Werewolves on Screen and Page, Summer to Autumn 2016: Polizeiruf 110, Olmos y Robles, Another WolfCop, The Devourers and She Wolf

Five new werewolf stories reached audiences between June and late September 2016. All are fiction. Taken together, they show how many different jobs the creature does: a symbol in a German crime film, a bait in a Spanish whodunit, a joke in a Canadian horror-comedy, a lineage in an Indian novel and a nightmare in a teenage comic.

She Wolf #1 (June 22)

Image Comics' press release says Rich Tommaso's She Wolf #1 arrives in comic shops on Wednesday, June 22, 2016, and follows "a teenage girl who believes she's been bitten by a savage werewolf," then suffers "feverish nightmares that seamlessly bleed into her everyday reality." Tommaso calls it "a horror tale about a teenage werewolf who uses witchcraft to become a higher level of demon." The setting is Sparta, New Jersey, where he grew up in the 1980s.

The Devourers by Indra Das (July 12)

Penguin Random House lists the ebook of Das's debut novel, The Devourers, as published July 12, 2016. The publisher's description places a chance meeting under a full moon in Kolkata, where a college professor transcribes a stranger's notebooks about "a race of people at once more than human yet kin to beasts," including a wanderer in seventeenth-century Mughal India. We cite the publisher's description only; a paperback followed later.

Polizeiruf 110: Wölfe (September 11)

On Sunday, September 11, 2016, Germany's ARD aired this installment of the long-running crime series. t-online's review says it was written and directed by Christian Petzold and stars Matthias Brandt as the Munich inspector Hanns von Meuffels and Barbara Auer as his Hamburg colleague. In the Alpine foothills, mutilated women's bodies are found. Wolves are observed, in one full-moon night "even one on two legs, the eyes blood-red." The reviewer asks whether the culprits were animals, and says the film leaves viewers with goosebumps.

Another WolfCop (September 25 and 28)

Dread Central reported on September 16 that director Lowell Dean's sequel to the 2014 Canadian horror-comedy WolfCop will have its world premiere at Austin's Fantastic Fest, with screenings Sunday, September 25 and Wednesday, September 28. The site's synopsis: the alcoholic werewolf cop Lou Garou, played by Leo Fafard, "gleefully and violently" disposes of criminals, causing problems for his former partner, now chief of police, Tina (Amy Matysio), in the town of Woodhaven. A strip-joint bloodbath, it says, alerts him to "the rise of something evil." Dean says the budget was "just over two million dollars" and that he has outlines for at least two more films.

Olmos y Robles (September 26)

Spain's RTVE announced that the third season's episode "El misterio del bosque tenebroso" would air Monday, September 26 at 10:30 p.m. on La 1. A flock of sheep is found dead near Ezcaray, and everything points to "a wolf of enormous size." Then a man's body shows the same bite marks, and the "far-fetched hypothesis" of a werewolf, "licántropo," surfaces. A new Guardia Civil officer joins the two leads. The broadcaster is also running an online "Murder Club" in which viewers search for clues "whether the killer is human or not."

What they have in common

In none of these is the werewolf presented as a real report. The German film and the Spanish episode are built as mysteries: a killing with animal bite marks, and the werewolf raised as a possibility. Neither preview says how the story resolves. The comic and the novel stay inside the creature's point of view, and the Canadian film plays the whole idea for comedy.

Bottom line

Between June and September 2016, a comic, a novel, a German TV film, a Canadian film sequel and a Spanish TV episode brought the werewolf back to screens and shelves. All are fiction. Previews of the Spanish episode and the sequel are announcements; this article does not review them.

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Attribution / source table

• Claim: She Wolf #1: premise, setting, June 22 date
  Attribution: Image Comics press release (spring 2016; date not shown on page)
  Link: Image Comics
• Claim: The Devourers: ebook published Jul 12, 2016; publisher description
  Attribution: Penguin Random House listing (later paperback not cited)
  Link: PRH
• Claim: Polizeiruf 110: Wölfe: Sep 11, 2016, ARD; Petzold; cast; plot hooks
  Attribution: t-online, Nina Bogert-Duin, updated Sep 11, 2016
  Link: t-online
• Claim: Another WolfCop: world premiere Fantastic Fest; screenings; synopsis; budget; outlines
  Attribution: Howard Gorman, Dread Central, Sep 16, 2016
  Link: Dread Central
• Claim: Olmos y Robles episode: broadcast Sep 26, 10:30 p.m., La 1; sheep; bite marks; Murder Club
  Attribution: RTVE.es, Sep 23, 2016
  Link: RTVE

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Legal / disclaimer footer

Entertainment and cryptid-news commentary only. Nothing here confirms a werewolf or any other creature. Claims belong to the sources named, and fiction is identified as fiction.