Pop Culture Musings: Alternative Cultures

It used to be that being part of an alternative subculture meant something. Today, anyone who's seen Ghost World can call themselves a punk and anyone who hasn't bathed in a few days and has a Hot Topic gift card can be a hipster. Like everything we know and love (Beatles and Stones songs, BDSM wear, homosexuality, etc.) it has fallen under the care of Corporations. Follow my blog and see how The Man(TM) decided to use hip and alternative subcultures to appeal to even the most well respected man about town.

Living Dead Dolls and Living Dead babies.

What are they? Relatively small dolls you can buy in Hot Topic or Forbidden Planet that have pale clammy skin, demonic expressions, and axe wounds.

Why does corporate love them? To quote Bob Hoskins' character in Unleashed, "Get 'em young, and the possibilities are endless." For the preteen girl who loves Tim Burton and mutilating Barbie but is a little wary of throwing her out just yet--voila! She can transition from doll loving girlhood to cynical goth adolescent. Think of Living Dead Dolls as the equivalent of a Dora the Explorer training bra.

I must confess to a soft spot for these dolls. I was a dark child, though. Back when I used to pore over the American Girl catalog, I always wondered why Kristen's accessories didn't include a few teensy tiny coffins of the siblings that succumbed to dysentery (too much Oregon Trail, I guess).

Emily the Strange.

What is she? She's a stony faced Wednesday Addams doppleganger, who has been appearing on wallets, buttons, purses, t-shirts, and her own book for years now. In the punk tradition of insulting your audience, Emily is associated with stock phrases like "Get lost."

Why does corporate love her? Emily appeals to the little girl who once loved to collect everything everything Lisa Frank ever put her name on. Today, though, said preteen grows weary of her fuzzy pens and her array of unicorn notebooks. And even though she's still polite and would never dream of doing anything truly transgressive (like wearing an "Down with Homework" or "Up with Miniskirts" tee-shirt courtesy of Mad Magazine), Emily gives her a way to both buy into the system and quietly tell the world she's a Bad Seed...without actually hurting anyone's feelings.

In terms of marketing value, Emily the Strange is just as lucrative as Lisa Frank, if not more, because the age range goes from age twelve to eternity. (Plus, you save overhead costs by not having to produce colors other than black or red.)

For parents who still think Emily's a bit too much for their previously wholesome little girls, don't worry about it. In a few decades, they'll be slaves to yet another fad: collecting Anne Geddes portraits and sighing over Alexis's tendency to carry around an alligator and Aaden's wheat allergy.

Twilight themed make up. What is it? The same old song with the same meaning. Different packaging, though. Brands like DuWop Lip Venom and Volturi slapped a Twilight label on them. They have as much to do with vampires as Barbie and Hot Wheels have to do with McNuggets.

Why does corporate love it? It appeals to girls who are too old for dollies but consider themselves a little too cool to be caught dead reading Anne Rice. Twilight's cool, though.

These products serves two purposes. One, it gets a really shoddy lip plumper product that doesn't work out there.

Two, it appeals to the kind of teenage girl who rolled her eyes when her brother renamed himself Azrael and asked her if she wanted to hitchhike to the Meadowlands to see the Cure open for Bruce. I'm talking about the girl who owns a copy of the Sephora Ultimate Guide (autographed by Bobbi Brown), and who saw First Wives Club and immediately begged Daddy for collagen. Sure, next time she's at Barnes and Noble, she won't pick up a copy of The Fall of the House of Usher or Meat is Murder, but she probably will purchase a Twilight New Moon tote bag. And that's what counts.

Pin Up Girl Merchandise. What is it? Pin up art of the forties and fifties is now festooning all kinds of crap like wallets and mugs.

Why does corporate love it? It's easily marketed to the hipster girl in her late teens and early twenties who doesn't want to admit to herself that while she still buys into the beauty myth, she doesn't quite meet the gold standard. After all, not every girl can be a perfect size six with Pacific blue eyes. For the plus sized princess who doesn't quite fit into the tanned hard body ideal, pin ups appeal.

