So you’ve seen this match up before, in
movies such as “Underworld” and “Van Helsing,” and you found the two together
in the show “True Blood”, which was inspired by the books, “The Southern Vampire Mysteries.” But that’s fiction, and today we’re going
to take this match-up a step further and really analyze what would happen if these two came
up against each other. It’s not that they’d naturally hate on
each other if they should ever meet, but let’s face it, both at times could have benefited
from some anger management classes. We very much doubt they’d instantly get
along and start sharing tales about the numerous people they’d disposed of throughout their
lives. With no further ado, welcome to this episode
of the Infographics Show, Vampires vs Werewolves - Who Would Win? Let’s do a bit of background first. Who is Dracula? Count Dracula was the creation of an Irish
novelist by the name of Bram Stoker. He wrote the book “Dracula” in 1897 and
since then we have seen many, many iterations of this story. The character was supposed to be partly inspired
by the 15th century Vlad the Impaler, who gets that name from impaling his enemies on
stakes. His massacres and unbounded cruelty were part
of the inspiration for the conniving count with cool fangs. But the idea of vampires goes back to folkloric
tales from ancient civilizations, at least as a precursor. In the 18th century in South Eastern Europe
the idea of a blood-sucking vampire really manifested, and people were even killed because
they were accused of being vampires. After Stoker’s novel, vampires were threaded
into the minds of people across the world, with Dracula being the king of all vampires. Werewolves, sometimes called lycanthropes,
also go back a long way. The shape-shifting beasts were written about
as far back as the 12th century, but again you can see similar beasts in ancient times
as part of various European mythological tales. It got real, too, with countries in Europe
in the 15th and 16th century having werewolf trials, in which normal people were accused
of being these beasts. Sometimes they were accused of eating children. In France there were quite a few of these
trials, with one teenager once being imprisoned on the charge. These were highly superstitious times. It wasn’t until the 19th century that the
beasts hit the mainstream, with novelists, even Bram Stoker, writing about werewolves
that could be killed with a silver bullet. As we see today, both Dracula and a werewolf
were sometimes talked about in the same stories. The two became entwined. In 1935 we had the movie, “Werewolf of London,”
and lots more werewolf movies would follow. Arguably the best of them all, and most critics
wouldn’t disagree, was 1981’s “An American Werewolf in London.” It was funny, and frightening, and for the
time the special effects were mind-blowing. No Dracula appeared in this movie, though. When we analyze at the powers of Dracula it
all depends on what you are looking at, so when we put a werewolf toe-to-toe with Dracula
we really have to know which Dracula we are talking about. Typically he has superhuman speed and strength,
and if he wants to, he can change into a bat which helps him to get out of certain situations
with great stealth. Sometimes he can teleport, which is also a
pretty good tool when the going gets tough. He is also said to be telepathic and can even
control people’s minds. In some cases he can even get the animals
on his side by controlling them, so that’s not a bad thing to have either when you need
help. In the Marvel comic book version he is stronger
than in the movie versions, with perhaps more agility and strength. On top of that, he has amazing intelligence
and can even control storms. Give him more blood, and he usually gets even
stronger. You can shoot him, beat him, but you won’t
kill him like that. We’ll get around to his weakness, but first
let’s look at the powers of a werewolf. Again, this thing has superhuman speed and
strength. In fact, he has a lot of similarities to Dracula
except for perhaps the great intelligence and ability to just disappear or reappear. A werewolf does have incredible agility, and
can sometimes to be seen jumping amazing distances. Ok, so it can’t disappear, but when you
can jump 50 meters maybe that is good enough. It also has amazing senses and stamina. Now for weaknesses. If Dracula sounds unbeatable in some respects,
he does have quite a few flaws. He can’t stand sunlight, so if you drag
him into that he will get burned and if he stays there it will finish him off. But our fight will take place at night perhaps. You can also put him on the backfoot by putting
a holy cross in his face, some garlic, or throwing holy water on him. That will dent his morale for sure, and he
might just try to escape. Ok, so in some depictions he just laughs that
stuff off and tells his enemy that this only works in stories, but let’s be purist here
