Review of Werewolf by Night
I just saw the Marvel / Disney+ “Special” Werewolf by Night. It was very good. I liked it. I will pick apart some things, particularly about Disney / Marvel policies, but know that in general I did love this Special (as they called it).
Most of it was shot in black and white and it has very good atmosphere and ambiance. It does feel like an old Universal or even Hammer (though those were usually in color) monster movie.
It is good to see the MCU (Marvel cinematic Universe) finally tap into its Gothic properties. This was the first time I had seen the character of Jack Russell (Yes, that’s really his name but they never say the last name in the special) in something other than animation. It was also good to see a depiction of Man-Thing that wasn’t in a low budget schlock film that technically counted as a Syfy Original movie.
I wish Marvel would use its supernatural / Gothic properties more than just around the Halloween season. As someone who loves Gothic Horror this is what turned me off of Marvel in recent years, the way they downplay their supernatural and Gothic properties in favor of scifi. Even the director of Doctor Strange (Who is supposed to be the Sorcerer Supreme) patted himself on the back about how everything in the movie could be explained with theoretical physics. If you want real elemental magick you have to hunt down the animated Doctor Strange movie from 2007, actually titled Doctor Strange: Sorcerer Supreme.
You may notice that was before Disney purchased Marvel. It was after Disney purchased Marvel that they started to heavily downplay the supernatural content. This was both to appeal to the Chinese market (who don’t like Western depictions of the supernatural) and to differentiate Marvel from Disney proper. Disney would have the magick while Marvel would be (as they intended) superheroes only.
I feel that if this had been just twenty or so minutes longer it could have been released theatrically however Disney is still obsessed with getting that coveted Chinese market and China will not allow “Western depictions” of the afterlife. i.e. Ghosts and things they consider occult (Though they allow the Fantastic Beasts franchise through...) The Chinese market has hindered supernatural horror here in the US for years. It’s why so few movies with supernatural content have large budgets. Most are made on a shoe string budget so that it doesn’t matter if it’s released in China or not to earn a substantial profit. It’s also why films like the Child’s play reboot went with an evil / malfunctioning AI instead of a possessed doll. Same with the movie M3gan.
Don’t let them trick you into thinking modern horror audiences don’t like supernatural content, or think it’s silly, or not scary. No. That’s not the reason. Real horror fans still love the supernatural. There’s nothing quite as scary as the unknown. And evil artificial intelligences have been done to death since the 60s.
The cynic in me feels that the gimmick of making it look like it was made in the 1930s had a secondary purpose of showing blood that was not red- and thus bypassing regulations that would have gotten the “special” an MA TV rating (The TV equivalent of an R rating).
When I was a teenager I loved Marvel’s horror properties. Tomb of Dracula, Werewolf by Night, Legion of Monsters, etc.. But by the twenty teens it was as if Marvel was shying away from the supernatural, even in their comic books. The only good vampire story they did in years was Avengers: Vampire Wars in 2019. And that was barely promoted. Most people didn’t even know the story arc happened.
The plot of werewolf by Night is Ulysses Bloodstone has just passed away, the Patriarch of the Bloodstone family and a secret cult of monster hunters. You can tell right away from the dialogue that these aren’t like Doctor Abraham Van Helsing trying to protect the world from evil. No. These are paranoid and self-righteous fanatics with a blood lust, looking for the freedom to kill anything they deem non-human. The only one that might be different from the rest of this sect is Elsa Bloodstone.
In the comics of the 2000s Elsa felt like a little bit of a knock-off of Buffy The Vampire Slayer but I think enough time has passed and they made enough tweaks to the character that this version stood on her own without anyone thinking of Buffy. Unfortunately now there might be comparisons to Syfy’s Van (Vanessa) Helsing.
One day I’d love to see a woman vampire hunter in the style of Peter Cushing’s Dr. Van Helsing. An older woman at least in her fifties, and perhaps dressed like a Victorian era man instead of in tight leather, as female vampire hunters have been forced into in pop culture since the 90s.
This gathering of monster hunters had a competition in mind, hosted by Ulysses widow (Elsa’s stepmother). They are allowed to kill each other in the process. The contest is to find and kill a monster, which they have attached the bloodstone amulet. The amulet grants near-immortality to its wearer, as well as enhanced strength and stamina and can weaken supernatural entities. “Monsters” (beings of the supernatural) cannot touch the bloodstone without being hurt.
A man is there who appears to be after the prize. This is Jack (Werewolf by Night). He’s actually there to rescue Man-Thing. If you’re not familiar with Man-Thing, he’s pretty much Marvel’s version of Swamp Thing only mute and his touch can burn and kill you if you are afraid. If you are not afraid his touch will not harm you. In this story Man-Thing answers to his previous human name of “Ted” much like how sometimes Swamp Thing answers to Alec.
Trivia: The creator of Man-Thing was roommates with the creator of Swamp Thing so it’s unclear which came up with the idea first.
Elsa learns the important lesson that not all monsters are evil as she helps Jack and later both Jack and Ted help her. Needless to say the other hunters (and her stepmother) end up dead and Elsa inherits The Bloodstone amulet.
My one big complaint was something that I thought as clever at first. They made the body of Ulysses Bloodstone look like the literary Frankenstein Monster as illustrated by Marvel comics own “Monster of Frankenstein.” In the teaser I almost thought it would be the Frankenstein Monster, who used to be portrayed as intelligent and articulate in Marvel comics and went by the name Adam... until they started to let people who never read Mary Shelley’s original novel write the character... Then he was portrayed as simple-minded like in some cliché horror movies.
The reason Ulysses resembling the literary Frankenstein bothers me is this homage indicates that Marvel has no intention of ever using their version of Adam Frankenstein with the literary look. And that’s a shame. They had one of the best versions of the Frankenstein Monster. He was even good in the kid friendly game Superhero Squad Online.
This felt almost like a TV pilot so I hope Werewolf by Night or Elsa Bloodstone end up with their own TV series as a result. The story appeared to be set in the 1930s. It would be nice if Marvel actually allowed some of its characters to be immortal. In the original Wolfman movies, Larry Talbot was immortal. DC doesn’t shy away from its supernatural properties or immortal characters. (See Lucifer, Doom Patrol, The Sandman, and Dead Boy Detectives).
They also implied that usually Jack only changes form during the full moon like in The Wolf-Man, which is ironic because when someone wanted to do a Werewolf by Night movie in the 90s, Stan Lee cynically suggested that they use any werewolf, that they didn’t need to waste money by using Marvel’s. Stan Lee had implied that Jack was so under-developed that there was nothing special to him. I don’t think Stan Lee was that fond of the Marvel horror properties even though Tomb of Dracula is considered a classic now.
Back when I was reading Werewolf by Night comics Jack was changing whenever emotional or he could shift at will, a bit like The Hulk. I guess someone didn’t want any “confusion.” I hate idiot proofing. Idiot Proofing is the impolite term for when Hollywood over-simplifies things because they underestimate the audience’s ability to follow the story.
I would like to see Marvel brave enough to use characters like these in the “Off season” that is to say outside of just around Halloween. It would show that they have faith in the property as being able to stand on its own and not just as a Halloween gimmick. I had forgotten how much I had loved Marvel’s Gothic properties and there certainly was good ambiance with this, even if it was a bit predictable. But sometimes predictable is good. There’s an entire generation that doesn’t know these tropes and never watched the classic monster movies so this could be a gateway for them to get into traditional Gothic Horror.
