My Crazy Youth: The Time that The Centurions Fought...Dracula

So this exists.

For Christmas, I got the multi-disc set containing the entire run of Centurions.  Naturally, I went right to finding the weirdest Episodes I could.  If you aren't a child of the '80s or never watched it, here's a refresher.  3 men (later 5) wore themed exo-suits (which is a tad redundant) that allowed them to use thematic weapon systems (for Air, Land or Sea).  Why?  They had to battle Doc Terror and Hacker, who is ironically quite dumb and probably didn't know Basic.  It's a pretty transparent Toy Line grab, but I still grew up loving the Show.  To give you an idea how weird this Show could get, the first one on the Disc was about Terror controlling whales to destroy bridges using a whale song...whilst inside of a giant, whale-shaped submarine and with a kidnapped Organist.  That's NOT the Episode we're highlighting, so bear that in mind.  The key thing to understand is that this Show is built around them constantly getting into their suits (after yelling 'Power Ex-treme!') and fighting Robots.  How does Dracula fit in?  Let's see...

The trio is called in to help Transylvania fend off a Doc Terror attack.  They accidentally address what must happen *constantly* as Max (the Sea guy) has nothing to do at first.

Of course, he goes in to check the Security and is called into action SECONDS LATER making this...entirely pointless.

They take out his forces- they were after a Monitoring Station if you were curious- and they crash into a Mountain.  They survive this and hike on foot to...

Castle Dracula.

No, really.

They convince Dracula to help them by calling the Centurions 'men of the law' and he attacks them at their weakest...and kidnaps Max.  Aim big, Drac!

The pair can't get their suits due to plot contrivance, so they go in with just their wits.  When confronted by a crossbow-wielding Max, Ace...takes out a cross.  This works.

I don't know why, Jake.  It just does.

The pair finally get their suits and absolutely wreck the place.  In fact...

They literally do (lamp shading it by saying 'Just like in the Movies.').  Jake here, however, is not shown leaving and he's in that bulky-ass suit, so...dead.

Nope.  Just bad Continuity.  Dracula flees the Sun and the bad guys escape (somehow).  The End.

Wow.  This was weird.  It was just a normal Show about guys in Power Armor battling 2 Cyborgs bent on world-domination until this point.  I kid, I kid.  The Show was always a bit weird, but generally just in the realm of Science-Fiction.  Giant Robots, Cyborgs and the like- all good.  Vampires, however, are another thing entirely.  It's also interesting how they do a whole Episode with nobody being turned into a Vampire, even a minor Character/Villager.  I'm sure it had to do with Standards & Practices.  The biggest thing is the disconnect between the Theme and the use of Villain.  They never have any of them really battle Dracula in their suits.  The closest thing they do is have Ace chase him around in his bat form until he flies into the view of the Sun.  The rest of them just fight robots and blow up a Generator.  Kind of weak, right?  In any event, this still exists and the World is greater for it.  Speaking of great, look who worked on the Show...

Amazing how you could go from 'Guys in Suits fight Robots' to 'Let's have Dracula show up!'  The 80s really did have the best drugs, I guess.