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Lesley

Grey Matter

Lesley is also a columnist for UFO Magazine. Check it out !

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2.24.10

Wolfmen

Last week we saw The Wolfman. It is the basic movie werewolf story that we have all come to know and love, so I enjoyed it very much.

As a child I totally loved wolfman movies. I am sure that I probably saw all of them. I loved old horror movies in general. I liked the Frankenstein, Dracula and Mummy movies too, but they never came close to scaring me as much as the Wolfman did. I think that is because the Wolfman is a far more violent creature than any of the others. He literally rips you to pieces before he or you even realize it. The Wolfman is truly frightening.

However, the wolfman isn't just some sort of Hollywood made up creature. Every culture on earth has some legend of a wolfman type creature. That does not prove that such a creature does or ever has existed, but it is a curious fact.

Here in New Mexico and in other places in the southwestern US, we have what are known as Skinwalkers. Skinwalkers are not necessarily a wolfman, but often times they seem to appear as one. My understanding is that the Navajo word for skinwalker, Yee Naaldlooshii, means something like - one that walks on all fours. And from what I understand, a skinwalker can take on any skin that it wants. It could be a Wolfman or maybe a Manbear.

In a sense that is the difference between modern Hollywood Wolfman tales and traditional ones. In most folklore, the human does not unwillingly become a Werewolf. Instead, they choose to become a Werewolf and use that power whenever they wish, not just when the moon is full.

The Navajo Skinwalkers have become such because they wish to. Normally they are people considered to be some sort of witch, they then commit some evil act (normally a murder) to transform themselves into a skinwalker. Well, so say the stories I have read.

Most of the European Werewolf folklore is similar to that. A Werewolf is not a person that had the misfortune of being bitten by another Werewolf, but rather someone that has sought out that power for their own selfish purposes. One wonders why Hollywood changes the tales, in a certain way, it is much scarier to think that people would WANT to become blood thirsty creatures. Although, we all know there are humans that would want such power.

I don't want to give away spoilers, but there is someone in this latest movie that likes being a Werewolf. Although, he did not choose to become one, he seems happy to be one. So in a sense that goes along with more traditional tales.

Personally, my thoughts are that men do not transform into wolves and men do not need to do such to be very evil. However, maybe when someone lays eyes upon someone that they would consider to be so inhuman, the only way they can comprehend that is to see someone or something that is not entirely human, a monster of some sort -- something that they consider very different from themselves.

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