Young Dracula
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Young Dracula | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Children's |
| Starring | Kieth-Lee Castle Gerran Howell Clare Thomas |
| Country of origin | UK |
| Language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Mia Jupp |
| Running time | approx 25 mins |
| Broadcast | |
| Links | |
| Official website | |
| IMDb profile | |
Young Dracula is a humorous and somewhat popular British children's television series appearing on CBBC and which is directed by Joss Agnew. The first series finished in 2006 and the second series is scheduled to be released in early 2007.
Contents |
[edit] The plot
The Dracula family (Vlad, his dad Count Dracula and his older sister Ingrid) once lived in Transylvania. Then they all moved to a normal small town in Britain because Count Dracula caused a bit of bother involving the village elders, their blood and an angry peasant mob.
The programme is set in the UK and is filmed in various locations around Wales, including Glantaf High School, Caerphilly Castle, Tretower Court and in parts of Llantrisant.
[edit] Cast
- Keith-Lee Castle - Count Dracula
- Clare Thomas - Ingrid Dracula
- Gerran Howell - Vladimir Dracula
- Lucy Borja-Edwards - Chloe Branaugh
- Craig Roberts - Robin Branaugh
- Beth Roberts - Mrs. Elizabeth Branaugh
- Aneirin Hughes - Graham Branaugh
- Terence Maynard - Mr. Van Helsing
- Simon Ludders - Renfield
- Ben McGregor - Ian Branaugh
- Luke Bridgeman - Paul Branaugh
- Terry Haywood - Jonathon Van Helsing
[edit] Rare casts
- Donna Grant - Magda Westenra
- Hilda Braid - Crone
[edit] Characters
[edit] The Draculas
- Count Dracula
Count Dracula is a 600 year old vampire who has immigrated to Britain to escape his sealed fate in Transylvania. He sleeps in a coffin, can put out candles at a wave of his fingers and has the ability, when he senses a trespasser in his lair, to move from room to room at uncanny speed that borders on teleportation: this apart from his tendency to glower fiercely and bare his fangs- which can lengthen at amazing speed when required- when he feels the need to frighten Vlad or (more often) Robin- or simply when he's thirsty. He is also extremely sexist (which may be a reason why his wife is currently in a relationship with a werewolf, although it seems that sexism is a trait common to most vampires). He favours his young son Vlad and is constantly ignoring or otherwise brushing off his daughter Ingrid, making both their lives a pain in different ways. His thoughtless treatment of Ingrid in particular is perhaps surprising considering the fact that she has the characteristics he expects of his "perfect child" (he even tried to marry her off in one episode) and his constant favourism towards Vlad is similarly illogical, considering that he does not want to be a vampire. The Count is often mistaken for a rockstar because of his somewhat Gothic style of clothing outside the castle- most notably in one episode when he went to Vlad's parents' evening and ended up being chased by screaming fans, while he was trying to protect himself from the sun with an umbrella, like Michael Jackson. After Vlad's refusal to eat a rabbit, the Count decided to re-marry, thinking a new mother would be a good influence on Vlad. He held a "hunt ball" to find (or cause) a new bride, but both his first wife Magda and the vampire slayer Mr Van Helsing came. Van Helsing came very close to staking the Count (albeit accidentally) causing Vlad, who believed his father to be dying, to promise that he would be "a proper vampire".
- Vladimir 'Vlad' Dracula
Vladimir "Vlad" Dracula (born 1996 in Tehran, Iran) is the Count's "son and heir" as he calls him obssessively. Unlike his sister Ingrid, Vlad would much rather prefer to be a normal kid, rather than a spirit of darkness- although he does occasionally share fragments of his father's wit and ability to manipulate. He finds friendship with outcasts Robin and Chloe Brannagh, as well as his sarcastic pet wolf, Zaltan. He is very emotional of his mother's betrayal to his father as well as exasperated by his father's complete ignorance of human life. In order to gain their full powers, teenage vampires have to pass exams called "blood tests". Although Vlad wanted to fail (so he could almost pass for normal), the Count told him that if he didn't pass, he wouldn't be allowed to see his human friends again, and even threatened to "deny all knowledge of his existence". In one episode, Vlad tried to slip his father a potion to try to make him nicer- and ended up failing miserably.
