Van Helsing

Van Helsing, a rather strange character. Originally, in Dracula by Bram Stoker, he was just a slightly bonkers ginger Dutch guy into cutting off chicks' heads and stuffing their mouths with garlic. A hypnotist evangelist with a pocket full of Communion wafers. But good old Hammer Horror cheerfully ignored a lot of this as Peter Cushing took on the man. The character was distorted still further by Cosgrove House when they produced their incontestably brilliant …

…Bill). That it succeeds in spite of sucking quite badly in many departments merely demonstrates that the whole can be greater than the sum of its parts. I would say, however, that a sequel would be monstrously ill-advised. Enjoy the hokey action for what it is, try and ignore the attempts at character development, and relish the bit with the cow, which gives just a little taste of what enormous fun it could have been.