Big Bad Wolf
Encyclopedia
The Big Bad Wolf is a term used to describe a fictional wolf who appears in several precautionary folkloric stories, including some of Aesop's Fables
and Grimm's Fairy Tales
.
, and The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids
, the theme of the ravening wolf and of the creature released unharmed from its belly
is reflected in the Russian tale Peter and the Wolf
, but its general theme of restoration is at least as old as Jonah and the whale
. The Theme also appears in the story of the life of Saint Margaret
, where the saint emerges unharmed from the belly of a dragon.
The dialog between the wolf and Little Red Riding Hood has its analogies to the Norse Þrymskviða
from the Elder Edda; the giant Þrymr had stolen Mjölner, Thor
's hammer, and demanded Freyja as his bride for its return. Instead, the gods dressed Thor as a bride and sent him. When the giants note Thor's unladylike eyes, eating, and drinking, Loki
explains them as Freyja not having slept, or eaten, or drunk, out of longing for the wedding.
Folklorists
and cultural anthropologists
such as P. Saintyves and Edward Burnett Tylor
saw Little Red Riding Hood in terms of solar myths and other naturally occurring cycles, stating that the wolf represents the night swallowing the sun, and the variations in which Little Red Riding Hood is cut out of the wolf's belly represent the dawn. In this interpretation, there is a connection between the wolf of this tale and Skoll
or Fenris, the wolf in Norse mythology
that will swallow the sun at Ragnarök
.
Ethologist Dr. Valerius Geist of the University of Calgary
, Alberta
wrote that the fable was likely based on genuine risk of wolf attacks
at the time. He argues that wolves were in fact dangerous predators, and fables served as a valid warning not to enter forests where wolves were known to live, and to be on the look out for such. Both wolves and wilderness were treated as enemies of humanity in that region and time.
from Walt Disney
's animation Three Little Pigs
, directed by Burt Gillett and first released on May 27, 1933. The Wolf's voice was provided by Billy Bletcher
. As in the folktale, he was a cunning and threatening menace. The short also introduced the Wolf's theme song, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?", written by Frank Churchill
.
The Wolf normally wears a top hat, red pants, green suspenders and white gloves. He doesn't wear a shirt and is barefoot. The Wolf has a taste for disguising himself, but both the audience and the Practical Pig could easily see through the Wolf's disguises. With each successive short, the Wolf exhibits a fondness for dressing in drag, and even "seduces" Fiddler and Fifer Pigs (who become more and more clueless as to his disguises with each installment) with such disguises as "Goldilocks the Fairy Queen", Little Bo Peep, and a mermaid.
The short was so popular that Walt Disney
produced several sequel
s, which also featured the Wolf as the villain
. The first of them was named after him: The Big Bad Wolf, also directed by Burt Gillett and first released on April 14, 1934. In the next of the sequels, Three Little Wolves (1936), he was accompanied by three just-as-carnivorous sons. (These three sons were later reduced to just one who, in contrast to his father, was full of goodness and charm and a friend of the three little pigs.) The fourth cartoon featuring the Three Little Pigs and the Wolf, The Practical Pig
, was released in 1939. During World War II
, a final, propaganda
cartoon followed, produced by The National Film Board of Canada: The Thrifty Pig (1941).
At the end of each short, the Wolf is dealt with by the resourceful thinking and hard work of Practical Pig. In the original short, he falls into a boiling pot prepared by the pigs. In The Big Bad Wolf, Practical pours popcorn and hot coals down his pants. In the final two shorts, Practical invents an anti-Wolf contraption to deal with the Wolf, who is shown to be powerless against the marvels of modern technology. The "Wolf Pacifier" in Three Little Wolves entraps him, chases him with a buzz-saw, hits his head with rolling pins, kicks him in the butt with boots, punches his face with boxing gloves, and finally tars and feathers him before firing him out of a cannon, all accomplished automatically and in time to a version of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?". In The Practical Pig
, the Wolf falls into Practical Pig's trap and is subjected to the Lie Detector, which washes his mouth out with soap, whacks his hands with rulers, or pulls down his pants and spanks him when he tells a lie. The machine's punishment grows harsher and harsher the more he lies, until it is finally spinning him around, smacking his head and scrubbing his bottom. When he finally tells the truth, the Wolf is ejected out of the house with a rocket.
The Wolf also appeared in Mickey's Polo Team
, directed by David Hand and first released on January 4, 1936. The short featured a game of Polo
between four of Disney's animated characters (one of whom was the Wolf) and four animated caricature
s of noted film actors.
In 1936 Disney's Wolf came to Sunday newspaper comics, which were reformatted and reprinted in the monthly Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
in 1941. They were popular enough there that a demand for new Wolf comics arose. From 1945, the original WDC&S series Li'l Bad Wolf nominally starred Big Bad's good little cub, but "Pop" repeatedly stole the spotlight. Carl Buettner, Gil Turner
and Jack Bradbury
were among the noted creators to work on the series in its early years, with Buettner giving Big Bad his proper name of Zeke (1946) and Turner supplying his middle name of Midas (1949).
In the comics, Big Bad generally wants his son to become a bad guy like himself; but, unlike the three little wolves who appeared in the shorts, the gentle Li'l Bad Wolf does not live up to his father's expectations. Indeed, Li'l Bad is friends with the Pigs, Thumper
, and other forest characters whom the comics portray as Zeke's intended prey. Today, new Disney wolf comics continue to be created around the world. A running gag
in the comics typically comes when in trying to catch the Pigs, Zeke runs afoul of Br'er Bear, who ends up pounding "Br'er Wolf" for one offense or another.
The Wolf made a couple of brief cameo appearances in Who Framed Roger Rabbit
(in one instance, he was wearing a sheep costume and mask which he instantly stripped off to reveal his true wolfish features). He was voiced by Tony Pope
in this one (who was perhaps well known for providing the voice of the original Furby
).
In Magical Tetris Challenge
, Zeke is one of Pete's henchmen, along with Weasel and is the boss you fight before Pete, the final boss. His levels theme seems to be a disco remix, with him wearing a purple top hat
with a matching tailcoat
, white dress shirt, red bow tie, purple trousers and brown Oxfords
.
In recent years the Big Bad Wolf has been a recurring character in Disney's House of Mouse
, where he is voiced by Jim Cummings
. His first appearance on this show featured him as a jazz artist called "Big Bad Wolf Daddy" (a parody of Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
), performing a swing version of his song with the Pigs as his backup band (they are under a contract that states he will eat them if they do not play for him). In this episode, his tendency to destroy houses by exhaling is shown to be an allergy-like reaction to the sight of a door
. Later appearances on House of Mouse, however, returned the Wolf to his more traditional role; one episode even featured a newly made short starring the character, based on the aforementioned Li'l Bad Wolf comic stories.
Apart from TV appearances, Zeke Wolf was one of the villains in the direct-to-video Mickey's House of Villains
; he also appeared in Mickey's Christmas Carol
, dressed as a streetcorner Santa Claus
, and in Who Framed Roger Rabbit
. As a walkaround costumed character, Zeke also appears at the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
for meet-and-greets, parades and shows.
Zeke Wolf also appeared in The Kingdom Keepers
series, in the fourth book, Power Play, where he appeared non anthropomorphized. In the book, he attempted to eat Pluto
and the main characters, Finn and Amanda. He ends up falling into the Rivers of America
Li'l Wolf debuted in his own self-titled series, beginning in the comic book Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
#52 (1945). The feature ran regularly through 1957, when it temporarily moved to the back pages of Mickey Mouse. Li'l Wolf returned to Comics and Stories in 1961, after which he continued to appear there frequently through 2008. Li'l Wolf has in fact starred in more issues of Comics and Stories than any other character except for Mickey Mouse
and Donald Duck
.
