Dracula (2020): Yearning for Death

So I finished watching the 2020 BBC Dracula miniseries last night, and it was a really confusing experience. Told in three parts, the miniseries covers pretty much the same story beats as the original work, but the most of the runtime is devoted to Dracula's pre-Britain escapades. Parts one and two are nothing short of fantastic, but then it all falls apart in part three, which is one of the more awful things I've seen in a while. I liked the series overall (because 2/3 ain't bad, but not great), so let's bite into 2020's Dracula, a strange tale of great setup ruined in the final act thanks to the genius of Stephan Moffat.

In case you couldn't guess, the first part is my favorite. It has a bit of everything one needs for a scary night by the campfire, including helpless victims.

I've already mentioned that the Dracula miniseries is told in three parts, but it's important to qualify what those are, because while the third part is undeniably the worst, they all had very good potential, though only parts one and two capitalized on it. Part one essentially tells the story of Jonathan Harker's role in the original work, including but not limited to his arrival, meeting, entrapment, and escape from the eponymous Count Dracula. His journey and deteriorating condition is interspersed by an interview with nun Agatha van Helsing at a convent in Budapest, and you can tell from the get-go that he's met a terrible fate. It's probably the best part of the three, if anything it's definitely the scariest, introducing us to both Dracula's powers as well as the themes of gothic horror. I've never readthe original Bram Stoker's Dracula before, but suffice to say that Dracula's ability to learn skills/memories from the blood of others is something I've never seen before. Over the course of the first part we see Dracula's transformation from a frail, old, and thick-accented man (who sounds remarkably like Tommy Wiseau) into a younger, distinctly English, and certainly more charming one. Ordinarily this wouldn't be particularly notable, but here his newfound vitality isn't given much ceremony, helping the disorienting tone of the first part. We also see several hallmarks of gothic horror in this first part, namely ancient evils (with romantic longings) and a paradoxical focus on both the fallibility and strength of mortal beings. Dracula, as a being of immense will and charisma, is able to influence and frighten most with a glance, but he's merely persuasive, not overpowering. Part two continues (sort of) the format from part one, with Agatha herself interviewing Dracula throughout. It essentially covers Dracula's shipping to England and his massacre of the crew and passengers of the ship he's on. It's not nearly as engaging as part one, but it gave me a lot more time to understand Dracula's powers and personality (he not only gains knowledge from others' blood, but also their quirks, like a stutter). With one exception, people act pretty realistically, and aside from that I have no complaint. Part three however, is where everything falls apart. So they decide to take Dracula to the modern day, and it had great potential. Here we have the descendants of Dracula's victims in parts one and two, ready to finally even the score...and in an utterly absurd twist his lawyer shows up and secures release. What the fuck? After this, does the vain Dracula do what he set out to do in part one, to consume English blood to no longer fear religion? He pursues online dating in order to consume "refined" blood, and he loses all menace from this. There's also this plot where he seduces this girl (who takes the role of Lucy in the original) and I think it was supposed to be suspenseful/comedic, but it's unbearable. She is without a doubt one of the most irritating characters ever given life. How am I supposed to feel anything but contempt for what amounts to some instagram narcissist when her self-gratifying practices lead to her death? The arc is just so cringey and awful, it was a losing battle for a while to even sit through her scenes. There's also so many non-characters here, and even though they're references to characters from the heroic posse of the book, they might as well not exist at all. Have no fear though, Dracula does die at the end at van Helsing's hand, and they even butchered that. So get this, apparently Dracula is afraid of death (at what point was Dracula ever depressive before the final twenty minutes?), so that's why he's lived so long, and all of his weaknesses (sunlight, crosses, etc.) are entirely mental in nature. Also the blood of cancer patients is apparently poison to him, and he apparently has the hots for van Helsing (played in both incarnations as a woman), so he literally kills himself as she dies from cancer by drinking her blood, and the final shot is of the two in a romantic embrace on a bed of sunlight. What the fuck, did I miss something? Literally nowhere this set up besides Dracula musing that he's never met an opponent like her, and even that lacks romantic subtext. It's so confusing, what was going through their heads as they were writing this? They had something great on their hands, all they had to do was to make the heroic posse likable, but apparently slam dunking the source material into the waste bin is the better move. I'm so disappointed that this is probably the reason why you shouldn't watch this miniseries at all.

This is such an interesting location, sort of like a vampire soulstone, but why exactly was this brought in at the third part? Nobody knows.

In Dracula's technical execution, it's much more consistent throughout, with parts one, two, and even three having some pretty appealing stuff, yet in keeping with the story, part three for much of the runtime makes me want to channel my inner white guy energy and punch a hole in drywall. Part one, fantastic, amazing use of makeup, implied character changes, camerawork, and (oddly enough) use of animals. In keeping with the basic concept of a vampire, bats and even wolves are present in large numbers, yet it's the inclusion of flies to signal the presence of death and decay that follows Dracula that I find most striking. This miniseries actually manages to make flies somewhat scary (until part three ruins it), and hats off to it. Creature effects can be seriously janky however, and I could tell that there wasn't a ton of budget devoted to this, but when the somewhat low-budget effects work, they really work. There's also a lot of great uses of editing and spliced together shots that really goes a long way to establish the panic, disorientation, and increasingly dire circumstances of Harker. Part two continues on one's successes, and while it's less notable to me from a technical standpoint, the costuming is great, and each character (barring one or two) is quite visually distinct from the other with a decent amount of personality. However all good things must come to an end, and part three squanders and essentially nullifies the achievements of the first. There's points where it feels like part three is part of the same miniseries, but for the most part it's awful. I gave the story of three a lot of grief, but it's so much worse from a technical standpoint. From seizure-inducing editing, atrocious backing soundtracks, and strange Bond-esque sets, part three made me want to throttle whoever was responsible. I know that CATS was an abomination against God, but at least there was competence and passion behind aspects of it, but here any effort put in here feels like gross incompetence, like someone came in at the last second. I mean what happened guys, where's the real part three? I know you can do so much better than this guys.

Yes, these two are apparently very much in love with each other, can you tell?

I was really excited to watch the Dracula miniseries despite hearing that the last part wasn't great, but goddamn what a letdown. I'm at a loss to understand what happened, and it's a shame, because the actors gave some pretty good performances, especially Van Helsing and Dracula, and there was so much excellence in the first and second parts, but then it's all ruined by the final third. In all honesty I find this really hard to recommend, despite how good the first and second parts are I'm unsure as to whether it's worth it or not to subject yourself to the trough of television. It did manage to elicit anger in me where CATS entertained, so there's that dubious honor. Let's say it's a semi-reccomendation from me, and that's it for this flawed series that I'm very unlikely to pick up again lest the urge to commit violence upon Stephan Moffatt wells up in me.

Next time will be something a bit different, a book that isn't fantasy or sci-fi. I'll try to get it done by Saturday night/Sunday morning, but painting my minis may prove to be too much of a distraction.