Stanton's Big Checklist For Werewolf Movies

[PariahPoet]

To be to the point (sort of) I like seeing clothing being torn asunder by rippling, roiling flesh, with aforementioned flesh sprouting fur willy-nilly.[/i]

Meh, I really don't like roiling flesh. It may be dramatic, but it seems a bit silly to me. I can see joints shifting, and muscles growing, but just random bubbling looks gross. There's no reason why that would happen.
I also like a rather rapid shift, say no more than 10 seconds or so.
The way I see a shift going- first the eyes change then the bones shrink or extend to provide the framework. At this time the skin gets pulled taut. As the bones are starting to finish, the muscles grow and the skin catches up to the rest of the body, and the fur comes through as this is going on.
Meh, that's just me. I know everybody has their own version of what should go on in mind, just wanted to add my two cents.

[white]

Sounds decent to me. I don't know about 10 seconds, but shifting really shouldn't take too long.

[Lupin]

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

[Ultraken]

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

Agree with you there. "First Change" should be relatively slow and melodramatic, as it's usually a major plot point. Even then, don't drag it out for five minutes. This isn't porn, you know.

Once the werewolf gets the hang of it, changing shouldn't take very long. Bonus points if the werewolf isn't crippled by pain, and can do other things in the meantime. (That's the way I tend to have my characters do it, but I don't go for the "horror" aspect as much. Your mileage may vary.)

[PariahPoet]

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

Yeah, I agree on that one.

[Apokryltaros]

Wow, I thought I came up with some wierd stuff....
Very funny

My dear, you haven't seen anything yet.

[white]

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

Chalk up another agreement with you there.

My dear, you haven't seen anything yet.

Oh, if only you knew what went on in IRC just now...

[Lupin]

My dear, you haven't seen anything yet.

Oh, if only you knew what went on in IRC just now...

Heh, that conversation. But I think they were talking about Detatchable Penis

[white]

o.O what?

[Akela]

A WHAT? Some strange powers are at work here...

[Lupin]

Yeah it's a weird song by King Missile.

[white]

Weird is certainly the right word for it.

[Aki]

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

I don't think shifting you be *too* quick. Unless your Wolf is pretty magical. I like it taking at least thirty or so seconds(more for first shift). Enough time that shifting in combat runs the risk of your opponent getting you while you're f*** around. And enough that you aren't jumping forward and landing into a run as a full wolf (as friggin cool as that is .

....

All this talk of quick-shifting reminds me of 'The Werewolf Solution', heh.

*poof!*

[Shadow Wulf]

it should take about 20-30 seconds for an experience shifter.

[Apokryltaros]

My dear, you haven't seen anything yet.

Oh, if only you knew what went on in IRC just now...

Apparently, you've never met me in person.

Weird is certainly the right word for it.

"Lousy" is a better word for it, in my opinion.

Shifting should be quick, unless it's the's the person's first shift. Then play it out for all it's worth.

I don't think shifting you be *too* quick. Unless your Wolf is pretty magical. I like it taking at least thirty or so seconds(more for first shift). Enough time that shifting in combat runs the risk of your opponent getting you while you're F@&^$ around. And enough that you aren't jumping forward and landing into a run as a full wolf (as friggin cool as that is .

....

All this talk of quick-shifting reminds me of 'The Werewolf Solution', heh.

*poof!*

The degree of loathing and disgust I feel towards "*poof* I'm a werewolf" type escapes my ability to describe it in mere words.
I'll grant that that when it's shown on movies, or cartoons, the people are just being lazy, but, when I read it in stories, well, things get really ugly.

it should take about 20-30 seconds for an experience shifter.

On the other hand, a 'shift can be drawn out too long...
Like when Eddy changed in "The Howling."

[Timber-WoIf]

First shif should eb drawn out, each successive shift should be shorter, mabie settling around no more than 10 seconds.

my openion

[Lupin]

All this talk of quick-shifting reminds me of 'The Werewolf Solution', heh.

*poof!*

Yeah, that would be a little too quick for a serious movie.

[Ultraken]

Ten seconds is not that short a time, though--try counting out ten seconds while (say) watching an action movie. A lot can happen in ten seconds. Twenty to thirty can seem like an eternity if it interrupts the flow of action. It'd be a different matter if the change weren't incapacitating, but that's just a personal bias of mine.

Timing does depend on what you regard as the "beginning" and "end" of the change; if the process has an ease-in and ease-out (using animation terms), that could extend the measured time a fair amount. After all, most werewolf stories do seem to have a "warm-up" period before the visually-obvious changes. That's mostly for dramatic reasons, of course. Depending on the story, even a voluntary change would likely require some sort of buildup (depending on experience).

