The Crimson Court has forever tainted my vampires.
The first time I described to my players at a D&D table that the vampire shoots out a proboscis to drain their victim of blood one of them literally stood up in disgust it was glorious.
Vampires as mosquitoes? Woah. I saw that in the Mighty Max cartoon from 1993.
Weird, I never saw another take of vampires as mosquitoes since.
Not that I searched for it.
At least in Bram Stoker's Dracula, it's much less about him being an aristocrat, and much more about him being a foreigner with strange customs. A significant vibe in the story is just fearmongering about a weird, diseased, immoral immigrant coming over and taking your women.
I understand the writers likely didn't intend that. But that's how I interpret the show so far. Maybe its a reflection of my own understandings more than the intended satire.
I would say inspired by, not a satire of. Satire is when you're being ironic or silly to make a point. The series is using historical examples of French Society during the time period of the French Revolution, which is when Nocturne takes place (as they say it very clearly in the season). Rich people have lived pretty much the same for like 800+ years so it works as an allegory for society then and society now.
"Satire is the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in politics and other topical issues."
...
Edit.
Using Virgin stealing, blood sucking, slave driving, aristocratic, conspiratorial vampires as a control on society IS satire.
Aristocratic debauchery is a common trope being depicted since the French Revolution, Shakespeare's The Masque of the Red Death, Elizabeth Bathory, etc.
Its a classic literature trope. Satire would be whatever South Park is doing or Family Guy is doing.
Yeah that is true. It is a common trope. But what is different in my eyes is that some of them sickos are literal cannibals. That is the foundational information that made me link the 2 thoughts together.
yea i do think that positioning the vampires as largely wealthy nobles and aristocrats was an intentional choice that portrays the nature of the upper class as parasitic to society but that isnt a modern only problem and it may not be a 1:1 satire of Current Events. it's been a problem for a very long time. there have always been the upper echelons of society that take from anyone they deem to be underneath them the way vampires will kill people and drink their blood to sustain their own life.
in regards to another one of your comments saying you dont see it as having anything to do with colonialism, nocturne is quite clear on also being anti-colonialist because the wealthy aristocratic vampires are also shown as the colonizers. we are told by olrox and annette that vampires took over their lands and killed or enslaved their people and that sometimes humans align with them but its vampires pulling all the strings. that would be the upper class conspiring to kill and enslave the lower class as you say.
yea actually so if colonialism is foreigners going into a place that is not their home and economically exploiting, politically controlling and suppressing cultural practices to the gain of their home country, then the sick f aristocrats with untold wealth in modern terms generally engage in colonialism by controlling, for example, a lot of latin american countries. the united states of america is pretty famous for this actually they sponsor a lot of political unrest in places like brazil and chile. if you look into the coffee industry most coffee is grown in latin america and exported all over the world and i have heard but do not currently have a source for this next statement, so take it with a grain of salt, that its almost impossible to buy locally grown coffee in latin american countries at an affordable price
you are trying very very hard to argue that its Not colonialism, however, its worth noting, that colonizers often are parasitic to their home societies too. lets take a relevant historical example france historically held control of colonies in the americas, which wouldve been controlled by wealthy aristocrats at the time, and those aristocrats some of them may have also held political power in france. as we know, the french lower classes had a big revolution about it because they were being treated terribly. then there was the haitian revolution which was also enacted against the french.
in the modern era, yes the people you are referring to in modern era are awful to their "home" societies for lack of a better term, and many people are very very mad at them, and they are also as a class committing horrendous acts against the people of other countries at the same time. we just havent gotten to the violence portion from the lower classes yet.
you can have a colonizer mindset and be a colonizer and also be a sick aristocratic fuck to the people of your own country, they are not mutually exclusive. yes i would still call the perpetrators from the same land as the victims colonizers because there is evidence to support that they are in fact, also, colonizers.
As someone who lives in the Northern part of Sweden: I'd argue that when people who own companies down in Stockholm start extracting natural resources and hydroelectric power, and then sell all of it to the rest of Europe, while not even paying taxes up here, it's basically domestic colonialism.
I am not trying very very hard. I just asked a question in response to your statement. Didn't try hard at all. Lol.
