This is a second part of the series inspired by the movie Frankenstein (2025) directed by Guillermo del Toro. First part is here. Would recommend it to understand this. A quick rundown on the basic plot of the original book. Oh, and spoilers, ofcourse, for the movie.

The story begins with a ship captain on an expedition to the antartic. He sees a stranded man - old and weary, but clearly incredibly intelligent. Once the ship captain rescues said man, a creature starts tailing them. None of their weapons work against this creature. The old man tells his tale. He used to be a curious young man with a scientific temperament. He was interested in nature, in the larger questions regarding the origin of life. Just before he left for his studies at university, his mother died. At university, the man puts his entire self into his work. He has a plan to create a living being from the remains of dead people. He toils at it and eventually succeeds. But in his quest to create, he was completely blindsided by the end result. When his creature comes to life, Victor Frankenstein, our narrator, is horrified. He FREAKS out and runs away, leaving the thing to take care of itself.

Somehow, the creature, left cold and completely alone in the world, manages to survive. He is attacked constantly because he looks unimaginably scary and terrifying. So our creature hides in the woods. He finds a family that he likes, hides near them, and helps them out however he can. He takes some food from them in return. They offer it to their helper. But they don't know who he is. There is a blind man in that family, wise and old. The creature listens to his stories. He loves this family; he grows to care for them. One day, he presents himself to the blind man as the one who has been helping them. The blind man accepts him. He teaches him to read as well. The creature, basically a grown baby, hopes the others will accept him. Once they know him, understand how much he cares for them and understand that he has an internal world too, maybe they won't try to kill him. But they find out and, of course, drive him away.

The creature knows now that he cannot escape this torment. He is doomed to be alone. If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear! So he trails Frankenstein. In the process, he even accidently kills his cousin William. But he begs for understanding and demands from his creator only one thing. Make me a companion. He wants what any normal person has. Frankenstein says no initially but eventually agrees. He works on it, and almost completes his project. But then realises that maybe they would then have offspring. So he gives it up. The creature hets super mad. He goes on a rampage. But Frankenstein escapes somehow. A cat and mouse game begins. He deludes himself into safety, and makes plans to marry his childhood sweetheart - Elizabeth. But he also remembers the main threat from the creature - _"I will be with you on your wedding night". It all comes to a head - the night of their wedding, the creature strangles her. Then it's Victor's turn to be a revenge-driven maniac. He chases the creature, tries to kill him but fails. Then he dies on the boat with the ship captain. The creature finds the captain and tells him his side of the story. And now that his creator is dead, he has nothing else to live for, he says. The book ends with his death.

So, pretty dark. The movie follows basically the same format. But the movie makes a few crucial changes. It begins with Victor's childhood and shows his relationship with his parents. His mother is great; his dad not so much. He is kind of cruel and judmental. He doesn't understand his son and forces things upon him. He is a doctor, and it's implied that he kills Victor's mom when their second son (William) is born. So Victor grows up, kind of obsesses with defeating death. And a second crucial change is with Elizabeth. She isn't just standard shoo-in love interest. She likes science too, but because we live ina society, she cannot follow her dream. Victor falls for her, but she is engaged to William. So Victor, a rejected man, does his experiments. And then, I think this is the main change, he does not ditch his creature after he is created. He sticks around, trying to teach his 'son' things.

But he falls into the same patterns as his father. He is cruel and judgmental and impatient. The creature is locked up in basement, scared and lonely. He only says one word repeatedly - Victor. But Elizabeth visits them, and she and the creature connect. Victor gets jealous. So he burns the house down with the creature. Amazing. Then the same cat and mouse game begins. The creature in this also goes to an old blind man for comfort; he again asks for a companion and is rejected. So in this one, on the wedding night of Elizabeth and William, the creature comes back. He is trying to talk to Victor, they fight, and then in the process, Elizabeth is shot by Victor. William also dies. Victor blames the creature for this and then tries to take revenge. But finally, after failing to kill him multiple times, he decides to accept his 'son'. The creature then leaves. In this, he is kind of immortal, so it's implied he has to go on living, broken, but alive.

