In the late 2010s, Universal tried to reverse engineer a cinematic universe with the “Dark Universe”, which was meant to start with Tom Cruise’s version of The Mummy, but after that movie ate sh-t at the box office, the whole thing was cancelled, taking down a series of movies meant to star Javier Bardem as Frankenstein’s monster, Johnny Depp as the Invisible Man, and Russell Crowe as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (he appeared in The Mummy and I think this is the start of Russell Crowe’s “silly voice” era in which he does a series of preposterous accents in his films for no apparent reason). 

 

But then, in 2020, Australian filmmaker Leigh Whannell remade The Invisible Man with Elisabeth Moss and Oliver Jackson-Cohen and turned it into a low-fi horror allegory for intimate partner violence. That movie rocks, but due to timing, the early COVID shuffle cut its cultural moment short. Whannell, however, proceeded to net another Universal monster movie, and his version of Wolf Man is due to hit theaters in January 2025. The full trailer is out, and it sort of looks like Whannell might be turning the classic Universal movie monsters into stand-ins for domestic violence. 

 

Wolf Man has been through some creative gyrations since 2020. It was originally going to be Whannell’s follow-up to Invisible Man, but then he had to leave due to a scheduling conflict, and Derek Cianfrance took over, with Ryan Gosling slated to star. But delays and creative differences ended with the project back in Whannell’s hands, and The Gos left, too, with Christopher Abbott taking over as the Wolf Man. It was also supposed to come out on October 25, just in time for peak spooky season, but it was bumped to January 2025 for no given reason. That’s too bad, because this October is shockingly skint on new horror movies, it’s basically just Terrifier 3 and Smile 2, both of which are technically slashers. We’re missing a good monster movie this year. Would’ve been a wide-open field for Wolf Man. 

 

All these shakeups aside, Whannell’s take on the Wolf Man looks good. Horror nerds were upset by the somewhat scraggly appearance of this Wolf Man, seen here for Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights:

That’s just a guy walking around in broad daylight. I’m not holding that against the movie, but it DOES fit with Whannell’s lo-fi approach to these monsters so far. There is a blink and you’ll miss it glimpse of Christopher Abbott as the Wolf Man in the trailer. I think it’s really going to come down to how much we see of him in action, and how Whannell sets up those shots. What he did with the Invisible Man was pretty rad, though, so we ought to give him the benefit of the doubt here.

 

Wolf Man also looks like another domestic violence setup, though how that jives with Abbott’s character being turned against his will, I’m not sure. But there’s a whiff of his family—Julia Garner co-stars—learning to distrust and fear him, so I do think the door is open for Whannell to continue that thematic thread. After The Invisible Man, I am VERY willing to see where Leigh Whannell goes with Wolf Man, even if I would rather see it now, in October, rather than in the depths of January’s bad movie boneyard.

 

Wolf Man trailer stills
Photo credits: YouTube/ Universal

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