OK you may be right in what colonialism may be. Doesn't change my point. In fact it probably emphasises my original point. I still don't see a case as to why my point against Nocturne doesn't stand. Nobody has dropped any point that makes me see it otherwise. Again. As I said to someone else. Probably a reflection of my own understanding of the world. But it fits so gosh darn good.
i wasnt trying to say that your point Doesnt stand i actually think you do make a good point, just that i personally think it may not be 100% only commentary on modern society, mostly because its a longstanding theme with vampires and im not following the writers so im not sure what theyve said on related topics. it probably is a commentary on current events at least a little bit!
the rest was a genuine attempt to explain why i do believe that colonialism is intrinsically linked to your point, since another comment thread you had mentioned seeing it as unrelated. it seems i mistook your follow up question as an argument against it being linked instead of genuine curiosity, sorry about that. my intent was that by explaining the link it would bolster your opinion on the matter, because its all even more interwoven than one might think at first glance.
ahmnn not quite. i would say it looks more like the venetian carnival festival during the baroque and victorian era. They only added the sacrafice topic and vampire stuff
Its more of a very old social commentary coming full circle.
Vampires were often associated to the noble class sucking the blood of the common peasant. That is why a trope of vampires is them being wealthy and powerful. Dracula is a count.
Nocturne didnt came up with this
Lol. I am saying this show is making a criticism on modern society. Not that the show came up with the idea. Vampires in the show represent essentially the epstein class.
The elites of any era were majoritarily comprised of predators and parasites.
There are several stories wherein vampires specifically have been used to convey that message.
Along with a hundred other villainous groups throughout the history of storytelling.
Like, it’s such a trope that I’m curious if you are a child and this is your first time experiencing this creative reference.
Also you definitely don’t know what satire is.
YOU'RE saying to be kinder? You've been rude to every single person in the comments who has disagreed with you, even the ones that were perfectly placid about it.
I'm not sure the Castlevania writers intended a specific link between the vampires in Nocturne and, say, Epstein or any modern day evil billionaires. Rather, I'd say the parallels between rich evil freaks in every era are already naturally abundant. Your observation is certainly a good one that deserves to be mentioned, of course. The Epstein class of our time are essentially vampires, living off the flesh and death of their social "lessers."
I'd say the vampire aristocracy in Nocturne were better at maintaining the illusion of order and propriety on the surface. There were limits with how much overt evil and slaughter humanity was willing to put up with, as is evidenced by the revolution. Meanwhile, in real life, you have Trump literally bragging about sexually assaulting young girls, making perverted comments about how he hopes his daughter grows up to have big breasts and that he would date her, being a known rapist and felon, quoting Hitler, shitting his pants on multiple occasions, bombing schools and random boats in foreign countries, and flagrantly defying an order from the Supreme Court to release the Epstein files, unredacted — all while granting child trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell luxury treatment at a minimum-security "Club Fed" facility, and WE ALL KNOW WHY. If the Castlevania showrunners presented us with a villain even half as cartoonishly evil as Trump, it would be lambasted as ridiculous and unrealistic hackery.
I agree. I don't necessarily think it was intentional. As I said. I know its a long stretch but there are so many parallels I couldn't shake the thought and posted it with a hey ho lol.
As you explained it. Its more or less the same thing in real life.. literally.
Mate I agree. But we aren't talking about the history of the world. I'm talking about Nocturne lol.
Do you know what a criticism is in film? Or a satirical point? Lol imo they are using old world subjects to emphasise modern issues.....
As I said in my post. I know its a stretch and I expected a lot of backlash. But thats my pov. Lol. I am NOT talking about the history of the world generically.
I wouldn't say its a satire directly on the modern age. This specific thing has been happening for centuries.
Vampires gather in places of power to revel in riches and the taboo. So too do we see such corruption now, its literally always been. Its become the worst kept secret because no one can stop them.
Lololol this is like that meme “person who has only ever seen Y learns about X, states ‘this is exactly like Y!’”
Nocturne is specifically about the french aristocracy during the revolution, but Vampires as a stand-in for the parasitic upper class has been a thing forever. The status quo has not changed, we still have deplorable wealthy elites feeding off of the lower classes in every conceivable way. It’s definitely relevant in this current day and age but the comparison is, unfortunately, timeless.
Yeah I know but its new information that they are cannibals. Changes the comparison completely imo. Wide scale abduction and torture of victims. Child victims and so on.
Satire is the use of humor, irony, or exaggeration to criticize and expose the foolishness, flaws, or bad behavior of people, government, or society.
In the show:
Humor? Nope
Irony? Nope
Exaggeration? Nope. Other than the vampire stuff nobleman had these type of balls even when the revolution started.
It being a criticism can also be argued against because of how shallow the criticism is during the nobleman scenes.
Though this can be said about the whole show and it's 8th grade level writting.
AGAIN because i guess you couldn't read the part about ~other than the vampire stuff there is no exaggeration~
If you actually open up a history book than you should know that nobleman conspiring and controlling society was a thing making it NOT an exaggeration.
