Relationship Spotlight: Jack & Ted (Werewolf by Night)

*Spoilers.*

Yep, we’re back for more Werewolf by Night! For such a short piece of media, I’ve managed to find all manner of stuff to talk about with this special. I feel like I’d need a bit more info if I was going to attempt to write a Favorite Characters/Character Highlight post on Man-Thing/Ted, but I have more than enough to talk about his delightful relationship with Jack.

Jack Russell does not want to take part in a winner-take-all monster hunt in the dead of night in a creepy mansion where monster heads are stuffed and mounted on the walls, in part because he knows he could be one of those heads someday. But when Ted is captured by Verussa’s people and used as the competition’s Most Dangerous Game, Jack knows he can’t leave his friend to fend for himself. So he secures an invitation to the belly of the beast, armed with an impressive monster-killing track record, an air of mystery, and some small explosives he doesn’t entirely know how to use.

Of course, he’s in no danger from the monster, and Ted is both relieved and happy to see Jack come for him. But both of them are in danger from the other hunters—even before Jack’s hidden agenda, and his own werewolf nature, are discovered, most of the other hunters wouldn’t hesitate to take him out just to thin the competition. So he’s sticking his neck out in a major way.

But quite simply, that’s what friends do. While both Ted and Jack are capable of being extremely lethal, they’re actually very gentle in nature, preferring cooperation and care to violence and vengeance. Jack’s ready to do what he needs to do to rescue Ted, but he tries to do it with as little collateral damage as possible.

Though Jack is more than willing to help Ted, he does come in with a bit of exasperation. He intimates that Ted is always getting himself into trouble and needing Jack to bail him out. In their dynamic, I’m reminded a little of Rocket and Groot in the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, and not just because Ted and Groot are both plant-based lifeforms of few words. It’s that sense of the clever little guy looking out for the well-meaning, gentle big guy who can blunder into things, an inseparable odd couple who fit together against all odds. But while Rocket starts out much more critical of Groot, casually insulting his intelligence and getting aggravated when Groot doesn’t understand his instructions, Jack is immediately kinder with Ted. He doesn’t come across as the bossy friend, more like the long-suffering brother’s keeper, and his frustration is mostly an expression of tough love.

And I’d say, ultimately, Jack and Ted are on more equal footing. For all of Jack’s scolding about Ted getting himself into dangerous situations, Ted is the one who looks after Jack when he turns, setting up camp for them and making coffee while he waits for Jack to wake as a human again. Their care for each other is really endearing and makes Werewolf by Night so much more than a straight homage to classic monster movies.

Relationship Spotlight: Jack Russell & Elsa Bloodstone (Werewolf by Night)

*Spoilers.*

I’ve talked about Jack and I’ve talked about Elsa, so now it’s time to look at the two of them together. Considering that Werewolf by Night is less than an hour long and they go into the special not yet having met each other, the connection that grows between these two in that time is impressive.

Elsa and Jack have incredibly different temperaments, which immediately makes for a compelling combo. Elsa comes into the monster-hunting contest with a huge chip on her shoulder and a job to do. She’s pissed that she has to prove herself to win something that she feels should’ve been hers by rights, and she’s prepared to kill to get what she wants. By contrast, Jack doesn’t care about the contest at all. When they first run into each other on the grounds of Bloodstone Manor, Jack suggests that, rather than duke it out and show their prowess, they just pretend they haven’t seen each other and go their separate ways. Hearing this attitude amid the dog-eat-dog environment of the competition stuns Elsa, and she’s entirely unable to figure out what to make of Jack.

He continues to perplex and surprise her. The next time their paths cross, he’s friendly to her and tries to be helpful, offering to assist her in tending an injury she received from another hunter. This is so unlike the other hunters, who spill blood freely, and Elsa doesn’t know whether Jack is dumb, soft, or perhaps something more.

