Vampire's Leading Ladies; Sookie vs. Bella

The dark, mysterious, romanticized world of vampires has always intrigued me. Before all this mania with Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight saga, I was a devout Vampire Chronicles and Anne Rice fan. For some reason, the wildly popular Stephanie Meyer is now the queen of immortal diction. There is huge critique right now of her characters being anti-feminist. An article in Ms. recently discussed the role of the passive main character, Bella.

I think these critiques are completely valid and true, Meyer's has said that she wrote Bella as sort of open-ended so the reader can read as if in her shoes. I don't believe this to be an acceptable answer to why Bella makes all her decisions based on her vampire boyfriend, Edward. In New Moon she contemplates ending her life because Edward leaves her, this is not a strong example of a leading lady for young readers, and I hope that most young ladies would not make the same decisions as she does when left by a boyfriend. As a feminist, I definitely realized the weaknesses in Bella before I read them in these various critiques, but, I can see how the younger audience might not realize how Bella is overshadowed by the "godlike" Edward. I must confess, I truly enjoyed the Twilight saga and appreciated it for what it was, G-rated light reading in between heavier readings for classes.

The Sookie Stackhouse Series by Charlaine Harris is another vampire saga that has not gained as much social ground as Twilight but has a stronger plot and a much stronger leading lady. These books have been turned into a series on HBO called Tru Blood where the telepathic small town waitress Sookie meets Bill, a vampire. Instead of becoming the damsel as Bella does throughout the Twilight series, Sookie rescues Bill from having his blood drained for profit. MSNBC recently compared Bella and Sookie, this is what inclined me to write about this topic.

I have to admit, that I really do love Twilight, the story is creative and entertaining. But True Blood carries more substance because the misunderstanding, intolerance, and segregation experienced by vampires in True Blood is satirical to minorities and the injustices they face in America. But while Twilight reaches to the younger masses, True Blood's racy scenes between Bill and Sookie are probably not age appropriate for most Twilighters.