Essay Example about The Vampire Diaries Series

In September 1991, author L. J. Smith began writing The Vampire Diaries book series. The name of the first book is called The Awakening: Volume 1. There is not much information about how popular the book was before the show had released. By May 2014, she had released the rest of the books, completing the series. Altogether there were 15 books for the series. In 2009, Julie Plec and Kevin Williamson, the co-creators, began the filming of the show and the pilot episode was aired on September 10, 2009, on The CW. The tv show was a great success and very interesting, in the beginning, but once it came to the last three seasons, the show went downhill.

L. J. Smith, the author of the book series, is an author that has written many books. She has had many series of books but her most famous and known series is the vampire diaries. Julie Plec, co-creator, is a famous American Producer that is most known for producing and directing the vampire diaries. Plec has had some other earlier producing jobs before the vampire diaries like the famous horror movies Scream 2 and Scream 3. Kevin Williamson, co-creator, is also a well-known director and producer. Plec and Williamson work on most shows and movies together.

The Vampire Diaries first episode starts off by showing the main character, Elena Gilbert. Elena lives in Mystic Falls, Virginia. Elena’s parents had just recently died in a car crash, and we can see that she is slowly recovering. In the first episode, Elena says, “Today will be different”. What she means by this is that she will laugh and have fun and not try to think about her parents’ death too much. Elena also has a younger brother named Jeremy Gilbert. Her brother is also going through a hard time and has become addicted to drugs. Elena tries lecturing him about it, but he is just stubborn and did not listen. Their legal guardian is their aunt, mom is sister Jenna. She is very young but still does an incredible job of taking care of them.

Later in the episode, Elena meets Stefan Salvatore. She pumps into him after leaving the boys' bathroom to lecture her brother about drugs. Her pumping into him while leaving the bathroom foreshadows a big role in the series finale. (Samantha Highfill September 09). Viewers end up finding out he is a vampire, who also lived in Mystic Falls and has come back because he is trying to get to know Elena because he was in love with her doppelgänger named Katherine in the early 1700s who also turned him into a vampire. Toward the middle of the episode, we meet Stefan’s older brother Damon Salvatore, who is also a vampire and is also interested in Elena because he also was turned by Katherine and was also in love with her. (Sanna et al.) Damon's most famous line in the show is “Hello Brother” and that is exactly what he says when he sees his brother for the first time after over two centuries. From the beginning of the series, viewers can see that the story foreshadows what will happen throughout the whole series, by showing that the two brothers were in love with a girl.

Throughout the series, we see the two brothers sometimes fight for Elena’s love and they were just brothers and did not see eye to eye most of the time. Damon was very ruthless, rude, killed people, and always drank blood. Stefan, on the other hand, was very sweet, kind, nice, and only drank blood from animals and knew how to control himself. In the first 4 seasons, Elena always chose Stefan over Damon. In season four, Elena turns into a vampire and changes. She falls in love with Damon and looks at Stefan as more of a friend. The reason Elena had fallen in love with Damon is that he had turned her into a vampire, but it was not his fault. Because Elena was turned by him, she had a sire bond to him, which means she was loyal to him, but this does get in the way, and she soon starts to develop feelings for him and ends up choosing Damon over Stefan.

The books and the television show do have some differences. Some of the differences are that in the book Elena had blonde hair but inside the show, she has brown hair. Also, in the book Elena has a sister named Margaret who is four years old, but in the show, she has a brother named Jeremey that is sixteen years old. One of the biggest differences is that in the books Elena never falls in love with Damon she only loves Stefan. This plays a huge role inside the show because one of the main focuses, and the reason why people watch it so because of the love triangle.           

Although the television show may seem like a constant fight between the two brothers trying to figure out the love triangle with the human, it is not. In the show, there are many creatures that are brought up like witches, werewolves, sirens, and many other creatures. (Sanna et al.). The writer did a very good job of including these creatures because it brought more action to the show and did not only focus on vampires, which made the show interesting and successful.           

The first five seasons of the show were very good and showed different types of supernatural creatures like witches, werewolves, and hybrids, which are half vampire half werewolf. Those five seasons all connected and made sense. In season 3 of the show, the writers brought in the Originals, who were the first-ever vampires. They were somewhat evil to the main characters of the show, and they wanted to kill them. The characters killed one and they discover that if you were to kill one, every single vampire in their bloodline would die. This brought up a news story that connected everything together. The originals stayed until season 4 and then the directors of the show decided to make them their own spin-off, which took place in New Orleans, Louisiana.

When it came to making the last three seasons, the story started to get confusing. The last three seasons did not all connect the way the first five did. In seasons seven and eight, Elena, the main character, was not even there. She was put into a slumber for many years. The reason Elena’s character was put into slumber was that the actress that played her, Nina Dobrev, did not renew her contract. This made the show confusing and overwhelming. The show started to have different types of creatures like half vampires, half witches, and sirens. It was hard to keep up with and started to lose interest.

The show was great and still is watched today by many people and is always talked about. The show was so successful that it had two spinoffs, The Originals which ended in 2018, and The Legacies, which are still airing today. The last episode of the series is very sad and will make you cry. It ended very sadly. Elena woke up from her slumber to find out one of her closest friends had passed away. One of the biggest mistakes in the last episode is Elena’s hair. The actress had cut her hair before the last episode and viewers could obviously tell how horrible the wig was. the show was very successful, and I still think about how good of a show it was until today. I just wish the writers and creators put more effort into the last season as they did with the first few seasons.