Van Helsing S01e01: “Help Me” Overview

It is 2019, three years since “The Rising” began and civilization has fallen. Only whispers of a human savior have given mankind hope. Vanessa “Sleeping Beauty” Seward lies on a hospital bed. She has been sleeping for three years now. The hospital is being attacked by a group of vampires who are on a mission to kidnap her. While everyone is busy fighting back, three vampires reach her. The group leader named Flesh takes one bite on the sleeping Vanessa. He feels ill, vomits blood, and falls to his knees. Vanessa wakes up from her three-year coma. The other two vampires attack her. She has no problem defending herself.

Thirty-six hours earlier, Axel feeds the vampire Doc with his blood. The alarms went off. A group of human survivors who are being chased by vampires is knocking on the hospital door. One of them is Ted, Axel’s comrade. Axel opens the door for them. Wendy, one of the survivors did not make it inside. One of them is severely injured. John, Wendy’s husband wants to go back outside to look for her but Axel won’t allow it.

Ted and Axel talk about what happened to Doc when Ted, Gomez, and Smitty went out. They talk about what happened to Ted during his trip. Meanwhile, the new-comers are planning on killing the vampire Doc. Mohamad steps in to stop them. Sam backs him up. John and the others retreat.

The vampire attack has begun. Axel and the rest move to action. They find Vanessa pinning a vampire on the floor. She kills him and stands up then calls for Dylan. Shocked, she asks them who they are then pass out. They then throw dead vampires on the garbage shute.  

Vanessa is still aghast that she got bitten by one the vampires and nothing happened to her. She is worried about what happened to her daughter Dylan.  One of the survivors blames her for the attack, saying that she was the reason for it. Axel tells her that her daughter is probably dead. Ted reveals to her that the world went to shit a couple of years ago — a fact she did not know. Ted tells her he can help her get out of the hospital so she can find her daughter. He adds that Axel is a good guy but he is just a little by the book.

Axel and Vanessa talk in the shower. She asks him what happened to her. Axel says he does not know. He does not even know she has a daughter. He says he was sent to the hospital to pick up a dead body three years ago but a volcano goes off in Wyoming and wipes out half the Western states. That thereafter, people just started killing each other and it is called “The Rising”. He reveals that half a dozen of them were dropped off at the hospital and that his orders were to protect Vanessa and the Doctor — a duty that he is still fulfilling up until now.  Vanessa is curious why is anybody interested in her when she is nothing special. Axel has a theory that it has something to do with what is happening to the world.

Vanessa coerces Axel at gunpoint to let get out of the place. Ted helps her but they are stopped by Axel. Axel reveals that he knows it was Ted who stole the lock codes from his notebook and opened the hospital door so the vampires could attack. Ted then attacks Axel. Vanessa makes for a run to get out while Ted and Axel fight. Mohamad and Sam came to Axel’s rescue.

Vanessa reaches the rooftop. She sees the sky is covered with ashes blocking the sun. Ted reveals that his true intent is to deliver Vanessa to the vampires, dead or alive. He hostages Vanessa. Vanessa fights back but Ted stabs her right hand. Vanessa hits him in the eyes with the knife stuck at her hand, killing him. She pulls the knife but the wound heals instantly.

Flesh, the dead vampire emerges from the garbage shute with blood all over him. This time, he is no longer a vampire. He says it was Vanessa’s blood that turns him back to being a human.