Must be Monday. New podcast! Just click on the fancy logo below.
SubpagesMain
|
"How did you manage to slip through the fifties wearing red velvet?"
So, Vampires Are Rich, Vampires Own Night Clubs and Vampires Are Sex Gods.
But are they always snazzy dressers?
Maybe it's because they're old-fashioned or just out of touch with humanity, but sometimes, vampires just can't seem to grasp the concept of contemporary fashion. They'll continue wearing the clothes that were in style when they were still human, hundreds of years ago (in extreme cases, they'll recycle the same outfit until long after it should've fallen apart in the wash). When this happens in groups of vampires, it can lead to Anachronism Stew.
This is a handy visual cue to the age of any vampire appearing in a visual medium, and can, depending on the outfit, be a characterization cue that lets you know this guy is evil.
This trope is becoming less and less popular for live action features, since it's all but impossible to put a vampire in tights and a doublet in The City and take the character seriously. Or to avoid the Fridge Logic this trope entails, as period costume would presumably wear out after a few decades' use, and similar replacements would get increasingly hard to come by.
Related to Jacob Marley Apparel and Fashion Dissonance.
open/close all folders
Examples:
Anime
Comics
- The Countess' coterie in Once Bitten all dress in the style appropriate to when she brought them over. Victorian prostitute, civil war soldier, etc.
Live Action TV
Film
- As the page quote suggests, many vampires in the film Queen of the Damned are wearing outfits that look like the Society for Creative Anachronism's best efforts, from the bizarre pseudo-belly dancer chic Pandora dons in the background to Akasha's interpretation of prehistoric Egyptian royalty's clothing.
- It partly makes sense with some of them, as a deleted scene shows them being woken up from who-knows-how-long slumber by Lestat's song. Like everything else in the movie, this doesn't match the book.
- This is lampshaded by Lestat (who is dressed as a rock-star) when he sees Marius wearing the same red velvet outfit as he did centuries ago, when he asks him how he managed to slip unnoticed through the past several decades wearing that.
- Played with in the 1980s comedy Once Bitten. The Countess and her Dragon have a modern fashion sense, since the Countess needs fresh virgin blood every year to maintain her youth and beauty. So they are often out-and-about. But, many of the Countess's lesser vampires are stay-at-homes who still dress in their period appropriate attire (we see one wearing a Civil War-era uniform).
- Though the 2001 film The Breed is set in a dystopic Not So Distant Future, many characters dress in stereotypical 50s detective noir get-ups. (Though to be fair, this is not limited solely to the vampires.)
- The 1990 film Sundown: The Vampire In Retreat takes this to an almost ridiculous extreme, where every vampire in the town is wearing clothes from when they were human, ranging from the villain Jefferson's Mayflower getup to the Old West hats and long coats sported by about a third of the cast.
- Averted in Lair Of The White Worm. Lady Marsh is very fashionable and chic.
- Averted in Underworld, where most vampires wear up-to-date clothing, even for a formal occasion. Amelia's outfit, for example, wouldn't be out-of-place at the Academy Awards. Then you have Victor, but he can be forgiven, as he has just been woken up after a century-long slumber, and he didn't get his normal update on all events of the past century. The decadent vampires dress for a party, while the Death Dealers and Kraven's goons prefer leather.
Literature
- This trope is something of a recurring theme in Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter novels.
- Mercy Thompson has met vampires who only do this for formal events. They dress in appropriate contemporary style the rest of the time, but in a formal setting wearing clothing appropriate to their native timeframe is a visual indication of how old they are, and therefore how powerful they may be as well.
- Kitty Norville has vampires who go either route. Some dress contemporary, some dress affected to their timeframe. One dresses like an old time cowboy.
- The Hollows has vampires who mainly dress contemporary rather than anachronistically.
- In The Dresden Files most of the Red Court of vampires dress in contemporary clothing, although they do have ancient Mayincatec outfits for ceremonial occasions. The White Court frequently dress in the height of fashion, or at least what will be the height of fashion in a month, but appear particularly fond of catsuits. The Black Court isn't well represented, but the sole prominent member seen, Mavra, does tend towards ancient styles of dress. Seeing as she's also unmistakably a walking corpse, and can become invisible, there's not much point in keeping up to date. At one point Harry notices that her centuries out of date clothing is machine made, so presumably she just likes the style.
- Justified in The Vampire Chronicles, where Lestat explains that if vampires don't wear the clothing from the time period in which they were mortal, then they like to wear clothing that resembles such apparel; it's explained (in so many words) as psychologically comforting for the vampire. Lestat also claims that it's an excellent way to gauge a vampire's age; given that this is very much a Stronger With Age world, it can help give another vampire a way to gauge the danger (i.e, if a vampire consistently wears clothing appropriate for Colonial or Elizabethan times or earlier, it's time to run).
- Played Straight in Team Human, where the vampires like to dress the way people did before they were turned.
Tabletop Games
- In Vampire The Masquerade, this trope is in effect in Elysiums (places where vampires can gather and socialize). When they are, well, masquerading, they are pretty keen about not standing out.
- The physical appearance of vampires in V:tM is unchanging from the time they turned. This includes hairstyles— their hair will not grow, but it also cannot be cut, nor can it be dyed. Tough luck if you had one of the more epic examples of '80s Hair when turned...
- Well, technically you can get a haircut and dye your hair and such. It's just that by the next night they will have restored to the situation they were in before anyway. This in itself comes in handy to cover your tracks, since nobody will assume that that guy over there with a full beard and long hair is very same person as the skinhead who wrecked your store yesterday.
- There's mention in one book of a hunter taking his apprentice into a bar and asking her to find the vampire. She pointed to the guy in 1800s attire. She was right.
Video Games
- The higher ranking "New Shadows" faction in the game Champions Online tend to dress in eighteenth century clothes. The mooks dress in torn rags, and the Big Bad of the faction wears armor similar to, but sufficently different from, the armor worn by Vlad Dracul during the back story of Bram Stoker's Dracula. And still wears it in a modern day New Orlea ... err, Vibora Bay, that is.
|
|
