The werewolf is an idea that Hollywood has embraced, with series and movies based on this half-man, half-beast creatures springing up all over the place. Today, we’re introducing you to Wolf-Man, a comic book character in the same vein. You’d think that being a werewolf inherently makes you a destroyer, but Wolf-Man demonstrates that this isn’t always the case.
Wolf-Man was created by Robert Kirkman and originally appears in Image Comics’ The Astounding Wolf-Man #1 in 2007. The series portrays Gary Hampton, a multimillionaire CEO who becomes a lycanthrope after being mauled by a werewolf on a family vacation.
Hampton discovers how to put his newfound werewolf abilities to good use. Hampton’s desire to become a classic, morally upright superhero was juxtaposed with lycanthropy’s dreadful, dark affliction in the series, which ended in 2010. Let’s get started, and don’t worry, he’s nothing like Jacob from the Twilight series!
The first comic book appearance and origins explored
The entire series titled The Astounding Wolf-Man revolves around the lycanthropic protagonist. The first issue opens with the scene of a terrible accident where Gary Hampton, a millionaire CEO was shown lying in a pool of his own blood, chest and arms ripped to shreds by what was believed to be a bear attack while he was out camping with his family in the Willow Creek Camping Ground in Montana.
It was truly an unfortunate incident to happen to a man who had a loving wife and daughter, a successful business, and was at the peak of his life. He was swiftly carried away to the hospital. However, most doctors believed that he would not pull through because of how terrible the injuries were.
He was then shifted from the hospital in Montana to one in New York City so that he could receive state of the art treatment but unfortunately, Gary went into a coma for a month which was extremely tough on his wife and daughter. However, one fine day, he opened his eyes as his wife was smoking in his hospital room, and voila! He was up.
The doctors and nurses rushed in to check on him as most of them, if not all, believed that it was an absolute miracle that he was even alive in the first place, let alone awake. After conducting a variety of tests, they were satisfied and declared him to be out of danger and on his road to recovery.
However, that night we see a very strange thing happen. It was coincidentally full moon night and in his hospital room, Gary transformed into a gigantic werewolf and jumped out of the window, into the streets. We see him run around, on top of buildings, past roads and he even manages to scare a poor old man who was just minding his own business.
However, he comes back to his room as the night ends. Surprisingly, all his wounds have completely healed and he needed no surgery anymore, not even the skin grafts that were scheduled for his torso and arms that had been ripped to shreds during the attack. The doctors were all surprised, once again, but had no choice other than to let him go.
Gary goes back to his own mansion and we see a whole host of new troubles plaguing him. His one-month-long absence from his company had caused the stocks to plummet since no one had thought that he would be able to pull through from a coma. However, even though his work was a massive headache for him, what we see is that he has an extremely loving and supportive family and he is an excellent father to his young daughter.
He goes to sleep that night beside his wife but wakes up to the moon as he changes into his beast form and runs into the compound of his mansion. He finds some rabbits and kills and eats them in his frenzy before returning to bed.
This incident is flagged by his estate manager and butler, and he and his wife watch video footage of him eating rabbits in his werewolf form. She suddenly realizes that her husband is the werewolf as they notice that both the beast and Gary had on the same pair of ripped shorts. As this realization dawned upon them, a man named Zechariah approached him and asked to be his mentor.
He promises Gary that he would help him learn and control his newfound powers because he was also an agent of the night, a vampire, and would be able to guide him. Gary accepted his proposal and the two began training together because Gary wanted to be a superhero and use his powers for good.
They begin training every night and Zechariah even introduces Gary to a man named Art who creates a costume for him and a gadget that allows him to store the light and energy of the moon in his costume so that he would not immediately transform back into a man if he stayed out for a little too long and the sun rose.
Gary gained the ability to control his powers and he was also dubbed ‘Wolf-Man’ by the media and the people who saw his doing good deeds and helping save people in the city. Thus originated this lycanthropic superhero.
However, with a power that is as unpredictable as this one, things would never be the same in Gary’s life, ever again.
Wolf-Man’s extensive story arc in brief
The 25-issue series perfectly captures the turmoils of being a superhero with such a power as Gary has to navigate his way through it all.
