Because the night belongs to vampires

After watching this trailer for 30 Days of Night, I learned it is based on a graphic novel. It's a reasonably diverting comic, but it is hard to imagine stretching the story into a movie.

The greatest strength of the comic is the art. The vampires become truly twisted and the violence is shown as movement, which made for some great visuals. I can see how a number of the scenes could be become fairly tense and scary, but the story is fairly trite.

Vampires show up in a town north of the Arctic circle where it will be completely dark for 30 days. They kill most of the people. Then the married police couple organize a resistance. There are a couple of surprises, but they are minor. A decent read, and I will probably read one or two more, but unless there is magic afoot the movie would be a rental.

For a strong, emotionally resonant horror graphic novel, try From Hell. Since it is about ten times the length of 30 Days of Night, it can develop real characters and hence real emotional impact. I can still see the panels where a dying victim of Jack the Ripper thinks back to her carefree days as a child, running across green hills with her siblings. I think I may have even gotten misty-eyed with that one.