Dracula, Motherf**ker!

by Alex de Campi, Erica Henderson (Artist)

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? A pulpy, pulse-pounding graphic novel of California psych-horror from acclaimed creators ALEX DE CAMPI and ERICA HENDERSON.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Horror, Vampires, Graphic Novels Comics, Fiction, Fantasy

72 pages, Hardcover

First published October 7, 2020

About the author

Alex de Campi is a New York-based writer with an extensive backlist of critically-acclaimed graphic novels including Eisner-nominated heist noir Bad Girls (Simon & Schuster) and Twisted Romance (Image Comics). Her most recent book was her debut prose novel The Scottish Boy (Unbound). She lives with her daughter, their cat, and a Deafblind pit bull named Tango.

Reviews

[Alexander Peterhans · Rating 3 out of 5]

1970s Los Angeles, city of vampires. Harker (lol!) is a freelance news photographer, who specialises in photographing crime scenes of grisly murders. Dracula is a faceless evil force with lots of eyes and lots of teeth. His 'brides' see in Harker a chance to take down ol' Drac.

The story isn't very interesting, I'm afraid. The idea of Dracula's victims turning against him is nice, but it's basically the only idea here.

A lot more interesting is Erica Henderson's art, which is quite different from her usual work (Squirrel Girl, Assassin Nation). In the book she describes how she decided the spreads would cover two pages, how the writing had to keep that in mind (so surprise reveals would be on even pages). She also would colour the pages herself as she went along, and this is where the book pops. It's also where the 1970s theme comes most alive. Swashes of purple and orange adorn the pages, with arresting impressionist touches. There are moments her art reminds me of exploitation cinema, and giallo horror specifically.

(Received an ARC through Edelweiss)

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

"He doesn't dump us. He kills us. Takes all that power for himself. And then finds himself a new . . . sucker." -- Ateera, bride of Dracula, seductively baring her fangs and licking her lips

deCampi's Dracula, Motherf**ker! has the infamous vampire resurfacing on the streets of Los Angeles in 1974 - courtesy of an aging party gal diva adorned with the wonderful moniker Bebe Beauland (undoubtedly influenced in name by the model and Playboy's November 1974 Playmate of the Month Bebe Buell, now probably best remembered as the mother of actress Liv Tyler) desperate for a fountain of youth - accompanied by a trio of brides doing damage to the necks of various 'El Lay' denizens. American International Pictures already mined similar territory with low budget flicks such as Count Yorga, Vampire (which was even name-checked by the author in a post-script essay) and Scream Blacula Scream back in the early 70's, so the concept is not quite a completely original idea. However, this horror-suspense graphic novel is still presented with a certain amount of gaudy but vibrant style - appropriately, every scene depicted was a nocturnal one, which certainly kicked up the dread factor - and having the protagonist (and eventual stake-wielding) Quincy Harker be an studious night-shift paparazzi was an inspired choice. However, the book was a bit limited by its extremely short length - only 75 pages! - and I wanted more because the story seemed to conclude much too soon. That said, it was a nice quick read with the approaching Halloween season.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

When a Hollywood party results in Dracula being wakened from his deathly sleep, Quincy Harker, police photographer, is in way over his head. Even with the help of some mysterious women, can Quincy avoid being Dracula's next meal?

I've been following Alex de Campi on the Twitter since reading Archie vs. Predator and Erica Henderson since she started live tweeting old Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episodes. When these two bad asses teamed up, I was powerless to resist.

Dracula, Motherf**cker is a sequel of sorts to the Bram Stoker classic, only Dracula has been coffin bound for decades and Quincy Harker is a crime scene photographer in Los Angeles.

I'll dance around the wrinkles of the plot but this thing is a breezy page turner. I wound up reading it twice in one sitting while my toddler was watching Little Baby Bum.

Visually, it's a very striking book. The color palette is moody as hell, reminding me of Francisco Francavilla's work at times. The depiction of Dracula and the other vampires reminds me of something out of Go Nagai's Devilman, more hallucinatory fever dream than Jack Palance in evening garb.

I need more Dracula, Motherf**ker. Four out of five sleazy 1970s stars.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

"He tastes disgusting."
"Blood keeps you young and beautiful, darling. Drink!"

Pulpy, campy writer Alex de Campi writer pens another homage to seventies movies and comics with this tale that both remains true to its roots--slasher films, Dracula, blaxploitation, that whole mix--complete with jarring juxtapositions of color and updates all this to include a revenge plot against Drac by the young women he has taken with a nod to #metoo, and the Jeffery Epstein and Harvery Weinstein real life horrors.

