My Review of Dracula's "Blood Vessel"

Written by Mark Gatiss & Steven Moffat
Directed by Damon Thomas

Sister Agatha: "Welcome to England, Count Dracula. What kept you?"

Yeah, I admit, I should have seen this one coming. I mean, it's the sort of thing that both Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss said they weren't going to do, so of course, it would be the thing they'd end up doing. All I can say is that they've certainly changed the game for the last episode of the series and that should be fun to watch.

As for the bulk of this episode, it was a rather fun and intellectually charged battle of wits between the Count and Sister Agatha over a game of chess as the two of them challenged the other's expectations throughout the 90 minutes of this lighter in action middle installment and this was a very light on action episode in spite of Dracula acting like a pig with truffles.

On the boat named Demeter, we saw the Count charm and mostly snack on the crew while also presenting an undead Agatha as a murder suspect before Captain Sokolov (Jonathan Aris) deduced that the Count himself was a murderer and it was something of a game of the survivors trying to stay one step ahead of the Count while trying to get to England.

For a quiet episode though, it did have fun seeing Dracula go through various members of the ship, playing certain people off one another and exploiting others greed and vulnerabilities but like the previous episode, it's really Van Helsing herself who is driving this series. I've liked Dolly Wells in other things I've seen her in but here, she's been an absolute revelation as Sister Agatha. She's got to appear in more dramatic or horror roles after this series is done with.

As for the last scene - Dracula showing up in present day England, greeted by a detective Agatha. Maybe it did annoy some fans but not me. I loved the twist and given the interplay between the two of them throughout the episode, it's actually satisfying as well. I just hope the pay off works out though as our Count will have to grapple with 21st century habits.

- Our current Master, Sacha Dhawan popped up here as a Doctor Sharma with a child. He didn't make it out of the episode alive.
- Dracula encountered a former conquest Grand Duchess Valeria (Catherine Schell) and we had a closeted gay couple, an actor from Stranger Things and one of the co-writers of this series in here too.
-  There was a reference to a character from John Polidari's The Vampyre, Lord Ruthven who also appeared in this episode. He was in a relationship with manservant, Adisa.
- Chronology: By the end of this episode, I guess the Count can sample life in 2020.

Blood Vessel is a very talky, light on action episode, the kind that Steven Moffat in particular has definitely crafted in some of his past works but it also succeeded with it's twists, interplay between the guest characters and capturing the sense of cabin fever and there was a lovely reference to another BBC series, which I'm sure everyone caught as well. I really hope the last episode doesn't blow the good work set up here.

Rating: 8 out of 10