Joe Dante’s The Howling (1981) is considered one of the best werewolf movies ever made. Its werewolf, a feral and vicious beast that looks like it genuinely enjoys ripping people apart, is an immense part of the reason why it’s so beloved by horror fans. Other than the werewolf from John Landis’ American Werewolf in London (1981), The Howling’s wolf stands as one of the most iconic movie monsters of the 1980s, and now it has its own SDCC-exclusive statue.
The statue is the result of a collaboration between SHOUT! Factory and PCS Collectibles and it comes in two variants: one available at shoutfactory.com and the other exclusive to SDCC as a limited-edition bloody paws/bloody mouth variant. The con-exclusive variant is limited to 500 units.
In terms of specs, the statue is 6.5” tall, and just over 9” if you include the base. It weighs around 16oz in the package and it’s made out of PVC. The statue is not posable.
The movie werewolf hall of fame is quite exclusive due to how difficult it has been to bring some truly memorable wolf designs to the big screen. Rick Baker’s werewolf for American Werewolf in London is one such hall of famer because it hits at the core of the ultraviolent menace that is this kind of monster. This werewolf moves on four legs and is just a hulking beast that does not look like it was the product of natural selection. It looks like it was the cruel consequence of a curse, which is how Landis treated the creature, albeit loosely. Baker created a deadly creature with heavy fur and apex predator eyes. You’re as much in awe of it as you are terrified of it. There’s not a lot of human in the creature.
The Howling’s werewolf, on the other hand, earns its iconic status by turning the creature into a bipedal monstrosity that reminds viewers just how human it is. It seems to have a mind of its own, a mind that schemes to get the violence just right. By keeping the wolf standing on its two hind legs, fully exposed and without torn clothing hanging from its frame, the movie manages to create a natural born killer that reflected the rising violence of the 1980s. This might be the reason why we had three werewolf movies come out in ’81, with Michael Wadleigh’s Wolfen being the third one. The Howling’s werewolf was designed by Rob Bottin, the legendary creature designer behind Legend, Robocop, and John Carpenter’s The Thing.
Be sure to keep an eye out for this statue if you’re attending SDCC. If you can’t make it to the convention, then SHOUT! Factory still has you covered. Just know that whichever version of The Howling statue you get still means you’ll own one of the most sadistic werewolves ever put on film.
More images of the SDCC-exclusive The Howling statue follow below.
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