Okay, so firstly I would like to say that Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein is a gorgeous looking movie. It is absolutely beautifully shot, the costume department did a fantastic job. All the actors are amazing - Jacob Elordi is the creature, he does an amazing job. Mia Goth is Elizabeth and Victor's mom. Amazing choice. And Oscar Isaac is Victor, he does a great job too I think. Some Stills -

Mia Goth as Elizabeth - [I LOVE THIS COSTUME]

Again, Mia Goth as Victor's mother - [No notes, 10/10]

And Jacob Elordi as Frankenstein's Creature - [Gorgeous Design]

And I can really tell that a lot of effort, creativity and passion went behind this. I do think Guillermo del Toro (just going to call him GDT from now on) really cares about the source material. This is a labour of love. And it shows.

But there is a hitch. The movie is too sympathetic to the monster. Jacob Elordi does a great job in portraying him. But he also makes him look cool rather than terrifying. The story is more focused on the father-son issues than on the science fiction aspect of it. And this is by design. GDT really connected with that aspect of the story - the father abandoning the son and all. In the book, Victor's dad isn't even that mean. William is a random cousin. It's not that important. But the movie plays this aspect up because it is what GDT wanted to show. And this is completely fine. People connect with whatever part they connect with - we can't really help it. So the movie makes it a story about a man whose ambitions are corrupt. But the book is about a man who is curious and doesn't understand the implications of his work. He isn't cruel in the beginning. He isn't trying to be. He freaks out and runs away upon making the creature for a reason. He is a coward. He is humanly flawed.

The movie, by making him a bit too on the nose evil, loses this balance. The creature is given all of your sympathy. ELIZABETH is nice to him? What for? The movie seems to imply that this misunderstood woman connects with him, and the mean ambitious man is cruel to him. It's this one, comically evil man's fault. In the book, there is a reason that the only person who treats the creature well in the book is blind man. It's because everyone else is to shit scared on seeing him to even attempt to understand him. The book beautifully balances this aspect. The creature is a baby. He is scared and lonely and hungry. He is smart, sensitive, and has an inner world. You do root for him. But you also know why people are scared of him. He never looks "cool" like he does in the movie. He is UGLY. He is everything you are afraid of. The book implicates YOU in the creature's mistreatment. You would shoot first, ask questions later if you saw this 'monster'. You'd be terrified for anything else.

Still, I think the movie isn't all wrong. It respects the source material, it's just not interested in telling the same story. I do think aspects of it could have been better, but it's a fun watch. And it's not like Mary Shelley was not into writing stories about messed-up fathers of people with dead mothers. She herself had many, many miscarriages. Some of her kids died soon after they were born. Brutal stuff. I think she must have understood a little something about looking at dead remains and wanting to create life from them.

But in my opinion, Mary Shelley's story is important precisely because of the science fiction aspect of it. The book's subtitle is 'A Modern Prometheus'. This is a story about technological progress. Perhaps a corpse would be re-animated... Galvanism had given token of such things

It is important to understand this. She was in rooms with people who loved discussing this stuff - they were interested in scientific progress and literature. They wanted to know how this would impact their world. And the fears she has described are universal. Do we know what we are dealing with here? When does our natural curiosity for the world around us become perverted? When can we play God? And are these questions still relevant?

The answers are left as an exercise for the reader's imagination.

Refs

1. Shiela O'Malleys' Excellent Blog, and Frankenstein related work
   

2. Frankenstein Wiki Page
   

3. An excellent article on Mary Shelley

Post Notes

1. The movie includes a line from Percy Shelley's poem Ozymandias - Thank you movie.

2. Mia Goth is excellent. I saw a GDT post, talking about Jane Eyre. Hope he makes a movie where she plays both Jane Eyre and the 'crazy' Bertha Mason - Would work very well. Jacob Elordi or Oscar Isaac could be Rochester - Either way is fine. But they have to do the scene where he dresses up as gypsy woman to meet his crush.

3. The best line from the book isn't included in the movie - "I will be with you on your wedding night". But I do love the tagline of the movie - Only monsters play god.