After he completely embraced the life of a superhero, he was able to assist the Auctioneers, a team of superheroes, in their fight against a slime beast. He hurried away since he still felt rather inexperienced to meet any true heroes. He decided to stay home the next night, and his change was activated when he was getting romantic with his wife. Unable to resist it, he abandoned his home, walked into town, and murdered Sergeant Superior, one of the superheroes he had previously assisted.
This incident causes him to hate himself and he isolates himself from everyone. When Zechariah arrives to meet him two weeks later, Gary charges at him in his wolf form. It’s discovered that Zec hasn’t met Gary in two weeks, since Gary assassinated Sergeant Superior.
Zec reveals everything and informs Gary that it was all supposed to happen this way and that there was nothing to worry about. Gary would transform into a savage werewolf on the first day of every full moon, Zec reveals, holding only a small part of his consciousness inside that will safeguard anybody intimately connected to him for those not as intimate, well, you better hope you didn’t run into the Wolf-Man.
Gary apologizes and states that he will resume patrolling soon. When Gary finally returns home, he is a little uneasy and assures his wife that he still loves her and that everything will be fine. The next day, Gary returns to patrolling, and we witness Zechariah’s unusual automobile in action. It manages to launch Gary into the air in order to apprehend Thrill Kill, a villain who kidnapped a woman.
Thrill Kill tries to negotiate with Gary by discarding the girl and compelling Gary to choose between beating him and rescuing the girl as Gary pursues him across the rooftops. When Gary lunges at him, they both fall off the roof, fight in mid-air, and Gary saves the girl before they reach the ground. When they arrive, the police attempt to arrest Gary, but the woman protects him as he exits. When Gary returns, he discovers the car has been destroyed and Zec has been kidnapped by a bunch of werewolves who refer to Gary as “Elder Brood.” He fights them, and they flee in terror. When Gary reunites with Zec, he has a slew of questions for him, which Zec refuses to answer, quite fishy behaviour from Zec.
Gary informs his wife the next day that he has been sacked from his job (remember how he was a millionaire CEO?) and that some of their housekeeping and comforts would have to be reduced. Gary’s butler, Dunford, enters and informs that there are guys at the door attempting to evict Gary. Gary apologizes to his wife and admits that everything was falling apart.
The family then relocates to Gary’s hidden underground bunker after vacating their home. After moving, he believed it was time to demonstrate his new form to his daughter. She was taken aback as he wolfed out and showed her his massive and scary werewolf form, causing her to go into shock. Gary and Zec went out again that night after Chloe had been calmed down however, the previously encountered werewolf group attacked him. Gary was so forceful in fighting them that he accidentally murdered one.
He then tried explaining himself to the others, but all they cared about was how powerful he was and could become. They began to inform Gary of all of Zec’s secrets, as well as the fact that Gary was on the wrong side of the conflict. Gary is then attacked by the main wolf, who demands that he reveal Zec’s whereabouts (this should have been a massive red flag about his relationship with Zec but like many others who choose to ignore red flags, so did he).
Gary then gets beaten to a pulp by the other werewolves and Zec finally shows up to protect him. Zec and the lead wolf start arguing as they all change back into their human forms, and it’s revealed that Zec used to be their friend until his bloodlust drove him to murder a young female werewolf. Gary inquires if the claim is accurate, which Zec admits but tries to justify himself (red flag number 2).
Gary is also told by the werewolf group that Zec only trained them to be a bodyguard for him. Gary screams at Zec and then snaps, slicing off Zec’s head with his claws, apparently killing him. Jacobson, the lead wolf pays tribute to him, claiming that he has found a powerful ally in Gary. However, Zec reappears in a misted state after the werewolf gang has left. The death was a ruse, and despite what he’s done, Gary still trusts in Zec and doesn’t believe he needs to prove himself. Zec expresses his gratitude for their friendship. The two of them part ways, promising to meet the next night.
Finally, Zechariah explains why Jacobson dubbed him “Elder Brood.” Gary discovers that he was not only attacked by a werewolf, but also by an elder werewolf. Elder werewolves are the werewolves that are the oldest of the lot and therefore, the strongest. They don’t just attack anyone, Zechariah explains; they pick and select who they attack. Gary and Zechariah agree to look for the man who turned him in Gary’s search for explanations.