Sure, pin up girls were long legged, pneumatic beauties who only look big compared to say, Keira Knightly. But throw in some shrewd marketing and these girls will start spouting catch phrases like, "Back in the fifties, they appreciated voluptuous women--Marilyn was a size twelve" and "Pin ups girls were empowered!" (Kudos to the Mad Men producers for riding this tide.) And thus, the merchandising continues. I bet Alberto Vargas is wishing he'd branched out into lunch boxes, t-shirts, candy bar wrappers, and bed sheets.

If liking pin ups in general is greatly encouraged by the Powers That Be, liking Bettie Page is even better. Unlike Marilyn, she was a brunette, and nothing says depth and intellect like eschewing a blonde. Add to that the BDSM stuff and guys who see you sporting a Bettie t-shirt will think you're liberated and intellectual about sex.

Porn again. What is it? Many corporations have decided to use commercials that emulate the porn aesthetic. Think the, "We shot this in some forty year old bearded creep's basement and he ogled the girls and paid them cash" look.

Why does corporate love it? We're a generation whose anthem is The Internet is for Porn. Of course, everyone likes to think that they're beyond modesty. Corporations are hip to that, too. Many companies have decided that the new "edgy" is shooting ads that look like they're part of the porn subculture. So you get Calvin Klein ads that look like they're in recrooms who look like they're narrated by a creepy guy who's about a roofie away from turning off the camera and pulling a JonBenet Ramsey.

American Apparel CEO Dov Charney also pioneered the art of taking young underfed darlings, hiring the cinematographers from Fiona Apple's Criminal video, and photographing the bobby socked waifs in decor that John Holmes would find dated.

When you combine the girls who adore pin ups with the jaded "Knowing About Porn = Feminism" perspective and subtract a spine, you also get SuicideGirls, a site for girls who think that an ironic Prince tattoo make up for having ever read a single paragraph of Germaine Greer, Simone de Beauvoir, or Gloria Steinem. The models of the site get to post photos of themselves in addition to blogging/live journaling their thoughts for their fans. And yes, people really do care about your opinions about this year's Burning Man and the latest Killers' album. Really.

Tattoos. What is it? The age old phenomenon of body festooned art. Being covered from head to toe in tattoos meant you really were someone at the local Freak Show. It meant that the college boys who came to geek off chicken heads every summer, albino hunchbacked dwarf with no real talents, and the only moderately mustached lady all looked up to you.

Why does corporate love it? If you want to make a TV show about a hot "alterna" chick, and she's got ludicrously square opinions, how else can you make sure the audience knows she's non mainstream? The dyed pink hair only goes so far. That's right! Tattoos.

Today if you look like her, you don't get ostracism from the mainstream and all the hot dogs you can eat at Coney Island. Instead, you get your own TLC TV show and your very own make up line.

Arm Warmers. What are they? Socks with holes on both ends that you put on your arms. Usually they're striped with black and some other color.

Why does corporate love them? Once again, they're designed to appeal to the mainstream kid who wants to look emo but isn't prepared to make all the sacrifices. Want to cut yourself to feel something...but the only problem is that the tempo of your life is more Songs in the Key of Life than How Soon Is Now? Purchase some twenty dollar striped arm warmers and you won't even have to break out the safety razor to gain acceptance into the alternate subculture. You'll be fielding, "Is everything okay at home--wanna rap?" questions your Jeff Rosso esque guidance counselor in no time!

Plaid, polka dots, stripes. What are they? Fairly self explanatory. Judging by Hot Topic and the Hipster Handbook, alternakids love things with stripes and polka dots.

Why does corporate love it? They require very little work to manufacture. And they're great equalizer. Anyone from actual schoolgirls to Gap and Burberry aficionados can pick out a plaid skirt or a polka dotted bra--it's not as daunting as buying thick emo glasses (too thick is Hank Hill, too thin and you start to look like Rachel Leigh Cook--getting that right Elvis Costello/Buddy Holly vibe takes months if not years to perfect).

