- This time... It's Seasonal!
Santa versus Dracula is a comic book written by Ed Power and drawn by Melissa Dejesus (Both of My Cage fame).
Three days before Christmas Eve, Santa is getting ready for his yearly round when all of sudden the Easter Bunny is found battered and bruised outside his workshop, who in his dying breath warns him monsters are coming for him. Shortly after, Dracula calls Santa, informing him that he plans to take Santa's job since he can enter any house he wishes and, being a vampire, this would grant Dracula that ability. Naturally, Santa doesn't intend to give it to him willingly, despite an offer of surrender (and a quick death). What follows is bloody battle at the North Pole between Santa's forces and Dracula's monsters for the fate of Christmas.
The idea was actually conceived in 2009 and meant to be told as a webcomic but stopped beyond the opening story. In 2011, it was then seemingly set to be an animated adaptation that was submitted to Fox for their Aniboom segment, again only the first few parts of the story were shown before things went quiet again. Finally in 2012, the creators hosted a successful Kickstarter to get a book funded and in 2013, the full story was finally told in a graphic novel format.
The comic was hosted on Go Comics till the end of 2015, after which it was quickly taken off once it was finished. Though the graphic novel is still up for sale. You can view the animated trailer, here
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Santa Versus Dracula has the following tropes
- An Asskicking Christmas: Set three days before, but it's set around the holiday season so it counts.
- Anyone Can Die: Yeah, this story doesn't mess around; many of the protagonists do die in the fight.
- The Alcoholic: Rumspringer, who's usually always seen drunk or drinking. Considering his backstory, you can't blame him.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Rumspringer, whose story the Rudolph mythos is based on, only much worse when it was revealed that his nose was able to glow. The villagers shunned him for it due to rumors and even his parents were scared of him despite his nose not being all that lethal.
- Badass Santa: Santa is still the same pleasant fellow you know from the stories, but he sure as heck isn't one to shy away from a fight. Especially if it involves Christmas.
- Bittersweet Ending: Despite Santa killing Dracula, he somehow was able to turn Santa into a vampire who proceeds to turn his elves into vampires and attacks the world on Christmas Eve. The only reason it's not a downer is because the Easter Bunny manages to revive and rally the other holidays to fight Santa.
- Captain Ersatz: Nick Frosty is essentially an elfin version of Marvel Comics' Nick Fury. He even wears an eyepatch.
- Cannon Fodder: The vampire kids. Dracula fully intended to sacrifice them so he could thin out Santa's elf forces before going after Santa himself.
- Dumb Muscle: Somewhat subverted, Frankenstein's monster admits he's just extra muscle to Dracula but he's far from dumb and seen reading books in his off time.
- Expy Coexistence: Wintry and Rumspringer are blatant stand-ins for Frosty the Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, but it's also strongly implied that Frosty and Rudolph exist in this universe as unauthorized retellings of Wintry and Rumpsringer's stories with the names changed to get out of owing them royalties.
- Fight Dracula: As the title suggests, the story is about Santa facing Dracula.
- Fight Unscene: The Invisible Man fight. Jack Frost takes him out easily since the Invisible Man can't wear clothes to keep himself fully invisible and, well, considering Jack's a spirit of winter, you can see how that battle plays out.
- Flaming Sword: Gloria, being an arch-angel, wields one. Santa later takes it from her after her treachery is revealed and kills her with it, then tries to use it on Dracula.
- Freudian Excuse:
- Frankenstein's Monster admits he joined Dracula's side because of a boy he tried to befriend taunting him which he killed. To him, no kids are innocent and sees the North Pole rewarding good kids as an affront to his belief.
- Mike the Werewolf admitted he sold out his kind and joined Dracula's side simply because he felt vampires were the superior monsters and there was no point in fighting it.
- Gloria's reasoning for betraying Santa was because she had helped him through many a holiday crisis but felt that Santa didn't appreciate what she had done for him. It's pretty obvious it goes deeper than that when she sees him around Kate.
- Girl Posse: Dracula's brides, naturally.
