Vampire question settled?

[jere7my]

mind control and possession are not only in the domain of vampires. Even if its just able to affect undead, saying possession = vampirism is just incorrect.

How fortunate, then, that that's not what I said!

One common way of depicting vampirism is to show someone's body being hijacked by a dark spirit. I don't think this is a controversial statement; it's basically how it works on Buffy. Another common way of depicting vampirism is to show them being corrupted by insatiable bloodlust, which is what Falbrogna et al. claim happened to the shaman that became Malack. In both cases, the vampire generally ends up with an aversion to sunlight, a lust for blood, etc.

Falbrogna's theory would have us believe that Durkon was afflicted with the second form of vampirism, then also afflicted with something that looks, to the audience, exactly like the first kind of vampirism, but isn't. Yes, Exorcist-style possession is also a thing, but here we've got both things going on in the same vampirized body, which seems pointlessly complicated and confusing for the audience. Why would Rich hit Durkon with vampirism, then install a dark spirit that gives every impression of being a second form of vampirism, but isn't really? And then not give any indication that the "corrupting bloodlust" kind of vampirization ever happened? It staggers the mind! It would be like showing us Peter Parker getting bitten by a radioactive spider, then later revealing that he's actually from Krypton and the spider-bite had nothing to do with anything.

I truly don't know how to explain this any more clearly.

and now, allow me to ask you a question. If your theory is to be true, what is your explanation for Malack giving out right contradicting information?

I'm not sure what "right contradicting information" is. Could you provide specific quotes from the text?

I re-read everything Malack said after being revealed as a vampire, and found nothing to contradict the notion that the evil spirit absorbed all the shaman's memories and identified with it, which is also a standard memory-absorbing trope. He remembers having brothers, e.g., but remembers drinking their blood much more strongly, which fits with the notion of absorbed memories not being quite as strong as real ones. He tells Durkula he'll be "...confused" for a while if he's released from thralldom too soon, which fits with the notion that it takes a while for the dark spirit to absorb all the memories.

This is, incidentally, exactly how vampirism is depicted on Buffy: vampires who talk about their life before being vamped generally use the first person. "I died so many years ago." It's common shorthand when writing dialogue for vampires; I think there's a lot of overthinking going on here.