Does anyone know where it's from? Is it Generation Kill?
No idea where it's from, but this is my reaction:
I unfortunately haven't seen True Blood because AFAIK it hasn't been picked up by any local network (yet).
But I've been a vampire story fan since I was a kid. I read the original "Dracula"while still a kid and I remember how I had real
nightmares after the scene where Dracula makes Mina Harker drink his blood. I was so scared!
Later on I saw Coppola's "Bram Stoker's Dracula" and detested it mightily - what pathetic misogynistic drivel!! But Gary Oldman was way cool as the fanged Count, nevertheless.
I read a number of Anne Rice's vampire novels back in the day - I remember the tiff when Ms. Rice objected to Tom Cruise's casting as Lestat. And her eventual retraction of the objection as Tom did a very decent role there. The film version of Interview with the vampire wasn't all that, despite the presence of Cruise, Banderas and Pitt I thought it was boring.
But Buffy - OMG I still love Buffy. And the Angel spinoff was so great for its first 2-3 seasons. I'm a total Buffy/Angel shipper to this day. I've got a lot of Buffy and Angel comics too. And of course it's completely impossible to not love and adore Spike.
I've read "Twilight" because someone who knew my past obsession with vampires figured I would like the book and gave it to me. Wrong! It's absolutely abysmal, a sort of pathetic Mary-Sue fanfic where Bella (who tells the story) goes on and on and ON over hundreds of pages about the physical beauty and beautiful eyes and sculpted chest etc etc. of her vampire boyfriend-to-be. And throughout the book she is and remains nothing but a damsel in distress, to be saved over and over by said boyfriend. UghUghUgh. But in a way I admire Robert Pattinson for taking on that role as Edward - there was a risk of not being deemed sufficiently sculptedy-chesty, with howls from enraged fangirls as a consequence if so. He must have known that that role was all about looks. Only about looks. His looks. Fulll stop. (But I gather he rose to the sculpted chest occasion. I haven't seen the film.)
So to end my reminiscing, I'd say vampire stories and movies have been popular and in the cultural mainstream continually since I was a girl, and looooong before that of course. "Nosferatu" and all.
I suppose it's the heady mix of themes such as the unknown, danger, eternal " life"and not least dark, strong sexuality that make vampires so captivating and fascinating and see them reinvented again and again in popular culture.