A mysterious man sets the evil trickster spirit, the nogistune free and in return, asks for revenge against Scott and his friends. Meanwhile, its been 15 years since the events of Teen Wolf, the show and our pack is forced to return to their old home town, Beacon Hills when they start seeing their dead friend, Allison. A premonition from Lydia has them confident that a ritual would put Allison’s soul at peace but the opposite happens.
Teen Wolf: The Movie starts off on familiar ground as we dive into the usual storytelling of its creator, Jeff Davis as he introduces strange supernatural concepts and goes about explaining them through twists and turns that we had especially loved in season 3 of the show.
A grander version of the Teen Wolf theme song will have viewers pumped up for the reunion including an exciting soundtrack album with rock and epic sounds that we usually loved of the MTV show. The whole Teen Wolf world gets a cinematic feel from the more realistic fight sequences to the CGI (that does lack sometimes but can be forgiven).
It seems that everyone has stepped up their game including the actors as it is evident from the younger cast significantly improving including former child actor Tyler Posey. It is also refreshing to see adults looking like adults by giving them realistic makeup to make them look 15 years older, unlike the time we had adults playing high school students in the show.
Exciting first-time appearances for all of our favourites from Scott and Derek to Allison will have fans cheering at their screens. We also get back several familiar faces like Mason who ends up as an officer and Coach being his usual loud and sarcastic self. Inside jokes that fans missed are peppered throughout the film like Scott’s nickname being the ‘alpha’ and Greenberg the mysterious student Coach always picked on.
The movie also rights some wrongs as we can finally hope for a Scallison endgame we had forgotten we had wanted with cute moments between Scott and Allison that remind us of the adorable ship from season 1. But that is where the fanservice ends in this reunion project.
The first sign that this is not the same teen drama with a bunch of supernatural high school kids pretending to be detectives, is through the swearing and nudity that can give viewers whiplash if they are not prepared. More unwelcome changes are seen in Teen Wolf: The Movie as it lets go of all logic the Teen Wolf universe had created from wolves going out of commission with just one bullet and Eli learning to heal with just one roar.
You’ll end up laughing not because of the comedy but at how cringe and implausible some of the aspects are – like Peter getting on the floor to sniff, the childish dialogues meant to be witty or serve as exposition, or Scott the big bad alpha tripping and falling on his own feet while being chased. And while the movie does address Stile’s absence and gives the Stydia (Stiles and Lydia) ship a plausible explanation, there is a gaping hole as he clearly left an impact on the story, the characters and the fans.
Meanwhile, Kira and Isaac are never even mentioned which feels very off. Pretending that Scott and Kira’s and Isaac and Allison’s relationships never happened highlights the lazy writing to easily pair up Scallison. And the worst part is that the two actors still have crazy amazing chemistry together that their characters could have gotten back together without erasing their exes who also happened to be crucial to the TV show.
Additionally, the reunion story doesn’t provide enough material for all the characters except Scott and Allison making us wonder if we are watching Scallison: The Movie. All of the other actors who are supposed to be part of the main cast are wasted like why bring Derek back only to cut short his screen time and importance to the plot and give him an ending he didn’t deserve?
Then there is poor Hikari who feels like a replacement for Kira as she is not given time to develop other than running around like Liam’s sidekick. The movie also happens to feel too long as the pacing is extremely slow and doesn’t solve all the storylines smoothly. The production could have easily used the same plot to create a reunion miniseries and allow for a more cohesive storytelling.
But as a standalone film and for viewers who have never watched the show, it is those types of supernatural teen movies that can either be skipped or watched on a slow day when one is in the mood for some eye candy and complicated werewolf lore which don’t really make sense.
