Count Sam Dracula, better known as Grandpa and sometimes referred to as The Count, is one of the main characters from The Munsters. He is an undead vampire and the doting, irritable, and sarcastic father of Lily Munster. While Grandpa is generally considered the wisest member of the family, he also has a decidedly stubborn streak. If he feels he isn't getting his due respect, he will let everyone know it, and often sulk or go to extreme lengths to demonstrate his offense at a perceived slight. While generally a successful mad scientist and magician, his experiments tend to be comically absurd, in keeping with the genre.
Background[]
He is an elderly look alike and parody of Count Dracula. Grandpa has an extremely sarcastic personality, and often insults his son-in-law, Herman. Despite this, Grandpa and Herman are quite close, as in many episodes of The Munsters revolve around the zany schemes Grandpa and Herman concoct, which either end successfully or result in Lily scolding the two for their failure. Grandpa keeps a laboratory in the cellar of the house, and often refers to “going down to the lab.” The potions and magic spells he devises there are central to many of the show’s stories. Many of his inventions are less than successful, but he never stops thinking up new ones. Grandpa declares his age as 378 years in the episode “Grandpa’s Lost Wife”, placing his date of birth in the year 1588. Grandpa describes having been married “167 times”, and although his wives are “all dead”, he still keeps “in touch with them”. Grandpa’s wife, Lily’s Mother, makes an emotional appearance in The Munsters Today series in 1990, in the episode “Once In a Blue Moon”. She also appears in a photograph in the original series which was taken during Herman and Lily’s wedding. Grandpa can transform himself into a wolf or a bat, as per Bram Stoker’s Dracula. In “Herman’s Sorority Caper” and Munster, Go Home! it is revealed that he takes special pills to turn himself into these creatures. In later episodes, however, and in all episodes of The Munsters Today he changes to and from a bat simply at will.