BDSM wear. What is it? A complex subculture of dominance and submissive relationships, psychology that probably can't be summed up succinctly. For our intents, it means whips, chains, thigh high boots, and corsets galore!

Why does corporate love it? Once again, it's fashion, and that means the outside being more important than any silly little thoughts on the inside. Plus, it's an easy way to push the envelope. Think Madonna's Sex book, or Maggie Gyellenhaal's sassy ass in Secretary.

After all, when the world's most famous virgin wears a three hundred dollar leather daddy get up, you know it's gone Disney.

This post dedicated to all the poseurs (and poseuses) I went to college for four long years with.

Musical Musings: Everything Old Is New Again

I've decided that what marks our current decade (which I have affectionately dubbed the Ooh Oohs) is its superficiality. News feeds 24 hours a day mean that you've only got a few seconds to get your audience's attention (damnit, don't think I don't see you guys checking out my blog roll while pretending to read my blog--it's so the online equivalent of your eyes traveling down to check out the gals). And what's more fun to snark than than the superficial?

Those of you who know me off-line know that for the most part, I can't stand new music and that I live for the pop sound of the early 60s. (Which is probably why you haven't read about any of this stuff on this blog.) So with that in mind, I decided to take a look at how the music of this decade basically rips off the most ludicrous aspects of the past.

The eyes have it.

Who needs singing? One word: autotune. It's this century's answer to Singin' in the Rain. Eye make up is what really distinguishes the chanteuse of today. Sexy singers of a bye gone era might have pioneered the heavy eye make up look.

But today's stars take it to a new level.

Sure, Avril may have lifted most of "Girlfriend" from the Rubinoos' "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend." But who cares if you're a plagiarist when you've got darker eyes than Ling Ling and Hsing-Hsing?

And the single Back to Black may rip off pretty much every Supremes song ever. But Amy Winehouse probably owns more stock in eyeliner than Ronnie Spector, Diana Ross, and Dusty Springfield combined.

Abuse (or What's Talent Got to Do With It?).

Rising from the ashes of abuse is the next best thing to having talent. And a great way to keep your name in the tabloids if you don't have a new single out.

Rihanna, kudos to you for not shrinking from the public image after your recent unpleasantness. And for having the foresight to be with an abusive fuck with the surname Brown. (Whitney would approve.) Now before you and Kurt Loder pen your epic struggle entitled I, Rihanna, all you need to do is come up with some better song titles. Or else your Ike and Tina-esque film will be called Um-Um-Umbrella and I think Pixar's already reserved that title for a short film about a spunky but flighty parasol traversing a department store at night.

Weird rumors.

Think sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber with the elephant man's remains while Webster and Kevin McCallister look on. Or that years ago you secretly went away and had a child who turned out to be Bubbles. The Jacksons really cornered the market on rumors the last couple of decades.

I'm willing to bet that just as Michael Jackson had his PR people come up with lots of stories about himself in the 80s, Lady Gaga's got a whole department of people furiously trying to beat the "Gaga's a man, baby!" story. May I recommend "Gaga seeking verified virgins to donate blood for weekly baths" next? It's more original than "Cher removed a rib to look thinner" and sexier than "Rod Stewart had his stomach pumped to get rid of semen."

I wanna be in pictures.

Every young female singer wants to sing, sure. But you're nothing if you're not also in movies singing versions of other people's songs. If you're the sexy young black singer of your generation, you get to play any singer you want in film. Diana Ross played Billie Holliday in Lady Sings the Blues and managed to make Lady Day's life into a feel good picture. She also proved that it does't matter how different you look and sound is from your subject matter when you get important enough. (And then illustrated how denial isn't a club in McMaynerberry by deciding she was going to take the role of a teenager in The Wiz at age 34.)

And of course, Beyonce has now taken it to a whole new level playing both Etta James and a thinly veiled version of Diana Ross. Just please make sure you don't star in Let's Fall in Love: The Ella Fitzgerald Story, Ms. Knowles.