Apart from Comics and Stories and Mickey Mouse, Li'l Wolf has also appeared in many different Disney anthology comic books, including a number of giant-size specials and a series of one-page text stories in Donald Duck.
From 2003-2008, reflecting a trend initiated in European Disney comics, Zeke Wolf increasingly often featured as the title character in new stories himself, although Li'l Wolf continued to play a major role.
Li'l Wolf's first animated appearance was in the Raw Toonage
short "The Porker's Court". However, he later appeared, in a more traditional role, in a self-titled short on Disney's House of Mouse
. The voice for the animated Li'l Wolf in House of Mouse was provided by Andrew Lawrence
. Li'l Wolf is not to be confused with the Three Little Wolves, Big Bad Wolf's three mischievous sons who appeared in the cartoon shorts The Three Little Wolves and The Practical Pig
, although he closely resembles them.
Created by animation director Tex Avery
, this variation of the Big Bad Wolf's cartoons included many sexual overtones, violence, and very rapid gags, and never became as popular as the Disney incarnation, but was more popular with an older crowd (especially soldiers in World War II).
After debuting in Blitz Wolf
(1942)—as Adolf Wolf, the Three Pigs' Hitler-like foe—the Avery Wolf returned as a Hollywood swinger in Red Hot Riding Hood
(1943), memorably aroused by Red's song and dance performance. Further girl-chasing roles came to the Wolf in Wild and Wolfy, Swing Shift Cinderella and Little Rural Riding Hood; simultaneously, the Wolf was used as foe against Avery's Droopy, a role he would keep into the 1950s. He would later reprise the role in the "Droopy and Dripple" segments of Hanna-Barbera
's Tom & Jerry Kids (1990).
The Avery Wolf was voiced by Frank Graham
in Red Hot Riding Hood and throughout most of the 1940s, with famed voice actor Daws Butler
providing the howling. Throughout most of the 1950s, Butler and Paul Frees switched off at providing the Wolf's voice. In modern-day appearances, the Wolf was voiced by Frank Welker
.
The Avery Wolf's actual name has varied over time. It was seldom given in the 1940s, but a 1945 studio announcement called him Wally Wolf. In modern-day appearances, the Wolf's name is often given as Slick Wolf or Slick McWolf.
The Avery Wolf was referenced in the film The Mask
(1994), when Stanley/The Mask (performed by Jim Carrey
) briefly transforms into him while watching Tina Carlyle perform in a Red Hot Riding Hood-like performance, howling and whistling at her and then banging his head with a mallet. The Mask also changes into his wolf-like form on occasion in the spin-off animated series of the same name, particularly in the animated crossover featuring Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
.
who eagerly turns to vandalism
, abuse
s minor
s, breaks laws
and is a heavy smoker
. His adventures revolve around constant failures to capture a Hare
. On the other hand, many of Wolf's attempts to catch Hare are often characterized by uncanny abilities on his part (including figure skating
, ballet
and waltz
ing) which demonstrate his more refined side. Wolf can also play the guitar
very well and ride the powerful rocker
motorbike, making his character more sophisticated than a normal hooligan.
In the first episode, while climbing a high building to catch Hare, Wolf whistles the popular mountaineer
song, "Song of a Friend" (the signature song of Vladimir Vysotsky
). In spite of these talents, most of Wolf's schemes eventually fail or turn against him. The character was originally voiced by Anatoli Papanov
.
's Looney Tunes
and Merrie Melodies
cartoons, particularly those of director Isadore "Friz" Freleng
. The first one is Little Red Riding Rabbit
. In two Bugs Bunny
cartoons directed by Robert McKimson
(the second of which, False Hare
(released in 1964), was the last cartoon of American Animation's Golden Age to feature Bugs Bunny), the Big Bad Wolf had a cheerful nephew.
Gmork in the film The NeverEnding Story
is a werewolf and the servant of the power behind the Nothing.
Big Bad Wolf is also the name for an Arrow Dynamics suspended swinging coaster
at Busch Gardens Williamsburg. It was one of the first successful suspended roller coasters from Arrow Dynamics
, and features a signature drop towards the Rhine River.
Kiefer Sutherland
played a (human) character representing the Big Bad Wolf in the 1996 movie Freeway.
The band Cartoons
released an album in 2001 called Toontastic!, in which there is a song titled "Little Red Ridinghood". The Big Bad Wolf is the song's narrator
, and he is telling the story of Little Red Riding Hood
in the first person form
.
The 2005 series of Doctor Who
on the BBC contains many references to "Bad Wolf", and this is carried through in the websites
the BBC has set up to accompany the series. The various references in the television series have been listed at the BBC's Bad Wolf website (along with many inaccurate references to folklore and mythology; some are blatantly intentional, such as a "French folk song" that's a French translation of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf", albeit one with an Easter Egg hidden inside). The 2008 series also contains references to Bad Wolf in the episode Turn Left where the Doctor associates these references with the end of the universe.
The Big Bad Wolf is a card used by Leonhard Wilson, whose deck is mostly composed of fairy tale monsters, in the second series Yu-Gi-Oh!
anime. This card does not appear in the real Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game
.
The name of one of the bosses in the Karazhan Tower in the World of Warcraft
universe is "The Big Bad Wolf". This boss is a werewolf-like being whose special ability is to transform one player into Red Riding Hood on which the wolf will focus his attacks.
In a dark webcomic called "Everafter," the Big Bad Wolf is the name given to a sentient and polymorphous mass of "Grimm" energy that roams the island on which the story's asylum is built—aptly so because of the creature's notable likeness to a gigantic black wolf, which can morph into a whole pack of identical wolves. This being, just like most of the "Everafter" characters, is much darker and seemingly immensely more powerful than his fairytale counterpart. Its appearance is more similar to a demon or ghost than an actual wolf and the mere sight of it can drive a human being insane.
Stephen Sondheim
's musical Into the Woods
features the Big Bad Wolf as a lustful and well-endowed character whose appetite for Little Red Riding Hood
is more sexual than victual.
On KGS a popular Go server there is a 9d player by the name BigbadWolf
. However, the best-known "good" adaptations are from films, where it is mostly used for a comedic effect.
Shrek
film series reversed many conventional roles found in fairy tales, including depicting the Big Bad Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood
as a friendly misunderstood crossdresser (apparently still wearing her grandmother's clothes) and on good terms with the three little pigs. This depiction, along with a seemingly transgendered bartender (who the crew deny on the DVD
commentary as having any sort of gender confusion) and Pinocchio's expansive nose in Shrek 2
, raised the ire of some groups who objected to the film's sexual content, in what is billed as a children's film. However, the wolf is no longer in drag in the video games.
In the fighting game Shrek SuperSlam, released 2005, Big Bad Wolf is a playable character and appears as "Huff n Puff Wolf".
's computer-animated 2006 film "Hoodwinked!" which was a spin-off from Little Red Riding Hood
, features the wolf from that story, as a misunderstood Fletch
-type wolf. He goes undercover with his squirrel
companion, Twitchy, and they record stories for the newspaper
called The Once Upon a Times. Along with Red, Granny, and the Woodsman, he is a suspect of the recipe-robbing crime, which is wreaking the forests he lives in. He is voiced by Patrick Warburton
.
features a reformed Big Bad Wolf as a major character, commonly referred to as "Bigby
". In order to pass for human (the other animal fables want nothing to do with him), he has been infected with lycanthropy, making him, in essence, a werewolf. He acts as sheriff for the Fable community, going by the name of Bigby Wolf. He is often portrayed as a typical film-noir-style trenchcoat-wearing detective
. In the context of the series, he earned the name "Big Bad" after his (much larger) siblings sarcastically noted his drive to be ferocious, particularly after his father, the incarnation of the North Wind, left his mother due to being bored with the relationship. Due to his unique parentage, his infamous "huff 'n puff" is a form of wind control that has been shown to be powerful enough to smash trees down, blow out an army of flaming animated puppetmen, and Bigby once conjectured that even a brick house would most likely be blown to bits by it.
