Continuing the grand tradition of remaking anything that anybody might recognize from any point in history, MTV is branching out into the horror market with a pilot order for a new series based on that other 1985 Michael J. Fox hit film, Teen Wolf. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Jeff Davis, creator of the CBS series Criminal Minds, will write the pilot as well as executive produce.
For those who don’t watch TBS as much as we do, Teen Wolf stars Fox as an awkward teen undergoing some natural life changes. You know, the kind every guy goes through: Facial hair becomes pronounced. His voice develops a deeper, more growly edge. His physique improves. He experiences inconvenient moments in the bathroom in which he wills something to go away. His eyes turn red and he sprouts fangs. Teen Wolf is a rambunctious metaphor for the difficulties of growing up, but stands the paradigm of the unpopular oddball on its head by making a star out of the freak: Fox leads his once-failing basketball team to victory, gets the girl, and learns valuable life lessons about friendship, family, love, and self-worth. And now MTV is going to re-wrap it for newer generations.
In the Hollywood Reporter piece, the show's creators claim that the new show will have "more of an American Werewolf in London feel." From the sound of it, the series will focus more on the horror aspect of the werewolf mythology and less on the cutesy high school melodrama of the film. With The Wolfman set to open in February and the werewolf-tinged Twilight sequel New Moon due this November, it looks like werewolves are joining vampires and zombies to do a media monster mash.