I got to see Daywalkers DayBreakers this weekend. It was fun. Nice visuals, competent acting and exploding vampires. Set your expectations exactly to “exploding vampires” and you won’t be disappointed. Anything above that and you’ll probably groan through your fangs for 2 hours.
I’ll remain spoiler free but the “science” involved in the movie is vampdiculous. Ok, I guess I’ll remain MOSTLY spoiler free because I want to address a few things. The reason for the entire human race going vamp (and these are REAL vampires: no sunlight, no reflection, fangs, immortality, stake the hear, the whole 9) is referred to as as “outbreak” that “started with one bat.” This is the only explanation given and it’s fine for me. Any more time spent on the cause and you’d have a different movie. The problem for me was the time frame. Humanity began to convert (some by choice, some by force) only 10 years ago. Yet in just a decade the world has completely transformed to a stable, vampire-run society.
I enjoyed some of the tech the vamps used to get around during the day and appreciated the use of giant florescent lights basically everywhere (inside and outdoors) to illuminate the constant night they are forced to live in. The idea starts to break down when you realize that if no one can be out during the day, then agriculture and farming probably don’t exist any more. This may not be a problem for the vampires since they only require human blood for sustenance, but it’s hard to believe the all of the jobs that depended on these industries were replaced by fang polish factories. One could assume that much of the Earth’s population died off during the outbreak and there just aren’t that many humans or vamps left.
I won’t spoil anything about the main plot but most of it is based on the same “just go with it for now” science. I really didn’t expect the film to address all these issues. It would have made the movie too long and detracted from the story but I was so intrigued by the idea of an all-vamp world that I really wanted to flesh out the universe. I guess I’m saying it’s a great idea that they really didn’t explore to its fullest extent. Might have made for a better series than a movie. Still it’s good stand alone Sci-Fi/Fantasy and most vamp-geeks will enjoy it. Just try not to ask too many questions and enjoy the exploding.
- Willem Dafoe Discusses Vampire Barebacking In Daybreakers
- Scald Your Eyes With Daybreakers’ Bloody, Futuristic Vision Of Vampirism
- Ethan Hawke Explains How To Keep Your Self-Loathing Vampire From Being A Bore
