8 Classic Monster Movies You Never Knew Were Reboots

2. Dracula (1931)

A lot of ink has been spilled over the decades about who cinema's greatest Dracula was. Those on Team Bela often tout their man as the original Count Dracula, which is both true and false.

Yes, Bela Lugosi was the star of the first licensed film adaptation of Dracula, and before that, he played the role on Broadway. However, the 1922 German film Nosferatu is, in fact, the first Dracula film. They called Count Dracula "Graf Orlok" and moved the action from London to Wisborg, but it was pretty blatant. The Stoker estate sued over it, won, and all copies were supposed to have been destroyed. Luckily, a single print survived, and we can still enjoy this early masterpiece of horror today. But that settles it, right, Nosferatu's Max Schreck was the first Dracula, case closed?

Yes and no. An even earlier film, Dracula's Death, is the first screen version of the vampire legend. The film is now lost, but we know from plot synopses that the story hinges on whether or not the protagonist, played by Erik Vanko, is delusional.

We'll seemingly never know who the real original screen Dracula was, but Team Bela should take solace in the fact that no one ever made any muppets resembling Max Schreck or Erik Vanko.