Colleen Owens

NAME: Colleen Owens
AGE: 19
OCCUPATION: Eco-Warrior
CANON: Vampire On Fire


It shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody by now how I feel about environmental issues: I support them. Climate change is a real thing and we should all do something about it. Animals need our protection instead of getting shot at or abused. Habitats for those animals need our protection as well. Colleen Owens embodies every one of these beliefs. There’s just one problem: she’s billed as a villain and takes her alignment a little too seriously.

Being an eco-warrior isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but taking it to the extreme is. Pretty much any political belief has the potential to be polarized whether you’re a pro-lifer who shoots doctors or an anti-war protester who loots liquor stores during a riot. Colleen has good intentions, but she achieves her goals through vicious means, which is what makes her a convincing villain.

In Vampire On Fire, an oil tanker is pulling into the harbor of a nameless city (before I started calling every location in my short stories Paulson City). Three different creatures of the night want to attack this oil tanker for different reasons. Mario Grand, a vampire who doesn’t burn during daylight but has a fiery aura, wants victims to feast on and fill his blood pool. Derrick O’Brien, a werewolf who undergoes his transformation via rage, wants relief from his PTSD. Can you take a guess as to what Colleen Owens wants with the oil tanker? She wants to destroy the fucking thing, that’s what.

Armed with little more than a machete and a bitchy attitude, Colleen storms the oil tanker and slashes innocent people along the path to her goals. She even goes so far as to torture one of them while screaming in an annoying voice. That’s the key thing you have to remember about Colleen: her voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard. She could scream the lyrics to a Soulfly or Five Finger Death Punch song and still sound disgusting.

Combine this with the will to kill anybody over the smallest disagreement over environmental issues and you’ve got the makings of a terrorist. If you leave your lights on when you’re not around, she’ll tie your ass to the couch and burn your home. If you eat a 50 calorie beef stick, she’ll shove it up your ass like a dildo and pop your eyeballs out. At this point, calling her a bitch might not be enough. We might have to move one more letter down the alphabet to accurately describe this violent woman.

So I guess Colleen Owens can be labeled by TV Tropes as being a Complete Monster. Even hardcore liberals can’t identify with this woman and those on the right hate her even more. She’s doing more damage to her cause than good. Sometimes she doesn’t even have a clear game plan; she’ll just rape and pillage everything until this entire world is burning in her violence, which also goes against the environmental doctrine.

A villain who gets called the C-word on a regular basis and earns it every time should be a satisfying kill for someone like Mario Grand or Derrick O’Brien. Fear not, readers. After the two of them take down an ultra-powerful mummy and put aside their differences, Derrick ties and gags Colleen with duct tape while Mario throws a head kick and decapitates her in the process. If I hadn’t used so many hyperbolic descriptions while ignoring the “normal” rules of writing, then maybe Vampire On Fire would be a satisfying read. Unfortunately, the writing techniques I employed along with the Deus Ex Machina ending would make this story a weak contender for publication and therefore a candidate for being deleted from my archives.

If I ever have the need for a bitchy villain who demands conformity and is too violent even for an NC-17 rating, then I’ll be happy to call on Colleen Owens for help. But if I’m going to use her, then I can’t have her be TOO bitchy. Otherwise, people might put the book down and pick up a copy of something a little more heavenly, like “The Fault In Our Stars” by John Green or “Love Letters to the Dead” by Ava Dellaira. I’d include “Fifty Shades of Grey” on that list, but I’m inclined to believe that Colleen Owens and Christian Grey would make the ideal Complete Monster couple. That’s a scary prospect no matter which way you spin it. It sends chills down my spine and it should yours as well.

　

***JOKE OF THE DAY***

When Christian Grey wants to go to a rock concert, does he shop at Ticket Master?