bumbling idiots as they pursue Bilbo Baggins and his dwarf buddies. And yet their subterranean lair is so vast, complex and visually striking that you have to wonder if theres an intriguing serial drama to be found there when Bilbo isnt around.
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Weretigers
Even the sexiest, most complex monster can get boring after a while. To spice things up, writers must come up with ever-wilder creations and even mix and match. The producers of The Originals know this well enough: According to USA Today, the series stars Joseph Morgan as a vampire-werewolf hybrid.
HBOs True Blood has highlighted plenty of supernatural beings over the years, but theres one that has yet to make an appearance: John Quinn, the strapping, purple-eyed weretiger (a human who can transform into a tiger) from The Southern Vampire Mysteries, the book series on which the show is based. With True Blood now taking a more focused direction, maybe Quinn should get a series of his own.