Hanna-Barbera's Loopy de Loop
The only theatrical short subject cartoon series produced by Hanna Barbera after they left MGM and formed their own studio, Loopy de Loop is cast as a tuque
-topped, kind-hearted wolf who speaks with a bad French Canadian
accent, and whose kind-hearted attempts to assist almost always ended up by being rejected by those he sought to help-or something slightly worse.
, Scott Cohen plays a character called Wolf, which is based on the Big Bad Wolf and there is some speculation to whether he may even be the Big Bad Wolf's descendant (mainly owed to the fact that most other characters in the mini-series are descendants of many well-known fairy tale characters). Wolf recognizes he has a sort of obsessive-compulsive disorder
towards eating lamb meat
, rabbit meat, or little-girl meat, which he tries to overcome when he falls in love with Virginia, the main character. (Note that her married name would be Virginia Wolf
.)
The Big Bad Wolf has become a regularly recurring puppet character on Sesame Street
, appearing usually in purple fur (although he originally had blue shaggy fur, as he was a variant of Herry Monster). He is generally puppeteered by Jerry Nelson
(particularly the blue version) and occasionally by Kevin Clash
and Marty Robinson.
In the animated series Drak Pack
, Howler, the werewolf
, has super-breath powers, apparently derived from the Big Bad Wolf's "huffing and puffing" to blow the pigs' houses down.
In the Swedish cartoon and television short films, Bamse
, The Wolf is, as his name suggests, a black wolf who had a thing for pulling pranks on the protagonist as well as his friends (he even won a diploma as "the master of evilness"). He eventually turned out to be a nice guy at heart and was only "evil" because of a problematic life where the only way for him to gain recognition from others was to do bad things.
In the Netherlandic series 'De Fabeltjeskrant', was the role as the Big Bad Wolf portrayed by the short tempered Bor de Wolf. He was, however, very bad at being bad since he wasn't really bad, as explained by the owl, Jacob: The other animals were afraid of Bor because he always got so mad, that's why he was always left out, and that's why Bor got so mad. After being well met by the host at Martha Hamster's birthday party, he got remarkably nicer, but had still some problems with his short temper.
An uncomfortable deconstruction of the "big bad wolf" archetype occurs in Witches Abroad
by Terry Pratchett
. In this novel, a rogue fairy godmother
, intent on making stories come true, has magically molded a little girl's life to follow the plot of Red Riding Hood. As part of the tableau, a wolf is reconditioned to act as humans perceive it, its mind clouded with human motivations to murder and destroy. Upon being found by the novel's heroines, a trio of good witches, the wolf begs for release from its madness, whereupon it is mercifully killed.
Another interesting interpretation of the Wolf can be found in The Sisters Grimm series by Michael Buckley. In the books, the Wolf is the alter-ego of Mr. Canis, an elderly caretaker for the two heroes and their grandmother. Canis fights with the monster for control over his body and as the series progresses the war is a losing one. Mr. Canis continues to become more wolf-like and in the most recent books is on the verge of losing his identity entirely to the savage beast.
The Big Good Wolf from Timothy Groen's cult short animated film series (16mm, very rare) The Little Pigs and the Big Good Wolf is another example. In this ironic retelling and its sequels, a philanthropist wolf donates money to the town of the pigs in order to develop a central housing authority and safety standards. It is eventually revealed that the big good wolf is actually the brother of the Big Bad Wolf, and is only exacting revenge against his brother for an unsettled debt. The safety standards he develops and implements end up turning the town into a locked-up pigfarm for his own exclusive use, but he has in the meantime developed friendships with the pigs and ultimately becomes their sworn friend and protector.
The Big Brain Wolf from the eponymous game
is actually a vegetarian, asthmatic genie-in-training.
Aesop's Fables
Aesop's Fables or the Aesopica are a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and story-teller believed to have lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 560 BCE. The fables remain a popular choice for moral education of children today...
and Grimm's Fairy Tales
Grimm's Fairy Tales
Children's and Household Tales is a collection of German origin fairy tales first published in 1812 by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, the Brothers Grimm. The collection is commonly known today as Grimms' Fairy Tales .-Composition:...
.
Interpretations
In both Little Red Riding HoodLittle Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
, and The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids
The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids
The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 5. It is Aarne-Thompson type 123., but has a strong resemblance to The Three Little Pigs and other Aarne-Thomspson type 124 folktales, and to the variant of Little Red Riding Hood that the Grimms...
, the theme of the ravening wolf and of the creature released unharmed from its belly
Stomach
The stomach is a muscular, hollow, dilated part of the alimentary canal which functions as an important organ of the digestive tract in some animals, including vertebrates, echinoderms, insects , and molluscs. It is involved in the second phase of digestion, following mastication .The stomach is...
is reflected in the Russian tale Peter and the Wolf
Peter and the Wolf
Peter and the Wolf , Op. 67, is a composition written by Sergei Prokofiev in 1936 in the USSR. It is a children's story , spoken by a narrator accompanied by the orchestra....
, but its general theme of restoration is at least as old as Jonah and the whale
Book of Jonah
The Book of Jonah is a book in the Hebrew Bible. It tells the story of a Hebrew prophet named Jonah ben Amittai who is sent by God to prophesy the destruction of Nineveh but tries to escape the divine mission...
. The Theme also appears in the story of the life of Saint Margaret
Margaret the Virgin
Margaret the Virgin, also known as Margaret of Antioch , virgin and martyr, is celebrated as a saint by the Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches on July 20; and on July 17 in the Orthodox Church. Her historical existence has been questioned; she was declared apocryphal by Pope Gelasius I in 494,...
, where the saint emerges unharmed from the belly of a dragon.
The dialog between the wolf and Little Red Riding Hood has its analogies to the Norse Þrymskviða
Þrymskviða
Þrymskviða is one of the best known poems from the Poetic Edda...
from the Elder Edda; the giant Þrymr had stolen Mjölner, Thor
Thor
In Norse mythology, Thor is a hammer-wielding god associated with thunder, lightning, storms, oak trees, strength, the protection of mankind, and also hallowing, healing, and fertility...
's hammer, and demanded Freyja as his bride for its return. Instead, the gods dressed Thor as a bride and sent him. When the giants note Thor's unladylike eyes, eating, and drinking, Loki
Loki
In Norse mythology, Loki or Loke is a god or jötunn . Loki is the son of Fárbauti and Laufey, and the brother of Helblindi and Býleistr. By the jötunn Angrboða, Loki is the father of Hel, the wolf Fenrir, and the world serpent Jörmungandr. By his wife Sigyn, Loki is the father of Nari or Narfi...
explains them as Freyja not having slept, or eaten, or drunk, out of longing for the wedding.
