How 'Moon Knight's Soundtrack References The Moon Knight/Dracula Meme

Music plays a big role in Disney+'s Moon Knight show -- not just because Wham!'s "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" played in the first episode and that's such a banger, but also because for the second episode in a row, we've heard the Bob Dylan tune "Every Grain of Sand" when Ethan Hawke's character is on the screen. The meaning there is pretty straightforward since Hawke plays a messianic character and the song has multiple references to Jesus. But, given the knowledge that song choices in this show are not accidental, what are we to make of the scene where Oscar Isaac is talking to a storage company worker and this classic Goth rock number can be heard on the radio? 

"Bela Lugosi's Dead" is, of course, about actor Bela Lugosi, famous for playing Dracula in two movies and Dracula-like characters in dozens more. Is the inclusion of this song a reference to Moon Knight being "undead" (as the song shouts a million times) because he died and was brought back to life by an Egyptian deity? Or could they be teasing an appearance by Dracula himself, who we'll remind you had his own 70-issue Marvel comic and has met the X-Men multiple times? This couldn't possibly be a reference to that meme where Dracula owes Moon Knight money ... right? 

Actually, believe it or not, it looks like that's exactly what this is. In a recent podcast interview, Moon Knight head writer Jeremy Slater talked about desperately trying to fit the character's foul-mouthed memes into the show. He references the one where Moon Knight makes fun of Punisher's dead family ... 

The one about his uncanny ability to throw "random BS" at criminals (note that the BS in question looks a whole lot like the golden scarab that plays a big role in the show's story) ... 

And, yes, the Dracula one, which is an edited version of a panel from a 1987 Avengers issue. According to Slater, including that meme in a Disney production proved to be a challenge: "We tried so hard, because we can't say (the F word) on Disney+ and we also don't have Draculas in the show. We tried so hard to think of some way to reference those memes and we just couldn't do it, I couldn't get it in there. Hopefully, maybe someday."  

While the mention of "no Draculas in the show" dashes our hopes of a live action recreation of that moment, the fact that the writers are not only aware of the meme but big fans of it suggests that the song choice wasn't accidental. We'll know this for sure when episode 3 has a scene including the classic Billy Joel song "Moon Knight Throws Random Crap At People And Makes Punisher Cry." 

Follow Maxwell Yezpitelok's heroic effort to read and comment on every '90s Superman comic at Superman86to99.tumblr.com. 

Top image: Marvel Studios, Marvel Comics