It was inevitable

Is anyone aware that vampires are quite popular right now? Yes, odd as it may seem, thanks in no small part to a certain book/film franchise, night-dwelling blood-suckers are all the rage. All sorts of filmmakers are giving their own touch to the vampire genre: 2012 saw the release of Tim Burton’s Dark Shadows, starring who else but Johnny Depp, along with Russian director Timur Bekmambetov’s Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, Irish director Neil Jordan’s Byzantium, and Italian director Dario Argento gave his take on the most famous Vampire of all with Dracula 3D. At this year’s Cannes Film Festival, popular indie director Jim Jarmusch debuted his foray into the vampire scene with Only Lovers Left Alive, starring Tom Hiddelston (Thor, The Avengers) and Tilda Swinton (Burn After Reading, The Chronicles of Narnia series). That’s not even counting the current television shows featuring, or starring vampires.

This one was kind of a surprise

Do you know what other ancient, violent things are popular? Vikings. A relatively new trend with a big debt of gratitude owed to Marvel’s Thor (2011) – a picture about a viking-god-superhero – and Dreamwork’s How to Train Your Dragon – about vikings fighting and (of course) training dragons – Scandinavian warriors with horned helmets are a hot commodity. The History channel’s 2013 series Vikings has been well received, and is getting a second season – it’s lead actor is even set to star in the Warcraft film.

So, it only makes sense to put these two hot commodities together in one film. Yes, Viking Vampire is being made. And surprisingly it’s not a film produced by the Syfy channel. This mash-up will be comedy straight from the viking homeland, Norway. Not much is known about the project at this point, but it will be produced by Filmkompaniet MadMonkey, and written by Kjersti Rasmussen and Kjersti Steinsbø. And, thanks to twitch.com, we have this synopsis:

In the reality show “Valhalla”, the participants live and compete like Vikings in the beautiful fjords of Norway. The Viking village is built on historic ground where the Viking King Eirik Bloodtooth once ruled and was later buried. Little do they know that the old king is a Viking Vampire who has waited for over a 1,000 years to be set free. When the reality participants plunder his grave at night, they break the seal in silver that kept Eirik Bloodtooth trapped in his grave, and release the most dangerous Viking King in Norwegian history.

Soon the participants will discover that “reality” sucks.

Production on Viking Vampire will begin in 2014.