Hey everyone, Slick Dungeon, here and you know what has been missing from my Universal Monster party? Werewolves. That’s right, the hairy, transforming creature has only just made its appearance on the Universal stage. Today I am going to review Werewolf of London (1935).

This movie is from 1935 so I am pretty sure I am okay to go ahead and say it’s your fault if anything below is a spoiler to you. Still, some people grow hair on their knuckles over that sort of thing so consider yourself warned.

Werewolf of London was one of the first movies to feature werewolves. This film should not be confused with the much more popular film The Wolf Man. I will get to that one but the Werewolf of London came first so I am reviewing it first.

The movie starts with a couple of Londoners in Tibet trying to get a hold of a rare flower that only blooms in moonlight. In their attempt to do so, one of them is bit by what looks like a man and a wolf combined. The film starts with good potential there and talks about superstitions and we all know where it is going.

The next, I don’t know, really long part of the movie, is a garden party. Yep, that’s right, there is a really long sequence at a botanical society and it is every bit as exciting as that sounds. There is a rival botanist who wants the moon flower that the Londoner stole because, well, it cures, “werewolfery”. The film tries to make the whole thing seem menacing but it comes off as pretty silly.

I’m sure you know where it goes from here. The botanist from London transforms into a werewolf. He does bad, bad things. We get to see a transformation and some makeup artistry at work and then, ultimately he is stopped.

The best part of this movie is the two innkeeper women who bicker with each other and occasionally knock one another out. For the rest of this movie I would put this in the Incredible Hulk category for MCU movies. That is to say, it is one you can skip and get along in life without just fine.

Still, there is one really good thing to come out of this film. And that’s not even a film, it’s a song. Warren Zevon watched this movie randomly on television one day and he was convinced that he should write a song about it and create a dance craze to go along with the movie. The song became a smash hit and is still played on the radio today. I bet you want to listen to it. No problem, I have you covered, just play the video below!

Horrifically and musically yours,

Slick Dungeon