Writer: Alex de Campi / Penciller and Colour Artist: Erica Henderson / Image Comics
14th October 2020
The Pitch: Vienna, 1889: Dracula’s brides nail him to the bottom of his coffin. Los Angeles, 1974: an ageing starlet decides to raise the stakes. Crime scene photographer Quincy Harker is the only man who knows it happened, but will anyone believe him before he gets his own chalk outline? And are Dracula’s three brides there to help him...or use him as bait?
The trouble with Dracula is it's done. Done to death. Everyone has done it or toyed with doing it. Everyone has... a stake. It's trad, dad! Old hat. How do you make the undying live again? How do you infuse a Victorian gothic masterpiece with modern sensibilities and make it fresh? Why, you go back 46 years and find a place that's custom-made for vampires... Like Hollywood! Neil Jordan once said that Hollywood is ideal for vampires. I'm inclined to believe him, especially after reading this. De Campi and Henderson present a feminist bent on the mythos: Dracula's three brides are abuse survivors who, sick of being played off against each other, nail Dracula to the bottom of his coffin in Vienna (the Hollywood of its day), back in 1889. They flee, living forever, drawn to a place that luxuriates in the sun, but revels in the moonlight. California, 1974...
The decadence of this place is the flame to which our Vampire moths are drawn.
Yes, ok, Hammer did kind of do this with Dracula A.D. 1972 back in, well 1972. But that was London and culturally a different prospect. Although one does wonder if this is why the '70s were chosen by de Campi and Henderson as their setting? Hollywood in '74... That was a town already full of Vampires. The movie business and its fringes were one big bloodsucker, taking people's hopes and dreams, not to mention their youth in pursuit of the adoration that came with being a movie star. Those in the industry practised the socially acceptable forms of vampirism: sex, drugs and the casting couch. People never got old in Hollywood. They just faded from view, only to be seen at parties, in their late forties, still trying to make it. Youth may fade but you can be young forever in film. The decadence of this place is the flame to which our Vampire moths are drawn. A starlet resurrects Dracula, hoping for the gifts that he offers to be given freely. But everything costs. And Dracula's resurrection also brings the Brides out of seclusion, no longer background players. They have become stars of their own lives now and intend to hold on to top billing. Bringing in Quincy Harker, a crime scene photographer to aid their fight.
Like Dracula, the images are amorphous and hallucinatory.
De Campi posits a lot of good ideas in this book, that preaches moving on and moving with the times to stay relevant. Dracula is unable to adjust and become more because he never acknowledges that he needs the women more than they need him. He can't even take corporeal form and instead is shown as a many-eyed beast that haunts the fringes. Dracula becomes the ageing starlet, vying for a role to which he is no longer suited. One that’s been rebooted and gender-switched. Here, the women use the men for their needs, only their touch is somewhat more benevolent. They don't seek to have Quincy destroy Dracula's new bride, but to stage an intervention and make her own decision about which side she falls on. They offer choice where there is none, asking her to realise that there is a metaphorical Vampirism to which she and others are being subjected that is potentially far worse than the literal form. On the point of metaphorical Vampirism... Quincy himself is also a vampire – taking pictures of the dead and selling them to Hollywood gossip rags. The editors who buy them feed on him, he feeds on the dead... The book highlights what a circle of shit the thing that calls itself 'showbusiness' really is. Not a solid, tangible goal but, like Dracula, amorphous and hallucinatory.
Henderson lets loose with colour in a way that would make Francavilla jump for joy.
Henderson's art style has morphed into something new with this book. No longer relying on comical beats, she lets loose with colour in a way that would make Francavilla jump for joy. The art – indeed, the writing – relies on instinctual narrative rather than plot beats. The inks and colours bleed into the pages and soak them in trippy, acid-tinged rage. As the book moves forward and Dracula's fury and power grow, his voice becomes a booming resonant cry, the letters and sound effects splashing across the panels. Quincy becomes tiny against the scope and action, overwhelmed by the weird events he's caught up in. The Brides, nameless and ageless, take a leaf from Dracula's own rules and navigate the tale deftly, influencing where they need to. They make Quincy resolute and braver than he was at the beginning. He is more because of the women, the lesson Dracula cannot learn. Strange that a beast with many eyes cannot see the truth in front of him. In creating this book, de Campi and Henderson have created a Vampire tale for our times, despite the trappings of its decade. Is it too much to ask that we see the Brides live again in 1984, 1994 and beyond?
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