Man and Beast
As we have already seen in the previous chapter, much of Marvel’s output in the 1970s now looks like it was the product of an algorithm designed to generate increasingly awkward titles (with Giant-Size Man-Thing as the obvious winner). Given Moench’s avowed preference for comics on the margins, it was inevitable that he would get more than his fair share. Which brings us to Werewolf by Night.
Like Tomb of Dracula, Werewolf by Night was the product of an informal committee. Roy Thomas came up with the idea, co-plotted the origin with Jean Thomas, and gave the assignment to writer Gerry Conway and artist Mike Ploog (Sanderson, Marvel Chronicle 154). Stan Lee thought up the name. The first story appeared in the try-out tile Marvel Spotlight (issue 2, February 1972), paving the way for the Werewolf’s own series later that year. The series was passed from writer to writer until Moench took over with issue 20 (August 1974), staying on until the series' cancellation (issue 43, March 1977). Though he did not create the title character and made only a few changes to the series supporting cast, Moench stayed with the series the longest.
Werewolf by Night was never a particularly satisfying name. For one thing, it’s obvious: when else is a werewolf supposed to come out? For another, it was increasingly inaccurate, as Moench developed more and more ways to bring the creature out during the day time. Worst of all, it was a title that could not easily be applied to the character within the story (“Look! It’s the Werewolf by Night!”). Generally, he was just referred to as the Werewolf.
By day (and by nights without a full moon), the Werewolf was Jack Russell (I know, I know), whose grandfather, after daring to read and transcribe a forbidden grimoire called the Darkhold, was afflicted with lycanthropy. The curse was passed down to his son and grandson when they turned eighteen. Throughout the series, Jack, his friend Buck Cowan, his eventual love interest (a young psychic woman named Topaz), and his younger sister Lissa searched in vain for a cure.
The premise for Werewolf by Night places the comic squarely in the Jekyll-and-Hyde tradition of alternating, opposing selves, most notably developed in Marvel’s Hulk stories. Most versions of the Hulk, however, could speak, at least to some extent. The Werewolf, on the other hand, was, like Frankenstein’s Monster, Man-Thing, and N’Kantu the Living Mummy, inarticulate, growling and howling and, except in his earliest adventures, not shown to have any thoughts of his own. Moench’s predecessors on the title came up with an elegant solution to the problem presented by a functionally mute, mindless protagonist: the stories were narrated by the Werewolf’s alter ego, Jack. It was Jack’s voice that spoke to the reader through the captions, providing continuity of action and character that could cross day and night man and wolf. This also gives the book a more modern feel than many of its contemporaries, in that (like Deathlok), it avoids thought balloons.
But privileging Jack’s voice also frees the writer from having to bother giving the Werewolf any of his own psychological traits or quirks—he is simply a beast. Imagine the Hulk’s stories narrated by Bruce Banner: this would either detract from the monster’s own characterization or turn the comic into a duel between first-person voices: the Hulk as Deathlok. Instead, Werewolf by Night turns the multiple personality problem into a single personality problem. In the narration, sometimes Jack uses “I” when describing the Werewolf’s actions and feelings, and sometimes calls him “the Werewolf.”
This approach to the protagonist(s) characterization was made before Moench came on board, but its ramifications become clear as soon as he has rid himself of the dangling plot lines he inherited from previous writers. Issues 22 and 23 have the Werewolf facing off against Atlas, a handsome actor who was hideous disfigured in a fire. Clearly unhinged, Atlas is a “monster” who is still simply a new iteration of his previous self. By contrast, Jack/the Werewolf looks like a classic dual personality, despite the continuity of Jack's narration. The last panel of the story both reinforces and undermines Jack’s dual self;
The werewolf huddled in the greasy squalor of filth and garbage, licking his wounds and dreading the dawn.
As usual, he didn’t know what had happened.
Dawn wouldn’t be quite so kind to Jack Russell. (22)
They are two entities, but it is Jack who has the burdens of consciousness and comprehension.
The nature of Jack’s dilemma is made clearer in the storyline that followed. Issues 24-26 see Jack and Buck track down Winston Redditch, a scientist who is on the verge of distilling the human personality into purely good or purely bad versions of the original self. Buck thinks this research might help Jack solve his own lycanthropic predicament. Unfortunately for them, Redditch has just made a breakthrough and tested the serum on himself. Even worse, his wife, while dusting the lab, inadvertently swapped the “bad” forumula for the “good” one. Redditch has transformed into DePrayve, his own personal Mr. Hyde.
There is nothing particular interesting or original about the DePrayve/Redditch story. Indeed, it is so familiar that Moench is able to convey their relationship as much through shorthand (explicit references to Stevenson’s novel) as DePrayve’s melodramatic proclamations (“Redditch is dead! I killed him !”). Instead, the story works thanks to its implicit contrast with Jack/the Werewolf. Jack’s alter ego is nonverbal; Redditch’s won’t shut up. And all he wants to talk about is how much he is not Redditch.
When Jack finally does get ahold of Reddtich’s “good” serum, it has no effect on him. No explicit reason is given within the story, but then, Buck never makes a convincing case for why the serum should work on Jack in the first place. The obvious answer would be that science cannot remove a magical curse, but there is another possible reason that is much more thematically consistent. In postulating that Redditch’s research could help Jack, Buck has latched on to a faulty metaphor. Even if we assume that “good” and “evil” are relevant categories for scientific inquiry, they are not appropriate labels for the Jack/Werewolf dyad. Jack is good, of course, but there is no reason to assume he is an absolute paragon of virtue. Nor can the Werewolf, a creature of instinct, truly be called evil. And, most important, they are not diametrically opposed personalities. Jack’s recall of the Werewolf’s actions varies in its accuracy according to the needs of the plot, but the very fact of Jack’s continuous first-person narration demonstrates a continuity of consciousness, rather than a rupture.