Producing samples

No, not the kind the urologist asks you to produce in a cup. Though frankly, I prefer that to Kanye's actual output. When you can come up with kick ass lyrics ("I'm Kan, the Louis Vuitton Don / Bought my mom a purse, now she Louis Vuitton Mom") all you need is a beat. (Rhyming "Louis Vuitton Don with "Louis Vuitton Mom--sheer genius.) And who needs originality when some old guys from the 70s that no one listens to anymore already did that? So let's lift from Can, Daft Punk, and Chakha Khan and hope no one pays attention.

Or you can make like Gwen Stefani and Jay-Z and decide that now that you're famous, things like beats and lyrics are overrated. Instead, you can rip off show tunes and focus on things like your fashion label. Who would have thought that Lonely Goatherd, Hard Knock Life, and If I Were a Rich Man would be tearing up the dance charts?

Now, with melodies taken care of, you can focus on more important things. Like deciding what brand of cognac to swig from on the red carpet when you pre-game before stepping on a kitten ruining Taylor Swift's moment.

Bizarre sexuality.

Mick Jagger and David Bowie pioneered the art of making people wonder whether you were gay or bi or what. Madonna decided to one up them by making out with two nubile young pop stars. Adam Lambert studied hard, paid attention to things like zeitgeist, and realized that the best way of making gay the new black (again) was adding eyeliner.

But of course, the most disturbing and therefore most fun sex stories aren't the super rehearsed ones. The truly bizarre is the stranger than fiction stuff. The stuff you read in Mackenzie Phillips' High On Arrival (that some people think incest really is best), for example. Or watching MJ's In the Closet video and realizing that despite the fact that there's a supermodel gyrating on him, he was probably getting through this by repeating a mantra of, "Think of Emmanuel Lewis, think of Emmanuel Lewis."

Scantily clad.

Everyone likes to be sexy, and what better way to do it than by showing some skin? At least back then, singers had the balls 'n ovaries to own up when they showed nipplage.

No, "the strategically placed bead exploded" for Janis and Jim. Take note, Ms. Jackson, when you're trying to have your cake and eat it too re: nipples, don't use the same excuse that Elaine Benes used with her X-X-Xmas cards.

Child stars.

Nothing says the entertainment industry like dolling up a little kid, screaming, "Dance, monkey!" at them, and then waiting for trauma to ensue. Sure, we all know about the hot mess that Britney became due to child stardom. And Brit, we're gonna let you finish messing up your life, but Michael Jackson was one of the most talented disturbed people EVER.

And before MJ, there was young Frankie Lymon who wrote and sang the hit song Why Do Fools Fall in Love by age thirteen, only to end up dead at 25 due to a morphine overdose with three wives fighting over his estate. And worst of all--to have his legacy be a second rate movie starring Halle Berry and Vivica A. Fox.

Now for a little test.

1. Rihanna: Chris Brown::

A. Whitney: Bobby Brown
B. Tina Turner: Ike Turner
C. Sadako: Current pop culture

2. Amy Winehouse is trying to emulate ______.

A. Ronnie Spector
B. Diana Ross
C. A bucket of rotting fish heads

3. In thirty years, the people who were bidding up a storm for MJ's glove and red jacket will be dying to purchase ______.

A. Justin Timberlake's jock strap
B. Rihanna's herpes test results
C. The exposed tampon string that proves that Lady Gaga is biologically female

4. What's Gwen Stefani's latest video going to be?

A. A remix of I Dreamed a Dream featuring Susan Boyle

B. A remix of The Parent Trap with Gwen playing twins
C. A remix of Memories with Gwen and tons of Asian girls in cat suits

Build a Better Chick Flick: Good Heavens, Miss Sakamoto, You're Beautiful!

I admit it. I love the trope of ugly, dorky girl turning into a sexy head turner. It's the equivalent of the rags to riches story, or the underdog team winning their sports game. It's my Bad News Bears, Mighty Ducks, or The Secret of My Success. I'm aware that I'm smart enough to know better. But I can't help it. So, let's break it down.