Folklorists
Folkloristics
Folkloristics is the formal academic study of folklore. The term derives from a nineteenth century German designation of folkloristik to distinguish between folklore as the content and folkloristics as its study, much as language is distinguished from linguistics...
and cultural anthropologists
Cultural anthropology
Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans, collecting data about the impact of global economic and political processes on local cultural realities. Anthropologists use a variety of methods, including participant observation,...
such as P. Saintyves and Edward Burnett Tylor
Edward Burnett Tylor
Sir Edward Burnett Tylor , was an English anthropologist.Tylor is representative of cultural evolutionism. In his works Primitive Culture and Anthropology, he defined the context of the scientific study of anthropology, based on the evolutionary theories of Charles Lyell...
saw Little Red Riding Hood in terms of solar myths and other naturally occurring cycles, stating that the wolf represents the night swallowing the sun, and the variations in which Little Red Riding Hood is cut out of the wolf's belly represent the dawn. In this interpretation, there is a connection between the wolf of this tale and Skoll
Skoll
In Norse mythology, Sköll is a wolf that chases the horses Árvakr and Alsviðr, that drag the chariot which contains the sun through the sky every day, trying to eat her. Sköll has a brother, Hati, who chases Máni, the moon...
or Fenris, the wolf in Norse mythology
Norse mythology
Norse mythology, a subset of Germanic mythology, is the overall term for the myths, legends and beliefs about supernatural beings of Norse pagans. It flourished prior to the Christianization of Scandinavia, during the Early Middle Ages, and passed into Nordic folklore, with some aspects surviving...
that will swallow the sun at Ragnarök
Ragnarök
In Norse mythology, Ragnarök is a series of future events, including a great battle foretold to ultimately result in the death of a number of major figures , the occurrence of various natural disasters, and the subsequent submersion of the world in water...
.
Ethologist Dr. Valerius Geist of the University of Calgary
University of Calgary
The University of Calgary is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1966 the U of C is composed of 14 faculties and more than 85 research institutes and centres.More than 25,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students are currently...
, Alberta
Alberta
Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...
wrote that the fable was likely based on genuine risk of wolf attacks
Wolf attacks on humans
A wolf attack is an attack on a human by a wolf or wolves. Under normal circumstances, wild wolves are generally timid around humans. Wolves usually try to avoid contact with people, to the point of even abandoning their kills when an approaching human is detected, though there are several reported...
at the time. He argues that wolves were in fact dangerous predators, and fables served as a valid warning not to enter forests where wolves were known to live, and to be on the look out for such. Both wolves and wilderness were treated as enemies of humanity in that region and time.
Aesop's Fables
- The Boy Who Cried WolfThe Boy Who Cried WolfThe Boy Who Cried Wolf, is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 210 in the Perry Index. From it is derived the English idiom 'to cry wolf', meaning to give a false alarm.-The fable and its history:...
- The Dog and the Wolf
- The Wolf and the CraneThe Wolf and the CraneThe Wolf and the Crane is a fable attributed to Aesop that has several eastern analogues. Similar stories have a lion instead of a wolf, and a stork, heron or partridge takes the place of the crane.-The fable and its alternative versions:...
- The Wolf and the LambThe Wolf and the LambThe Wolf and the Lamb is a well known fable of Aesop and is numbered 155 in the Perry Index. There are several variant stories of tyrannical injustice in which a victim is falsely accused and killed despite a reasonable defence.-The fable and its variants:...
Grimm's Fairy Tales
- Little Red Riding HoodLittle Red Riding HoodLittle Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
- The Wolf and the Seven Young KidsThe Wolf and the Seven Young KidsThe Wolf and the Seven Young Kids is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm, tale number 5. It is Aarne-Thompson type 123., but has a strong resemblance to The Three Little Pigs and other Aarne-Thomspson type 124 folktales, and to the variant of Little Red Riding Hood that the Grimms...
Disney's version
The Big Bad Wolf, also known as Zeke Wolf or Br'er Wolf, is a fictional characterFictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
from Walt Disney
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
's animation Three Little Pigs
Three Little Pigs (film)
Three Little Pigs is an animated short film released on May 27, 1933 by United Artists, produced by Walt Disney and directed by Burt Gillett. Based on a fairy tale of the same name, Three Little Pigs won the 1934 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. In 1994, it was voted #11 of the 50...
, directed by Burt Gillett and first released on May 27, 1933. The Wolf's voice was provided by Billy Bletcher
Billy Bletcher
William "Billy" Bletcher was an American actor, comedian, and voice artist, a native of Lancaster, Pennsylvania.-Career:...
. As in the folktale, he was a cunning and threatening menace. The short also introduced the Wolf's theme song, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?", written by Frank Churchill
Frank Churchill
Frank Churchill was an American composer of popular music for films. He wrote most of the music for Disney's 1937 movie Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, including "Whistle While You Work" and "Some Day My Prince Will Come"...
.
The Wolf normally wears a top hat, red pants, green suspenders and white gloves. He doesn't wear a shirt and is barefoot. The Wolf has a taste for disguising himself, but both the audience and the Practical Pig could easily see through the Wolf's disguises. With each successive short, the Wolf exhibits a fondness for dressing in drag, and even "seduces" Fiddler and Fifer Pigs (who become more and more clueless as to his disguises with each installment) with such disguises as "Goldilocks the Fairy Queen", Little Bo Peep, and a mermaid.
The short was so popular that Walt Disney
Walt Disney
Walter Elias "Walt" Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well-known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O...
produced several sequel
Sequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...
s, which also featured the Wolf as the villain
Villain
A villain is an "evil" character in a story, whether a historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villain usually is the antagonist, the character who tends to have a negative effect on other characters...
. The first of them was named after him: The Big Bad Wolf, also directed by Burt Gillett and first released on April 14, 1934. In the next of the sequels, Three Little Wolves (1936), he was accompanied by three just-as-carnivorous sons. (These three sons were later reduced to just one who, in contrast to his father, was full of goodness and charm and a friend of the three little pigs.) The fourth cartoon featuring the Three Little Pigs and the Wolf, The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig is a Silly Symphonies cartoon. Released on February 24, 1939, and directed by Dick Rickard. It was the second-to-last Silly Symphony made, and the fourth and final cartoon starring The Three Pigs...
, was released in 1939. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, a final, propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
cartoon followed, produced by The National Film Board of Canada: The Thrifty Pig (1941).
At the end of each short, the Wolf is dealt with by the resourceful thinking and hard work of Practical Pig. In the original short, he falls into a boiling pot prepared by the pigs. In The Big Bad Wolf, Practical pours popcorn and hot coals down his pants. In the final two shorts, Practical invents an anti-Wolf contraption to deal with the Wolf, who is shown to be powerless against the marvels of modern technology. The "Wolf Pacifier" in Three Little Wolves entraps him, chases him with a buzz-saw, hits his head with rolling pins, kicks him in the butt with boots, punches his face with boxing gloves, and finally tars and feathers him before firing him out of a cannon, all accomplished automatically and in time to a version of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?". In The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig is a Silly Symphonies cartoon. Released on February 24, 1939, and directed by Dick Rickard. It was the second-to-last Silly Symphony made, and the fourth and final cartoon starring The Three Pigs...
, the Wolf falls into Practical Pig's trap and is subjected to the Lie Detector, which washes his mouth out with soap, whacks his hands with rulers, or pulls down his pants and spanks him when he tells a lie. The machine's punishment grows harsher and harsher the more he lies, until it is finally spinning him around, smacking his head and scrubbing his bottom. When he finally tells the truth, the Wolf is ejected out of the house with a rocket.
The Wolf also appeared in Mickey's Polo Team
Mickey's Polo Team
Mickey's Polo Team is a short animated film, directed by David Hand and first released on January 4, 1936. The short featured a game of polo between four of Disney's animated characters and four animated caricatures of noted film actors...
, directed by David Hand and first released on January 4, 1936. The short featured a game of Polo
Polo
Polo is a team sport played on horseback in which the objective is to score goals against an opposing team. Sometimes called, "The Sport of Kings", it was highly popularized by the British. Players score by driving a small white plastic or wooden ball into the opposing team's goal using a...
between four of Disney's animated characters (one of whom was the Wolf) and four animated caricature
Caricature
A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...
s of noted film actors.
