Kirkman later pitched a new version of the film, leaning more into the comedic aspects of the story, and the production rights were acquired by Skybound Entertainment.

Renfield had its world premiere at the Overlook Film Festival on March 30, 2023, and was released in the United States on April 14, by Universal Pictures.

Renfield hopes to broker a land deal, and after proving to be a useful assistant, he ends up becoming Dracula's familiar, which grants him immortality and super strength and speed when he consumes bugs.

He tracks down one of the group member's abusive lovers so he can give him to Dracula without feeling remorse, but they are attacked by an assassin hired by the rival Lobo crime family, whom Renfield kills.

The two fight through corrupt police officers and Lobo henchmen who come to the apartment to kill them and escape, but after attempting to call Kate, Rebecca discovers that she has been taken hostage by Dracula and Bellafrancesca.

She tricks Dracula and injures him by exposing him to sunlight, leading to him having a final standoff with Renfield and Rebecca that ends with the two capturing him in a magical circle.

Kate is healed, Bellafrancesca is arrested, and Renfield resurrects his self-help group friends with Dracula's blood, feeling empowered to make a new life for himself.

The film was described as a comedic approach to the story of Count Dracula, in the vein of Taika Waititi's vampire mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows (2014), that focuses on the character of Renfield.

[17] In April 2021, Chris McKay entered negotiations to direct after Fletcher left to work on a reboot of The Saint for Paramount Pictures.

[39] The film's black-and-white opening scenes recreate the events of Dracula (1931) with Nicolas Cage and Nicholas Hoult respectively inserted in place of Bela Lugosi and Dwight Frye as Count Dracula and Renfield ("compositing the actors into the old backgrounds — we're just erasing [the original actors] and putting Cage and Hoult in"), with Helen Chandler and Edward Van Sloan appearing as Mina Seward and Abraham Van Helsing via archive footage.

[45] In the United States and Canada, Renfield was released alongside The Pope's Exorcist, Mafia Mamma, Sweetwater, and Suzume, and was projected to gross $8–10 million from 3,375 theaters in its opening weekend.

The website's consensus reads: "Although it fails to take full advantage of its committed stars and killer premise, Renfield's batty horror-comedy blend sinks in just enough to leave an impression.

[48] Tim Robey of The Daily Telegraph gave the film three out of five stars, writing, "It fulfils the basic requirements of a beat-'em-up formula established by Buffy and Blade, but that's it.

"[52] Amy Nicholson of The Wall Street Journal wrote, "The small gags are great, the overall story arc is weak—particularly a quasi-romantic subplot where a cop (Awkwafina) challenges Renfield to turn from heel to hero", and gave the film a B grade.

[53] Conversely, Kevin Maher of The Times gave the film a score of two out of five stars, calling it "a gore-splattered, consistently tiresome, one-joke movie that could only have been pitched in a Hollywood development meeting as, you know, 'It's fucking Dracula!

'"[54] Alison Willmore of Vulture praised the film's premise, but said it had "maybe a comedy sketch's worth of ideas to stretch over a feature-length run time.

"[55] ABC News's Peter Travers wrote, "what started as a clever, contemporary spin on the Dracula myth gets swallowed up into a quicksand of cartoonishly repetitive, R-rated action cliches that make Renfield seem too long at a scant 93 minutes.