Beatrice Fedozzi
AP1 (WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT FOR UNIT 3): Dracula (NBC, 2013-2014)
The new Dracula: a charming monstrous hero
Dracula, the monster with a dark soul first created by Bram Stoker, has been adapted many
times over the years. Alexander Grayson, the name that Dracula assumes in the NBC
adaptation in order to hide his identity in Victorian London, is a wealthy businessman whose
main objective is to battle the Order of the Dragon, a historic chivalric order to which Vlad the
Impaler (actually Dracula himself) belonged centuries before. Here, somehow Dracula is
rehabilitated and turned into a sort of a hero; in fact, Alexander Grayson is different from
Stoker’s Dracula: he’s charming, sexy, kinda sensitive and civilised (although he still has to
satisfy his hunger by killing and drinking the blood of his victims). Moreover, his love for his
dead wife Llona is incomparably great and makes him more human, alive, if not a real
human being considering what kind of people he had to deal with (specifically the members
of the Order of the Dragon). I must add, however, that he has a number of limitations, such
as being vengeful, kinda cruel and rather selfish. Taking into account all of his flaws and
qualities, I would say he is neither a monster nor a hero in the broad sense; he’s more of a
“monstrous hero”, a hero that cannot overcome his monstrosity, even though he tries his
best to better himself.
As we already mentioned, Alexander Grayson is not exactly like the monster Bram Stoker
created; for instance, Grayson is a likeable and pleasant person, an American entrepreneur
who is extraordinarily intelligent, as well as witty, cunning and a perfectionist: in the NBC tv
series he says “Good enough isn't really very good", meaning that he won’t accept anything
that doesn’t reach excellence; “good enough” is not good enough for him, he needs
everything to be perfect and to go according to plan. He is also still very much in love with
his dead wife Llona, a true beauty who appears to be reincarnated in Mina, reason why
Grayson is incredibly respectful and mindful of her and he eventually falls in love with her as
well as make her fall in love with him (although at the beginning he is hesitant of turning
Mina to win her as he believes it would be terrible of him to turn her into a vampire - reason
why he tries to reunite Mina with Jonathan as it would make the couple happy). Another
thing that he has in his favor is that Grayson has a deep bond with his assistant Renfield
(who also saved from being tortured to death); I would dare to say their relationship looks a
lot like a brotherhood: Renfield plays the part of the older brother who takes care of the
youngest one, he directs, advises and protect him, very much like a brother would do. Last
but not least, he is better than the people forming part of the Order of the Dragon. Not only
those last ones are the most horrible, viperous, heartless people ever seen, but they also act
in the name of God when in reality, they think only about their personal profit and
advantages. It is not hard to be better than them to be fair, and Grayson’s acts are not even
comparable to theirs (for instance, Grayson would never exterminate an entire family in front
of the father’s eyes just as a punishment, which is what the Order did to professor Van
Helsing). He can be sometimes vengeful and he is certainly cruel with his enemies and
hunters, but who wouldn’t be? In the end, he is protecting himself and his interests from the
people that want to destroy him, something that anyone would do. What normal people
would never do is killing (and obviously drinking the victim’s blood) in order to advance
themself in a dispute or to selfishly pursuit what they want, but he is not a normal person: he
is still a “monster”, so to say, who was programmed to kill and to be unscrupulous and he
cannot change that.
As previously mentioned, I wouldn’t define Alexander Grayson a mere monster nor a mere
hero: he has plenty of qualities (such as his love for Mina (and his last wife Llona), his
partnership with his loyal assistant Renfield, his being witty, smart and charming) but he has
also limitations (he is selfish and uses everything that it's in his power to get what he wants,
he is thirsty for revenge for what they did to him years back, he is cruel and sometimes not
the nicest person, especially with professor Abraham Van Helsing who tries to develop a
serum to let him walk in the broad daylight). For all these reasons I would say he is a
“monstrous hero”, basically a hero with some dark in him. As Dracula says in Bram Stoker’s
book: “...the world seems full of good men - even if there are monsters in it.”. Alexander
Grayson seems an ordinary good man, one of those you can totally trust, but in reality, there
is a monster (his being a vampire) inside of him. The truth is: he cannot change the way he
is. He tries, for example depriving himself of blood to feel more human or trying to find a
method to be able to go out during the day as a normal person, but in the end, he doesn’t
succeed.
Summing up, Alexander Grayson is a monstrous hero and as one he has traits both of a
hero (primarily) and a monster, a vampire to be more specific. He is at the same time
charismatic, intelligent, likeable, caring with those who he loves, and harsh, ferocious and
hostile to those who try to obstruct him and his meticulous plans. He is certainly different
from the monster Bram Stoker created but this doesn’t make him less of a vampire: he still
needs blood to satisfy himself, he has to live in the dark and he is scared of the cross. In the
end, some things never change.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Dracula, Bram Stoker (1897), Archibald Constable and Company (UK)
Dracula, (NBC, 2013-2014)
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