In a way, it depends on how much emphasis you want to place on "the change" itself versus other things in the story. As much as I like Leonardo Vidal's Alpha Luna and his other work, I've noticed that he focuses very intently on the process of the change (9 pages so far in AL, and not done, and several pages in his other comics). To be fair, his stories tend to focus on "first change", which is a different matter. (And part of it can be justified by the "time stands still" phenomenon of adrenaline rush.)

[Timber-WoIf]

I've no problem with any kind of slow-mo, "bullet time" adriniline effects, just that, in real time the and experinced shifer takes no more than 10 seconds, at least for a shift to gestalt

[Jamie]

This is similar to my personal criteria. I base my satisfaction on:
1) Good plot
2) Good transformation scene
3) Good-looking costume, animatronics, CGI beast, trained real wolf or whatever they use for the non-human form of the werewolf when it isn't actively changing.

If a werewolf movie gets one of these right, I'm basically satisfied with it (though I do crave for more). If the plot is good enough, I can forgive fall-behind-the-table transformation scenes and a costume that looks like someone stapled on a carpet. If the transformation scene is good enough, I can forgive everything else. I have the hardest time finding something with a suitable beast form. If the critter looks good, often it does not move realistically. If it moves realistically, then often it looks like crap. I actually prefer films that use trained real wolves as the beast form (like in Ladyhawke) because it (by definition) looks like a wolf and moves like it is not a puppet.

[Shadow Wulf]

Ten seconds is not that short a time, though--try counting out ten seconds while (say) watching an action movie. A lot can happen in ten seconds. Twenty to thirty can seem like an eternity if it interrupts the flow of action.

Just so you know, 10 seconds goes by in a flash during a movie so 10 seconds will seem like 2 seconds when watching the movie for the first few times. Plus it would be unrealistic for the body to TF in that short amount of time know all the parts it has to change and expand. If you look at Cursed TF, it was done in a perfect amount of time, 30 seconds, and everytime I watch the TF it feels alot shorter that it really is.

[Apokryltaros]

Ten seconds is not that short a time, though--try counting out ten seconds while (say) watching an action movie. A lot can happen in ten seconds. Twenty to thirty can seem like an eternity if it interrupts the flow of action.

Just so you know, 10 seconds goes by in a flash during a movie so 10 seconds will seem like 2 seconds when watching the movie for the first few times. Plus it would be unrealistic for the body to TF in that short amount of time know all the parts it has to change and expand. If you look at Cursed TF, it was done in a perfect amount of time, 30 seconds, and everytime I watch the TF it feels alot shorter that it really is.

30 seconds to a minute, maybe 5 minutes, is what I'd like sit for for a TF.

[Ultraken]

As an exercise, I counted out ten seconds while visualizing a shift. Unless the werewolf is "pushing" the change to go faster than normal, ten seconds is indeed rather fast. Perhaps some werewolves could change that fast naturally, but it should be a fairly rare and special ability. Twenty to thirty seems a more "natural" pace.

I've brought this up before, I'd prefer to allow the werewolf to do something else during that time, though I suppose it depends on how "easy" you want shifting to be. Typical werewolf movies tend to assume shifting is hard, and so make it take a long time and make it incapacitating. I'd rather have one or the other, to at least keep it fair. That way, werewolves aren't totally helpless while changing.

Going along with this, I prefer that every "intermediate" shape look natural. So many werewolf films make the transitional steps look really weird and/or ugly. My rule of thumb for "natural" is that you could picture the werewolf staying in that shape indefinitely, and not look like a mutant.

[Morkulv]

Another thing: don't show werewolves as monkeys (wall-climbing, jumping over fences).

[Morkulv]

Ten seconds is not that short a time, though--try counting out ten seconds while (say) watching an action movie. A lot can happen in ten seconds. Twenty to thirty can seem like an eternity if it interrupts the flow of action.

Just so you know, 10 seconds goes by in a flash during a movie so 10 seconds will seem like 2 seconds when watching the movie for the first few times. Plus it would be unrealistic for the body to TF in that short amount of time know all the parts it has to change and expand. If you look at Cursed TF, it was done in a perfect amount of time, 30 seconds, and everytime I watch the TF it feels alot shorter that it really is.

I think the transformation could be worse in Cursed. But the hair falling off looks just fake. Why can't movie-makers LEAVE the hair on the head? Oh well...

The Cursed-werewolf itself looked more like a bear then a werewolf, but I guess thats just what you get when you combine a wolf and a human. But maybe if they gave it a tail, it would look more like a werewolf.