10 Ways to Decide if Vampires are Better Than Werewolves

The immortal question: Team Edward or Team Jacob. Not since the Nephytes battled the Laminates has Mormon literature produced a more dramatic showdown between supernatural creatures. The question of lyncanthropian versus vampiric superiority has gone beyond the Cullen and Black clans. I've devised ten sure-fire categories that will surely help us find an answer to this question. Team Edward? Team Jacob? Team Bill? Team Alcide? The only team I'm on is Team Truth.

1. Spider-Man Supporting Chracters:

Morbius vs. Man-Wolf

Morbius was a scientist who, in a failed experiment to cure his fatal blood disease, turned himself into a vampire. Man-Wolf was the astronaut son of J. Jonah Jameson who was turned into a werewolf by a magic moon rock. The origins of these two frenemies of Peter Parker is further evidence that all science should be outlawed in the Marvel Universe. No space probes. No medical experiments. Not even a crystal radio kit. Morbius can't help but be a villain sometimes, which is understandable considering he needs to suck people's blood to live. He's been a good guy as well. He's teamed up with Spider-Man, Dr. Strange and the Punisher. Man-Wolf, however, once had sex with She-Hulk. 'Nuff said True Believer.

Advantage: Werewolves

2. Purple Muppet:

Count Von Count vs. the Big Bad Wolf

I do not remember the Big Bad Wolf except for the bit where he is being interviewed by Kermit. It is true that he is technically not a werewolf. He counts because he is a fusion of human and wolf. He still qualifies even if the wolf portion is a puppet and the human part is just a hand. What the wolf cannot do, however, is math. I feel that's a fair assumption considering the difference between bricks and straw alluded him. Not to besmirch the recently deceased Jaime Escalante, but The Count is truly the greatest math teacher who ever lived. When I was a high schooler it would have been very helpful if he expanded his curriculum from counting to ten to Algebra 2.

Advantage: Vampires

3. Ridiculous True Blood bars:

Fangtasia vs. The Lone Wolf

Honestly, I would not want to visit any of these bars. The mixture of techno music, black latex, and mind control in Fangtasia doesn't sound too appealing. The Lone Wolf seems dangerously close to a bear club. In classic True Blood style, character traits are expressed through theme bars. Vampires are faux-elegant and predatory while werewolves are earthy and rowdy. I'm going to give this one to the vampires because I enjoy Pam and Eric's banter.

ADVANTAGE: Vampires

4. Munsters:

Grandpa vs. Eddie

Both have cool widow's peaks and furry side burns but only one became an eccentric old coot who ran for governor of New York. Eddie gets points for being half Frankenstein which has long puzzled viewers but makes sense when you use your brain. When Dr. Frankenstein assembled Herman, the genitals must have come from a freshly deceased lycanthrope. There is also a possibility that Lilly cheated on Herman with the Werewolf of London. Grandpa still wins because he was not only Count Dracula but also a mad scientist thus becoming the greatest fictional character ever.

ADVANTAGE: Vampires

5. Monster based cereals:

Count Chocula vs. Fruit Brute

Count Chocula may be the favorite for this battle. I've never had Fruit Brute because it was discontinued when I was an infant and my parents thought it best if I stick to formula rather than sugar frosted sugar bits. Count Chocula is delicious and has a vampire on the box. What more could you want? I'll tell you: a werewolf wearing green and pink overalls ferociously offering you lime flavored marshmallows.

ADVANTAGE: Werewolves

6. Best Insane Ghanaian Painted Movie Poster:

Mr. Vampire 3 vs. Twins

If you have not looked at the amazing world of Ghanaian movie posters go here and take a journey into the legitimately disturbing landscape of Third World exploitation cinema. According to the poster, Mr. Vampire 3 has a tough sensei battling vampires. That's weak tea compared to the horror that is the Twins poster. Which human-dog hybrid face is more hypnotically horrifying? I have no idea what the film is about but I would wager that it is not the same film as the famous Schwarzenegger/DeVito romp. I would nominate "Horror Nigerian Movie" as the greatest, most terrifying tag-line of all time.

ADVANTAGE: Werewolves(?)

7. Lon Chaney Jr. Facial Hair:

Son of Dracula vs. The Wolf Man

The Wolf Man is the classic, but Son of Dracula is one of the best later Universal horrors. It's one of the first vampire romances ever. Also, it's the first time a pop culture blood sucker relocated to the bayou: the preferred home of modern sleazy vampires. That's not why it's going to win. It's going to win because of the John Waters-meets-Salvador Dali flavor saver that LCJ is sporting.