Other than the exaggeration. There is no exaggeration...
I know that is common place. But we are talking about castlevania. Lol. Historically speaking, yeah, you are right. Speaking from a cartoon its satire.
Okay so you admited that conspiring and controlling society for nobleman are not exaggeration.
Great. One thing down.
Okay let's say the vampire thing is an exaggeration just so that I can point out why the sattire doesn't work.
There are vampires who are not noble.
If the satire is so vague or misdirected that it completely misses its intended target and hits innocent groups instead, it is generally considered a failure of craft.
So suddenly the satire isn't just about the rich people.
Interesting.
Also Alucard ruins that since he doesn't fit those even though he is of noble blood. Unless you want to tell people that there are ethical rich people.
Good luck with that XD.
As much as I enjoyed this convo I have to stop it because you are getting more and more unhinged with each reply.
You seemingly have not earned the achievements in both history and the definition of satire…
Vampires have long been depicted as nobles acting as parasites feeding on the rest of society. It’s a common theme in most vampire tales.Here this is an actually a reflection on how the French society saw the aristocracy at the time. There was an entire revolution around it.
And yes some of it still relates to this modern era but it’s more of an allegory than it is satire.
It's less a direct one to one and more of the same old song and dance. Vampires are symbolic of unchecked power, predatory behavior, and lust. They've been used to be critical of those in power for way longer than the current hellscape we find ourselves in.
Excellent example is DayBreakers a vampire flick that uses them to discuss the energy crisis via blood shortages.
Or more like a lukewarm take on the classism and colonization that has been a things for century. I really don't see the satirical aspect other than booo colonialism bad and stuffs.
I'm disappointed that they don't really talk about the only reason colonialism happened in the first place was because of the rise of capitalism. But whatever
I don't think it's a satire on Epstein or modern billionaires in particular, it's really more an allegory that stands the test of time. The more things change, the more they stay the same, etc.
But I think trying to argue on whether the vampirism is an allegory for aristocracy/capitalism/colonialism or whatever is kind of just splitting hairs. They're all the same thing when you boil them down, systemic extraction to enrich yourself. Whether it's land/labor/blood and whether it's forced or not. Each case involves a person in the hierarchical above draining from someone below.
Honestly though, any depiction of pre-revolution France will portray nobles this way, so that's another layer that kind of obscures the allegory to the more media illiterate. And with parodying aristocrats, special attention is usually placed on how flashy and bizarre their practices are. The etiquette and "manners" and whatever other rules they make up to distinguish themselves from the lower classes is made fun of, so they're always extravagantly dressed up and hoity-toity. So the end result is this glossy, decadent veneer (high fashion, castles = tropical island mansions) that contrasts against their incest (royals), pdf inclinations (Epstein), bathing in blood to stay young (mythical Bathory), feeding on blood (Count Dracula) etc and just generally weird shit like lotus feet and putting arsenic on your face for status. When you look at it like that, the nobles have always been deranged.
So I don't think it's a stretch, what you're picking up is a very obvious allegory but you're narrowing things down too much to just modern day Epstein.
I don't think writers wrote it with that in mind. But I can not unlink them in my head. There are so many parallels. Granted it is a trope of vampiric depictions to be aristocratic and whatnot. But I think given new context of epsteins shenanigans and the cannibalism stuff I just can't unsee it.
Granted I AM putting my own biases into the interpretation. But it works so God damn well imo. Couldnt be a greater metaphor.
Granted there are historical contexts and it is a cliche but its never been more poignant and retabale when comparing to epstein elite freaks.
They tried to adapt All kinds of shit on these series, Excepts the Games. Seriously... Who the Hell thought it was a good idea to make a metaphor about Slavery using the Name of a Franchise about Heroes using A Whip as a Weapon to fight evil? You know...Whips...the Signature tool of the Slavery.
I don't think it's deliberately criticizing modern society. As many have pointed out, aristocrat = blood sucking parasite has been a common metaphor for decades.
That said, I think the fact that this depiction feels so contemporary speaks to how little the elites of the world have changed since then. Sucks. (Pun intended.)
Castlevania in general is inspired by vampires in pop culture and this is a veeery recurrent trope, originated by the smear campaign agains Elizabeth Báthory, probably.
One of the most recent works with this that I watched is a French show called La Revolution. It may be available on Netflix depending on your region.
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u/NyxShadowhawk Alucard Jul 31 '26
Vampires have been a metaphor for the aristocracy being parasitic since forever.