‘Hotel Transylvania: Transformania’ Theory – The Zombies Are Enslaved by Dracula to Serve the Hotel
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania is the fourth and final installment in the animated franchise. It seeks to tie up all of the loose ends for its lovable movie monster characters. However, one specific Hotel Transylvania: Transformania gag points to a dark theory involving the zombie staff. Dracula (voiced by Brian Hull) actually enslaves them to serve the hotel against their human will.
[Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers from Hotel Transylvania: Transformania.]
‘Hotel Transylvania: Transformania’ incorporates a ‘monsterification ray’
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania finds Dracula and Ericka (Kathryn Hahn) ready to throw in the towel and retire. They decide that it’s best to gift the hotel to the family. Dracula’s daughter, Mavis (Selena Gomez), and her husband, Jonathan (Andy Samberg) are next in line. However, Dracula fears that his son-in-law will run the hotel into the ground. He lies to Jonathan and blames “monster real estate law.” Dracula says that he can only transfer the ownership of the hotel to another monster.
Jonathan seeks out the help of Van Helsing (Jim Gaffigan). He uses a “monsterification ray” to turn the human into a monster. As a result of serious miscalculations, Dracula and some of his monster friends into humans. The monsterification ray is accidentally destroyed in the process, but not all hope is lost. Dracula and Jonathan set out on an adventure across the world. They must find a cure before it’s too late.
Dracula enslaves the zombies to the hotel
After Jonathan gets turned into a monster, Dracula chases his son-in-law around the hotel with the ray to try and turn him back into a human. However, he’s too fast and difficult to hit with the ray. As a result, he keeps accidentally hitting other targets in a rush to solve the problem before Mavis and Ericka find out what happened.
One of the targets he hits with the ray happens to be one of the zombie staff members in the hotel as he’s pushing some luggage along. He turns into a human and exclaims in excitement and relief that he’s finally free. Immediately after, Dracula shoots the monsterification ray at him and turns him back into a zombie. He lets out a sigh of sadness and continues working.
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania continues to display Dracula’s control over his zombie staff. Nearly every installment shows them obeying his orders, even if it results in them losing their heads or being set on fire. They never tag along on any of the adventures that other staff do. The Hotel Transylvania zombies always remain at the hotel unless they’re doing Dracula’s bidding.
Van Helsing’s monsterification ray has the ability to turn the zombies back into humans, which is clearly what this particular zombie wanted. Dracula took his short-lived humanity back and doomed him to an eternity of servitude.
‘Hotel Transylvania: Transformania’ leaves the zombies in Mavis and Jonathan’s hands
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania ends with Dracula returning to a vampire and Jonathan returning back to his human self. He gives Mavis and Jonathan the key to the hotel that is now destroyed by the hamster that Van Helsing turned into a monster with the monsterification ray. They are now able to build the hotel once again, but in their own image for the future.
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania leaves the zombie staff in the hands of Mavis and Jonathan. Since this is the final installment, the world will never know how they truly run the hotel. The more cartoon-ish animation at the end depicts how their version of the hotel looks, but it’s likely that they simply serve whoever owns the hotel. Perhaps Mavis and Jonathan will treat the zombie staff with a little bit more respect.
Hotel Transylvania: Transformania is now available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