and say that those things do actually hurt him. The problem for the werewolf is that these
beasts are not renowned for their planning skills. When they turn, they are usually out of control. So, we are thinking that our werewolf hasn’t
been down to the local church in human form and gotten hold of some holy water and then
headed to the supermarket to pick up a few cloves of garlic. In fact, in most cases the human form of werewolves
are not sure what happened to them after they have shape-shifted. You might also drive a wooden stake into Dracula’s
heart, but this is usually best not attempted when he is out and about. After all, how can you do that to something
that can climb walls, change into a bat and completely disappear. Try driving a pin into a housefly’s heart
and you’ll see what we mean. Even if a werewolf ripped Dracs to shred his
injured body would just regenerate, but we are thinking being torn to pieces would certainly
set him back a bit. Now, the werewolf has one main weakness and
that is being shot by a silver bullet. He can also regenerate, perhaps more slowly
than Dracula, but in the case of a silver bullet getting him that is not so. He may have an infectious bite, but we are
thinking Dracula is immune to that. So, while the werewolf has far fewer weaknesses
the one he does have is a biggy. The reason for that of course is that Dracula
can plan, and he might have been down to the store at night and picked himself up a gun. He might then have bought a silver bullet
off eBay. This is a major problem for our werewolf. If that didn’t happen, a cage-fight type
of scenario would likely see Dracula doing a lot of running. He’d just take off, knowing that getting
into a wrestling match with this utterly terrifying and outrageously vicious beast would be a
waste of time and regenerative power. We don’t really think Dracula would have
enough in his physical arsenal that could bring the werewolf down. It would be a war of attrition, with both
suffering injuries and both having to regenerate a lot. But we think in the end if these two were
really intent on killing each other, Dracula would sit tight, do his shopping, wait for
a full moon and then shoot the werewolf. Let’s imagine Dracula doesn’t know who
the human form of the werewolf is. That’s not how it happens in the film Van
Helsing, as when Van Helsing turns into a wolfman he just bites Dracula and that infectious
bite turns the vampire into bones. But hey, that’s just fiction, and we don’t
think it would go down that way. Ok, so now let’s have a look at what others
think about this. Do they see the same scenario as we do? That brains beats brawn. Well, the top post on a Quora thread about
this contains these lines, “Against Dracula, no mere werewolf stands a chance.” That poster agreed that in terms of physical
power they are closely matched, but Dracs would just outsmart the beast. In fact, that person said the werewolf would
likely end up working for Dracula. He would tame the savage dog! Others say the same, but they also say Bram
Stoker’s Dracula was perhaps not good enough to beat the werewolf, only the more modern
iterations could. Everyone seems to agree that it is Dracula’s
extra powers that would win the fight for him. We might remember that he can control animals,
too, and that is said to include wolves! Although, don’t despair werewolf fans. We like this point that we found on another
forum, when the question was asked who would win this fight: “Werewolf. They lack the weaknesses that vampires have. They can stroll around in the daylight and
if they locate where the vampire is sleeping, drag his lethargic ass into the sunlight and
torch him.” The problem with this of course is what we
said earlier, in that is the werewolf a good enough planner to go looking for Dracula? In fact, on the rest of that same thread every
single person said a vampire would win for the reasons that we have talked about today. The again, it all really depends on what kind
of Dracula we are talking about as he has been created in weaker forms. Lastly, maybe the funniest comment we found
was on a website called Vampires.com. Ok, so that site might be a bit biased in
favor of the vampire. It listed nine reasons why Dracula would win,
nothing we haven’t said today. But it also added this, “Werewolves are
usually crippled by a lengthy, painful transformation, giving a vampire ample time to smoke, check
his laundry, eat a light dinner of blonde virgin, watch the latest episode of True Blood
on HBO, come back after picking up his dry cleaning, and finish the werewolf before he’s
even finished growing a tail.” What we’d like to do now is turn this over
to you. Who do you think would win? Do you agree with our assessment today? Why, or why not? Tell us in the comments. Also, be sure to check out our other show
You vs Freddy Kreuger - Who Would Win. Thanks for watching, and as always, please
don’t forget to like share and subscribe. See you next time.
