Main cast: Gael García Bernal (Jack Russell), Laura Donnelly (Elsa Bloodstone), and Harriet Sansom Harris (Verussa)
Director: Michael Giacchino

I wish so badly that Werewolf by Night isn’t connected to the MCU, because for one, the twist in this movie would be awesome had its title already hadn’t spoiled it, and two. good lord, the MCU is already convoluted and labyrinthine as it is with gods and Eternals and vampires and time cops… and now monsters and werewolves too?

It’s fine in the comics because nobody is trying to squash everything together into one sandbox, but that’s what the MCU is trying to do, and the result is just sprawling chaos of WTFery.

This show, on the other hand, could have been an interesting entry that would work great as either a standalone or the start of a franchise unshackled by ties to the MCU.

So yes, it’s a world of monsters and monster hunters. No, not that kind of monster hunters, we’re talking about people using weapons and rules of cool to take down great beasts.

The greatest of them all, Ulysses Bloodstone, possessed a gem that shares the same name as his last name—a coincidence, surely—and the gem granted him superhuman strength and longevity. Well, he has no use of the Bloodstone now, as he’s dead.

His widow Verussa Bloodstone summons five of the other most successful monster hunters out there to come to the Bloodstone estate to take a test that will determine the new owner of the gem. Joining the fun is our hero Jack Russell, whose werewolf identity is spoiled by the title of this show as well as for anyone that has read the comics with him in it, and the rest Jovan, Liom, Azarel, and Barasso.

Also there is Elsa, Ulysses’s estranged daughter that decides to return after 20 years to compete.

The test is simple: a terrible monster, one that these hunters have never seen before, will be set loose in the estate grounds with the Bloodstone implanted on it. Whoever kills it and retrieves the Bloodstone will the new owner of the gem and the Bloodstone estate—the new monster hunter boss.

Thus begins the suspense. Will anyone not named Elsa and Jack Russell end up the winner? Oh, and Jack has his own motives to take part. Let’s just say he’s not exactly interested in winning, but rather, he intends to do something else altogether for a friend of his.

Let me give the lowdown on the good part first. Yes, part—singular. The movie has a solid pace and generally entertaining to watch.

Now, the bad. These are all rather minor, sometimes petty issues, but the sheer number of them causes my annoyance to snowball and make me duck an oogie off the final score.

At the end of the day, this is a present day MCU movie: the guy that gives this movie its title turns out to be a bungling fool that, even in werewolf form, can only take down mooks while it’s Elsa that does all the heavy lifting. Girlboss forever, after all. Poor Jack isn’t even granted the coup de grace: that goes to Ted.

Hence, Jack may be the titular character, but is of not much import or relevance aside from facilitating the girlboss’s ascension to her rightful place.

Still, that doesn’t mean he’s a complete dud as a character. An affable and not-so-capable nice guy that transforms into a dangerous werewolf makes for an interesting juxtaposition—there’s a reason why Escanor is the only cool one of the Seven Deadly Sins, let’s just say—and who knows, Jack may get to shine one day in a sequel, provided the MCU wouldn’t still crap the bed by then.

Elsa isn’t that bad of a girlboss compared to some of the recent ones that slithered out of the MCU slime pit, as she also gets beaten up now and then and she does need Jack’s help as much as he needs his. It’s just that the script does the character really dirty by handing all the victories to her instead of sharing it more fairly with Jack, sigh.

Also, she takes down supposedly best monster hunters like they are amateurs, so once again, we have a present day show that tells me how women are stronger and better than men only when these men are deliberately made weak and ineffective. Doesn’t anyone realize how insulting this kind of “female empowerment” is to females in general? What, women can shine only when they play in easy mode? Sod off!

One more thing: the fight scenes are pretty sad. Seriously, people, a werewolf with kung-fu?

Oh, and poor Gael García Bernal—they gave him some facial decorations that could have looked good, but because this movie is done in black and white, he just looks like he has some unnatural fungus or something growing on his face. He does a pretty good job channeling his inner Roddy McDowell though!

That’s why I really, really wish Werewolf by Night is a show unshackled from the MCU. The tedious tropes of present day MCU plague the otherwise intriguing script and turns the whole thing into another show that wants people to tune in for the lead character referenced in the title only to cringe as some snotty girlboss upstage and belittle the titular character.

Such a waste, really.