History Main / VampireHunter

* Baron Vordenburg in ''Literature/{{Carmilla}}'' is one of the earliest examples, and probably the TropeMaker. He is an eccentric old nobleman who has devoted his life to the study of the lore of vampires and the tracking down and extermination of them. He also has family history with Carmilla (the vampire in the story): his ancestor was an admirer of Countess Mircalla, as she was then known, during her life and did some research about what became of her. Unlike later examples of the trope, he does not actually hunt vampires physically, probably because he is too old and frail for that, but provides the lore and information needed to dinf and eliminate them.

* Baron Vordenburg in ''Literature/{{Carmilla}}'' is one of the earliest examples of literature, possibly the TropeMaker. He is an eccentric old nobleman who has devoted his life to the study of the lore of vampires and the tracking down and extermination of them. He also has family history with Carmilla (the vampire in the story): his ancestor was an admirer of Countess Mircalla, as she was then known, during her life and did some research about what became of her. Unlike later examples of the trope, he does not actually hunt demons physically, probably because he's too old and frail for that, but assists the hunt with lore and information.

* Baron Vordenburg in ''Literature/{{Carmilla}}'' is one of the earliest examples of literature, possibly the TropeMaker.

* Season three of ''VisualNovel/HavenfallIsForLovers'' introduces a female vampire hunter who claims the name Van Helsing, and takes a few style notes from ''LightNovel/VampireHunterD'' and the various Belmonts of ''Franchise/{{Castlevania}}'' while she's at it. Since a vampire and a werewolf both number among the protagonist's close friends and potential love interests, Van Helsing's arrival in Havenfall provides more than a little cause for concern.

* ''LightNovel/VampireHunterD'' is of the HunterOfHisOwnKind type in the {{Dhampyr}} variation.

* ''Film/JohnCarpentersVampires'': Jack Crow leads a group of vampire hunters who are [[FantasticCatholicism on the payroll of the catholic church]]. They're pretty effective at it until they receive a visit from the [[MonsterProgenitor Master Vampire]] Jan Valek, who is far stronger than anything they have ever dealt with, so quickly wipes out everyone but Crow and his best friend.

* ''{{Film/Bit}}'': A group of them attempt to kill the vampires led by Duke. However, it turns out they were actually mind-controlled by Vlad (another vampire) to get rid of them so he'd be freed from captivity, with the leader killing the rest with him after they're no longer of use. Duke and co. later wipe out the rest in their bunker [[CombatPragmatist with hand grenades, which vampires aren't expected to use]].

* ''{{Film/Bit}}'': A group of them attempt to kill the vampires. However, it turns out they were actually mind-controlled by Vlad (another vampire) to get rid of them so he'd be freed from captivity, with the leader killing the rest with him after they're no longer of use. Duke and co. later wipe out the rest in their bunker.

* In ''Webcomic/{{Sinfest}}'', [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=1623 Monique thinks "Slick: Vampire Hunter" would be a good slogan.]]

* Creator/JamieFoxx’s character in ''Film/DayShift'' is a vampire Hunter who poses as a pool cleaner to hunt his prey during the daytime. He is even part of a union of vampires.

* ''Series/FirstKill'': Cal's whole family are these, plus {{monster hunter}}s in general. She's in training to be this as well. That becomes complicated when she meets Juliette, a vampire whom she's drawn to and causes Cal to question if they're right in their actions.

* ''Series/FirstKill'': Cal's whole family are these, plus {{monster hunter}}s in general. She's in training to be this as well. That becomes complicated when she meets Juliette, a vampire whom she's drawn to and questions if they're right in their actions.

* ''Series/FirstKill'': Cal's whole family are these, plus {{monster hunter}}s in general. She's in training to be this as well. That becomes complicated when she meets a {{dhampyr}}, Juliette, whom she's drawn to and questions if they're right in their actions.

