Day 8: Where Wolf By Night?

October 8, 2022

Dear Disney,

Tonight, Darling and I sat down to watch a brand-new Marvel Special Presentation, Werewolf by Night. We went into this presentation knowing nothing about the source material. We turned off the lights and turned-on Disney+. and started the movie. The following hour was something else.

I do not want to spoil anything, so I will quickly summarize the premise of the show. The patriarch of a family of Monster Hunters had recently passed without an heir leaving behind a mystical jewel called the Bloodstone. In order to determine who the new owner of the jewel will be, a group of monster hunters was called together and one of them would be the new owner and heir to the Bloodstone.

Darling and I watched the entire movie and when it was done, we turned to each other and said, “I want more.” We loved every part of the presentation. At first, Darling did not like the sepia, film noir color scheme as it hurt her eyes. However, after the first fight scene, the reason for the color scheme became evident. The fight scenes were smooth, and beautifully choreographed, and, if in color, would be extremely gory.

The dialogue was smooth and witty, and the characters were either meant to be hated or meant to be enjoyed. It could have been easy to make these characters wooden and boring, but the characters were not. They were delightful and cute and wonderful, or so terrible that you rooted for their come-uppance. The two protagonists Elsa and Jake, played by Laura Donnelly and Gael Garcia Bernal, chemistry together was delightful. I cannot wait to see more of them in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

One of the many things that we enjoyed was that the film was almost grindhouse in its art style. Cigar burns would show up in the upper corner of the film. The only thing that we thought missed the mark was that the film was too nice, too crisp, too sharp to really be a grindhouse picture.

This will be a perennial favorite of ours and we hope that Marvel makes more of these films.

Sincerely,

Jim Dear and Darling