Dracula 1.05 “The Devil’s Waltz”

Dracula is starting to find its stride with storytelling as “the Devil’s Waltz” offers up some great action and background information about everybody’s favorite assistant.

In the last episode, Renfield (Nonso Anozie) was last seen being kidnapped by hired assassins on the orders of Lord Davenport (Robert Bathurst), as he wanted to know more about Dracula (Jonathan Rhys Meyers). So it was a swift move on Davenport’s part to take his most trusted advisor. Renfield is taken to an unknown location and (brutally) tortured for information. The torture scenes were a bit hard to watch and seeing this happen to one of your favourite characters on the show is even harder, but despite that, the scenes were wonderfully setup; every method used to hurt Renfield made you cringe in your seat.

When Dracula learns of Renfield’s disappearance he tasks Harker (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) with finding some clues as to his whereabouts. What I really liked about this episode was the fact that it really explored the relationship between Renfield and Dracula, as both characters had flashbacks of their first meeting. We get to see the lengths to which they would go for each other; Dracula doing everything he can to find Renfield, and Renfield doing everything he can to protect Dracula’s secrets from his captors. When Dracula does find Renfield, he makes short work of his captors by ripping them limb from limb. I have to point out as well that this was probably one of the more violent episodes, albeit most of it is off-screen; but here and there you will see Dracula walk by with a head or an arm from Renfield’s POV while he is lying on the ground.

Harker and Mina’s (Jessica De Gouw) engagement party comes to a head as everyone in town gathers for the event, and even members from The Order are in attendance. Harker is unsure of how to repay Dracula for his kindness in setting up the event so he offers his employer the first dance with his fiancée. When Dracula and Mina come together, the world stops and everyone notices the affection they are showing one and other; Harker, Lucy (Katie McGrath), and Lady Jayne (Victoria Smurfit) all take in the fact that there is something more between the two of them, and when Harker goes to intercede, Dracula slashes his throat open! But thankfully that part was just a dream.

Van Helsing (Thomas Kretschmann) and Dracula put the daylight serum to the test by restarting a captive vampire’s heart, so that the serum would pump through the entire body. My question is how does that work out exactly, seeing as how they are…dead? In any case the serum works briefly before their test subject slowly started to burst into flames. After the vampire was no more, Dracula shed some tears like he usually does. However somebody could have just as easily saved her life. Somebody like Van Helsing, maybe? They could have used her once again to test another serum, instead of having to make more vampires, but that’s just my personal opinion.

This episode was a good one and it truly shed some light on Dracula’s relationship with Renfield. If this relationship reminded me of any other, it would be the one that Batman shares with Alfred. There are also more developments within The Order, as Browning (Ben Miles) becomes ever more curious about Alexander, and readily thinks that he is the ‘old one’ that they seek. Lady Jayne, however, doesn’t want to believe it’s true, but Browning grows more suspicious. Will Browning find out about Alexander’s connection to the vampires in London? Only time will tell, so stay tuned…