- Ingrid Dracula
Ingrid Dracula (born 1992 in Tehran, Iran), is the daughter of Count Dracula. She is, after her father, easily the most self-assured and cruel character in the series, but is nevertheless attractive and spends most of her time taunting people or arguing with her sexist father to get her rights in the house. Ironically, she is still proud to have Count Dracula as a father. She also avoids the wooing of two schoolboys who follow her around all day, although she has no problem with making them do stuff for her purely because they love her. She is not entirely heartless, however: in the final episode of the first series when her father held his hunt ball, when Mr and Mrs Brannagh gave her a present she became quite emotional (never having received much in the way of kindness before) and although the Brannaghs could not see it, she then insulted them to drive them out of the castle when the other vampires came dangerously close to biting them- and so saved their lives. For all this, Ingrid got top marks in her "blood tests" and plans to become an "all-powerful vampire goddess" when she grows up.
- Renfield
Dracula's servant/dogsbody, Renfield is a disgusting specimen who likes nothing more than eating maggots and nothing less than humans. He does all that can to help the Count, but tends to get it wrong. He seems to enjoy cross-dressing: he apparently stole a dress from Ingrid, and claims that he looks "absolutely stunning in sequins". He once accidentally fell in love with Van Helsing while he was dressed as a woman- despite the fact that he had not shaved his beard before putting on the disguise, which says a great deal about the level of both characters' intelligence.
- Zaltan
Vlad's pet wolf, Zaltan is annoyingly sarcastic and flippant and is always against Vlad's ridiculous plans. He also happens to be stuffed.
- Magda
Apparently Dracula's ex-wife (though in episode three she says "We never got married, I couldn't see what was in it for me."), Magda "ran off with a werewolf". Upon discovering that the Count was about to re-marry, in episode fourteen, she travelled to the castle to try and stop him, claimed to love him when she thought he was dying from the stake Van Helsing fired at him, but claimed not to mean it when it was clear he was alright. Ironically, he seems to love her precisely because she is so unpleasant.
- Crone
Vlad and Ingrid's grandmother and the mother of Magda. Crone appears quite rarely and only makes two appearances throughout the first series. She and the Count dislike each other: indeed, she refers to the family as the "the Draculosers" and keeps threatening him to tell the Vampire council and the Grand High Vampire that they are not living a "true vampire existence".
[edit] The Branaughs
- Robin Branaugh
Vlad's slow-witted best friend, and self-confessed "vampire geek", (even wearing a cape to school) Robin is one of the more incompetent characters of the show- although one of the first humans to discover the truth of what the Draculas are. Robin occasionally comes close to getting bitten by the Count when the latter feels the need to prompt Vlad into concentrating on his vampiric responsibilities harder than he does, but is otherwise- grudgingly- accepted into the Dracula household, by and large. Besides this, he is quite a loyal friend to Vlad (if only because he is so fixated with vampires)- even if he wants Vlad to be as much of a vampire as possible while Vlad has no real interest in it whatsoever. In spite of being slow, and a bit of a loner without Vlad, he is shown as being an incredible chessmaster, apparently beating "the greatest chess player in history" repeatedly. However, when he nearly, in one episode, tried to break his friendship with Vlad after an argument, he made an attempt at finding interest in sports like his older brothers and turned out to be quite good- implying that in fact he has some hidden talents.
- Chloe Branaugh
A year younger than the more unintelligent Robin, Chloe is a voice of reason amongst the Robin-Vlad-Chloe trio and a sort of an arch-enemy to Ingrid. She is very knowledgeable; in one episode she translated Egyptian hieroglyphs.
