Episode Title: “The Devil’s Waltz”
Writer: Nicole Taylor
Director: Nick Murphy
Previously on “Dracula”:
Episode 1.04 “From Darkness To Light”
After taking a week off to honor the 50th anniversary of JFK’s death, NBC’s “Dracula” is back this week with “The Devil’s Waltz.” After the last episode, “From Darkness to Light,” I feel like there is hope for this show after all. How much hope? I’m not too sure about that, but we’ll see how these next few episodes play out.
I have to wonder how NBC thought this would play out, pitting a haphazardly written show against CBS’ “Blue Bloods,” a show that manages to pull in at least 11 millions viewers each week. Were they relying on the name of Bram Stoker’s Dracula alone to drive in its viewership? One may never know. It’s always seemed as if NBC doesn’t run on logic, but, maybe the leftover snortings of the alien elves that live on the planet, Snortlax 9.
Regardless of whose nose NBC’s programming comes out of, back to “Dracula.” Tonight we find Alex Grayson/Dracula’s (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) spell finally starting to infiltrate the mind of Mina Murray (Jessica De Gouw). He starts by invading her dreams, and it provides us with the first vanilla sex scene that didn’t include Lady Jayne Wetherby (Victoria Smurfit). Question: where vampires are concerned, if it happened in her head, does it mean it happened in real life? Regardless, her romantic infatuations have come full… square? No triangle can hold the likes of Alexander Grayson, Jonathan Harker (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) and Lucy Westerna (Katie McGrath). If we’re going to be honest, Lucy has to know she’s in last place with no chance for advancement.
Jonathan Harker is still a lingering lump of a character, present because he’s a vital character in Bram Stoker’s novel. He’s turned into an information obtaining lackey for Grayson mostly, and most of that information is already known to the viewer. Grayson does his part to make him less interesting, dismissing most of the information he provides as not really important. Will his role always be to stay close to Grayson, so he can be close to Mina? Is there also an episode where he isn’t berating Mina about something? She always acts as his anchor despite the circumstances, and yet, when he is anchored becomes vastly lest interesting.
At the end of “From Darkness to Light,” the previews for this episode teased Grayson slashing Harker’s throat at the Engagement party. Of course this is too good to be true, a vision of sorts playing in Grayson’s head, but the sight is nonetheless horrifying.
J.M. Renfields’s (Nonso Anozie) character is flushed out in this episode. He was kidnapped by the Order of the Dragon at the end of the last episode, and this week the second part of that is the torture aspect. Through flashback sequences, we find Renfield on a train as a bartender. Grayson is there to make a land deal; Renfield steps in as a voice of reason at one point, informing Grayson of new Federal laws that would effect his land deal. Thus begins Renfield’s torture and the forging of a long friendship. In a horrific scene, he’s knocked to the ground in the train car and the beating begins at the hands of the associates Grayson is dealing with. Dracula sets down the drink that Renfield has given him and begins to unleash havoc. Everything is seen from Renfield’s point of view, as intermittent shots of Grayson destroying these men crosses his field of view. At one point, Grayson walks by clutching a severed head by its hair.
The real time torture sequences rely a lot on the imagination of the viewer. Scenes are set up gruesomely; a shot of a pointed instrument underneath one of Renfield’s finger nails cuts to a long overhead shot, and screaming, and naturally cringing. Even the close up visible scenes are hard to take in. When salt was rubbed against an open wound, I couldn’t help but shudder. Renfield’s tormentors want to know one simple question: “who does Alexander Grayson love?” The question is as unnatural as it is haunting. The funny thing is, by the end of the episode the answer is obvious to everyone.
Jonathan Rhys Meyers seems to be settling into his role better at this point in the season. At the beginning, he was all over the place. It was almost as if he had a different voice for each character he was interacting with. Now, his steady flow and flushed out supernatural aspects have added depth to the character. For instance, he can apparently smell memories of people. His ploys with Abraham Van Helsing (Thomas Kretschmann) are still progressing slowly. Apparently, you can electrically shock a vampire’s heart into beating. They do so to a vampire test subject and inject her with the day walking serum (If they make this work, I’m calling him Bladula in these reviews. Sorry, I can’t help myself), with negative results. The stall tactics are slogging on a bit too long, but if the previews for next week’s episode are any indication, Grayson will have no choice but to walk in daylight.
“The Devil’s Waltz” is “Dracula’s” most violent episode. The violence was tastefully done, often off screen, though when on it, didn’t become a huge spectacle. There also wasn’t bad kung-fu moves. During Renfield’s rescue, Grayson easily dispatches everyone, but the last man; he rips his arm off with such ease. The blood and gore is left out of it, as if arms come off like that all the time.
The dance between Mina and Dracula is the single most disturbing event of the night. Nichole Taylor manages to write the most wonderfully disturbing psychological scene. Throughout the dance, the two get closer and closer, embracing more and more as lovers. The look on the faces of all the people that love Mina and Grayson dearly (Harker, Lucy, Lady Jayne.) is the definition of horror. The scene climaxes when Harker looks to cut in and the scene cuts to Grayson slashing his throat. Just a desire, but director Nick Murphy builds tension till it’s slowly boiling over.
“The Devil’s Waltz” may be proof that “Dracula” is not flash in the pan after all. Not a lot really happened in this episode, plot wise, but instead of being lusterless, added a ton of depth to the show’s tone and characters that it didn’t matter. Now that “Dracula” has rooted itself in great story telling, I’m anxious to see if Cole Haddon and company can keep it up.
