To celebrate the release of The Vampire Diaries Season 3 on DVD and to get everyone's appetites whetted for the new instalment of Twilight at the end of the year, it's time to take a look at both of the series' leading ladies, and decide who is the better Vampire.
Elena Gilbert and Bella Swan have more in common than most - both fell in love with boys who turned out to be vampires, and over the past year have become Vampires themselves.
Bella made the transformation after giving birth to Edward Cullen's baby, and Elena was given vampire blood to prevent her almost certain death, which caused her to become a vampire. But what else separates the girls?
FAMILY:
Elena - After her parents died in a car crash, Elena lives with her brother Jeremy and her Aunt Jenna.
Bella - In the first of the Twilight films, Bella moved from Phoenix, Arizona to live with her dad Charlie in Washington. She has no siblings.
FRIENDS:
Elena is best friends with Bonnie Bennett and Caroline Forbes, who turned out to be a witch and vampire respectively!
Bella is good friends with Edward's sister Alice Cullen who often tries to dress her up. She also becomes good friends with Rosalie Hale after the birth of her daughter. Her closest human friends are Jessica Stanley and Angela Webber who she met and bonded with at school after she moved to Washington.
STYLE:
Elena loves the classic- all American style, and is frequently seen in jeans, trainers, vests and t-shirts often topped off with a leather jacket. She also loves to add to the mystery and fantasy element of the show by wearing rich purple, red and green colours.
Bella - Beloved of dark colours, she mainly wears shirts, jeans and trainers.
LOOKS:
Elena is the classic girl next door; she's tall, slim and beautiful and is fought over by many of the boys in Mystic Falls.
Very pretty with dark hair and ghostly pale skin, Bella attracted many of the boys in Forks before she met Edward. After her transformation to a Vampire she becomes even more beautiful with even paler skin, red eyes and straight dark hair.
LOVE LIFE:
Elena has an on-off relationship with Stefan Salvatore and in the third season as Stefan was drawn to the dark side, began to fall for Stefan's brother Damon.
Bella has a relationship with vampire Edward Cullen, and married him in Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1. She was also pursued by werewolf Jacob, and although she realises she does love him- it's not the intense love she has for Edward.
From looking at both of these lovely ladies, it's clear that they have way more in common than we probably thought and it's unsurprising that they have both attracted similar vampire boys. But in true gothic fashion, there really can be only one, so...
You can catch both these ladies in vampire action on screen. Elena appears in The Vampire Diaries: The Complete Third Season, out now on Blu-ray and DVD, while Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 2 is in cinemas in November. See more pics below...