BSV Forum - General - The Bloodshedpub

Blood tears

Jun 19 2009 02:59 am   #1Guest

I have watched every episode of Buffy and Angel the series. I have seen vampires bleed, and vampires cry. Never have I ever seen a vampire cry tears of blood, or watery, red blood tears, or anything special. So why, in so many fics, do Spike and Angel cry blood tears? Where did that come from? Is it from a book or a myth or another TV show? Maybe one author did it and others thought it was a part of canon and added it in?

I've read a lot of stories with blood tears and I can't tell where the idea came from, so I thought I'd ask.

Jun 19 2009 03:09 am   #2slaymesoftly
Anne Rice
I am not a minion of Evil...
I am upper management.
Jun 19 2009 03:29 am   #3nmcil
I think that that the use of blood tinted tears is also being used in True Blood series -
” Recent evolutionary models have demonstrated what politicians have long known: the best way to get people to collaborate and to think like a group is to identify an enemy and charge that “they” threaten “us.”

Michael Tomasello is co-director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Jun 19 2009 03:46 am   #4Guest
As Spike said once, "People still fall for that Anne Rice routine.  What a world."

IMHO when writing fanfic, especially in the Buffyverse, if one of the characters makes it a point to mock a particular vampire "myth" i.e. crosses and holy water- then I don't think anyone should use it.  Maybe it's just me, but I got the impression that Spike didn't think much of her writing, so I do not use any of her conciets, such as blood tears.

Fetching Mad Scientist
Jun 19 2009 04:20 am   #5Spikez_tart
It could also be from that movie David B made.  I think it was called Valentine or something and he had bloody tears.  It was a very very bad movie, so naturally I watched it.
If we want her to be exactly she'll never be exactly I know the only really real Buffy is really Buffy and she's gone' who?
Jun 19 2009 06:44 am   #6LisFayte
Laurell K Hamilton also uses, well not bloody, but pink tinged tears.
The most wasted of all days is one without laughter.--- e e cummings

Come to challengespuffy  post Spuffy fic challenges or find something to write about
Jun 19 2009 12:54 pm   #7slaymesoftly
It's pretty hard to pin down who did it first, but I'm blaming Anne Rice. lol  And yeah, if Joss mocked her (easily done sometimes, alas) then I don't think anyone writing fanfic for his verse should use her myths.

On the other hand, that's the cool thing about writing about unreal creatures, you're really free to make them whatever you want them to be - just maybe not when you're playing in someone else's sandbox....
I am not a minion of Evil...
I am upper management.
Jun 19 2009 03:05 pm   #8BecomingChosenGirl13
Ugh, I never liked the idea of blood as tears.
Jun 19 2009 09:46 pm   #9nmcil
I like the idea of blood tears because the blood is the essence that gives them life - for a vampire to be crying in the Buffyverse Mythos is a huge thing - But they are not used in the series - only time that blood comes from their eyes that I can remember is the virus in Angel Season Five.  Did Angel/Angelus ever cry blood tears in the early seasons with Buffy?  When he is first cursed he cries normal tears - if I remember right.
” Recent evolutionary models have demonstrated what politicians have long known: the best way to get people to collaborate and to think like a group is to identify an enemy and charge that “they” threaten “us.”

Michael Tomasello is co-director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Jun 19 2009 10:54 pm   #10Guest
No one in the Buffy/Angel verses ever cried blood, except for in "Destiny" but that was different...demons and humans who went insane.  Also, the vamps from those series aren't impotent.  I agree with FMS--leave the blood tears out (unless someone's possessed :P ).

~Scarlet
Jul 21 2009 03:57 pm   #11Guest
Well we are 70% salt water so it's only logical that we would cry the very same transparent liquid that makes up our organism.
As for vampires, they don't replenish their supply of liquids with water as we do, but with blood...So it seems practical to me that they would cry a sorta pinkish fluid because that's really all they have to sustain themselves.
Jul 21 2009 07:47 pm   #12nmcil
in True Blood the vampires do cry blood tears -
” Recent evolutionary models have demonstrated what politicians have long known: the best way to get people to collaborate and to think like a group is to identify an enemy and charge that “they” threaten “us.”

Michael Tomasello is co-director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Jul 21 2009 09:06 pm   #13sosa lola
I've read a couple of fics that had Spike crying blood, that was before I watched the show. When watching, I thought it was a blooper when Spike cried regular tears.
Jul 22 2009 01:11 am   #14Immortal Beloved
As for vampires, they don't replenish their supply of liquids with water as we do, but with blood

In that case, I'd say that Spike would cry whiskey ;-)

Some things from other vampire anthologies that bleed (no pun, I swear) into BtVS fanon are okay.  Some are just plain hoakey.  I'd put blood tears in the hoakey category.  But, if someone wants to use them, then okay by me.  I'll probably just get choke on the corn and stop reading. :-P
Give me Spuffy, or give me death.
Jul 22 2009 01:35 pm   #15slaymesoftly
Hee, Sosa, that's the danger of coming to the fandom through fic rather than the show itself.  You get used to certain fanon ideas and are confused when you see what really happened. :) 

I am not a minion of Evil...
I am upper management.
Jul 23 2009 03:11 am   #16Abby
As for vampires, they don't replenish their supply of liquids with water as we do, but with blood...So it seems practical to me that they would cry a sorta pinkish fluid because that's really all they have to sustain themselves.

But blood isn't entirely red, either ... it's made up of red cells, yes, but also other cells and proteins that aren't at all red when the individual components are separated.  Plasma, a major component of blood, is a clear yellowish colour.