ADVANTAGE: Vampires

8. Groovie Goolies:

Count Dracula vs. Wolfie

Look at how Dracula runs. That makes Edward Cullen look like Jason Statham. Dracula was voiced by Larry Storch from F-Troop which does help his case a bit. Wolfie, however, was voiced by Howard Morris a.k.a Ernest T. Bass from The Andy Griffith Show. Also, Wolfie reminds me of that other monstrous hippy: Charles Manson. Talk about "creepy-crawling"!

ADVANTAGE: Werewolves

9. Cutest transformation animal:

bat vs. wolf

Generally speaking, bats are not very cute. They are very good at echolocation and eating mosquitos but cuteness is not their forte. The red bat, however, looks like a Pokemon that Santa's elves made.

ADVANTAGE: Vampires

10. Young People's organizations:

Al "Grandpa" Lewis's Jr. Vampires vs. Teen Werewolves

Self-obsessed teenagers wearing fake tails and cat eye contacts or a dodgy z-level celebrity peddling a 1-900 number? Neither are particularly attractive. The Teen Wolves, however, do provide a sense of community to kids that might not have it. If you need to pretend to be a fantasy monster to relate to other human beings, go for it. Do not kill the neighbors' dogs and you'll be okay. When are neck bolts going to be a fad? What about dusty linen wrappings? Fake humps? Kid's shouldn't limit themselves to just vampires or werewolves. There's a whole world of horror archetypes out there! Whatever the problems with Teen Wolfing, I'm sure the kids get something out of it. With Grandpa's Junior Vampires Scam Club all the kids got were some amazingly lame stories, shitty patches, and a lecture about their parents not being made out of money. If the few kids who did dial up Grandpa's hotline had a wolf pack of their own, then maybe they wouldn't have wasted hard earned money on possibly the stupidest thing ever.

ADVANTAGE: Werewolves

and the winner is...

FRANKENSTEIN!

Upon reflection, I have decided that Frankensteins are cooler than both Vampires and Werewolves. This is fact not conjecture.

Where's the love?

Entertainment Weekly has made another list. This time it's counting down the 20 greatest vampires. As expected, the luvvy vampires ranked pretty high. They also rank Klaus Kinski's portrayal of Dracula for Werner Herzog's Nosferatu the Vampyre pretty high so kudos. What is unacceptable is that this guy was left out:

Make no mistake: without Barnabas there would be no Lestat, no Bill, and no E.C. He was the first romantic vampire hero. He was the first vampire who was more about the melancholy than the rubber bats. They put friggin' Kate Beckingsale on that list but they missed out the one who started it all. That's like making a list called "The 20 Greatest Movie Sleds" and mentioning Cool Runnings instead of Citizen Kane. For shame EW, for shame!

Universal Appeal: Dracula

Seventy years before Stephanie Meyers sent many of the double X chromosone possessing population into inexplicaple hysterics with her own brand of Byronic Blandness there was another (literally) toothless vampire tale that made audiences quiver.

How could a movie as slight as Tod Browning’s Dracula become one of American cinema’s most culturally important films? Even for 1931 standards (as its Irish twin Frankenstein illustrates) most of the film is extremely dull stuff. The real shocker of the film is how quickly the dreamlike monster fable becomes a nearly unwatchable parlor based melodrama. The atmospheric sets are replaced with some of the most humdrum interiors ever committed to film. In this setting Lugosi’s undead predator is transformed into a middle-aged weirdo whose second language is English and has a wooden stake up his coattailed posterior.

From this...

to this...not as creepy as spider castle of doom although that fireplace is pretty weird

Is it just me or does Dracula look like he is struggling to read his contract? "I shood hav paid more attenshun in schooel"

Did Dracula make dinner for Renfield or did he make the brides do it? Was he in the kitchen trying to remember what humans eat?

I know what would make this movie less boring....

..a PHILIP GLASS soundtrack!

Honesty time: Lugosi’s Dracula is one of my least favorite Lugosis. It’s not the demented hammery or spectacular oddness I like in my Lugosi roles. It’s a scientific fact that the following Lugosi performances outshine his most famous role:
• Son of Frankenstein
• The Murders of Rue Morgue
• White Zombie
• The Raven
• The Black Cat
Actually, just about all of his Universal performances (and some of his cheapos) are better than Dracula but the performance is so mythic that it's undeniably powerful.

"This one is MINE!" (That's a True Blood reference btw)

Universal Appeal: Strong and Weak. The iconic eeriness of the first 20 minutes is a large part of our collective mythology. The beautiful matte painting mountains, the “children of the night” line, the brides, and Dwight Frye’s freak out on the boat are all immortal classics. The rest of the movie (with the exception of the cigarette case mirror smash) is immediately forgettable. As someone who was born six years after Star Wars it is impossible for me to understand how audiences felt seeing and hearing the first talking supernatural horror picture. I would assume that the novelty of the original mix of sex and death (and phony fireplaces) kept Depression Era audiences captivated despite some seriously lazy filmmaking.