A series that works on so many levels requires well earned patience to fully appreciate

heidistandell

When looking for Dracula episode guides to keep track of where I am in the series as I never seem to catch it on television so must sometimes watch two at a time online to catch up, I've noticed posts suggesting the ratings are low or that people are disappointed in the series. I do have to agree that after the first episode, the plot of the show (which is large) seemed more than a bit unmanageable, and contrived. I mean, honestly, the Count trying to use "electro-magnetism" to prevent his ages old rivals, the Order of the Dragon, from taking over the world through the use of oil as a fuel? Well, that's a done deal, whatever "order" decided to take that strategy has already won the war! Dracula as an Industrial Revolution magnet, and with a fake American accent to fool his British foes as to his real origins and whereabouts in the last, oh, 500 years or so, didn't exactly dazzle me. The last few episodes I've seen, however -- episodes 4 - 6 -- are beginning to explore the relationships within Dracula's world, and, that, I think, is the key to catching and keeping an audience on any genre series (remember the similar series Buffy and Angel; neither would have lasted long if the storyline hadn't focused as much on the growth of the characters as it did on the strange, vampy, witchy, demonic situations they faced). I suppose I am citing these two series as, while they were focused on young people, much of their audience became more adult over time, and the producers, directors, and writers recognized this. Dracula is not meant to be a Tweeny oriented vamp television show such as The Vampire Diaries (I give that one a D minus and not an F as it has to be doing something right to keep getting renewed AND also a spin-off!). This is a series for grown ups, and jaded ones at that. While the visuals are sexy and lush, as too are the characters, they aren't terribly realistic, which is as they should be -- if you've been alive for a few more years than 20 you can appreciate that Dracula's creators are re-creating and paying homage to every significant, and some not so significant, cinematic Dracula settings from Todd Browning to The Hammer Studios to Coppola AND to Buffy. The acting, the scenes, the blood and especially the clothing(!) are all a bit over the top, all jaded themselves, and work as a kind of parody of the overstatement so often found in cinematic and literary vampires. It's a series worth watching partly for that, but it is also worth watching for the plot that I hope providence allows time enough to unfold. I think it will become very worth spending an hour each week as Dracula and his entourage of Van Helsing, Mina and Jonathan Harker, Lucy Westerna, Renfeild and the Buffyesque Lady Whetherby take their re- visioned roles into something inescapably entertaining, using something old, something new, borrowed and blue, to meld a revisionist yet "true" tribute to Bram Stoker's Dracula.

score 8/10

heidistandell 15 December 2013

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2922516/