Quincy Harker is a photographer of the newly dead (such as the Harlen Maquire [Jude Law] character in the Sam Mendes film Road to Perdition) who gets conscripted by some of the women in their plot, the dialogue for which has a noirish feel. I like the way that Dracula gets transported to seventies LA "youth-loving" culture, underscoring the dark underbelly of all that glitter and gold. Yeah, there's a lotta death in de Campi's Tinseltown, the City of Angels, a grindhouse for young women.

[Sadie Hartmann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Review originally posted in issue #66 of SCREAM Magazine
https://wayopay.com/p/scream-issue-66...
...
Quincy Harker is a crime scene photographer in Los Angeles, CA during the1970s. Lately, he seems to find no shortage of work as dead bodies are showing up everywhere. Harker takes full advantage of Hollywood’s bloodlust by aggressively photographing the grisly details in order to sell them to the highest bidder. What he doesn’t know, is that someone has awakened the legendary vampire, Dracula and he has taken some brides. Now, Harker’s very life is in danger.
But wait! I’ve said too much because basically, this review has the potential to provide you with more of the story than the actual graphic novel itself.
The artwork is beautiful and stylish but there is hardly anything of substance going on in these pretty frames. Characters are ushered in and out of the story so fast, there is no point in even trying to remember their names or their purpose in the story.
All filler and no killer, I am disappointed in myself that I was captivated by a catchy title and a well-designed cover. I paid $17 USD for something that took me about 10 minutes to read.

[Stacey-Lea · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars

We all know I'm always here for vampires so naturally I was interested in one of the og vamps being brought into the 1970s LA scene. A total vibe.

Sadly there was really no depth to this story and without the character studies at the end I wouldn't have even known the names of majority of them. However I did love the visuals. Erica Henderson has done an amazing job, especially with colour, to really give this graphic novel something to hold on to.

*ARC provided by Edelweiss for an honest review*

[Rod Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

Like Snakes on a Plane, the work just cannot live up to the title it has stumbled upon.

The author and artist say in the end matter that they are trying to be more free and experimental, but de Campi gives us a nothing vampire story and Henderson hides her pencils under some ugly ass coloring. Disappointing.

[Sara the Librarian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Genuinely gorgeous, fantastically psychedelic art work can't save this plotless, very confusing retread of a story that's been reimagined so many times we've all lost track. Its the 70's and Quincy Morris the nightcrawler photographer somehow captures photos of a Dracula's brides and gets caught up in a centuries long battle between vampires.

This took about four seconds to read which says something both about the pace and lack of story. I did not know what was going on and I did not especially care.

Pretty to look at. But that's it.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars. I know this book is listed as 72 pages but I promise it felt like 20. Feel like I blinked and this thing was over. I mean before I could start piecing together what was happening, I was at the end. The story moves fast as hell without any backstory as to why everything went down. I didn’t develop any connection with any of the characters. It starts off in 1889 with Dracula’s brides locking him away without any explanation as to why or how that got the drop on him to do it. Literally next page, it’s 85 years later and they are releasing him. Needless to say, not enough here to get me excited. The art was pretty nice except for the final battle. Got a little tough to decipher what was happening. Loved the colors used here tho.

[Diz · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story is a bit loose and it fits together like a psychedelic fever dream. For most stories, that would be a bad thing, but it works here. The disjointed nature of the story creates a sense of disorientation that adds to the sense of horror. The real standout here is the art. The use of color here is so vivid and vibrant, and it is a joy to look at.

[Buddy Scalera · Rating 2 out of 5]

Loved the high concept, didn't really enjoy the actual story. Fantastic cover and fascinating coloring inside the book.

The story was hard to follow. There were times when I just couldn't figure out what was happening. Then it just ended.

Mostly it was a bummer.

[Valéria. · Rating 1 out of 5]

Najzbytočnejšia vec aká vyšla za poslednú dobu, ktorá je totálne nezaujímavá či dejovo alebo v 90% aj kresbou. Plus z názvu by človek fakt čakal, že sa sem tam pobaví, ale je to neskutočne tupé a nudné.

[Matt Peterson · Rating 2 out of 5]

The back material from author and artist was really interesting but the rest of the book was just kind of ok.

[Fabian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ultra cool looking mishmash of one of the most beloved turn of the century (19th, to be clear, not 20th--and also in my Top Ten of All Time) novels AND sex- and ex-ploitation films of the 1970's. But when the speed of the narrative itself makes things similar to a movie capturing a scene every 3 or 5 minute interval, missing so much in between. The colors and textures, while by an artist who is radical yet exquisite, her dreams come to life (such a different look to this sci-horror graphic novel! And, speaking of graphic novels--does this one constitute as a whole? There is no Volume 1 or 2, Whole work? Really? Or the stirrings of a solid and entertaining idea? Sketches? I dunno. More SOMETHING [including Dracula himself--you always expect Dracula to look a certain way and here... does he even come out? Jeez!)