Cool new haircut, and a side order of make up. My first mentor was Mary Anne Spier. When her father let wear her hair loose instead of in pigtails, it was a symbol of how he finally saw her as mature, instead of as a Laura Ingalls Wilder clone. And in my fave BSC book of all time, Mary Anne's Makeover, when she chopped off all her hair without a second glance and applied a little eyeliner, I knew the truth. A makeover really can change your life. As I've posted before, I blame Mary Anne (and Mia Farrow) for why I keep thinking I can pull off a pixie hairdo. But mostly Natalie Imbruglia--damned Torn video showcasing her spunky but vulnerable charm.

(Il)legally Blonde. There IS a corollary to this, however. If you decide to go blonde to revamp your personality, it almost never works. See Brenda Walsh of 90210, Margene Heffman of Big Love, Mallory Pike of the BSC, and every damned girl I see on the subway who neglects to dye her eyebrows along with her head hair. Why does it never work? Because blonde is just too gorgeous for words. (See Serena van der Woodsen, Kelly Taylor, and Stacey McGill.) Uppity non-blondes need to learn that acquiring golden tresses is the equivalent of new money trying to get itself invited to the country club cotillion.

Clothing makes the woman. The great equalizer. Andy taught us that access to Nuclear Wintour's fashion accoutrements can turn even a size 6 into hotness.

The thigh high chocolate brown leather boots are shorthand for she's a sexy working girl. The short skirt says, "I'm flirty and fun" but the blazer says, "I'm classy and I don't need to show cleavage to get a second glance." And the accessory says, "I ate a shitload of asparagus, crapped it out and put it on a stick for everyone to see." Who needs personality when you've got Chanel?

Weighty issues. See Monica Gellar, Marty Sherman in the fat camp episode, and those assholes in the "One Rule: Obey!" ads that are ruining everyone's Internet experience. Yeah, this one's not too helpful if you're already thin but not fashionable or hot.

I have confidence in me. You don't really change anything on the outside, but you're really confident on the inside and your inner light shines through. This one usually only works if you're already jaw droppingly gorgeous and the rest of the cast has been paid off to pretend they don't think you're attractive until, say, sweeps week. Like Joey Potter in the beauty contest who finally caught Dawson's eye with her caterwauling rendition of On My Own.

The best way of getting confidence, based on Bridget Jones's Diary and Georgy Girl (Bridget Jones before there was Bridget Jones) seems to be having at least two guys pursuing you at the same time. It more than makes up for a few love handles here and there. Even if one of those guys is James Mason.

And just look at the titular character in Stephen King's Carrie. Despite being the school punching bag, when she put on a ball gown and went to the prom on the arm of the high school answer to Robert Plant, she was seen as gorgeous. (And personally, I think the bloody revenge only enhanced her attributes but I'm a sucker for the Medea type.)

However, this was always my least favorite way of being seen as hot. No matter how much confidence can transform you from nottie to hottie in literature, it rarely works in a more visual medium. Jenny Humphreys in the book version of Gossip Girl was a short, curly tressed big breasted cutie pie who eventually became sexy due to her confidence and associations with other cool kids. In the TV show? She's already Serena van der Woodsen's understudy. And despite the opening lines of Gone With the Wind ("Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm"), it doesn't make much of a dent when you take a look at Vivien Leigh.

How lovely to be a woman. Sometimes, blossoming from awkward child into glorious womanhood is enough. The baby fat rolls off, the braces come off, and the boobs come on.

Sometimes, though, puberty isn't enough, and a sexual awakening is needed. Like Susan Sarandon's character in Witches of Eastwick. Sure, she did the hat trick of removing her glasses, and letting her hair down, but most importantly, she simmered with the kind of sex appeal and inner confidence you only get from red hot intercourse with the devil.

The feminist part of me that says that men shouldn't reawaken women, that we should discover all that for ourselves hates this meme. But the part of me that still loves Sleeping Beauty and lip gloss loves it.

