Wolf Man Has A Rare Horror Movie Problem That Sinks Its Story
Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for Wolf Man (2025)
While Wolf Man’s story could have been compelling, the Blumhouse movie’s small cast ends up completely killing its potential tension. 2025’s Wolf Man reboot has a very straightforward story. The city-dwelling writer Blake tentatively returns to his childhood home deep in the secluded mountains after his estranged father, who went missing years earlier, is finally officially declared dead. Blake brings his wife Charlotte and his daughter Ginger along for the trip and soon the small family falls victim to the titular threat when a werewolf causes them to crash their car.
By Wolf Man’s ending, Blake has transformed into a werewolf after sustaining a scratch from the creature during the car crash. Charlotte and Ginger mercy-kill him in what is clearly intended to be a moving moment. Although Wolf Man’s version of a werewolf looks and acts a little different from the traditional movie monster, it would truly be surprising if any viewer emerged from director Leigh Whannel’s movie feeling shocked by its conclusion. The revelation that the werewolf who attacked Blake was his missing father is so obvious that it barely registers as a twist.
Wolf Man’s Limited Cast Makes Its Plot Way Too Predictable
Wolf Man's Surviving Characters Are Easy To Guess
Although Wolf Man’s blend of home invasion horror and traditional werewolf story is responsible for at least some of the movie’s struggles, the Blumhouse effort’s biggest problem is its limited cast. The small set of characters inadvertently makes Wolf Man’s plot incredibly predictable. It is immediately obvious that the movie’s lone male main character is almost certainly going to become the eponymous Wolfman and, as such, is unlikely to make it out alive. Meanwhile, Ginger and Charlotte's survival is equally inevitable due to the story’s setup.
Wolf Man would need to be a profoundly darker type of horror movie for Ginger to die and Charlotte to survive.
If Charlotte was killed protecting her young daughter from the werewolf, Ginger would most likely die as she would be left alone in the wilderness with no caregiver. Meanwhile, Wolf Man would need to be a profoundly darker type of horror movie for Ginger to die and Charlotte to survive. Wolf Man’s cast makes the movie’s story immediately obvious, as viewers instinctively know who can and can’t survive before the plot has even begun. Even if it weren’t for Wolf Man’s nods to The Shining, few viewers were unlikely to expect that the family’s father would emerge unscathed while his wife and child perished.
Wolf Man’s Low Body Count Isn't A Problem (But Its Lack of Stakes Is)
The Blumhouse Werewolf Movie Follows A Predictable Plot
Since there was no way that a mainstream, mid-budget Blumhouse movie would kill off Charlotte or Ginger, most of Wolf Man's runtime is spent killing time waiting for Blake to transform and subsequently die tragically. A limited cast is not an inherent problem for a horror movie, and there are many surprisingly intense horror movies with a body count of zero. However, there is no real threat present here, since the outcome of Wolf Man’s story feels so obvious so early on.
Compared to Whannel’s earlier Universal horror movie The Invisible Man, the contours of Wolf Man’s plot are way too predictable for the viewer. By the process of elimination, it is instantly clear that Blake is the only character who is likely to die, and his father must be the werewolf, since the movie hasn’t introduced any other notable supporting characters. Thus, Wolf Man’s entire story can’t help but feel painfully rote despite solid performances and competent effects work.
Wolf Man
- Release Date
- January 15, 2025
- Runtime
- 103 minutes
- Director
- Leigh Whannell
- Writers
- Leigh Whannell, Rebecca Angelo
- Producers
- Beatriz Sequeira, Jason Blum, Ryan Gosling, Ken Kao
Cast
Christopher AbbottBlake
Charlotte
- Franchise(s)
- Universal Monsters
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