In 1936 Disney's Wolf came to Sunday newspaper comics, which were reformatted and reprinted in the monthly Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
Walt Disney's Comics and Stories, sometimes abbreviated WDC or WDC&S, is an anthology comic book series that has an assortment of Disney characters, including Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck, Mickey Mouse, Chip 'n Dale, Lil Bad Wolf, Scamp, Bucky Bug, Grandma Duck, Brer Rabbit, Winnie the Pooh, and...
in 1941. They were popular enough there that a demand for new Wolf comics arose. From 1945, the original WDC&S series Li'l Bad Wolf nominally starred Big Bad's good little cub, but "Pop" repeatedly stole the spotlight. Carl Buettner, Gil Turner
Gil Turner
Gil Turner was an American folk singer-songwriter, magazine editor, Shakespearean actor, political activist, and for a time, a lay Baptist preacher...
and Jack Bradbury
Jack Bradbury
Jack Bradbury was an American animator and comic book artist.Bradbury began working for Disney at age 20 and was responsible for key scenes in movies like Bambi, Fantasia, and Pinocchio...
were among the noted creators to work on the series in its early years, with Buettner giving Big Bad his proper name of Zeke (1946) and Turner supplying his middle name of Midas (1949).
In the comics, Big Bad generally wants his son to become a bad guy like himself; but, unlike the three little wolves who appeared in the shorts, the gentle Li'l Bad Wolf does not live up to his father's expectations. Indeed, Li'l Bad is friends with the Pigs, Thumper
Thumper (Bambi)
Thumper is a fictional rabbit character from Disney's animated movie Bambi. He appeared again in Bambi II. He is known and named for his habit of thumping his left hind foot...
, and other forest characters whom the comics portray as Zeke's intended prey. Today, new Disney wolf comics continue to be created around the world. A running gag
Running gag
A running gag, or running joke, is a literary device that takes the form of an amusing joke or a comical reference and appears repeatedly throughout a work of literature or other form of storytelling....
in the comics typically comes when in trying to catch the Pigs, Zeke runs afoul of Br'er Bear, who ends up pounding "Br'er Wolf" for one offense or another.
The Wolf made a couple of brief cameo appearances in Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Who Framed Roger Rabbit is a 1988 American fantasy-comedy-noir film directed by Robert Zemeckis and released by Touchstone Pictures. The film combines live action and animation, and is based on Gary K. Wolf's novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit?, which depicts a world in which cartoon characters...
(in one instance, he was wearing a sheep costume and mask which he instantly stripped off to reveal his true wolfish features). He was voiced by Tony Pope
Tony Pope
Anthony Pope , also known as Anthony Mozdy, was a voice actor.He was born in Cleveland, Ohio and was known for providing the voice of Furby, as well as the voice of Newton Gimmick and other voices in the popular toy series The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin in the 1980s.-Death:He died on February 11,...
in this one (who was perhaps well known for providing the voice of the original Furby
Furby
A Furby was a popular electronic robotic toy resembling a hamster/owl-like creature which went through a period of being a "must-have" toy following its launch in the holiday season of 1998, with continual sales until 2000...
).
In Magical Tetris Challenge
Magical Tetris Challenge
Magical Tetris Challenge, known in Japan as Magical Tetris Challenge Featuring Mickey, is a puzzle game for the Nintendo 64, Game Boy Color and PlayStation . It was released on January 14, 1999. It is a version of Tetris featuring Disney characters. It was also released in the arcades on the Seta's...
, Zeke is one of Pete's henchmen, along with Weasel and is the boss you fight before Pete, the final boss. His levels theme seems to be a disco remix, with him wearing a purple top hat
Top hat
A top hat, beaver hat, high hat silk hat, cylinder hat, chimney pot hat or stove pipe hat is a tall, flat-crowned, broad-brimmed hat, predominantly worn from the latter part of the 18th to the middle of the 20th century...
with a matching tailcoat
Tailcoat
A tailcoat is a coat with the front of the skirt cut away, so as to leave only the rear section of the skirt, known as the tails. The historical reason coats were cut this way was to make it easier for the wearer to ride a horse, but over the years tailcoats of varying types have evolved into forms...
, white dress shirt, red bow tie, purple trousers and brown Oxfords
Oxford shoe
An Oxford is a style of laced shoe characterized by shoelace eyelet tabs that are stitched underneath the vamp, a construction method that is also sometimes referred to as "closed lacing". Oxfords first appeared in Scotland and Ireland, where they are occasionally called Balmorals after the Queen's...
.
In recent years the Big Bad Wolf has been a recurring character in Disney's House of Mouse
Disney's House of Mouse
Disney's House of Mouse is an American animated television series, produced by Walt Disney Television, that originally aired from 2001 to 2003-Premise:...
, where he is voiced by Jim Cummings
Jim Cummings
James Jonah "Jim" Cummings is an American voice actor who has appeared in almost 100 roles. He has appeared in classic animated movies such as Aladdin and The Lion King, as well as taking on roles in more current films, such as Bee Movie, Princess and the Frog, and Winnie the Pooh.-Personal...
. His first appearance on this show featured him as a jazz artist called "Big Bad Wolf Daddy" (a parody of Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy is a contemporary swing revival band from southern California. Their notable singles include "Go Daddy-O", "You & Me & the Bottle Makes 3 Tonight ", and "Mr. Pinstripe Suit". The band played the Super Bowl XXXIII half-time show in 1999.The band was originally formed in Ventura,...
), performing a swing version of his song with the Pigs as his backup band (they are under a contract that states he will eat them if they do not play for him). In this episode, his tendency to destroy houses by exhaling is shown to be an allergy-like reaction to the sight of a door
Door
A door is a movable structure used to open and close off an entrance, typically consisting of a panel that swings on hinges or that slides or rotates inside of a space....
. Later appearances on House of Mouse, however, returned the Wolf to his more traditional role; one episode even featured a newly made short starring the character, based on the aforementioned Li'l Bad Wolf comic stories.
Apart from TV appearances, Zeke Wolf was one of the villains in the direct-to-video Mickey's House of Villains
Mickey's House of Villains
Mickey's House of Villains is a direct-to-video film produced by The Walt Disney Company. It is a film adaptation of the Disney Channel animated television series Disney's House of Mouse, starring Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Daisy Duck and Disney Villains that have appeared in...
; he also appeared in Mickey's Christmas Carol
Mickey's Christmas Carol
Mickey's Christmas Carol is a 1983 American animated short film produced by Walt Disney Productions and distributed by Buena Vista Distribution Company. It was directed and produced by Burny Mattinson...
, dressed as a streetcorner Santa Claus
Santa Claus
Santa Claus is a folklore figure in various cultures who distributes gifts to children, normally on Christmas Eve. Each name is a variation of Saint Nicholas, but refers to Santa Claus...
, and in Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Who Framed Roger Rabbit is a 1988 American fantasy-comedy-noir film directed by Robert Zemeckis and released by Touchstone Pictures. The film combines live action and animation, and is based on Gary K. Wolf's novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit?, which depicts a world in which cartoon characters...
. As a walkaround costumed character, Zeke also appears at the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
Walt Disney Parks and Resorts is the segment of The Walt Disney Company that conceives, builds, and manages the company's theme parks and holiday resorts, as well as a variety of additional family-oriented leisure enterprises...
for meet-and-greets, parades and shows.
