Vampires and Humans

With the new Twilight movie upon us, I thought I would compare the characters in my guilty pleasure, Twilight, to those in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. While different in several ways, the characters are also quite similar. Buffy and Bella share a common top priority: family and friends.

Both Buffy and Bella repeatedly go out of their way to sacrifice themselves for the one's they love. They both define family as not only those related to them by blood, but also those who they care about, love, and depend on. Let's not forget to mention, they are also both humans who fall for the dangerous vampires. Granted, in Twilight most of the vampires are depicted as fairies and won't harm a human if given the chance. Buffy literally sacrifices her life in order to save her younger sister, Dawn. She considers her life insignificant if she can't share it with the people she holds most dear. Similarly, Bella leaves her parents in the dark about her relationship with a vampire in order to protect them. She repeatedly makes the Cullens aware that her first priority is keeping her father safe (her mother lives in Florida).

Bella, by nature, is much more careless and irresponsible than Buffy. In the second volume of the saga: "New Moon,"Bella intentionally does reckless things to bring back her beloved vampire. Though Buffy is reckless for having a relationship with the more foreboding, Spike, she does not intentionally put herself in horrifying situations to attract another's attention.

Another way in which they are fundamentally different is that Bella wants into the supernatural world, and Buffy wants out. Bella sees the world of vampires as sexy and alluring and she wants nothing more than to be part of it. Buffy did not choose to lead the supernatural life, and would love nothing more than to be a normal teenager. Perhaps some fan fiction switcharoo? I'm not sure how much Buffy would like Edward though....