Horrifying challenges. A dream line-up of guest judges. A chaotic cast of monsters. Season 6 of The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula has got it all.

So say the horror icons behind the series, Dracmorda and Swanthula Boulet. Ahead of the new season’s October 1 premiere on Shudder and AMC+, the duo sat down with INTO to talk all things Dragula, including bringing back on-location floorshows, which classic horror movies inspired the season’s challenges, and why they think Longlegs could’ve gone straight to streaming.

The cast of Season 6 of The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula.

Hey Drac and Swan! I absolutely cannot wait for Season 6 of Dragula, especially seeing that you two have called it the best season yet. What sets it apart from the previous seasons?

DRACMORDA BOULET: I think the cinematography is really elevated. I think that the scripted portions of the show are much more fully realized this time, which I’m really excited about. And I think the cast — I mean, just everything about the show, we pushed to level 10. 

The exterminations, every episode is shocking. It’s not like, you know, sometimes we’ll do two really shocking ones, and then we’ll go easy on them for three episodes. That is not the case this time. Every one of them is horrible. [laughs] And the guest judges, it’s probably the most star-studded guest judge roster we’ve had, and the competitors are wild. They’re kind of Season 2 energy. And so I just think the show knocks it out of the park this year in every way.

I’m excited to see those exterminations! Do you think any of them will rival the needle extermination from the Season 2 premiere?

SWANTHULA BOULET: Absolutely. Probably more than once during the season.

Okay, terrifying. And speaking of those guest judges, are there any you’re especially excited for fans to see on the show?

DRAC: Jennifer Tilly is such a gem. She’s so herself at all times. So it was really fun to see her just be on the judges panel and be unrestrained. Jamie Clayton was fantastic. Honestly, all of them were great. They’re so pleasant to be around. They’re so happy to just be there. A lot of times they’re super fans of the show, and so they’re kind of giddy and taking pictures behind the scenes with us and stuff. It’s really fun.

SWAN: I think Akela Cooper was awesome to have; I love a new horror writer on the roster of guest judges. And I’ll double down with Jennifer Tilly and Don Mancini being on the same episode, and the challenge — the synergy is just perfect.

Does that mean we’re getting a challenge somehow connected to the Child’s Play franchise?

SWAN: Well, what do you think?

I’d hazard a guess, yeah!

DRAC: Yeah, sort of.

Everything about the show, we pushed to level 10. 

– Dracmorda Boulet

I can run with “sort of.” Another change to this season everyone’s excited for is a return to on-location challenges, which have been fan favorites in seasons past. What inspired the choice to bring them back with a vengeance?

DRAC: We always love to do that. But the truth is, as the show gets bigger it’s harder to pull stuff like that. It’s very expensive. It’s huge crews of people and all this equipment. We used to have a smaller budget, so it was easier to move the troop around. But now it’s like, oh my god, it’s a whole thing. 

Also, after Titans, we decided that was like chapter one of the show, so we wanted to do a new stage and change the way the floorshows were shot. Well, that costs a lot of money to build a whole new stage and a new set and a new soundstage and all that. So we were like, “We need to use what we spent our money on.” That was sort of a sacrifice — we couldn’t take them out as much, but we love the on-location challenges, so we got into a lot more of that this year. 

Not so much judging on location — I think that’s the part that proved to be very tricky, is like, how am I supposed to get Jennifer Tilly out to the woods two hours from LA? Not gonna happen, you know? But as far as the competitors doing things on location, there’s a lot more of that this season.

What are your favorite on-location challenges from past seasons?

DRAC: ​​God, so many of them. I think the cabin in the woods was really good. That was a lot of fun to shoot. And Season 1, the desert one, because that’s the first time we did it, and that sort of set the standard, I think.

SWAN: The trip to Wasteland Weekend, those two episodes, that was an experience. Because, you know, traditionally — and I think this is what the show is all about — Wasteland is kind of a heteronormative post-apocalyptic, like, “I drive a big truck and shoot guns for real” type of gathering. But they embraced us so fully. And when we were done fighting in the Thunderdome, people came up to us and they were like, “Those were the nastiest and most intense fights of the weekend.” The drag queens kicked more ass than the other people that were in there.

That tracks. This season also features a collab with video game franchise Dead by Daylight, with you two appearing as new killers in the game along with one of the Season 6 monsters. What excites you about that two-way collab?