Men never make passes at girls who wear glasses. Glasses are shorthand for smart and unappealing to men. I could regurgitate that Laura Mulvey essay on the male gaze I read when I saw Vertigo in film class, but I'll spare you. Rachel Leigh Cook, Meg Cabot, Meg Murray, Toula Portokalos, and even Daria taught me all that I needed to know (though in her defense, Daria went back to bifocals). And part of me remains convinced that this is why Mallory Pike never attained true gorgeousness (well, that and the fact that she was never permitted to reach an age where she's getting attention from more than just the Humbert Humbert type).

The eye of the beholder. So everyone thinks you're ugly. Just go someplace where you're the ideal. Hey, if the Twilight Zone taught me anything, it was cultural relativity (and I thought that's what college was for). Some cultures prefer voluptuous pale skinned gals, others prefer tanned slim hard bodies, and still others prefer jowly piggy faces. (But they all go nuts for Pamela Anderson.)

And where else but among unwashed hipper than thou artsy Boho types could Helena Bonham Carter be considered the crown princess of hottitude? My forays into the counter culture that is New York City (read: Williamsburg) have taught me for every girl who idolizes Beyonce or Kate Moss, there's an unwashed poseuse who spends about ten cans of Bedhead a week to look like this:

I think I'll put Leslie Hornby (aka, Twiggy) in here. Twiggy growing up was seen as skinny and odd looking but in the sixties became the face of fashion. If I wanted to be uncharitable, I'd point out that she surfed the growing waves of anorexia, but why inflict my cynicism on my hapless readers?

When all else fails, disrobe. Hey, it worked for Ms. Gypsy Rose Lee, Linda Lovelace, Dita Von Teese, and almost every greasy haired, pasty skinned, "voluptuous," hipster I encountered on the burlesque circuit. Sure, men seldom make passes at girls with big asses, but if said ass isn't ensconced by anything as prudish as a pair of Levi's, you're in.

Sometimes you don't have to take them all off--you just have to wear fewer garments and the ones you do wear just need to be tighter. (See Olivia Newton John's transformation in Grease.)

Gypsy is both an example of disrobing and of gaining confidence and learning to believe you really are pretty, in the Joey Potter tradition. I do have to say, if you can go through life not realizing you're beautiful when you look like Natalie Wood or Katie Holmes, you probably need to be in a self-esteem class with Michael, LaToya, and Sadako herself. As moderated by Mr. O'Neill, of course.

I want to say one word to you...Plastics. Sometimes getting a makeover from Molly Ringwald, Cher Horowitz, or Carmindy isn't enough. Sometimes you need to call in the big guns. And surgery's nothing to be ashamed of. Sometimes something's just missing. Like an extra eye or an end stage nose.

I'm going to put Meg Cabot's Airhead in here. (Getting your brain transplanted into the body of a supermodel will one day be the ultimate surgery.) When you take this together with the Uglies series by Scott Westerfield, and Number 12 Looks Just Like You, it's hard to believe we won't all be supermodel clones in some far off year. Though personally, I found the "Different body" thing to be kind of a cheat. Like hiring about eight ringers as consultants so you can win your company's softball game.

Happy Thanksgiving, fellow bloggers and readers.

Pretty Dead

Meet Charlotte. She's a blonde haired blue eyed svelte beauty. She gets compared to Gisele Bündchen regularly. She's got all the right clothes and accessories. She's also a vampire, but please--don't use the "v word," as she puts it. All the boys want her and all the girls want to be her, which seems to make her the Ann Margret of the undead set. Charlotte's got a husband, William, an amoral sexy Byronic cad who turned her into a vampire a hundred years ago, whom she's now fleeing. Plus, she's got a sweetly naive high school best friend named Emily, now dead. And Jared, Emily's boyfriend who Char's now in love with. And oh yeah, turns out Emily's not exactly dead...she's...undead. And I thought life was hard enough when you were just the other kind of v-word.

So...what happens when Francesca Lia Block jumps on the Twilight bandwagon?

That fateful conversation between Francesca Lia Block and her trusty editor:

Editor: So we were thinking of doing something Twilight-y. Except edgier and hipper.