- "The Twins" (Ian and Paul)
A couple of sporting over-achievers, the twins both have a large crush on Ingrid. Though originally simply annoyed by their presence, Ingrid eventually grows into a sort of friendship between the two. They are amongst the few recurring characters who are unaware of the Draculas' secret. They both refused Ingrid's proposition to marriage (she offered them to marry her to escape her father's sexist rule over her). They sang a song to Ingrid in Episode 9.
- Mr and Mrs Branaugh
Plumber and housewife, the annoyingly cheery Mr and Mrs Brannagh are a constant pain in the neck for Dracula (who very nearly, at the "hunt ball" became exactly the same thing for them), and for their son Robin, and where Dracula does his best to make Vlad a normal vampire, they constantly do their best to make Robin a "normal" boy, finding his fixation with vampires somewhat unhealthy. The Count does develop a friendship with Mrs Branaugh in one episode and Mr Branaugh gets slightly close to Count Dracula's Madga.
[edit] The Van Helsings
- Mr "Eric" Van Helsing
Incompotent vampire slayer, Mr Van Helsing originally believed Robin (due to his dark hair and cape) to be one of the undead but then turned his attentions towards Vlad. While not a huge threat to the much stronger and cleverer Dracula, he is a constant annoyance to the family, who, under no circumstances can unleash their secret on the world. He only once came close to slaying Dracula and even that was when he (accidentally) fired a crossbow-like stake straight into a flask of poisoned blood that was in his enemy's waistcoat pocket, which he had likewise been responsible for putting there- whilst disguised as a female vampire.
- Jonathan Van Helsing
The "Ingrid and Vlad" of the Van Helsings, Jonathan is often exasparated by his father's tendency to see vampires everywhere. He is, however, rather slow in the uptake, having been unable to spot that Vlad, Ingrid (on whom he has a huge crush but she ignores him completely) and Count Dracula are in fact vampires until the final show of the first series. He is frequently hypnotised by Ingrid, once into performing ballet in a classroom and another time into giving himself a mad haircut. His father continuously ignores his needs because of his vampire obsession and Jonathan occasionally tries to tell him that's the reason why his mother left for an estate agent. Ironically, no point has ever been made of the fact that their family situation is so strikingly similar to that of the very people they keep trying to kill.
[edit] Overview
One of the reasons that the series is as popular as it is, is- not unlike its earlier ITV counterpart My Parents are Aliens- perhaps that aside from its fantastical elements (with the central character being a vampire), its humour lies in the fact that it contains things that its main viewers, as children and teenagers, may be able to relate to. On the series' own webpage there is information on moving house, which can be stressful for young children, and one of Vlad's early concerns is that he has to adjust to living away from his native country. There is divorce and adultery in both the Dracula and Van Helsing household, Vlad's despair at how out of touch his father is on modern-day life (a complaint of many young teenagers), both Vlad and Robin's feeling of isolation not only from others but from the rest of their families, and above all (which compares it all the more to My Parents are Aliens and another popular CBBC series that Craig Roberts also appeared in, The Story of Tracy Beaker) the feeling of being intensely embarrassed by one's own parents- a trait that Vlad, Robin and Jonathan all share, despite being otherwise quite different characters. It is also possible that the Count's expectations of Ingrid to be a proper vampire girl and Mr and Mrs Branaugh's expectations of Robin to be a "normal" human boy is something that some viewers would relate to as well, and any child who has ever seen their parents arguing with their in-laws would likely see something in the Count's war with Crone. Although perhaps not depicting Dracula or Van Helsing as truly as a real "vampire geek" like Robin would doubtless point out from how they are described by Bram Stoker, given Young Dracula's appearance at a time when moving house, divorce and conformism is more at the centre of modern British everyday life, the series' popularity is perhaps unsurprising.
