Research Abstract
Examination of Past and Present Werewolves and How They Highlight a Culture’s Greatest Fears
Werewolves are humans who are doomed to transform into beasts against their will and prey on humans. Other monsters, such as vampires and zombies, may be equally scary and violent, because they want only to kill innocent people. But it is curse of the werewolf which makes them more horrific than other monsters. Werewolves are unique not only because of the 
dual nature of the werewolf, but because the curse only takes hold monthly, when the full moon rises. Once the transformation is over, the man returns to his regular life, knowing he had killed innocent people and hiding his affliction from all others. Understanding why werewolves are scarier than other monsters can help people realize what they fear the most. Monsters symbolize certain predominant fears of a culture during a time. “…The monster is a metaphor for all that must be repudiated by the human spirit. It embodies the existential threat to social life, the chaos, atavism, and negativism that symbolize destructiveness and all other obstacles to order and progress” (Gilmore, 3). As cultures change over time, so do their overarching fears. Tales based on the beast of Gévaudan illustrate the earlier fears of western culture. In return, Ethan from Penny Dreadful illustrates the current fears of western culture. Analyzing these two werewolves will illustrate that werewolves in particular illustrate the biggest fears of a culture during a specific time, and therefore are the scariest monsters of that culture.
Capstone Description
Wolves in Penny Dreadful and the Fluid Meaning Behind a Symbol
Humans have always had a strong kinship with wolves. Early man was inspired by the animal, and attributed respectable attributes to them. I will be looking at two scenes in Penny Dreadful to argue that the spiritual relationship between men and wolves does not always represent the best we have to offer. Both scenes center on Ethan Chandler, a werewolf and former American soldier during the American Indian Wars. In the first scene, Chandler is talking to Ferdinand Lyle, an accomplished historian on ancient 
cultures. Chandler notices a shield adorned with a painting of wolves. When asked about its meaning, Lyle explains that the wolves were meant to be a spirit animal for the warrior, acting as a sort of spiritual protector. Ethan scoffs at the idea of a wolf being a protector, and tells Lyle of his firsthand experience of wolves hunting helpless prey. The second scene shows Ethan telling the other main characters of the ways in which he and his fellow soldiers hunted Native Americans. Their tactics were eerily similar to those of the wolves. People like to believe that man’s spiritual relationship with wolves is one that highlights admirable traits such as honor and bravery. By analyzing these scenes of Penny Dreadful, and texts that analyze man’s spiritual relationship with wolves, I argue that it can represent something much more sinister.