By the time you realize its one of those just-for-cool but nothing truly momentous, a-la Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, it becomes clear that it went by TOO fast, it meant something PROBABLY, and you love Dracula so, just for the title and different personifications, it gets the AB3*

*Stands for Average Book/3 stars

[Frédéric · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sort of Dracula follow up in 70's LA. The plot is very brief - Drac's famous brides want revenge and use a news photographer hack to do it - but it's the pretext for a superb graphic flight of fancy, saturated pop colours. It's worth a look, if only for that.

[Theediscerning · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yeesh, I really didn't take to this messy vampire story at all. Indulgently bizarre styling comes with an excessively short run-time (the creators' notes on the bonus pages almost taking as long as the rest of this thin book), but it still nearly got ditched. So, bravura, or just ugly? Just hope you can see enough of a preview, or that the store has an unsealed copy, before any cash is parted with.

[Dev · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received an ARC copy of this book from Edelweiss

There was a lot of potential here but it really just needed to be about twice as long as it actually was. I loved the art style and character designs and the concept was really good as well, but I feel like I almost didn't know what was supposed to be happening most of the time until I read the author's note at the end.

[RG · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too short

[Erin Entrada Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

Honestly not much going on in this book beyond the catchy title and pretty colors. Fast paced but in a bad way, a bunch of no-name characters, and a confusing, barely-there plot made this one pretty disappointing.

[Maggie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I received an advance copy of this work from Edelweiss+ in exchange for an honest review.

Vampires are objectively the best kind of monster.

There, I said it. No one can top vampires in my book - not zombies, not the Wolfman, not even the eerie, Millicent Patrick-designed Creature from the Black Lagoon. Vampires are just quintessentially unsettling, a literal living embodiment of death that have haunted popular culture since the publication of Dracula in 1897. They’ve popped up everywhere from movies to cereal boxes to children’s television programs, and as Halloween approaches every year, we see more and more versions of their stories pop up. Some are classic, like the recent BBC adaptation of Stoker’s novel, and some push boundaries, like My Babysitter’s a Vampire or the ever-popular Twilight.

Sometimes, vampires are even presented in the context of 1970s, drug-soaked Los Angeles - as is the case of Image Comics’ Dracula, Motherf**ker, the story of a crime scene photographer sucked in the world of monsters and demons when he runs into the Brides of Dracula, a trio of women hellbent on taking revenge on the monster who ruined their lives. (And monstrous he is, taking the form a shapeless, blob-like mass covered in hundreds of blood-red eyes.) The title alone is eye-catching, and the promise of the World’s Greatest Vampire being dragged to a place he’s never been before seems enough to deliver on an already trusty monster formula.

Visually, Dracula, Motherf**ker reads like a Quentin Tarantino movie, if Tarantino weren’t such an utter shithead and chose instead to one up Wes Anderson’s color game. There’s something sleazy about it, but in that way that all modern art set in the 70s is. It’s a sleaze meant to lure you in, keep you trapped with its fools gold and promises of intrigue - much like a vampire, in a way. Erica Henderson strikes a balance between realism and high-concept psychedelia, a strange, alternate-version of Junji Ito if he’d gone to Studio 54 and scored some quaaludes from Candy Darling. The women all looked like they could’ve been pulled straight from a Biba catalogue or the set of Solid Gold, and explosions are rendered like kaleidoscopic flowers on a Jimi Hendrix album cover. It’s lurid in the way that a good classic horror film is, breaking every rule of traditional comic art as though they never existed in the first place.

All of that contributes to the plot reading like a high-concept student film, with little in the way of details in favor of showcasing Henderson’s multi-eyed, nightmarish rendition of Dracula. It’s a bad trip you can’t come down from - faces you don’t recognize, names you can’t place, details that can’t be made out under the cover of inky darkness. The reader is dragged along whether they like or not, in a haze too thick to determine what’s happening or who’s riding out the high with them. It’s all the visuals and concept of Blacula with none of the camp or fun.

