[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for Teen Wolf: The Movie.]From show creatorJeff Davis,Teen Wolf: The Moviepicks up 15 years after the events of the original series, as evil and an unexpected old flame have returned to Beacon Hills. No longer a teenager, alpha werewolf Scott McCall (Tyler Posey) is tested in a way that leads him to reunite with trusted friends and allies, including a wide variety of supernatural beings, to fight against a powerful and deadly enemy that has them all facing their pasts.
During this 1-on-1 interview with Collider, executive producer Davis talked about when he realized he’d become the go-to werewolf guy, what they were able to do with this movie that they weren’t able to do with the TV show, the impossible task of weaving the long history of the TV show into a new story, having to edit down a three-hour cut, whether there was ever a version written that included Stiles, and making the decision to have a character sacrifice themselves. He also talked aboutWolf Packand what makes the series different fromTeen Wolf, and how he’s approaching hisÆon Fluxseries.
Collider: When did you realize that you’ve become the werewolf guy? What was the moment that you decided to embrace that?
JEFF DAVIS: It was a gradual process withWolf Pack. I said, “All right, I’ll just write the pilot, and then I’ll hand it off.” But of course, I wrote it and I fell in love with the characters. I said, “All right, I guess I’ll stay on a little bit longer.” And then, when we got Sarah [Michelle Gellar], I was in it from there on out. I said, “All right, I guess I’m the werewolf guy.” That’s always how it is in Hollywood. One day, you’re the procedural guy, which I was too, and the next day you’re the horror/werewolf guy. It’s just another way of telling a very human story about the monsters lurking within us, or the fear of a monster inside of us. I love horror, for that reason, which is funny because I never liked it before. As a kid, horror movies scared the hell out of me. But then, as I became a teenager, I began to gravitate towards them probably because they had such a visceral response for me.
In what ways would you say thatTeen Wolf: The Movieis the show we used to know, and in what ways is it a new thing?
DAVIS: I would say, it’s definitely the show you used to know, but it’s very much now about adults, as well, because they’ve all grown up. One of the things we definitely wanted to do was bring in one new teenager, and that’s Vince Mattis, who plays Eli Hale, Derek’s son. We knew there had to be, in some way, a new Teen Wolf, so we brought him in. It was really interesting to revisit all these characters, 15 years later, as adults. As Tyler [Posey] and Holland [Roden] will tell you, it’s strange to be playing this character as their age.
What were you able to do with the movie that you weren’t able to do with the TV show? Because they’re older and you’re telling a more finite story with this, were there things that you were able to do, that you had always hoped to do, or wanted to do, and just couldn’t before?
DAVIS: One thing I wanted to do, that we did in the movie, was a lacrosse scene in a big stadium. We got our big stadium, and I was able to do that championship game. I also wanted to do really big life-or-death moments. And I wanted to just keep telling the story. When we did Teen Wolf, we tried to make every episode look like a movie, even on our limited budget. We didn’t have a Marvel movie sized budget for the movie either, so we were still pushing the boundaries of the budget. But one of the things that the movie allowed us to do was to tell a more compressed story. It’s fast-paced, even for 2 and a half hours. I’m really hoping the audience likes it.
How did you decide how much time had passed? What made 15 years feel right?
DAVIS: We decided how much time had passed for two reasons. One was that I wanted to have enough distance for Scott’s character to be in a mid-life crisis. I knew I wanted him to be somewhere in his thirties. I found my inspiration in my own thirties, and there were big changes that happened to me. We also wanted to give enough time for Derek to have a teenage son. I knew I didn’t want him to be eight years old. I wanted him to be around 15 or 16, so that dictated the time, as well.
How hard is it to tell a story that has multiple seasons of history to it, but that you also know people will be coming to without having seen any of that?
DAVIS: It’s not just hard, it’s a near impossible task. I remember sitting at the computer, thinking to myself, “I have 20 main characters. How the hell am I supposed to do this?” The script was 148 pages, when I finished it. It was long. The first cut of the movie was three hours. I was trying to give every single character a moment and every single relationship a suitable end, but that’s impossible to do. You can’t do it, unless you’re doing a full season of TV. So, a lot of that gets stripped out, and you find yourself honing it into something smaller and more intimate. Really, a movie is about one or two people. Usually it’s about one person who wants something. But in this movie, I had to consider all those characters and all those relationships, and how much I wanted to touch upon them. I know there’s gonna be some fan disappointment with, “What happened with this character? What happened with that character?” But I would say that’s for the next movie.
Was it agonizing then to edit it down from three hours?
DAVIS: It was. Trying to cut down a 3-hour movie is a particular challenge, especially when you’re cutting things that are character moments that you know are important, but don’t necessarily need to be there for this story, you just want it anyway. I wanna see that moment with Malia. I wanna see that moment with Jackson. And then, you realize, “Well, maybe not in this movie.”
How did you approach writing this and figuring out the story you wanted to tell? Did you find out who would actually be able to return, and then write it? Did you have to make some adjustments?
DAVIS: When a movie gets announced and the actors have not all signed up, it’s a lot more complicated. There were questions, as to who was gonna be back, all the way up until a very late point in the creative process, so we were left scrambling for a bit and were coming up with new things, constantly. It was tough. I would not do that again. But it also left us a certain challenge of, whose story do we focus on? Whose story is this? I got to think a lot about that, and it always brought me back to the character of Scott McCall, played by Tyler Posey. I said, “All right, this is still just a story about a young man. It’s about Scott McCall. Everything else revolves around that.” I always had that anchor point.
