Dracula Trailer Emerges From Its Coffin
A Halloween holdover rises from the grave this Christmas Season, as a trailer for the upcoming BBC series Dracula has been released online. From Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat, the creators of Sherlock, Dracula will be the latest in a long line of retellings of Bram Stoker’s legendary horror novel, with Danish actor Claes Bang as the Transylvanian Count. The series will premiere on January 1, 2020, on BBC One, and will consist of three episodes airing on three consecutive nights – presumably each 90 minutes long, like Sherlock. On January 4, all three episodes will arrive on Netflix. Check out the Dracula trailer below:
I’ve been looking forward to this one. I love Sherlock (outside of its awful version of Moriarty, which everyone but me seems to adore), and while I’m hopeful another season of Holmesian hijinks will materialize at some point, Gatiss and Moffat putting their spin on a different literary classic is a tantalizing alternative. However, the Dracula trailer does little to impress me. Visually, it looks excellent, with the gothic locations creating a haunting atmosphere befitting the king of vampires – that is, until the oddly placed humor completely undercuts it. It’s hard to tell from a short trailer, of course, but as of now, this feels like a misstep and something that doesn’t gel with a Dracula story (aside from the underrated Dracula: Dead and Loving It). Sherlock has a lot of humor, too, but it fits the characters well, and there’s a basis for it in Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories. Dracula was much darker, and the Count was portrayed as a real threat. Also, Sherlock Holmes is a good guy; Dracula, despite being the protagonist of the series, is evil, and having him make puns at his own expense lessens the intimidation he imposes. There’s a lot of give and take to the Dracula trailer. I love the sight of the nuns standing in a row with stakes in their hands like they’re a secret army of vampire hunters, but I don’t like the silly use of “Lust for Life” as the background song, just in case we took any of it seriously. I liked the creepy hand and zombies lurking around, but I groaned at the goofy-looking fly landing on the camera. Claes Bang certainly has the look for Dracula, and in the more horrific clips, he comes off well; I just hope they don’t have him making corny jokes too often as he does at the end. I’ll certainly be watching when this hits Netflix, but I’m preparing for a letdown now.
What did you think of the Dracula trailer? Are you planning to watch the series? Has Hotel Transylvania given us the definitive version of the horror icon? Let us know in the comments and stick around Geeks + Gamers for more TV news!
