Dracula, Wicked-style
Everyone is the hero of their own story
If you were a vampire, would you be good? Evil Or something in between?
What would you do with that kind of power?
Vampires — and Dracula in particular — are almost exclusively cast as villains. But why? Aside from the obvious (humans tend to object to being eaten), there’s nothing inherently villainous about being a vampire. As with everything else, it comes down to choice. Power doesn’t make you evil. What you do with it might.
If you’ve read Bram Stoker’s novel, you know Dracula isn’t nearly as present as popular culture suggests. In fact, he’s barely there. The story centers on Jonathan Harker and his circle, and because we experience events through their accounts, the narrative is biased against the Count from the start.
It’s time we heard his side.
Inspired by Winnie Holzman’s adaptation of The Wizard of Oz (Wicked), I set out to retell the legend of Dracula in the same spirit — recasting the infamous vampire as the hero of his own story. To do that, I had to work backward and construct an origin that would eventually lead to his ill-fated meeting with the lawyer Jonathan Harker.
But before I could write a single scene, one question refused to leave me alone:
What the hell happened between Dracula and the Christian Church?
Because somewhere along the way, the myth outgrew its source. Adaptation layered upon adaptation until Dracula’s feud with the Church became synonymous with his identity — so embedded in the cultural imagination that it feels original, even when it wasn’t.
Yes, he’s a vampire. Yes, vampires are traditionally framed as embodiments of sin and corruption. But strip away the shorthand, and the question remains:
What happened?
I haven’t seen an adaptation where Dracula bursts into flames at the sight of the Star of David, the Star and Crescent, prayer beads, or any other sacred symbol. It’s always the Crucifix. Even holy water — in most vampire lore — is explicitly Christian.
There’s an easy explanation. Most widely distributed vampire stories are produced in predominantly Christian cultures. Lore reflects the worldview of its creators. That’s real-world context.
But inside the fiction, that context disappears.
On the page and on screen, the hostility remains — unexplained, unquestioned, inherited.
So I’ll ask it again: What the hell happened between Dracula and the Christian Church?
For a reaction that extreme, something must have occurred. Something personal. Something violent enough to calcify into myth.
That is where this story begins.
Unholy Empire will take you from 12th-century France to 19th-century England. You’ll meet Dracula as he was known then: Dragomir. A vampire who happened to be in the wrong place at the right time.
You’ll hear his version.
You’ll see what he sees.
And by the time we reach Jonathan Harker, you may find your loyalties less certain than you expected.
© Copyright 2026 Rian C. Stone. All rights reserved.