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If you are like me, reading the Twilight Saga, written by Stephenie Meyer, fueled your obsession for vampires, impossible love, and beautiful unattainable people. Well, I have read the series four times, own three different copies of the Twilight movie, and scour the Internet daily for news of New Moon. So, what to do while I wait? The easy answer is The CW’s Vampire Diaries airing on Thursdays.
Vampire Diaries is a new television series about a teenage brother and sister who lose their parents tragically and try to get back to a normal life in Mystic Falls. What they discover is there are two young vampires in town. Great, so we have teenage humans, “teenage” vampires, an inescapable attraction between a human and vampire, and of course a good vampire and evil vampire for even more conflict.
As I was reading about the new series and anticipating the first episode I began to see the similarities. Now that I have watched the first six episodes, I am hooked and while there are still many similarities, Vampire Diaries does have enough differences that I cannot wait for Thursdays to see the next episode! Here are just a few of the basic similarities and differences:
| Feature | Vampire Diaries | Twilight Saga |
| Female Teenage Human | X | X |
| Male Teenage Vampire | X | X |
| Attraction between two said characters | X | X |
| Oblivious Townspeople | X | X |
| Traditional Vampire | X | X |
| Vegetarian Vampire | X | X |
| Innocent lives lost | X | X |
| High School setting | X | X |
| Small Town | X | X |
| Damsel in Distress | X | |
| Human wanting to be vampire to be with her love | X | |
| Vampire Rules | X | |
| Vampires in the Sun without sparkling | X | |
| Werewolves | X | |
| Witches | X | |
| Based on books | X | X |
In Vampire Diaries, Elena Gilbert (Nina Dobrev) is very confident and sure of whom she is and does fall all over herself for the attraction she feels to Stefan Salvatore (Paul Wesley). Unlike in the Twilight Saga, Bella (Kristen Stewart) seems very lost in her obsession with Edward (Robert Pattinson) and does not feel she could live without him. Elena even states that she will not let a boy get in the way of her happiness.
Another pointed difference is the relationship between the good and bad vampires in Vampire Diaries. Stefan is the good vegetarian vampire while his own brother, Damon Salvatore (Ian Somerhalder) is the bad vampire attacking humans and is in conflict with Stefan. In the Twilight Saga, Edward Cullen and his family are very supportive and follow the same diet rules and the bad vampires are the human-attacking kind.
The writers and producers of Vampire Diaries note the similarities of the two stories but are quick to point out that their series will separate quickly and go in directions not thought of in Twilight. Personally, I am hooked and cannot wait to see what is going to happen with the brother rivalry, the love of the human and vampire, how the townspeople will get along with two vampires in their town, and how Elena’s friends will handle her dating the mysterious new guy. But none of this alters the love I have for Twilight either! There's room enough for both in my world.