Zeke Wolf also appeared in The Kingdom Keepers
The Kingdom Keepers
The Kingdom Keepers is a series of novels for young readers, written by Ridley Pearson and published by Disney Hyperion. The first novel, Disney After Dark, was published in 2006, and the second, Disney at Dawn, was released on August 26, 2008, and the third, Disney In Shadow was released on...
series, in the fourth book, Power Play, where he appeared non anthropomorphized. In the book, he attempted to eat Pluto
Pluto (Disney)
Pluto, also called Pluto the Pup, is a cartoon character created in 1930 by Walt Disney Productions. He is a light brown , medium-sized, short-haired dog. Unlike Goofy, Pluto is not anthropomorphic beyond some characteristics such as facial expression...
and the main characters, Finn and Amanda. He ends up falling into the Rivers of America
Li'l Bad Wolf
Li'l Bad Wolf (or just Li'l Wolf as referred to by his friends) is Zeke 'Big Bad' Wolf's son. In spite of his name, Li'l Bad Wolf wants to be a good little wolf; badness is really the domain of his father. Zeke wants his son to be just as bad as he is, but the kindhearted (or, at worst, naive) Li'l Wolf, despite wanting to please his father, cannot bring himself to do others harm. Even worse for Zeke, Li'l Wolf's best friends are the Three Little Pigs themselves, and he constantly saves them from his father's appetite. Despite disappointing his father, Zeke Wolf was shown to be very fond of his son, and Li'l Wolf of his father.Li'l Wolf debuted in his own self-titled series, beginning in the comic book Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
Walt Disney's Comics and Stories
Walt Disney's Comics and Stories, sometimes abbreviated WDC or WDC&S, is an anthology comic book series that has an assortment of Disney characters, including Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck, Mickey Mouse, Chip 'n Dale, Lil Bad Wolf, Scamp, Bucky Bug, Grandma Duck, Brer Rabbit, Winnie the Pooh, and...
#52 (1945). The feature ran regularly through 1957, when it temporarily moved to the back pages of Mickey Mouse. Li'l Wolf returned to Comics and Stories in 1961, after which he continued to appear there frequently through 2008. Li'l Wolf has in fact starred in more issues of Comics and Stories than any other character except for Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks at The Walt Disney Studio. Mickey is an anthropomorphic black mouse and typically wears red shorts, large yellow shoes, and white gloves...
and Donald Duck
Donald Duck
Donald Fauntleroy Duck is a cartoon character created in 1934 at Walt Disney Productions and licensed by The Walt Disney Company. Donald is an anthropomorphic white duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a sailor suit with a cap and a black or red bow tie. Donald is most...
.
Apart from Comics and Stories and Mickey Mouse, Li'l Wolf has also appeared in many different Disney anthology comic books, including a number of giant-size specials and a series of one-page text stories in Donald Duck.
From 2003-2008, reflecting a trend initiated in European Disney comics, Zeke Wolf increasingly often featured as the title character in new stories himself, although Li'l Wolf continued to play a major role.
Li'l Wolf's first animated appearance was in the Raw Toonage
Raw Toonage
Disney's Raw Toonage is a half hour Disney animated cartoon series that aired on the CBS network in the fall of 1992.-History and production:...
short "The Porker's Court". However, he later appeared, in a more traditional role, in a self-titled short on Disney's House of Mouse
Disney's House of Mouse
Disney's House of Mouse is an American animated television series, produced by Walt Disney Television, that originally aired from 2001 to 2003-Premise:...
. The voice for the animated Li'l Wolf in House of Mouse was provided by Andrew Lawrence
Andrew Lawrence (actor)
Andrew James Lawrence is an American actor. He is sometimes credited as Andy Lawrence or Andy J. Lawrence.-Career:...
. Li'l Wolf is not to be confused with the Three Little Wolves, Big Bad Wolf's three mischievous sons who appeared in the cartoon shorts The Three Little Wolves and The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig
The Practical Pig is a Silly Symphonies cartoon. Released on February 24, 1939, and directed by Dick Rickard. It was the second-to-last Silly Symphony made, and the fourth and final cartoon starring The Three Pigs...
, although he closely resembles them.
MGM/Tex Avery's Big Bad Wolf
Tex Avery
Frederick Bean "Fred/Tex" Avery was an American animator, cartoonist, voice actor and director, famous for producing animated cartoons during The Golden Age of Hollywood animation. He did his most significant work for the Warner Bros...
, this variation of the Big Bad Wolf's cartoons included many sexual overtones, violence, and very rapid gags, and never became as popular as the Disney incarnation, but was more popular with an older crowd (especially soldiers in World War II).
After debuting in Blitz Wolf
Blitz Wolf
Blitz Wolf is an early anti-German World War II Hitler-parodying cartoon produced in 1942 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by Tex Avery and produced by Fred Quimby. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons.-Plot:...
(1942)—as Adolf Wolf, the Three Pigs' Hitler-like foe—the Avery Wolf returned as a Hollywood swinger in Red Hot Riding Hood
Red Hot Riding Hood
Red Hot Riding Hood is an animated cartoon short subject, directed by Tex Avery and released on May 8, 1943 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In 1994 it was voted #7 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field...
(1943), memorably aroused by Red's song and dance performance. Further girl-chasing roles came to the Wolf in Wild and Wolfy, Swing Shift Cinderella and Little Rural Riding Hood; simultaneously, the Wolf was used as foe against Avery's Droopy, a role he would keep into the 1950s. He would later reprise the role in the "Droopy and Dripple" segments of Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. was an American animation studio that dominated North American television animation during the second half of the 20th century...
's Tom & Jerry Kids (1990).
The Avery Wolf was voiced by Frank Graham
Frank Graham (voice actor)
Frank Lee Graham was an American radio announcer and cartoon voice actor.-Biography:Graham was born in Michigan to Frank L. Graham and opera singer Ethel Briggs Graham and travelled with his mother on tour....
in Red Hot Riding Hood and throughout most of the 1940s, with famed voice actor Daws Butler
Daws Butler
Charles Dawson "Daws" Butler was a voice actor originally from Toledo, Ohio. He worked mostly for Hanna-Barbera and originated the voices of many famous animated cartoon characters, including Yogi Bear, Quick Draw McGraw, Snagglepuss, and Huckleberry Hound.Daws Butler trained many working actors...
providing the howling. Throughout most of the 1950s, Butler and Paul Frees switched off at providing the Wolf's voice. In modern-day appearances, the Wolf was voiced by Frank Welker
Frank Welker
Franklin Wendell "Frank" Welker is an American actor who specializes in voice acting and has contributed character voices and other vocal effects to American television and motion pictures.-Acting career:...
.
The Avery Wolf's actual name has varied over time. It was seldom given in the 1940s, but a 1945 studio announcement called him Wally Wolf. In modern-day appearances, the Wolf's name is often given as Slick Wolf or Slick McWolf.
The Avery Wolf was referenced in the film The Mask
The Mask (film)
The Mask is a 1994 American superhero comedy film based on a series of comic books published by Dark Horse Comics. This film was directed by Chuck Russell, and produced by Dark Horse Entertainment and New Line Cinema, and originally released to movie theatres on July 29, 1994 through New Line...
(1994), when Stanley/The Mask (performed by Jim Carrey
Jim Carrey
James Eugene "Jim" Carrey is a Canadian-American actor and comedian. He has received two Golden Globe Awards and has also been nominated on four occasions. Carrey began comedy in 1979, performing at Yuk Yuk's in Toronto, Ontario...
) briefly transforms into him while watching Tina Carlyle perform in a Red Hot Riding Hood-like performance, howling and whistling at her and then banging his head with a mallet. The Mask also changes into his wolf-like form on occasion in the spin-off animated series of the same name, particularly in the animated crossover featuring Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective is a 1994 American comedy film directed by Tom Shadyac and starring Jim Carrey. It co-stars Courteney Cox, Tone Loc, Sean Young and former Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino....
.
Nu Pogodi!
