Why teenage girls are suckers for vampires...

From The Irish Independent

Isn't it time vampires went back in the coffin? Our fanged friends are in serious danger of outstaying their welcome.

A new Twilight movie is almost upon us (wasn't the last one in cinemas, like, the other week?); the hilariously over-sexed vampire soap True Blood just started on terrestrial television and has critics foaming at the chops; and vampire novels continue to swamp our bookstores with over-written prose and stilted dialogue .

In other words, vampire mania is approaching saturation point. Frankly, somebody ought to stand up and yell 'stop' (preferably while twirling a string of garlic and hefting a hammer and stake) Actually, someone has.

The prominent comic book and horror novelist and screenwriter Neil Gaiman -- his most recent movie, Coraline, was recently released on DVD -- has expressed the wish that vampires would do the decent thing and disappear from the cultural landscape for a quarter century or so.

"Vampires go in waves," he says. "And it kind of feels like we're now finishing a vampire wave, because we're at the point where they're everywhere, it's probably time to go back underground for another 20 or 25 years."

As you would expect, his comments were greeted with shrieks of fury from vampire devotees, who, as is the way with geeks with too much time on their hands, have lit up the internet with their criticisms. But that doesn't mean he hasn't got a point.

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