promethia does tv wrong: Dracula
9 Jan 2020 09:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
promethia_tenkSo, I'm on my final week of work hell *cries*, I'm running on fumes, living on hot dogs, and Doctor Who is finally back and is actually good again. And yet I am on my third viewing of Moff and Gatiss' Dracula because I need Steven Moffat's writing like I need oxygen.
Of course Tumblr hates it, lol.
Is it Moff's strongest work? Heck no. I'd call it solidly uneven. There are writers who can make truly dark content sing, but I don't think Moff is one of them (Gatiss might be; I don't know enough of his writing outside Who). I think Moff doesn't quite know how to focus properly when he doesn't have a redemptive element to build around. That said, there was something sickly satisfying about watching him roll out every one of his magical alchemy tropes and systematically destroy them because, look, sometimes caring about something hard enough just doesn't fix things.
I've actually read Dracula, like it a lot, was looking forward to a relatively faithful adaptation. I rather thought, going into this, that the novel already had a ton of elements that seemed right in Moffat's usual wheelhouse. This wasn't a faithful adaption, however, so much as our intrepid writers ransacking the book for parts and then diving cheerfully off the deep end. I was fine with this once the initial shock wore off.
What they did write, however, was basically Hannibal with Dracula trappings. From the shift in focus to a central, mutually obsessive relationship, to Dracula smugly dropping vampire puns into conversation with unsuspecting humans, to the opening credits which, frankly, are a complete rip-off/homage. Was it as good as Hannibal? Of course not, but few things are.
Claes Bang is an immensely watchable Dracula. Just endless fun. I have a huge annoyance with most modern vampire stories (the 'vegan vampires,' I call them). Reading Dracula was massively refreshing because here was a vampire of an whole different sort: entirely monstrous, deeply inhuman, and perhaps most importantly, a shadowy, unknowable figure. Most often glimpsed out of the corner of your eye rather than hogging the spotlight . . . So the show got the monstrous part right, at least. I'm not mad about it: this Dracula is stupidly entertaining and is basically Hannibal, as I said before. Still, I await the truly faithful Dracula adaptation of my dreams that omits Dracula himself as much as possible.
I'm not going to argue with anybody that episode three wasn't a hot mess: by far the worst of the three. However, this definitely goes a long, long way towards making me like it anyway (warning: actual spoilers and hard-core Moff-style metaphors). Watching episode one again with this in mind and knowledge of where it's all going is fantastic.
Everything I've just said scarcely matters, however, because omg, Sister Agatha. omgomgomogmomgomomgomgomgomg I love her so much. Nobody writes like Moffat. Nobody. Oh god, she's so great, I can't.
Anyways, Tumblr hated it. If any body knows the location of some thoughtful, substantive, mostly positive writing on the subject, please, please point me towards it.
Of course Tumblr hates it, lol.
Is it Moff's strongest work? Heck no. I'd call it solidly uneven. There are writers who can make truly dark content sing, but I don't think Moff is one of them (Gatiss might be; I don't know enough of his writing outside Who). I think Moff doesn't quite know how to focus properly when he doesn't have a redemptive element to build around. That said, there was something sickly satisfying about watching him roll out every one of his magical alchemy tropes and systematically destroy them because, look, sometimes caring about something hard enough just doesn't fix things.
I've actually read Dracula, like it a lot, was looking forward to a relatively faithful adaptation. I rather thought, going into this, that the novel already had a ton of elements that seemed right in Moffat's usual wheelhouse. This wasn't a faithful adaption, however, so much as our intrepid writers ransacking the book for parts and then diving cheerfully off the deep end. I was fine with this once the initial shock wore off.
What they did write, however, was basically Hannibal with Dracula trappings. From the shift in focus to a central, mutually obsessive relationship, to Dracula smugly dropping vampire puns into conversation with unsuspecting humans, to the opening credits which, frankly, are a complete rip-off/homage. Was it as good as Hannibal? Of course not, but few things are.
Claes Bang is an immensely watchable Dracula. Just endless fun. I have a huge annoyance with most modern vampire stories (the 'vegan vampires,' I call them). Reading Dracula was massively refreshing because here was a vampire of an whole different sort: entirely monstrous, deeply inhuman, and perhaps most importantly, a shadowy, unknowable figure. Most often glimpsed out of the corner of your eye rather than hogging the spotlight . . . So the show got the monstrous part right, at least. I'm not mad about it: this Dracula is stupidly entertaining and is basically Hannibal, as I said before. Still, I await the truly faithful Dracula adaptation of my dreams that omits Dracula himself as much as possible.
I'm not going to argue with anybody that episode three wasn't a hot mess: by far the worst of the three. However, this definitely goes a long, long way towards making me like it anyway (warning: actual spoilers and hard-core Moff-style metaphors). Watching episode one again with this in mind and knowledge of where it's all going is fantastic.
Everything I've just said scarcely matters, however, because omg, Sister Agatha. omgomgomogmomgomomgomgomgomg I love her so much. Nobody writes like Moffat. Nobody. Oh god, she's so great, I can't.
Anyways, Tumblr hated it. If any body knows the location of some thoughtful, substantive, mostly positive writing on the subject, please, please point me towards it.
