Cry Wolf: The Werewolf in Film and Television

A while back I did a couple of entries about vampires (seehere and here). So I felt it only fair that I also give some attention to that other often written about supernatural creature, the Werewolf. Werewolves have a long history in Hollywood, almost as long as vampires. Certainly the cinematic fame of Dracula was just as popular as that of the Wolf Man. And just as vampires have evolved and changed throughout the years, depicted in numerous different incarnations, so too have the same been done with werewolves.

Werewolfism, or lycanthopy, has its origins in popular folklore. Throughout the world there are numerous tales of men who become beasts or beasts who become men in all manner of different combinations. It was not until film adaptations and storytelling that the idea of a werewolf came into a solidified set of rules and features, most of which tend to be shared by all the different stories. Hollywood took a random scattering of folklore and myth and turned it into a genre.

As I mentioned, the origin of the werewolf in Hollywood is the brilliant film The Wolf Man, starring the brilliant Lon Chaney Jr. This film displayed so many of the classic werewolf tropes that would become staples of those types of films. The idea that being a werewolf is a curse spread by the bite of a wolf; the transformation during a full moon; the killing by a silver bullet. They’re all there in this first popular installment of werewolf cinema.

Since the Wolf Man, the rules for werewolves were pretty well established. You have to be bitten. You change during a full moon. You can only be killed by a silver bullet. And that was how werewolves were portrayed for the most part for almost forty years. It wasn’t until the 1980s that several new interpretations of werewolves were considered in a plethora of different movies.

An American Werewolf in London took the basic premise of the werewolf as established in previous movies but decided to completely revolutionize the onscreen transformation of the monster. Instead of just being an upright human with fur and claws, the poor victim of the werewolf bite turned into a monstrously large creature stalked the city streets, another change since most werewolf films took place in rural setting.

The same decade we were introduced to An American Werewolf in London, we were also introduced to one of the longest running werewolf franchises, The Howling. The Howling changed the rules of werewolf transformations, allowing the werewolves in the film to change into their monstrous forms whenever they chose. Also the franchise added an international feel to the idea of werewolves with the third installment set in Australia and subtitled The Marsupials. It depicted lycanthropes that did not change into wolves but some form of marsupial like beast, even depicting the female character of the film giving birth and the offspring living in a marsupial pouch.

The 80s film that really tried to change the way werewolf is portrayed was Teen Wolf. While werewolves had been in comedic films before, such as Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein, there had never really been a humorous portrayal of a person with lycanthropy. First of all they removed the idea of a curse from a bite, having the main character being just the latest in a long line in an entire family of werewolves. Being a werewolf was not being a monster. The main character actually uses his lycanthropy to gain popularity and athletic fame.

Although the Eighties saw a invigoration of werewolf storytelling, the next two decades were not as blessed. Multiple low budget and made for TV movies were released, recycling the same old tropes of the genre as seen in the near half a century of films before. A few clever attempts like Ginger Snaps, about sisters dealing with one of them becoming a werewolf, or Dog Soldiers, about a troop of British commandos attacked by a pack of werewolves, were enough to keep interest in the idea of lycanthropy alive.

What really led to a reinvigoration of werewolf films was the under recognized Underworld series. This series decided to depict the idea of Vampires and Werewolves in constant conflict with each other, an idea that had never really been explored before. Certainly there had been films that feature both a werewolf and a vampire in their cast of characters, but never something that portrayed a continuous conflict between the two. The reason why I feel it is so important to mention this is that I feel were it not for the vampires vs. werewolves depiction in the Underworld films, we might never have gotten the romantic rivalry of vampire vs. werewolf in the Twilight series.

Twilight, I hate to admit this, brought the idea of werewolves back into popularity in our current culture. The multitudes of (not always so) young women (and a few young men) declaring their affection for Team Edward or Team Jacob showed that there was an audience for werewolf heartthrobs. And if you watch any number of supernatural set TV shows, there are a ton of werewolf heartthrobs. There is Alcide on True Blood; Tyler on The Vampire Diaries; Josh on Being Human (US); Monroe on Grimm; Peter on Hemlock Grove; Dyson on Lost Girl; And nearly half the cast of the show Teen Wolf. I’m sure there are more but I only have so much time on my hands.

Genres and stories are meant to evolve. It is a sign of changing in society to see how our stories change along with us. As long as there are people who want to see new stories about werewolves then there will be people who will continue to try and find new ways to tell those stories, insuring they never grow stale.