FLB: But I've never worked with vampires before...I'm more into gorgeous skinny girls with fairy wings who wear too much eyeliner.

Editor: Don't worry. That'll go over fine. Make your main character beautiful, but to keep up with the whole Bella Swan ideal, give her a few great qualities that could be flaws.

FLB: Like, she's really tall and thin, but back in the 19th century when she first became a vampire, that wasn't considered beautiful?

Editor: Perfect! Oh, and make sure that her breasts are just a little too big for her tiny waisted frame. God, I love that flaw.

FLB: This whole drinking people's blood thing sounds a bit icky, though...

Editor: Nah. Veganpires are in. The kids love socially conscious vampires--they drink animal blood or synthetic blood or something. Why don't you write it so your main character gets a constant supply of cow's blood on the black market. The black market part sounds edgy, the fact that no one's killing humans will make sure it goes over well in the heartlands, and you won't even offend the Jews and Muslims because it's not pig's blood.

FLB: What about the whole sleeping during the day thing. Sure, my characters wake up late but sometimes they go to the beach at dawn to surf.

Editor: Haven't you read Twilight? When you want to break a rule of traditional vampire lore, just have your character chuckle, look wistful, and say something like, "Ah yes, a bit of vampire mythos from one of your human films. If only being a vampire were really like that." Just make sure they don't sparkle. Meyers and her people have patented sparkling.

FLB: Maybe my character could just...wear a lot of sunscreen?

Editor: One more thing. We're really trying to court the kind of girl who's not usually into vampires, so try not to use the word "vampire" too much. Use "the v word" or have your main character say that she's not really into labeling herself. We want our average reader to be the girl who watches Top Model and spends more time in Sephora than in Hot Topic. What can you do for us?

FLB: Stop comparing my protagonists to Nefertiti or Aphrodite and start name dropping Kate Moss and Gisele? And mention some lip gloss shades?

Editor: Franny, you're on fire. Pretty Dead is going to do for vampires what Weetzie Bat did for weird alternative chicks in love with their gay BFFs.

Attributes of a Francesca Lia Block -pire.

Coffins are NOT a girl's best friends. Char: "I sleep in a big bed with a headboard of an antique silk Japanese wedding kimono, embroidered with flowers and cranes..." (Oh yeah? I sleep in a racecar bed!) Charlotte sometimes thinks she'd like to climb into her Louis Vuitton trunk at night, but she wants to appear normal.

"I never drink....wine." PSYCH! Early on in the book, Charlotte and her manpire William kill to live. In the present, though, Charlotte drinks cow's blood to live. She also eats real food on occasion--like very rare steak. She even imbibes red wine. When your character has more lax standards about drinking blood than Audrey II, you know you're in trouble.

Let the sun go down on me. Nothing bad happens to these vampires in the sun. They don't even sparkle. But they do take care to wear layers just in case, because you never know with vampires (or volcanoes). And I wasn't joking about the sunscreen remark earlier.

Pretty vampire. At one point, Charlotte's process becomes reversed and she starts turning human. During her re genesis of that mortal coil, she breaks a nail that won't heal! And she even gets a zit. Vampires, on the other hand, have impossibly clear skin and great bodies and they never get wrinkles. They're like 90210 or Melrose Place characters. They get to hang around while the world gets bombed (London and Hiroshima circa WWII) and watch while suffering no ill effects. (Hell, even 90210's Kelly Taylor suffered some minor burns after that rave episode that put her self esteem in major jeopardy.)

We never smudge our eyeliner or mascara. Vampires can't cry! They don't even cry blood like in True Blood. Charlotte will always have that perfect smokey eye. Normal girls with their pores and emotions just can't compete.

We don't have to stay undead. Charlotte doesn't even have to deal with the fact that she'll be alone when all her mortal friends and loved ones die because she gets to go back to being a normal girl at the end of it. (Her vampire husband reverses the process so that Emily can turn into a vampire, but Charlotte has to go back to being human.) So Char gets the fun "staring into the abyss" part of being a vampire without the long term soul sucking loneliness. Or as I like to refer to it: angst-in-a-can.