Did you have a version written that Stiles was in? Did the jeep end up playing a bigger role because it filled that void?
DAVIS: The jeep was always gonna be in it. The jeep is its own character. It’s definitely Stiles’ jeep, but the jeep became a character unto itself, after a while. Yes, we did have ideas of how Stiles could be in the movie, but nothing that ever passed the outline stage. No scenes were ever written. There was always the question of, “Well, Dylan [O’Brien] has got a lot on his plate now. He’s doing movies. His passions are different. Would he wanna revisit this character?” I didn’t know if I wanted to revisit these characters. I needed to take some convincing, as well, because I thought, “All right, maybe I’ll just produce it and watch other people take it over.” And then, I realized that I had better write it.
When everything leads up to having a character sacrifice themselves, at the end of your story, did you always know who that would be? How did you come to this specific decision?
DAVIS: I remember when I came up with the idea, I couldn’t do it without Tyler Hoechlin’s blessing. When I talked with Tyler, I said to him, “What do you think of giving Derek a big, heroic ending?,” and he was into it. He loves the character just as much as I do. There was always trepidation and fear about it. I remember being with him on set, looking at him, and saying to him actually, “Oh, my God, we’re gonna have to bring you back. I don’t know if we can do this.” But I think you need to take big swings. You need to take those chances in a movie.
WithWolf Pack, in taking on a book series, did you know, from the beginning, what you wanted to carry over and what you wanted to change, or has that been an evolving process?
DAVIS: It’s almost a technical thing. You’re building the foundation for a series, so you need that support. to maintain the structure. When I decided to use this or that, sometimes it ended up being based on the book and sometimes it was more or less inspired by the book.Wolf Packwas written for such a young audience of 9- to 11-year-olds. We used the ideas, but not necessarily the structure of the book. When I talked to the author (Edo van Belkom), he was very flattering and very generous with it. He said, “I know you have to make a lot of changes for the TV show.” He was just thrilled to see his book come to life.
One of the things that both shows have in common is that you have this young ensemble cast at the center of it. What do you enjoy about collaborating with a group of younger actors like that, both in the early days of Teen Wolf and now with Wolf Pack? What are you finding with this new foursome that you’re working with?
DAVIS: The kids this time are definitely different. They just seem more worldly. That may have to do with the incredible changes happening in the world around them, with the pandemic and things like that. But I like working with young actors because they’re so new and so malleable. They’re open to new things. They don’t have quite the same cynicism as the rest of us do, in Hollywood. They’re ready for challenges. I love that about working with young actors. I also find that there’s an innocence and a curiosity that us older people don’t seem to have anymore, or that’s rare with Hollywood veterans. There’s an excitement to it. Honestly, they’re a beautiful young cast, and there’s a little bit of wish fulfillment in it for the audience. Especially with this cast, I’m really happy with the new young actors. Our casting director, Jonathan Clay Harris, did an amazing job.
Wolf Packseems to have an interesting balance between being a show that people will talk about while also covering real issues. What is the formula for finding the right balance between those two things, so that it doesn’t lose itself?
DAVIS: The rule for me is that you may never let the issue overtake the story. The biggest difference in telling a story like this is that, usually in network TV, the issue, whether it’s anxiety or something to do with teenage life, gets wrapped up and solved in one episode. In reality, these things aren’t solved. They’re dealt with. There are things that we have to live with, and learn to live with, for the rest of our lives, in that respect. Anxiety is not something that’s just gonna get solved. It’s an issue that Everett has to deal with, throughout the season and hopefully throughout the series.
You didn’t know you would be returning to the world ofTeen Wolf, and on top of that, you now also haveWolf Pack. Are you looking to keep both going? Do you want to do moreTeen Wolfmovies? Are you looking to set upWolf Packfor as long or longer thanTeen Wolf?
DAVIS: It’s funny, a lot of people ask me the question, “Where do you see yourself in 10 years?” I always answer the same thing, which is that I don’t know what I’m doing six months from now. This business is so fickle and so tumultuous that you never really know. I’ll take whatever is in front of me. I’m really excited about my next Paramount+ project, which isÆon Flux, the adaptation of the MTV anime, and telling a sci-fi story. As much as I love being the werewolf guy, there are other genres to explore. But I do love these stories, as well. After 100 episodes ofTeen Wolf, I said, “I’m never doing another werewolf story again.” I was pretty wrong.
What are the challenges of doing something likeÆon Flux, that has been out in the world before?
DAVIS: With any project that’s a reboot or a remake, you can’t worry about what the old fans are gonna think. You have to be true to the source material, in a way that’s true to your own artistic vision. If you come onto a project like that, yes, I know that they are gonna be criticisms. I know that people are gonna be coming for me with pitchforks and saying, “That’s not theÆon Fluxof my childhood.” You can’t care. You have to tell the story that you wanna tell. So, that’s what I’m doing with it. I’m a huge fan of the TV show. I loved it, as a kid. So, you’ll see inspiration in it, but you’ll also see changes because it has to become a show that makes sense, and is not just an avant garde, five-minute, beautiful tone piece.
