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A review by gbennett92
Dracula: The Graphic Novel by Bram Stoker, Staz Johnson, Jason Cobley
3.0
16.01.20 3.5 STARS
I actually really enjoyed this short comic book adaptation of Bram Stoker's classic Dracula! Although I have to admit, while I DO infact have the original hardback book on my shelf, I actually have never read it... It has been on my list for a long time, but it's just so heavy going that I never picked up. I will though, in the future... I promise.
ANYWAY back to the graphic novel version. I have seen some reviews that say they weren't a fan of the artwork, whereas I personally thought it fitted the story perfectly! It was so well drawn and the colours were very moody and dark, but let's be honest, Dracula is a particularly dark vampire centered novel. So I especially thought all of the blue hues and darker tones that were used suited exactly what was happening. I for one especially loved one of the scenes towards the end with Van Helsing and Mina (there are a lot of characters to get your head around but it does click eventually who everyone is) in the forest. It was stunning and the colours were beautiful.
I will say it can be hard to follow in places, but that I think would also be true of the actual novel as it is simply the way it is written. Yet they clearly had to pick the bet parts out in order to create this comic adaptation, otherwise it would have been ridiculously long! The whole point of a graphic novel though is that the story can be told through the pictures as well, so you really don't need as many words. That being said, there's still a lot of words in this particular graphic novel and it took me a little longer than expected to read through.
Also, I absolutely love that they have multiple copies! This one is the "original text" version, so everything that is copied over is exactly how it was written in the original. They also do a "quick text" and a "modern text" version if you prefer something a little easier to read, which I think is just plain AWESOME! There are many other books that they have adapted too, including Frankenstein and Wuthering Heights - both of which I have read so I will definitely be adding these versions to my bookshelf soon.
All in all I thought it was a really solid adaptation and they had as much detail as they possibly could without making it much too long or wordy. The creativity of the drawings and how they portrayed the story all on their own was beautifully well done. I would recommend this if you are a fan of graphic novels in general and would like to read this chilling classic.
I actually really enjoyed this short comic book adaptation of Bram Stoker's classic Dracula! Although I have to admit, while I DO infact have the original hardback book on my shelf, I actually have never read it... It has been on my list for a long time, but it's just so heavy going that I never picked up. I will though, in the future... I promise.
ANYWAY back to the graphic novel version. I have seen some reviews that say they weren't a fan of the artwork, whereas I personally thought it fitted the story perfectly! It was so well drawn and the colours were very moody and dark, but let's be honest, Dracula is a particularly dark vampire centered novel. So I especially thought all of the blue hues and darker tones that were used suited exactly what was happening. I for one especially loved one of the scenes towards the end with Van Helsing and Mina (there are a lot of characters to get your head around but it does click eventually who everyone is) in the forest. It was stunning and the colours were beautiful.
I will say it can be hard to follow in places, but that I think would also be true of the actual novel as it is simply the way it is written. Yet they clearly had to pick the bet parts out in order to create this comic adaptation, otherwise it would have been ridiculously long! The whole point of a graphic novel though is that the story can be told through the pictures as well, so you really don't need as many words. That being said, there's still a lot of words in this particular graphic novel and it took me a little longer than expected to read through.
Also, I absolutely love that they have multiple copies! This one is the "original text" version, so everything that is copied over is exactly how it was written in the original. They also do a "quick text" and a "modern text" version if you prefer something a little easier to read, which I think is just plain AWESOME! There are many other books that they have adapted too, including Frankenstein and Wuthering Heights - both of which I have read so I will definitely be adding these versions to my bookshelf soon.
All in all I thought it was a really solid adaptation and they had as much detail as they possibly could without making it much too long or wordy. The creativity of the drawings and how they portrayed the story all on their own was beautifully well done. I would recommend this if you are a fan of graphic novels in general and would like to read this chilling classic.