She’s spiky and guarded. He’s warm and inviting. She’s highly competent and lethal. He doesn’t quite know what he’s doing, but the last thing he wants to do is hurt anyone. He reaches out but she’s untrusting, he wants to work together but she’s a lone wolf. She’s a monster hunter. And he’s a monster.

But despite all these major differences between them, something clicks. Maybe it’s because Jack’s relentless openness wears Elsa down, maybe it’s because she’s not as hard-edged as she purports to be. Somehow, they start working together, Elsa helping Jack free Ted (the captured monster they’re supposed to be hunting) in exchange for the Bloodstone. And even when it comes out that Jack is a werewolf and Elsa is ready to paint him as a creature and a traitor, he gets her to still see his humanity. When Verussa forces him to turn, he’s able to hold onto a shred of his memory of Elsa, which protects her during the attack.

By the end of the special, they’ve parted ways—Jack, human again, is waking to a post-werewolf hangover while Elsa has claimed the Bloodstone and her ancestral home once and for all. But see, this is why we need more Werewolf by Night in the MCU (I’ve noticed that my Werewolf by Night posts, like my Moon Knight posts, tend to end with a pitch for more. I’m okay with that.)

Where do Jack and Elsa go from here, separately and (hopefully) together? How will they run into each other again? Has meeting Jack (and Ted) changed Elsa’s attitude toward monsters? What will she do with the Bloodstone now that she finally has it? Will we ever learn about the one other person Jack was able to remember in his werewolf form? Inquiring minds very much want to know, and I’ll gladly take any further specials/series/movies/whatever that the MCU wants to give us.

Favorite Characters: Elsa Bloodstone (Werewolf by Night)

*Some spoilers.*

My biggest takeaway from Werewolf by Night was Jack himself, and I’m 100% ready for more MCU content for him in any form—Midnight Sons would be awesome, because I’d love to see how Jack interacts with Marc and Steven (and Jake?) However, beyond any future team-ups or ensemble pieces, I also want more Werewolf by Night specifically, and Elsa is a big part of that.

The daughter and once-heir of the famed Ulysses Bloodstone, Elsa estranged herself from her renowned monster-hunting father. Because time is at a premium in the TV special, the details of the characters’ backgrounds are more suggested than fleshed out, but we get little hints here and there of how Elsa didn’t jibe with the rest of her family.

But regardless of what happened in the past, Elsa still very much considers herself the rightful heir of the Bloodstone after her father passes. When Verussa arranges a contest between a group of monster hunters to decide who will get the stone next, Elsa is affronted at there being a contest at all, along with not being invited to participate. Despite her rejection of her family and upbringing, there’s definitely some of that entitled rich girl still in there.

Even though she expects the Bloodstone by birthright, though, Elsa has the skills to back up her famous name. She takes out other hunters during the competition, and her intimate knowledge of Bloodstone Manor gives her a home court advantage—for instance, when Jack shuts the two of them in the family mausoleum, unaware that the door often gets stuck, Elsa recalls which of her departed relatives had expected to be resurrected and was therefore buried with tools they could use to escape.

A lot of Elsa’s character is a balancing act: how much of her reflects where she came from, how much reflects what she’s made of herself. And as the shit really goes down, Elsa reveals that she is cut from a different cloth than her family. The Bloodstone means more to her than any obsessive zeal for monster hunting, so she agrees to help Jack rescue Man-Thing/Ted in exchange for her prize. And despite her ingrained feelings against monsters, she ultimately aligns with Jack after he’s exposed as a werewolf. When Verussa forces him to turn, Elsa doesn’t join in on the efforts to kill him. Rather, she holds to the steps Jack takes to remember her in his werewolf form, placing a bit of trust in someone other than herself at an extremely critical moment.

Now that Elsa has claimed the Bloodstone and the manor house, Verussa and her lackeys having been mauled to death after they effed around and found out, it’s unclear where she’s going to take her family name and resources next. But one thing I think we can safely say is that it’ll be somewhere they haven’t gone before.