Alex de Campi’s paper-thin plot becomes one of horror’s standard sacrificial victims in favor of Henderson’s plot, leaving much to be desired if you want DM to serve as more than just a pretty coffee table book. What could’ve been fantastic female characters are left out to dry, given no more than five lines of dialogue and an anti-climactic chance to take out their infamous adversary. (An adversary who leaves his new “wives” to do all the fighting, thus pitting women against other women in a narrative move so cheap and tacky that the pages nearly stuck together.) The story begins like a VHS someone forgot to rewind; it’s not that nothing much happens - it’s that too much happens without any sort of explanation at all.

What could’ve been a fascinating tale of self-reclamation and revenge thus turns into a messy slush of components mixed together, a stoner’s pool of vomit spotted with the rainbow-colored dots of LSD tabs. It lacks any of the hallmarks sought after by horror enthusiasts, skewing more towards Requiem for a Dream than anything to do with the great Count himself. The idea of the original brides of Dracula defying their abuser is diluted to a Buffy tribute dressed in bell-bottoms, accompanied just barely by a pseudo-protagonist with a surname so obvious he might as well have worn a shirt saying “walking Bram Stoker reference”. There’s no heart to the faces on the pages, no beating pulse that differentiates any good vampire slayer from the cold, dead thing they seek to hunt.

In the author’s notes at the back of the book, de Campi claims that DM can be read as both a “fun, overheated pulp fantasia about terror in the night”, and as a story about “the unchecked predatory actions of powerful men” and the tragedies of the women who think it’ll be different for them”, but that comparison falls flat when there’s no evidence to back it up. Without filling out the characters meant to be avenging their trauma with so much as a name, what was intended as societal commentary is cheapened to an imitation of a genre already steeped in feminist history. Horror is not immune to empowered storytelling, but nobody would’ve rooted for Nancy Thompson if she’d been a walking teenage stereotype, or Laurie Strode if she’d only been the babysitter. Moral lessons require characters to tell them, and characters (even on a comic page) require more than a stern look and well-drawn revenge.

What Dracula, Motherf**ker lacks is any significant contribution to the vampire canon, whether by way of lore or by moral lesson. Concepts are introduced to entice the reader and then left hanging, a sad version of a hangman’s noose that isn’t even knotted correctly. The brides of Dracula go unnamed, despite being the most important part of the story, and we understand nothing about how the plot even got itself off the ground (or out of its coffin) in the first place. Even What We Do in the Shadows, in all of its silly glory, manages to tell a story and further the already extensive catalogue of vampire lore better than this book does. (Hell, even Love Bites does, and that uses some of the most contentious plot devices I’ve ever seen.)

For horror enthusiasts, it may feel like a cheap stab at notoriety, slapping already established names over hollow shells of characters rather than creating new, fully-fledged ones. Dracula, Motherf**ker is more art installation than graphic novel - fine for an hour, but leaves no lasting memory on anyone.

[Dakota Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title is far more campy than the actual narrative, which is a grim, violent noir. Honestly, I had low expectations based on the title. It's basically "Snakes on a Plane" - okay, you've caught my attention, now show me something worth my time.

Dracula, Motherf**ker is worth your time. It's the typical Dracula narrative but focused on his victims, the "brides." Alex de Campi offers a smart update on the historically handsome, suave vampire by making this creature of the night literally an amorphous monster. But, it's a monster that offers you immortality and endless beauty, which is apparently hard to pass up in 70s L.A.

The book is short and sweet, following a crime scene photographer over the course of a few nights being chased by Dracula and his brides. It's actually a pretty basic narrative with few surprises - the real draw here is Erica Henderson's artwork, which is positively magnetic. She recklessly plays with color and forms, sometimes giving the book an anime flair and other times descending into noir depths. It's stunning to look at, if sometimes hard to read.

I loved the end matter where de Campi and Henderson explained their thought processes related to the book. Their thoughts made me appreciate Dracula, Motherf**ker as a work of art rather than bland exploitation of the Dracula name.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Apparently this wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but I greatly enjoyed it! I think de Campi herself put it best in the closing notes that it's both serious and not serious at the same time. This is a fresh perspective on something that has long been an accepted cultural trope, but should we always be satisfied with that? Our author doesn't think so, and gave us this new take to question it.

Is it over-the-top? Sure, but that's part of what makes it such fun. The psychedelic art, the color choices, the sweeping spreads; all of it completely drew me in. Is de Campi completely coming for Dracula? I don't think so. I think she's just providing an angle that hasn't had a voice before. It's a commentary about how the value society places on women has a direct correlation with their youth, and men get away with it CONSTANTLY. AND you get to watch cool women kick butt in an INCREDIBLE color scheme and art style at the same time.

This was loads of fun for me, and you can bet that I'll be giving it a reread next Halloween!

