It was a fortuitous combination. He had a feeling for that sort of material. Equally competent directors didn't seem to have the same feeling for that type of story. Fisher's admitted disinterest in science fiction, for instance, certainly makes those films less interesting (SPACEWAYS? Lord. There's nothing D.W. Griffith could've done to wake that one up). Don Sharpe comes close, and John Gilling. Freddie Francis, to me, always seemed more interested in visuals. Competent but uninvolved.

I really think BLOOD OF THE VAMPIRE is a good example. Other than Cushing or Lee in the cast, it has pretty much all the "Hammer" ingredients, but is just ponderous. Or anything done by Herman Cohen: similar schedules, overlapping cast members, color, shock sequences... nuthin', just nuthin' except laughs and homoerotic overtones.

That said, I also think that if Roy Baker would've directed something like SCARS OF DRACULA in 1958, he would've been the alternate-universe Fisher, it's just that SCARS was about 15 years too late: been there, done that, too many times.