- Good Is Not Nice: Kate, Santa's second wife, who, despite being the only human among the holiday immortals, manages to take out Igor by herself and more then willing to help in the clash against the vampire kids. Likewise Gloria, who, despite being an angel, doesn't hold back against the kids. Also applies to Santa as well, though he at least tries to get the opposing forces to back down before going into action.
- Grand Theft Me: Winty manages to take control of Frankenstein's Monster body after he drowns him due to his magic hat falling on the monster's head.
- Groin Attack: Rumspringer kicks Hyde in the crotch during their fight when the latter has him pinned down.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Two of Dracula's brides are shown to be this before the attack on the North Pole.
- Holy Burns Evil: Subverted. Dracula brings up the common vampire weakness of holy objects causing them harm upon contact, then immediately reveals that it's a myth and that he avoids touching them due to disliking what they represent rather than the objects being harmful towards him.
- The Igor: Part of Dracula's group is the famous hunchbacked assistant, who is said to have helped every mad scientist ever and is implied to have gone under other names besides Igor, such as Fritz.
- Killed Offscreen: Jack Frost deals with the Invisible Man offscreen and implies after the fight that the Invisible Man froze to death, as the expected outcome would be for an invisible being who has to disrobe to be truly invisible battling a being with power over winter.
- Klingon Promotion: The way to take Santa's job from him by force, kill him, and assume the title, which is just what Dracula intends to do.
- Manipulative Bastard: Somewhat touched upon with Santa. Granted, he's nice, but from other viewpoints in the story namely, Rumspringer, Gloria, and even slightly with Winty, he tends to pull an All Take and No Give mentality for the sake of his job. This winds up having consequences in the story.
- The Mole: Gloria, the angel that helps Santa, is revealed to be working for Dracula. Her reason being that she felt Santa didn't appreciate all that she had done for him in the past.
- Monster Mash: Drac's side consists of his brides, kids he turned into vampires, a werewolf, Igor, the Invisible Man, Mr. Hyde, and Frankenstein's monster. Later in the story, he manages to get the Abominable Snowman on his side after his main werewolf manages to bite him. He also had a witch, but melts her after she annoys him.
- No Ontological Inertia: Stated by Santa that if the head vampire, in this case Dracula, is killed, full vampires die with him and half-vampires and monsters under his power return to normal.
- No-Sell: When Wintry tries to defeat Frankenstein's Monster using fire, the Monster reveals he's not afraid of fire due to hypnotherapy he got from Dracula.
- Muggle: Katie, a New Jersey native and Santa's second wife whom he met on a dating reality show after Mrs. Claus ran off with the Boogie Man.
- Saw It in a Movie Once: Dracula admits he got the idea for his plan from The Lost Boys, but thinks Santa won't know that. Turns out, Santa has seen the movie on Netflix and bases the idea of the whole "kill the master, restore the others" from it.
- Sequel Hook: Santa is a turned into a vampire, but the other holidays are ready to fight against him.
- Take That!: To Twilight. Many of the kids in Drac's army were turned because of reading the book. Drac isn't amused in the slightest by it.Dracula: When I get my hands on the woman who created "Twilight"...Igor: I know, sir, I know.
- Uncertain Doom:
- The fight between Rumspringer and Mr. Hyde ends with both of them collapsing as the glow in Rumspringer's nose goes out and Mr. Hyde turns back into Dr. Jekyll. The possibility of their survival is suggested only by the fact that it's never directly stated that they died.
- The last we see of Wintry, now inhabiting Frankenstein's body, and the wolfified Abominable Snowman is going over a cliff in their fight. Considering how tough both are, it's very unlikely they were killed by the fall.
- Undead Child: Dracula makes a whole army of them as his main force to fight against Santa's elves.
- Versus Title: Yeah, pretty much what it says on the tin.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: We never find out what happened to Debbie or the other vampire kids who weren't killed in the fight.
- Your Vampires Suck: Dracula brings up that he can touch holy objects, he simply avoids doing so because he detests what they represent.
