Not a single cast member from the Wes Craven-presented Dracula 2000 returned for Dracula II: Ascension, the first of two straight-to-video sequels, and who can blame them?

Picking up where D2K ended, with the count burnt to a crisp on a neon crucifix, Ascension wheels the charred corpse of the vampire lord into a morgue, where the enterprising workers steal the body, sensing an opportunity to make some money. They take it to the conveniently vacant and isolated mansion of their professor, played by Craig Sheffer. He’s confined to a wheelchair because of cerebral palsy and has his left hand drawn up and turned in a way that looks like he’s constantly playing charades and no one has yet guessed “hieroglyphics.”

Sheffer — like Stephen Hawking without the RoboVoice and the charisma — believes the key to his cellular regeneration lies within the blood of Dracula, so he has his students revive the body by literally giving him a bloodbath. It works, and the first to die is former Playboy Playmate of the Year Brande Roderick, who briefly comes back as cinema’s only vampire to sport matching red bra and panties from Victoria’s Secret semi-annual lingerie sale. Eventually dying (but not soon enough) is the token black guy who, after sprouting fangs, exclaims with no irony, “I got the hooyah power in me!”

Meanwhile, the increasingly oval-faced Jason Scott Lee tracks them down. He’s a priest-cum-vampire hunter, as quick with the scythe as he is with the scripture, and he is as intent on saving souls as he is severing heads. Oh, and what of Drac? He’s tied up for nearly the entire movie, freed of his chains only at the end to set up Dracula III: Legacy, leaving one to hope it has more bite. —Rod Lott

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It’s obvious that the people behind The Thing remake studied John Carpenter’s gruesome masterpiece before they began their prequel. But studying ain’t the same as mastering; while Thing 2011 plays the same notes as Thing 1982, there’s barely any music to be heard. Maybe it’s an unfair comparison, but when you produce a prequel to one of the genuine horror classics of all time, you know the risks going in.

Carpenter attached the scenario of an alien that perfectly mimics other life forms to an isolated arctic base and amped the claustrophobia, resulting in a paranoid classic that is also one of the great practical effect showcases. Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. follows the template, but leeches away any hint of tension. It’s not that the audience knows the ending going in; it’s far more that you should never trust a brand property to an unproven talent (see also: anything produced by Platinum Dunes, Michael Bay’s production company). There isn’t one moment in this Thing that isn’t completely predictable.

Where does it go wrong? It’s the overuse of painfully obvious CGI where practical effects would have been a far superior choice. It’s the unnecessary Americans that join a group that we have, for 30 years, assumed to be completely Norwegian. It’s the marked lack of Kurt Russells, Wilford Brimleys and Keith Davids. It’s the oversights of particular plot points in the original (what happened to the thermite charges?). It’s the replacement of Ennio Morricone’s eerie score with a bombastic symphony that telegraphs every scare. It’s the disappointment of seeing that the inside of the spacecraft is just stereotypical weird tunnels. It’s rejigging the idea that anyone could be the monster to, “Oh, I think I know who the monster is: that two-headed guy running down the corridor.”

It’s all this, and more. When only one scene even approaches the level of terror and/or coolness of the original (think face-melting), you don’t have a true sequel, an adequate prequel, a loving tribute or an energetic fan film; you have a sweaty-faced Elvis impersonator in a polyester suit, fighting a heart attack while he bellows “Suspicious Minds” to a group of bored tourists in Nevada.

That said, it’s still better than anything Platinum Dunes has ever released. —Corey Redekop

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