Being Human, UK vs US Flavors: or, A Tale of Two Angsty Hot Vampires

[mswyrr]

I caught up with the second half of the US Being Human. I'm very impressed by the way they're doing it. It's like a really well written AU fanfic with, you know, a full staff of writers, actors, and a budget. lol

Comments

[intrikate88]

Wow, that is a really interesting analysis that I hadn't thought of before, and I think it's a very apt one. He came of age as a person and as his rebirth as a vampire during that period, so it makes sense that much of the character types from that period come forward with him- they solidified in his character then. Looking back with this lens, I can see in Mitchell things like the paranoia and isolation of Septimus Smith (Mrs Dalloway), or the need for personal occupation and justice that comes with a darker side, like Peter Wimsey (from Dorothy Sayers' mysteries). Mitchell's personal changes in waking up to a world of more supernatural experience and violence is a mirror of the political climate in which everyone was waking up to a broader world that was more capable of violence and destruction than they had previously known.

[qkellie]

Oh, wow, this is an amazing analysis. I took a grad school class on WWI analyzed through British History and Poetry, and what we studied in there is totally, thoroughly in line with this. So eloquently put, and yet I never noticed this.

What if Aidan had been in Vietnam instead? Or even WWII? Because though in the US we view WWII as a similar sort of "righteous cause" and whatnot, there is this other undercurrent of very sad literature and song, of loves lost and young men being drafted and quickie marriages before soldiers shipped out, only to leave young widows behind all too quickly. I feel like for the US, WWII is sort of our WWI, if that makes sense.

'Nam... it's not so much the romantic sadness that lingers now, it's the anger and the waste. Soldiers were not exploited to be killed, they were more often left maimed and emotionally bereft. It's a much angrier war in retrospect.

Maybe another compromise could have been the Civil War, but I wonder if US BH didn't go that route because that's the backstory of Bill Compton on

[caipirinhas]

I think Civil War, Korean Conflict, or Vietnam would all have gotten that point across exceedingly well. This is such a good point.

[jeeshee]

I've never thought of Mitchell like that, but I think your analysis is spot on.

[wastedlittled_j]

This is a very insightful look at Mitchell. I haven't seen US Being Human, so I can't appreciate the difference, but I had never thought about Mitchell like that, and it really is a perfect description.

[caipirinhas]

I had absolutely never thought about it that way, but I think that's an extremely accurate and interesting point. The revolutionary was is regarded as a triumph, and WWI is connotated entirely differently.

Agh, it just makes Mitchell all the more tragic and missed. There's a reason the WWI poets are some of the most poignant and tragic.