Are you quite ready for Nicolas Cage as Dracula? If so then you should be very excited aboutRenfield, a new movie coming this April. The movie will be starring Cage as well as Nicholas Hoult as R.M. Renfield, who is Dracula’s most trusted UberEats delivery boy. The plot will revolve around Hoult as he finds new and more risky ways to fetch food for his master and promises a good mix of action as well as quippy jokes if the trailer is to be believed.
But what could this movie end up leading to? Good box office returns? Maybe, but also maybe a lot more than that. It may not be completely evident, but Universal has a potential gold mine on its hands with this film. Let’s break down what this movie could mean for them.
The Status of the Market
Comic book moviesare kind of a big deal. That’s something of an understatement, but ultimately it’s pretty unlikely that they’re going to end anytime soon. They all really came from humble beginnings with the very basicIron Man. A movie with a self-contained story that took itself just seriously enough to make things stick. It kept things simple, fast, and funny. Marvel movies that came after cheated offIron Man’stest and picked up on all the same basic ideas with the movies just ever so slightly expanding the world with each sequel and giving audiences enough humor to break through the lore and serious plot-building moments. It’s all about building that big franchise where your characters can interact in some larger way.
WhereDC has gone wrongwith the formula is dumping lore on audiences too fast and having no discernible plan, so their entire lineup is just chaos. They also forgot to make movies where you actually like the characters appearing on-screen.
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If DC and Marvel are like two divorced parents trying to figure out how to attract their child, Universal is watching from the bleachers trying to figure out how to make a movie that sparks some interest. While the Brendan Fraser version ofThe Mummyis still beloved almost 24 years after its release, 2017’sThe Mummyreceived some pretty bad backlash, with director Alex Kurtzman calling it the biggest failure of his professional career in an interview withThe Playlist.
What people have largely forgotten is that this movie was actually meant to inspire a larger Dark Universe for Universal’s classic monsters to interact in. People like Dr. Jekyll would team up with Dr. Frankenstein, but the idea ended up being dead on arrival.
The Opportunity Is Here
It’s doubtful though that Universal has given up entirely on the concept, given how big of a moneymaker it can be. This is whereRenfieldreally has a huge advantage. This is a movie that appears to be its own thing. A dark comedy that wants to just be a fun, action-packed, mostly self-contained story that takes itself just seriously enough. Sound familiar?
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But what’s more, is that the template for more is there too. This movie will stand out because it gives more freedom to Renfield to be whoever they would like to mold him into rather than just having toretell the story of Draculaagain in a different locale. Something like that has been done about 100 times, but this is sort of unique in that they’re going to focus on the sidekick character here instead.
Imagine now if further movies in the universe were to take the same exact angle. So a movie about Dr. Frankenstein is now about Igor having to look around for dead body parts swapping horror stories of his boss with Renfield. Going at it from a different angle still, they could potentially do the Bridesmaid of Frankenstein to introduce the female counterpart indirectly. When the focus isn’t the monsters themselves, there are lots more places you can go in developing the franchise in ways that haven’t really been attempted before. Adding in new characters alongside old familiar ones is a proven formula that worked extremely well in the spectacularPenny Dreadful, which saw characters like the Wolf Man and Frankenstein all woven into a single dark narrative.
Another big benefit to this movie is it’s rated R. An adult-oriented universe is still sort of a vacant seat as far as movies are concerned. DCwants to be rated R, the way they throw in lots of dark and gritty moments into what’s supposed to be a movie about hope. Ultimately though, they come up short and don’t want to cross that threshold save for a few side projects likeJoker. Deadpoolmade about $786 million at the box office, and it was an unapologetically R-rated movie. While it may seem a bit of a stretch to compare them, the market is undeniably there.
With the right script, people will go see this movie as there is a proven audience that wants to go see big franchise movies with adult jokes and gratuitous violence. It’s important to do something different for this type of movie, to stand out in any way possible against the tide of Marvel movies that are comfortable being family-friendly.
Of course, none of this matters if the movie ends up being terrible. But the roadmap seems clear enough. In defense of Universal, Marvel themselves had to churn out aGhost Riderand aHulkas well as a regrettableFantastic Fourin 1994 before they struck gold with a riskyIron Man. This movie feels like it has a similar setup is the thing. A few failed projects, figuring out what has worked and what won’t, then finally doing something a little different and risky. Universal may find that it pays off in spades for them.