[kate elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

the art was dope but felt like I couldn’t grasp the story as well as I could’ve but the wives of Dracula were girlbossing so whatever

[Stephanie Cooke]

Cool concept and great art.

[Nate Deprey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Visually staggering from beginning to end with a truly original color palate but it's a slight read without much story. I know this is in the tradition of stuff like 30 Days of Night but ultimately I just wanted a little more to go with this great art and concept.

[Alex Sarll]

A lurid reworking set in seventies LA, the story's unpleasantness brought out in a wash of unhealthy colours (there's deliberately no hint of natural daylight once in the book). The Brides come to the fore, with Dracula himself an almost abstract force of hunger, somewhere between a Lovecraftian elder god and Hellsing's Alucard when he drops the veneer; de Campi's interest here is largely in the devil's bargain made by the women who yoke themselves to the worst of men, with Melania Trump mentioned by name in the afterword. Henderson, meanwhile...I first encountered her through The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, and her subsequent work on Assassin Nation wasn't a million miles away from that in its general fun, comic vibe, even if the scenarios she was depicting there tended to have somewhat less wholesome resolutions. This, though, is a very different proposition, non-naturalistically coloured so as to suggest an arthouse thriller (though unlike many of them, the book is short and punchy enough not to outstay its welcome and get lost in its own experiments). I had her down as an artist who was extremely good at doing one thing (which is no slight, that goes for a lot of my favourites); nope, turns out she can also do sleaze a treat. I don't know if this is intended as any kind of companion piece to Jesusfreak, but if Image are deliberately doing a line of myths retold as unwholesome seventies cinema, I salute them for it.

(Edelweiss ARC)

[OmniBen · Rating 2 out of 5]

(Zero spoiler review)
If there is one thing I hate more than bad stories and bad writing, its when the aforementioned gets glowing praise from the authors friends and other suck-ups within the industry. Read the back of this book and you would think you hold in your hands something revelatory. Something monumental. What in fact you hold, is a bargain basement vampire tale, very blandly told, with some admittedly cool art, even if it wasn't quite to my taste. This clocks in at about 40 or so pages, and there is barely any story to speak of. If De Campi was trying to see how far she could stretch 8 sentences, then I'd say congratulations, you succeeded admirably. If her goal was to craft a compelling narrative you would want to read again and again, then she gets a big fat F.
When you set your book in the sleazy Hollywood Hills of the 1970's and you can't make a go of it, then you really have shat the bed something proper. A few pages in, I thought it had promise A few more pages in, I realised it wouldn't. A few more pages in (and it was basically over anyway). As long as this kind of shitness continues to get published (and somehow get praised) then this industry will continue to flounder amidst a sea of flotsam and mediocrity. Do not give this book your time or money. 2/5


OmniBen.

[Scott Rhee · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Dracula, Motherf*cker!” Is, by far, the quickest read I have read in a long time. I literally read it, front to back, during a 15-minute break at work.

That’s not meant to be bragging, that’s just stating a fact. Take it as you will. It’s simply meant to illustrate that “Dracula, Motherfucker!” Is a quick read.

Which isn’t to say that it’s a simple read. Or a vapid read. Neither of those descriptors would accurately describe this graphic novel.

If anything, Alex de Campi and Erica Henderson’s Technicolorful ode to 1970s campy horror and blaxploitation films is a complex artistic vision that can be enjoyed, on the surface, as a straightforward horror thriller, but it contains several layers of depth. It is, at its heart, a female empowerment story; a story about used and abused women who strike a blow at the male patriarchy who betrayed them and forced them to become a powerful force to be reckoned with.

It’s also a cool, violent Dracula story, with a unique—-and horrifying—-vision of the classic Bram Stoker novel, updated to 1974 Los Angeles, CA.

Not for the squeamish: this graphic novel contains an awful lot of blood and guts. Albeit beautifully drawn and extremely colorful blood and guts but blood and guts nonetheless.

[Kathryn Grace Loves Horror · Rating 5 out of 5]

Between this and Archie vs. Predator, Alex de Campi is quickly becoming one of my favorite names in comics. Dracula, Motherf**ker! is a fascinating, quick read with starkly beautiful artwork. My only complaint is that I wish it were longer. I would love to see de Campi and artist Erica Henderson revisit this world - 1970s L.A. gone gothic and haunted by vampires. Speaking of the vampires, this is one of my favorite depictions of Dracula's brides yet.

Be sure to read de Campi's postscript, "On Monsters" at the back of the book. It's enlightening on her vision for the story, and I agree with her thoughts on the depiction of Dracula (he should never be depicted as beautiful) and her reasonings for her portrayal of the brides.