The next night, Chloe enters a chamber where her father has been imprisoned so that he cannot harm his family or anyone else. Rebecca informs Chloe that her father will have to do this every mouth, but that the situation will improve. “Will things ever get better, what if it keeps getting worse?” Chloe wonders.
Things keep getting worse for Gary unfortunately. We learn that his daughter, Chloe is getting bullied at school and being called ‘homeless girl’ ever since Gary lost his job and they were forced to shift into the secret hideout, causing her to develop an intense hatred for her father.
Due to all of these frustrations, his werewolf form gets more and more volatile and he even gets called a murderer while out on the streets. His former adversaries and the people he had accidentally killed keep coming back to haunt him – such as the return of Sergeant Superior whom he had killed long ago, who came back in the form of a vampire. This creates a chasm between Zec and Gary and Gary tells him to never come into his life ever again.
By this time, he is a dejected and lonely man and begins to wish that he had never gotten these powers in the first place as he was not even able to do any good with so much power at his disposal. His relationship with Zec comes to a lurching end when Zec kills his wife and drinks her blood.
After having lost everything, he loses the one person who had unconditionally stood by him and as he cradles her dead body, Chloe walks in and immediately thinks that her father had lost control and killed her mother. This incident prompts Gary to go into hiding. Zec continues to do his evil deeds and recruits Chloe so that he could train her and help her kill her own father. Honestly, Zec is probably the most abominable character in the entire series.
Gary is eventually found and taken to prison for the murder of his own wife. The others plot to kill him and Chloe even manages to stab her father in the chest with a sword but he escapes, taking Chloe with him, to safety. Gary’s journey as a werewolf has been laced with hardships at every turn and the comic, with its dark and gritty feel, does a tragically beautiful job of portraying it all.
His powers and gadgets explained
We see a whole slew of powers and abilities on show from the moment Gary wakes up from his coma. The first notable power is his accelerated healing factor which allows him to recover from a fatal wound and leaves him with not a single scar on his body. He gains superhuman senses, strength, speed, agility, and, durability which are all most pronounced while he is in his wolf form.
His powers are very much like that of a traditional werewolf. However, if there is one thing we know about these creatures of the night, it is that they have an extremely tough time controlling their powers, especially when they first receive them. It was no surprise that he was out of control and did not know how to rein in his powers however, after only two weeks of training, he had gained control over his powers and could even change into a werewolf at will.
However, because he also was a superhero, he had a couple of gadgets at his disposal which helped him streamline his powers and skills and channel them much more efficiently.
His suit is his most integral gadget. It is a black spandex outfit under a bulletproof chest piece with a Thundercat-esque Wolf emblem, two big gauntlets with lunar energy-absorbing discs for prolonged transformation beyond nighttime, and some type of armored boots with the tips cut off for the use of the claws on his feet.
It appears that a secret base is being set up for Gary’s use in the first couple of issues. To build it, Zechariah has mind-controlled construction workers, but he paid them well, and they thought they were building a mall to conceal Gary’s identity. The base was first revealed in issue three, but this time in greater depth. It appears to be quite big and the family finally moves into this base when Gary gets sacked from his job.
Lastly, his car is another of his gadgets (very James Bond-esque) however, the person who drives this car is primarily Zechariah. Although, a launchpad installed in the rear hood of the car is specifically used to launch the Wolf-Man into rooftops and other high, unreachable areas. The car is a fog grayish color with a Wolf-Man emblem on the front.
The Astounding Wolf-Man contrasts the terrible curse with Gary’s ambition to be a classic hero, using typical horror tropes from werewolf myths. During the full moon, his curse drives him to lose control, putting a burden on his career, family, and money. When he helps people, he wears a uniform, but his hideous look often causes people to dread and distrust him. He is chased down after his wife is murdered by an enemy, because no one believes his word, despite his heroic efforts.
His daughter turns against him and along with Zechariah, storms the prison in an attempt to assassinate him after he had suffered multiple indignities and abuses while wrongfully indicted there for the murder of his wife. He does, however, beat the vampire, and reunite with his daughter after a tense meeting with her. After this, Wolf-Man’s name is cleared, and now that he has proven himself, he may finally live the heroic life he has always desired. All’s well that ends well…..I guess?
What do you think about the Wolf-Man? Let us know in the comments section below!