Over 400 Ranker voters have come together to rank this list of The Lamest Movie and TV Draculas Ever
Voting Rules
Vote up the Dracula portrayals that sucked the most.
Dracula has to be one of the most popular and enduring vampire characters in the history of the vampire genre; this guy's longevity is mind-boggling. However, not every Dracula-related movie or TV show does the bloodsucker justice - the lamest Draculas ever really attest to this fact.
Dracula first hit the scene in Bram Stoker's novel of the same name, published in 1897, and since then, he's been depicted in countless other media productions. Every time a Dracula was staked in a film, he'd pop up in a one-off episode of a supernatural themed television show. He's got that eternal life thing down pat. Much like, well, a vampire… And weird Draculas aren't just the stuff of Hollywood magic; there are also some notorious, real-life Draculas that have cropped up in history.
But here's the gag. For every great, chillingly charismatic performance of this iconoclast vampire, there are countless crappy movie vampires and television Draculas chewing the scenery and stinking up the joint. In fact, lame Draculas are a dime-a-dozen. So are you ready to check out this countdown of the lamest Draculas ever?
Photo: Embassy Pictures
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120 VOTES
John Carradine As Count Dracula In Billy The Kid Vs Dracula
Dracula has transported himself to the Wild West. Because why the heck not? Here, he rolls through town dressed like that one magician in the magic circle that's just taking it too far. He has a mustache perfect for twirling after tying a woman to some train tracks. This Dracula is a lot more Silent Movie villain-esque in his presentation and demeanor than blood-sucking, lusty vampire.
Here, he faces off against Billy the Kid, who is able to take down this Vaudeville vampire by throwing a gun at this head. Yeah. That's how Dracula meets his untimely end. Pretty lame, huh?
Everyone's familiar with the Anne Rice-associated vampires, right? The long-haired, pale, fancy-looking fellows audiences all know (and maybe love?) from Interview with a Vampire. Well Buffy's Dracula takes a leaf right out of that play book and runs away with it. Maybe, knowing Buffy's tongue-in-cheek tone, this is actually a parody of that vampire archetype
That doesn’t stop this Dracula from being any less lame. His lips are perpetually pursed. His wig is so long it borders on Amanda Bynes's "hair cape" territory. Is he wearing eye shadow? Perhaps. This Dracula is imminently ridiculous and subsequently lame.
This short-lived NBC period-drama was actually pretty entertaining. Most of the time it was a nutso show about light bulbs and the power of electricity, peppered with some lesbian activity. The only thing consistently letting the show down was Dracula himself. God, Dracula was a real drag.
Rhys-Meyer's Dracula was in a near-constant state of broody mope-dom. Not to mention he had assumed a secret identity of brilliant scientist/light bulb-enthusiast, Alexander Grayson. So the audience was mostly robbed of seeing Dracula be, well, Dracula. And that's a shame. Because this show could have been a fantastic vehicle for some fang-banging, blood-sucking action on primetime.
Talk about your lame Draculas… Kier's performance of a drained, blood-starved Dracula is just depressing. There's no charisma, cunning, or sex appeal to revel in. Instead, the audience is being bummed out for the duration of the movie.
In this Andy Warhol-produced vampire flick, Kier's Dracula is in dire need of blood. He's practically on his death bed. Or, well, what do you call a deathbed for someone who’s already dead? Regardless, this Dracula needs some virgin blood, and, in a particularly creepy detail, it absolutely has to be virgin blood; otherwise, he'll perish. What that leaves a viewer with is an increasingly desperate and debased Dracula that sucks the joy out of the vampire genre rather than the blood he so desires.
This depiction of Dracula - Drac-piction? Depicula? - does try to do something different with the character. They switch out Dracula's long-understood-to-be-canon original identity of Vlad the Impaler for the equally recognizable Judas Iscariot. Yeah, that's right - Judas. Bible Judas. That could have been a cool concept, and it does lend itself to an explanation of why all vampires are not down with religious iconography. Unfortunately, the rest of the movie oscillates between being boring and straight-up crazy.
Gerard Butler doesn't so much play Dracula as just have great pectoral muscles that are constantly on show. He's less of a Dracula and more of a sex object. Really, you could take any mention of the name Dracula out of this movie, and he'd be an interchangeable sexy-vampire-stock character. However, this movie does take 'sexy vampire' to hilariously ludicrous levels. No less because this Dracula can screw his sexual partners into the sky. He and whomever he's penetrating can float across the screen like they're James Bond and Dr. Holly Goodhead in Moonraker, though, in the latter's case, they drift across the screen via a lack of gravity. In Gerard Butler's case, it's presumably some kind of sexy vampire magic.
Oh just look at that plunging neckline. This is Dracula if Dracula was a bro. And this is no more apparent than when this Dracula re-christens himself 'Drake,' predating the actual Drake (rapper and Degassi-alumni Aubrey Graham) and his earliest mixtape.
This Dracula is like a beefy gym bro who has ripped the neckline of his tank top to cavernously deep levels so as to expose his pecs. What's lacking here is sex appeal, charisma, and any hint of intelligence - all things that should be front and center in any good Dracula depiction. All that's left is meaty muscles and bulging neck veins.
