Let’s start with the title. Dracula 3000: Infinite Darkness. A bold promise, suggesting either a galaxy-spanning vampire epic or maybe just a really long blackout at a space station rave. What we get instead is 90 minutes of Casper Van Dien squinting at cardboard sets while Coolio chews the scenery so hard you wonder if he mistook the plywood for catering. This isn’t just bad—it’s a cautionary tale, a reminder that if Bram Stoker had known his Count would one day be rebooted as a budget cosplay floating through outer space, he might’ve skipped the whole vampire novel thing and gone into real estate.
The Plot (Or Lack Thereof)
It’s the year 3000, though nothing looks particularly futuristic. The sets look like they were borrowed from a bankrupt laser tag arena, and the costumes resemble what you’d find in a clearance bin at Party City the day after Halloween. Our heroes (and I use that word loosely) are space salvagers who stumble across the Demeter, the abandoned ship from the original novel. This should be exciting. Instead, it feels like the world’s slowest episode of Storage Wars, where the lockers are full of sand, corpses, and regret.
The crew, led by Captain Van Helsing (Casper Van Dien, whose face screams “I once had an agent, I swear”), begins poking around the ship. They find coffins, because apparently space vampires also shop IKEA for their undead storage needs. Inside the coffins? Sand. That’s it. Just sand. Nothing says terrifying intergalactic horror like someone’s spilled litter box.
Soon the crew is picked off one by one, not because the vampires are particularly clever, but because the characters are dumber than a bucket of nails. The android cop who used to be a sexbot? She’s here to deliver exposition and fulfill the late-night cable contract for mandatory awkward sex scenes. The wheelchair professor? He betrays the group, because even in space, academics are petty. And Coolio as “187”? He gets turned into a vampire and still manages to overact like his paycheck depended on the number of facial contortions per minute.
Dracula, or Whatever This Is
The vampire at the center of this nonsense isn’t even called Dracula. He’s Count Orlock, which is like making a Batman movie where the villain is named “Mr. Ratman.” Played by Langley Kirkwood, Orlock is less menacing prince of darkness and more “guy who would get kicked out of a Renaissance fair for being too handsy.” His big plan? Get to Earth. That’s it. No empire building, no galactic blood harvest, just hitching a ride to Earth like it’s a long Uber trip.
This might have worked if he had any charisma, but instead he lurks around in cheap prosthetics and mutters lines that sound like they were generated by a discount AI in 2004. At one point he loses an arm because the crew closes a door on him. Imagine Star Wars if Darth Vader had been defeated by a faulty elevator.
Performances That Make You Miss Silence
Casper Van Dien acts with all the conviction of a man who accidentally signed the wrong contract. He spends the film vacillating between confused and constipated, and by the end you’re not sure which face is which. Erika Eleniak plays Aurora, a sexbot turned android cop, and manages to deliver lines about immortality and vampire lore with the same energy you’d use to order a sandwich at Subway.
Then there’s Coolio. God bless him. His performance as “187” is so unhinged it almost becomes transcendent. He hisses, he snarls, he rolls his eyes so violently you worry he might detach a retina. He treats vampirism like a chance to audition for Looney Tunes: The Musical. It’s bad acting, yes—but it’s also the only time the movie is entertaining. When Coolio dies (again), the film loses its only source of accidental comedy.
Special Effects Courtesy of a 1997 Screensaver
The effects budget for Dracula 3000 appears to have been about $12. The spaceship exteriors look like they were rendered on a Nintendo 64. The vampires’ fangs look like they came from a dollar store blister pack. And the climactic explosion of the Demeter? Let’s just say I’ve seen more convincing fireworks at a suburban barbecue.
At one point, a character gets staked with a pool cue. Not a futuristic laser spear, not a glowing energy blade—just a regular old pool cue, like you’d find in a dive bar. It’s not so much sci-fi horror as it is Dracula Goes to Dave & Buster’s.
Pacing and Tone: A Black Hole of Fun
The movie somehow manages to be both rushed and endless. Characters make huge revelations—like Aurora being a sexbot—in the middle of scenes that already have too much going on. The tone swerves between bargain-bin sci-fi and bad soap opera, with occasional bursts of slapstick comedy. The result is a film that feels like it was edited by a toddler with safety scissors.
Even the sex scene, meant to add spice, feels like an afterthought. Aurora offers “comfort” to Humvee before they all die in the sun. Comfort, in this case, being awkward mechanical thrusting in a ship that’s about to explode. It’s less erotic than watching two Roombas bump into each other.
The Ending: Blessed Oblivion
Eventually, the Demeter drifts into a binary star, the vampire is defeated, and everyone dies. This should feel tragic, but instead it’s a relief. The credits roll, and you can finally escape the coffin you’ve been trapped in for 90 minutes. Somewhere, Bram Stoker spins in his grave so fast he could power the ship’s failing reactor.
The Real Horror
The scariest thing about Dracula 3000 isn’t the vampire, or the blood, or the cheap sets. It’s the idea that someone greenlit this, multiple actors signed contracts, and a production crew spent weeks building these sets and shooting these scenes, all while nobody stopped and said, “Guys, maybe this is a bad idea.” That’s horror on a cosmic level.
Final Verdict
Dracula 3000 is what happens when you mix Bram Stoker’s novel with a SyFy Original and forget to add talent, budget, or shame. It’s a film that promises infinite darkness but delivers only infinite boredom. Still, it has Coolio hissing like a feral cat, and if that’s not worth something, I don’t know what is.