** The [[Series/BeingHumanUK original]] has [=McNair=], who travels around Britain with his son, hunting vampires. A somewhat unusual example as both of them are [[FurAgainstFang werewolves]].
* Monsignor Javier Mendoza in ''Series/BloodTies2007'' is a villainous variant. He was a Grand Inquisitor during the UsefulNotes/SpanishInquisition, who captured vampires using any means possible, tortured them until they confessed, and then brutally executed them. Oh yeah, he also used their blood in a potion that stopped his aging process, allowing him to continue the hunt. He doesn't shy away from murdering innocents to get to his prey. In "Heart of Ice", he murders a prostitute and drains her of blood, so that [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Henry]]'s friends would give him up.
** Interestingly, the only anti-vampire weapon they show him having is a sun-shaped Chinese-made object that weakens a vampire to the point of a human being stronger. The object has to be physically attached to the vampire's chest to work, requiring trickery, given the vampires' speed.
* This is the calling of the Slayer in the ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' series. Slayers, in addition to fighting vampires, also have to fight [[VillainPedigree demons]], which vampires are something of a subset of in the Whedonverse.
** Angel falls into this category as well, both on Buffy and [[Series/{{Angel}} his own series]]. Unfortunately so does Holtz, a dedicated vampire hunter who turns out to be one of Angel's more effective enemies. When he was evil, Angel(us) murdered Holtz's family. Holtz pursues Angel through time to the modern day, determined to exact revenge regardless of Angel now having a soul or being a fighter against evil.

* Most modern examples are [[TropeCodifier descended in part from]] the character [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Van_Helsing Abraham Van Helsing]] in the original ''Literature/{{Dracula}}''. Van Helsing was never described as a vampire hunter in the novel, though; he was merely a doctor with knowledge of exotic diseases. It's never explicitly said, but Van Helsing clearly demonstrates perfect knowledge of vampire weaknesses and is instantly willing to make use of his knowledge after noting that Lucy's symptoms match those in the legends, without so much as a hint of skepticism. This would seem to imply that he has some previous experience with vampires or other supernatural phenomena, even in the original novel. [[note]] On the other hand, he doesn't recognize Lucy's symptoms on sight and it takes him a while- too long, in fact, to prevent Lucy's death- to understand what's going on [[/note]]

** In "Hunted", in which the VillainOfTheWeek is HuntingTheMostDangerousGame, the flashback scenes have Nick, [=LaCroix=] and Janette hunting--and being hunted by--a human vampire hunter.

* ''Series/ForeverKnight'' had a dhampyr-type hunter in the episode "Bad Blood". He wasn't a vampire's child, but had dhampyr-type enhanced abilities due to not being completely drained by [=LaCroix=] years before.

* ''Film/FrightNight1985'': Peter Vincent is initially a subversion, as while he plays the role of such a hunter on TV, he's just that, an actor. However, once Jerry and Evil Ed come into the picture, he slowly [[BecomingTheMask becomes the real deal]] when he manages to kill the latter with the very stuff he has on hand. Charley himself is forced to become one in order to save his girlfriend from Jerry's influence and vampirism.

* The 18th century Austrian Empire [[https://warhistoryonline.com/guest-bloggers/the-austrian-armys-vampire-hunting-detachment-a-halloween-special.html briefly had a vampire hunting squadron]], although they were closer to doctors, as vampirism was considered a disease at the time (and probably was a poorly-understood mundane disease.

[[quoteright:350:[[ComicBook/TheTombOfDracula https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_bladetombgene_9694.jpg]]]]

* Monsignor Javier Mendoza in ''Series/BloodTies'' is a villainous variant. He was a Grand Inquisitor during the UsefulNotes/SpanishInquisition, who captured vampires using any means possible, tortured them until they confessed, and then brutally executed them. Oh yeah, he also used their blood in a potion that stopped his aging process, allowing him to continue the hunt. He doesn't shy away from murdering innocents to get to his prey. In "Heart of Ice", he murders a prostitute and drains her of blood, so that [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Henry]]'s friends would give him up.

* Every PlayerCharacter in the ''Franchise/{{Castlevania}}'' series, eventually, with the most prominent ones being [[BadassFamily the Belmonts]].

* Eric Van Helsing from ''Series/YoungDracula''. Thankfully for Vlad and his family, he is fairly incompetant.