Living in a material world. Vampires get more options for sexiness. No more limiting themselves to Morticia Addams or Elvira for fashion icons. Charlotte's got a house full of sexy red dresses, Chanel No. 5, gladiator type sandals, and make up galore. Charlotte spends most of her century with William feeding and wearing cool decade appropriate outfits. (Did you really think FLB would miss up an opportunity to have her main characters dress like Marilyn and James Dean in the fifties, or John and Yoko in the 70s?) And when Char sees that her best friend Emily has come back to life, her reaction isn't, "Holy shit, are they appealing to the zombie demographic, too" but rather, "Her lips were painted red...I even thought I recognized the shade. M.A.C. Viva Glam."

If you're wondering what makes an FLB-pire all that different from Tyra Banks that time she went postal in season 4 of AMNT...good question.

Beep beep! Plagiarism alert!

There are just so many people that I can think of who might want to sue Ms. Block. That either means she has no new ideas of her own when it comes to vampires or that she's really got her finger on the pulse of young undead America.

The producers of True Blood. Look at those lips.

Except you could tell that HarperCollins was really courting the young teen demographic. Instead of blood red lipstick, we have pinkish lip gloss sheen with a gold shimmer. The teeth are biting into a red and white mint that's dissolving into blood. In other versions of this book, the mint is black and white and there's no blood. (Why, you may ask? So this book would appeal to both the goth crowds who think that the only thing more romantic than blood is dying of TB in a sanatorium, and the kids who just purchased their first Bettie Page t-shirts at Hot Topic but are scared off by bodily fluids.)

The Estate of Francine Pascal. Charlotte has blue eyes the color of the Pacific Ocean. Come on, FLB, couldn't you have thought of something a little bit darker? She's a vampire, not a Bratz doll. How about "eyes as deep, dark and menacing as the Black Sea at dusk"? Whoa. That was easy. Too easy. Urge to stop snarking and start writing vampire fanfic, rising...

Diablo Cody. FLB: "Teenage girls are powerful creatures. They want what they want and they will do what they must to get it." The line in Jennifer's Body that goes, "Hell is a teenage girl" is equally trite, but at least Diablo got there first. (FLB, you do get points for knowing better than to try to lift the inane lines "Honest to blog" or "Oh my god, Move on dot org!")

Britney Spears and whoever got blackmailed into directing her Lucky video. Charlotte says, "People want to be me. But I am like that [Chinese goddess statue] lying prone in my bedroom. No one understands the extent of my loneliness." To be honest, I preferred, "She's so lucky / She's a star / But she cry cry cries in her lonely heart...Why do these tears come at night?"

Prosaic Prose

• Charlotte has reservations about killing people, so the vampire William makes a speech about why it's okay to kill people to satisfy the bloodlust. Yes, this is before Charlotte decides to only drink cow's blood. The vampire Bill plays the amoral Lestat to Charlotte's sensitive Louis:

We must make the best of it. We must love our victims, honor and respect them. We give them meaning. We give them value. By dying this way, their lives have purpose.

This almost makes Mufasa's insipid reply to "But Dad, don't we EAT the antelope" seem deep. Vampire William, do you guys also make sure to use every part of the human after you drain it for blood?

• Jared begs Charlotte to make him into a vampire, and she replies:

I will not pierce your neck like a barbarian...But my body senses your need, like a mother with a newborn.

Char, if you weren't a vamp, I'd be begging you to get your tubes tied.

Conclusion

I know as a teenager that I was pretty lame. My idea of being a vampire meant seducing pre-24 Kiefer Sutherland while living in a coven that featured Bill S. Preston, Esquire and Richard Gilmore. I thought Cry Little Sister was a great song. And I thought vampire chokers were the height of good taste. Yup, I was a square.

With all that in mind, I still feel comfortable condemning Charlotte and William to the trash heap of vampire fiction.