DRAC: The first thing is, it’s an honor to be the first horror hosts featured in the game, because there’s a lot of movie killers in there — like Jason or Michael Myers or whatever — but they haven’t had any horror hosts in there yet. So to be the first to be invited to be on there is a real honor, and it means a lot to us. 

I think incorporating them into the show is a big deal, because a lot of people that are on Dragula played Dead by Daylight. So when the competitors heard that there was a Dead by Daylight challenge, I think they were just ecstatic. And I think the audience is going to be as well.

SWAN: I think the most exciting part is just being able to step into the skin of the Boulet Brothers and murder people with our giant claws. It’s going to be awesome.

Do you two play Dead by Daylight yourself?

DRAC: Yes! I think Swan infamously has talked about on our podcast, laughing, going around me sometimes while playing it and getting very upset.

SWAN: My favorite part about a Dead by Daylight experience is being over Drac’s shoulder, listening to her freak out over these little kids slapping her with crates because she likes to play the killer.

DRAC: Oh my god, it’s so f*cking annoying! I’m like, come on, if I put you on this hook, you should just die. And I have to sit there and guard it for a minute? I’m like, that’s annoying!

There’s going to be a lot of drama. I’ll just say that.

– Dracmorda Boulet

Yeah, how unrealistic! You also recently put out the first single from your upcoming EP The Boulet Brothers’ Halloween House Party, releasing on October 4. What inspired the EP?

SWAN: It’s an ode to classic Halloween vibes. And we love putting together playlists for fall like so many other people do, and we just imagine any of the songs on the new EP could appear on people’s Halloween playlist.

DRAC: We wanted to create an album, you know, like those classic holiday albums. Like, every family at Christmas pulls out this one record that they listen to. And so we wanted to create that for Halloween. 

This is a Halloween album that anybody can listen to. It’s perfect for pumpkin carving parties or little Halloween house parties and stuff like that. And it was a lot of fun to make, and we’re really excited about it.

Will any of the EP’s songs appear during Season 6?

SWAN: Yes! Much like Season 4, where one of the songs was featured as part of the challenge, we did that again for Season 6. “All Hallows’ Eve” is released now, but there’s a single that will come out to coincide with the challenge. And it’s a great challenge. The drag is so level 10. Like, I can’t wait for people to see it.

Can you give us a hint to the theme of the song and the challenge?

SWAN: I think all of them are an ode to Halloween in some way. I guess I’ll just leave it at that.

DRAC: I’ll say that there’s a movie that inspired the track called Terror Train. That’s my Easter egg.

Speaking of movies, do you have any favorite horror media that’s come out recently?

DRAC: So much. I mean, Cuckoo was really interesting. There’s been so much horror content coming out.

SWAN: I think Alien: Romulus kind of tapped the same vein that Alien and Aliens did. I know it didn’t make everybody happy, but I was happy when I left the theater. 

DRAC: Me too.

Any thoughts on Longlegs? That one was pretty controversial.

DRAC: I liked it! I mean, I did think it was more of a streaming release than a theatrical release. Like, I don’t know that I needed to see it in a theater, if that makes sense, but I thought it was good. I was intrigued by it.

It was also very cool that Osgood Perkins wrote and directed that. That’s so iconic.

SWAN: I liked it too — lowercase L. I think it was so hyped that my anticipation and my expectation was way amped up. “The scariest movie you’ve ever seen,” and people that listen to us in our podcast and stuff know, nothing scares Drac and everything scares me. So I was building myself up. I’m like, “Ooh, I’m ready to just be terrified. I want to leave and have nightmares.” And it just didn’t happen.

Hard agree. Anything else you’d like to add about the new season?

DRAC: I just want to ask fans to please be cool this year and not harass the contestants as much as they have in the past. Most of the fans are very respectful, but there is definitely a rough group of what I call toxic fans that just really make the competitors’ lives hell. And I hope that they do not do that this year, because there’s going to be a lot of drama. I’ll just say that.

Yeah, this cast of monsters looks like one for the ages!

DRAC: It’s a lot of fun, that’s the truth. The season is a lot of fun. I really think people are gonna like it a lot, and it’s gonna go down as maybe the best season of the show ever. ♦

Season 6 of The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula premieres on October 1 on Shudder and AMC+. Check out the trailer below.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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