In the Soviet animated series Nu Pogodi, the wolf, commonly translated into English as Volk , is portrayed as a hooliganHooliganism
Hooliganism refers to unruly, destructive, aggressive and bullying behaviour. Such behaviour is commonly associated with sports fans. The term can also apply to general rowdy behaviour and vandalism, often under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs....
who eagerly turns to vandalism
Vandalism
Vandalism is the behaviour attributed originally to the Vandals, by the Romans, in respect of culture: ruthless destruction or spoiling of anything beautiful or venerable...
, abuse
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
s minor
Minor (law)
In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...
s, breaks laws
Crime
Crime is the breach of rules or laws for which some governing authority can ultimately prescribe a conviction...
and is a heavy smoker
Smoking
Smoking is a practice in which a substance, most commonly tobacco or cannabis, is burned and the smoke is tasted or inhaled. This is primarily practised as a route of administration for recreational drug use, as combustion releases the active substances in drugs such as nicotine and makes them...
. His adventures revolve around constant failures to capture a Hare
Hare
Hares and jackrabbits are leporids belonging to the genus Lepus. Hares less than one year old are called leverets. Four species commonly known as types of hare are classified outside of Lepus: the hispid hare , and three species known as red rock hares .Hares are very fast-moving...
. On the other hand, many of Wolf's attempts to catch Hare are often characterized by uncanny abilities on his part (including figure skating
Figure skating
Figure skating is an Olympic sport in which individuals, pairs, or groups perform spins, jumps, footwork and other intricate and challenging moves on ice skates. Figure skaters compete at various levels from beginner up to the Olympic level , and at local, national, and international competitions...
, ballet
Ballet
Ballet is a type of performance dance, that originated in the Italian Renaissance courts of the 15th century, and which was further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. The early portions preceded the invention of the proscenium stage and were presented in large chambers with...
and waltz
Waltz
The waltz is a ballroom and folk dance in time, performed primarily in closed position.- History :There are several references to a sliding or gliding dance,- a waltz, from the 16th century including the representations of the printer H.S. Beheim...
ing) which demonstrate his more refined side. Wolf can also play the guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
very well and ride the powerful rocker
Rocker (subculture)
Rockers, leather boys or ton-up boys are a biker subculture that originated in the United Kingdom during the 1950s. It was mainly centered around British cafe racer motorcycles and rock and roll music....
motorbike, making his character more sophisticated than a normal hooligan.
In the first episode, while climbing a high building to catch Hare, Wolf whistles the popular mountaineer
Mountaineering
Mountaineering or mountain climbing is the sport, hobby or profession of hiking, skiing, and climbing mountains. While mountaineering began as attempts to reach the highest point of unclimbed mountains it has branched into specialisations that address different aspects of the mountain and consists...
song, "Song of a Friend" (the signature song of Vladimir Vysotsky
Vladimir Vysotsky
Vladimir Semyonovich Vysotsky was a Soviet singer, songwriter, poet, and actor whose career had an immense and enduring effect on Russian culture. He became widely known for his unique singing style and for his lyrics, which featured social and political commentary in often humorous street...
). In spite of these talents, most of Wolf's schemes eventually fail or turn against him. The character was originally voiced by Anatoli Papanov
Anatoli Papanov
Anatoli Dmitrievich Papanov was a popular Soviet film and theatre actor.Papanov starred in some of the best and well-known Soviet films, often together with his friend, Andrei Mironov. Mostly known for his great performances in comedies, he also had serious and dramatic roles, such as that of the...
.
Other Bad Wolves
Several versions of the Big Bad Wolf have appeared in Warner Bros. AnimationWarner Bros. Animation
Warner Bros. Animation is the animation division of Warner Bros., a subsidiary of Time Warner. The studio is closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies characters, among others. The studio is the successor to Warner Bros...
's Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
and Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies
Merrie Melodies is the name of a series of animated cartoons distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures between 1931 and 1969.Originally produced by Harman-Ising Pictures, Merrie Melodies were produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1944. Schlesinger sold his studio to Warner Bros. in 1944,...
cartoons, particularly those of director Isadore "Friz" Freleng
Friz Freleng
Isadore "Friz" Freleng was an animator, cartoonist, director, and producer best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros....
. The first one is Little Red Riding Rabbit
Little Red Riding Rabbit
Little Red Riding Rabbit is a 1944 Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoon, directed by Friz Freleng, and starring Bugs Bunny. It is a sendup of the Little Red Riding Hood story, and is the first time in which Mel Blanc receives a voice credit...
. In two Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is a animated character created in 1938 at Leon Schlesinger Productions, later Warner Bros. Cartoons. Bugs is an anthropomorphic gray rabbit and is famous for his flippant, insouciant personality and his portrayal as a trickster. He has primarily appeared in animated cartoons, most...
cartoons directed by Robert McKimson
Robert McKimson
Robert "Bob" Porter McKimson, Sr. was an American animator, illustrator, and director best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros., and later DePatie-Freleng Enterprises...
(the second of which, False Hare
False Hare
False Hare is a 1964 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated short starring Bugs Bunny and the Big Bad Wolf who had previously appeared in Now Hare This . Released on July 28, 1964, the cartoon was written by John W...
(released in 1964), was the last cartoon of American Animation's Golden Age to feature Bugs Bunny), the Big Bad Wolf had a cheerful nephew.
Gmork in the film The NeverEnding Story
The NeverEnding Story (film)
The NeverEnding Story is a 1984 German-American epic fantasy film based on the novel of the same name written by Michael Ende. The film was directed and co-written by Wolfgang Petersen and starred Barret Oliver, Noah Hathaway and Tami Stronach. At the time of its release, it was the most...
is a werewolf and the servant of the power behind the Nothing.
Big Bad Wolf is also the name for an Arrow Dynamics suspended swinging coaster
Big Bad Wolf (roller coaster)
The Big Bad Wolf was a suspended roller coaster in the Oktoberfest section of Busch Gardens Williamsburg. First opened in 1984, the ride operated for 25 years and the ride closed on September 7, 2009...
at Busch Gardens Williamsburg. It was one of the first successful suspended roller coasters from Arrow Dynamics
Arrow Dynamics
Arrow Dynamics was a roller coaster and amusement ride design company based in Clearfield, Utah, United States. In 2002, the company went bankrupt but was quickly bought by fellow amusement ride manufacturer S&S Power to form S&S Arrow. During its peak, Arrow Dynamics was responsible for some of...
, and features a signature drop towards the Rhine River.
Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland
Kiefer Sutherland is an English-born Canadian actor, producer and director, best known for his portrayal of Jack Bauer on the Fox thriller drama series 24 for which he has won an Emmy Award , a Golden Globe award , two Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Satellite...
played a (human) character representing the Big Bad Wolf in the 1996 movie Freeway.
The band Cartoons
Cartoons (band)
Cartoons, also known as Cartoons DK are a technobilly/glam pop band from Denmark, best known for their 1998 Eurodance cover of the 1958 novelty song, "Witch Doctor" by Ross Bagdasarian, as well as for their outlandish plastic costumes and wigs used in live performances as caricatures of 1950s...
released an album in 2001 called Toontastic!, in which there is a song titled "Little Red Ridinghood". The Big Bad Wolf is the song's narrator
Narrator
A narrator is, within any story , the fictional or non-fictional, personal or impersonal entity who tells the story to the audience. When the narrator is also a character within the story, he or she is sometimes known as the viewpoint character. The narrator is one of three entities responsible for...
, and he is telling the story of Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
in the first person form
Grammatical person
Grammatical person, in linguistics, is deictic reference to a participant in an event; such as the speaker, the addressee, or others. Grammatical person typically defines a language's set of personal pronouns...
.
