It's In The Blood!

Blood and vampires go together like butter and bread, and by now most concepts of vampire fiction seem rather over used, if not down to the hilt over decades upon decades of film adaptations starting in 1922 with F.W. Murnau's "Nosferatu". Yet back in the late 1990s came the film adaptation of Marvel's comic book vampire hunter from their 1970s series "Tomb Of Dracula", and that vampire hunter was named Blade. For the first time seemingly in decades, especially for younger audiences like I was at that time, it seemed revolutionary to treat vampirism as a blood disease, but it wasn't. In fact, the only reason I knew the concept wasn't new was because I had already seen the majority of the classic Universal horror films by that point.

In 1945 Universal released "House Of Dracula". Personally, I find it to be one of the best films of the sequels that Universal ever made. Though it does get a bad wrap for being out of place within series continuity (the continuity of the Universal films is going to definitely be a future post!). The film deals with a non-mad scientist whom attempts to cure both Dracula and Larry Talbot of their supernatural afflictions. The good doctor also has a female hunch-backed assistant awaiting a cure as well. This film explores vampirism as a blood disease that can be cured, and is the first to attempt such a scientific explanation to vampirism. Yet while trying to give Dracula a transfusion the good doctor is double crossed and the infusion of vampire blood into the good doctor's system creates the unusual effect of making him become like Jekyll and Hyde, but not quite a full fledged vampire. Of course Dracula (portrayed by John Carradine) is after the doctor's beautiful assistant, the Hyde version of the doctor ressurects Frankenstein's Monster, but Larry Talbot is finally cured...at least until "Abbot And Costello Meet Frankenstein" (the subject of yet another future post!).

In Hammer's "Brides Of Dracula" from 1960, an odd sequel that was actually sans Dracula but retained Peter Cushing in the role of Dr. Van Helsing, the good doctor treated vampirism as an infection! Lo and behold the vampire hunting hero gets bitten and does an intricate procedure to cure the infection. If my memory serves me he pours holy water into the wound on his neck and then coterizes it with a steaming hot branding iron. Then as you watch the film the scar on his neck, including the burn, heals! Vampirism is also referenced as an infection in the 1972 film "Dracula 1972 A.D." which starred both Christopher Lee as a revived modern day Dracula as well as Peter Cushing as a descendant of his original Van Helsing character.

Then in the late 1960s on the Dan Curtis produced TV show "Dark Shadows" a scientist named Dr. Julia Hoffman creates a scientific cure for the curse of Barnabas Collins (portrayed by Jonathan Frid). Unlike many vampires who are bitten by another vampire it was Barnabas' fate to be cursed by a spurned lover, the dreaded witch Angelique, around 1792. While being treated by Dr. Hoffman he gradually becomes more human again with each passing treatment, and can even endure sunlight once more. Yet upon feeling scorned by Barnabas due to his wanting for Victoria Winters, the supposed physical reincarnation of his long dead fiance Josette Dupree, it is Dr. Hoffman who sabotages the cure and thus instead of completing his transformation back into a full fledged human it rapidly ages him while restoring his need to feed. Barnabas would eventually be cured for good, or at least until he travels back in time to the mid-1800s to stop Quentin Collins from hurting a young Collins family member in the future. Quentin became a werewolf, and unfortunately Quentin had been dating Angelique the witch, whom turned Barnabas back into a vampire once more upon finding out that he'd been cured. Seriously, it's either worth a look-up on Wikipedia or if you have a few thousand dollars to spend buying the complete series of Dark Shadows! Also there was a series remake in the early 1990s which followed much of the same storyline, although they never got as far as Quentin Collins, but the only season did retell the origins of Barnabas Collins.

After those live action variations there were some note worthy animated variations. In the cartoon "The Real Ghostbusters" vampires did appear in approximately three episodes. The first episode was "No One Comes To Lupusville" in which a town of werewolves had been imprisoned by a town's worth of vampires. Though there is no implicit labeling of vampirism as a disease there is a showing of vampirism's mutagenic affect in an unprecedented fashion. According to this episode if a vampire bites a werewolf or vice versa, the werewolf becomes a vampire and the vampire becomes a werewolf. Now, in a way that is a cure for the vampire condition. A werewolf is not an undead being, although lycanthropy can elongate a human lifespan far well beyond the bounds of normal longevity. In that respect one could claim that they are living beyond their normal death, but in truth it is more like gaining immortality than having died and then resurrecting after death (Though in "Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man" it is set up that Larry Talbot is revived, one could speculate that the beams of the Full Moon revived him after only being put in a coma by being hit by his father whom used the silver wolf's head cane against him). Thus, by biting a werewolf a vampire could become a living being once more albeit cursed to be a werewolf instead. Nice trade off, isn't it? Seriously, you get to live as a normal human, see the sun again, immortality, and only one real weakness to boot!

In another "Real Ghostbusters" episode later on during the series, a town in Germany calls upon the Ghostbusters to actually bring back their ghosts...because their ghosts had made them a big tourist destination! Yet the ghosts of the town were not missing, but had become the victims of a local vampire, who sucked them dry of slime! After draining the slime from all the local ghosts the vampire needed to drain the slime from one more ghost in order to become human once more at sun rise. very unusual concept, but highly entertaining! Who'd have ever thought there'd be a vampire that only gets sustenance from ghosts? Who drains ectoplasm instead of plasma! Slimer becomes the last ghost the fiend needs, and the Ghostbusters prevent the vampire from returning to his human form. The question is, would he have become a normal human or a human vampire? I believe this variation was actually the ghost of a vampire that once fed on humans, so whether or not the cure was going to make him a normal living human again or just a humanoid vampire again is unclear.

Then came the early 1990s cartoon by Universal called "Monster Force". One of its last episodes featured a machine created by Dr. Crawley that could make vampires human once more. The machine worked on people who had been turned into vampires, but unfortunately it had little effect on Dracula himself from what I can recollect. Volume One of the cartoon is on DVD now, but the episode I remember should be on Volume Two if it ever gets released.

The cartoon show "Archie's Weird Mysteries" also had a three episode story arc about vampires and a fabled "Eternal Night". In this series much of the Archie cast (Betty, Veronica, Dilton, and Reggie) are turned into vampires. It is stated in this series that the way to cure a newly bitten vampire is to destroy the vampire that bit them on the same night as it happens. Luckily for Archie, they are able to accomplish just that!