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Vampire Princess Miyu

The Japanese have a long tradition of weird and wonderful monsters, from umbrellas with eyes to nine-tailed foxes that mischievously seduce farmers and travelers. Recently, Western vampires have been added to this crowded pantheon. Castlevania is a hugely popular series of games featuring elegant, bishounen vampires. Master of Mosquiton is a humorous take on the Dracula legend, where a very sharp, modern girl takes the old Count to the cleaners. One of the most popular, and oddest, vampires is Kyuketsuki Miyu, or Vampire Princess Miyu.

Miyu takes the form of a 13-year old girl, though her true nature is not made clear. She is burdened with the duty of returning stray Shinma back to their own world. Shinma are described as a combination of gods and demons that feed on the misery and sadness of humans. Interestingly, Miyu does not fight the Shinma for the sake of their victims. for she generally seems indifferent to human suffering. The series succeeds in characterizing Miyu as something "other." She looks human, but is not. Cool and aloof, jealous of her prerogatives, she operates quite outside our moral compass. Her anger at the atrocities of the Shinma stems not from sympathy for the lives they lay waste, but from a disorderly and reckless ignorance of the rules and laws that govern her shadowy realm. She herself feeds on humans, but only beautiful ones, her delicate bite sending them into a pleasant but static limbo that Miyu has decided is better than the sad mortality of earth.

The series is tinged with sadness, for Miyu finds little happiness in her driven existence. Her sole consolation is the mysterious Larva, a bishounen Shinma who serves as servant, guardian, friend, and perhaps more. Denied the life of a normal girl, Miyu spends her melancholy existence watching and waiting for prey, occasionally wondering at her peculiar destiny.

The anime consists of an OAV and a television series. The OAV is stronger artistically, coming close to the dreamlike, impressionistic manga. Miyu is depicted as chillingly capricious, at times almost cruel. While not as powerful visually, the television series has more time to delve into her character. To better hunt the Shinma, Miyu disguises herself as a schoolgirl. She becomes friends with a cheerful classmate named Chisato, an experience that proves emotionally confusing as Miyu comes to know something of human suffering and joy. Larva warns her she is going native, but something about the genki girl draws her. Perhaps there is a spark of humanity in the Vampire Princess, after all.

The original manga series is shoujo, which has a long tradition of horror themed works. In shoujo, the real horror is not scary monsters, but the darkness in human hearts. Shinma enter into the lives of people who are desperate, lonely, or weak. The episodes are often depressing, as otherwise good people come to terrible ends they do not deserve. It is a world quite outside the Judeo-Christian calculus, where people suffer not because they deserve it, but because it is their fate. Miyu is called The Watcher, which is exactly what she does. From a point beyond good and evil, she watches the folly and tragedy of human existence, and smiles. Chilling, sad, and strange, Vampire Princess Miyu is an excellent choice for connoisseurs of quiet, subtle horror.
  • Studio: OAV: Animeigo, TV: Tokyopop
  • Format: DVD, VHS
  • Episodes in series: OAV 4, TV 26
  • Series Completed: Yes
  • Number of DVDs: 6
  • Number VHS: 2

 
  • DVD Audio Tracks: English, Japanese
  • VHS Audio Tracks: English
  • DVD Subtitles: English
  • Genre: Horror
  • Ages: 13+
  • Cautions: Violence
  • Reviewer: George
  • Core Collection: Magic and Occult, High School (TV and OAV), Adult (OAV)