The 2005 series of Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
on the BBC contains many references to "Bad Wolf", and this is carried through in the websites
Doctor Who tie-in websites
The 2005 series revival of the long-running British science fiction television programme Doctor Who features several tie-in websites produced by the BBC website team that viewers can access on the Internet...
the BBC has set up to accompany the series. The various references in the television series have been listed at the BBC's Bad Wolf website (along with many inaccurate references to folklore and mythology; some are blatantly intentional, such as a "French folk song" that's a French translation of "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf", albeit one with an Easter Egg hidden inside). The 2008 series also contains references to Bad Wolf in the episode Turn Left where the Doctor associates these references with the end of the universe.
The Big Bad Wolf is a card used by Leonhard Wilson, whose deck is mostly composed of fairy tale monsters, in the second series Yu-Gi-Oh!
Yu-Gi-Oh! (second series anime)
Yu-Gi-Oh!, known in Japan and the rest of East Asia as is an anime based on the Yu-Gi-Oh! manga. It is produced by Studio Gallop and Nihon Ad Systems, and the English-language adaptation was distributed by 4Kids Entertainment until March 29, 2011 when TV Tokyo and Nihon Ad Systems sued 4Kids...
anime. This card does not appear in the real Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game
Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game
The is a Japanese collectible card game developed and published by Konami. It is based on the fictional game of Duel Monsters created by manga artist Kazuki Takahashi, which is the main plot device during the majority of his popular manga franchise, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and its various anime adaptations...
.
The name of one of the bosses in the Karazhan Tower in the World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994...
universe is "The Big Bad Wolf". This boss is a werewolf-like being whose special ability is to transform one player into Red Riding Hood on which the wolf will focus his attacks.
In a dark webcomic called "Everafter," the Big Bad Wolf is the name given to a sentient and polymorphous mass of "Grimm" energy that roams the island on which the story's asylum is built—aptly so because of the creature's notable likeness to a gigantic black wolf, which can morph into a whole pack of identical wolves. This being, just like most of the "Everafter" characters, is much darker and seemingly immensely more powerful than his fairytale counterpart. Its appearance is more similar to a demon or ghost than an actual wolf and the mere sight of it can drive a human being insane.
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
's musical Into the Woods
Into the Woods
Into the Woods is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine. It debuted in San Diego at the Old Globe Theatre in 1986, and premiered on Broadway in 1987. Bernadette Peters' performance as the Witch and Joanna Gleason's portrayal of the Baker's Wife brought acclaim...
features the Big Bad Wolf as a lustful and well-endowed character whose appetite for Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
is more sexual than victual.
On KGS a popular Go server there is a 9d player by the name BigbadWolf
Positive portrayals
Several recent interpretations of the Big Bad Wolf show him as being a character with relatively good intentions, mostly considered "Bad" due to a misunderstanding or prejudice. Arguably, this practice started with the 1989 children's book The True Story of the Three Little PigsThe True Story of the Three Little Pigs
A parody of The Three Little Pigs, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs is a children's book by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith. Released in a number of editions since its first release in 1989, it is the story of The Three Little Pigs as told by the Big Bad Wolf, known in the book as "A. Wolf,"...
. However, the best-known "good" adaptations are from films, where it is mostly used for a comedic effect.
The True Story of the Three Little Pigs
The story as told by the Wolf from The Three Little Pigs shows that wolves do not necessarily have to be "Big" and "Bad", but misunderstood because what they eat happens to be cute. The rather civil wolf has a cold, but is baking a cake for his grandmother's birthday, so the wolf must journey to the little pigs' houses to borrow a cup of sugar. Each time the pigs turn him away the wolf's cold causes him to huff and puff and sneeze a great sneeze, whereupon the wolf would accidentally destroy the pig's house. Finding the inhabitant deceased, the wolf decides to eat their body so as not to let good meat go to waste, since the pig is dead anyway. The final pig's house is not blown down, and the wolf goes into an excessive sneezing fit while the pig insults his grandmother. The authorities come and drag a furious and flustered wolf away and lock him up in prison, from where the wolf is telling his story.Shrek's Big Bad Wolf
The popular computer-animatedComputer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
Shrek
Shrek
Shrek is a 2001 American computer-animated fantasy comedy film directed by Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson, featuring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, and John Lithgow. Loosely based on William Steig's 1990 fairy tale picture book Shrek!...
film series reversed many conventional roles found in fairy tales, including depicting the Big Bad Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
as a friendly misunderstood crossdresser (apparently still wearing her grandmother's clothes) and on good terms with the three little pigs. This depiction, along with a seemingly transgendered bartender (who the crew deny on the DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
commentary as having any sort of gender confusion) and Pinocchio's expansive nose in Shrek 2
Shrek 2
Shrek 2 is a 2004 American computer-animated fantasy comedy film, produced by DreamWorks Animation and directed by Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury and Conrad Vernon. It is the second installment in the Shrek film series and the sequel to 2001's Shrek...
, raised the ire of some groups who objected to the film's sexual content, in what is billed as a children's film. However, the wolf is no longer in drag in the video games.
In the fighting game Shrek SuperSlam, released 2005, Big Bad Wolf is a playable character and appears as "Huff n Puff Wolf".
Hoodwinked's Big Bad Wolf
The Weinstein CompanyThe Weinstein Company
The Weinstein Company is an American film studio founded by Bob and Harvey Weinstein in 2005 after the brothers left the then-Disney-owned Miramax Films, which they had co-founded in 1979...
's computer-animated 2006 film "Hoodwinked!" which was a spin-off from Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood
Little Red Riding Hood, also known as Little Red Cap, is a French fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings....
, features the wolf from that story, as a misunderstood Fletch
Fletch (film)
Fletch is a 1985 comedy film about a wisecracking investigative newspaper reporter, Irwin M. Fletcher , who writes under the name of Jane Doe...
-type wolf. He goes undercover with his squirrel
Squirrel
Squirrels belong to a large family of small or medium-sized rodents called the Sciuridae. The family includes tree squirrels, ground squirrels, chipmunks, marmots , flying squirrels, and prairie dogs. Squirrels are indigenous to the Americas, Eurasia, and Africa and have been introduced to Australia...
companion, Twitchy, and they record stories for the newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
called The Once Upon a Times. Along with Red, Granny, and the Woodsman, he is a suspect of the recipe-robbing crime, which is wreaking the forests he lives in. He is voiced by Patrick Warburton
Patrick Warburton
Patrick John Warburton is an American actor of television, film, and voice. He is best known for his several TV roles, including the title role of The Tick, David Puddy on Seinfeld, the evil Johnny Johnson on NewsRadio, and anchorman Jeb Denton on Less Than Perfect...
.
Bigby Wolf
The comic book series Fables by Bill WillinghamBill Willingham
Bill Willingham is an American writer and artist of comics.-Career:Willingham got his start in the late 1970s to early 1980s as a staff artist for TSR, Inc., where he illustrated a number of their role-playing game products...
features a reformed Big Bad Wolf as a major character, commonly referred to as "Bigby
Bigby Wolf
Bigby Wolf is a major character in the comic book series Fables. He is the Big Bad Wolf of legend and served as the sheriff of the exile community known as Fabletown for several hundred years...
". In order to pass for human (the other animal fables want nothing to do with him), he has been infected with lycanthropy, making him, in essence, a werewolf. He acts as sheriff for the Fable community, going by the name of Bigby Wolf. He is often portrayed as a typical film-noir-style trenchcoat-wearing detective
Detective
A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes"...
. In the context of the series, he earned the name "Big Bad" after his (much larger) siblings sarcastically noted his drive to be ferocious, particularly after his father, the incarnation of the North Wind, left his mother due to being bored with the relationship. Due to his unique parentage, his infamous "huff 'n puff" is a form of wind control that has been shown to be powerful enough to smash trees down, blow out an army of flaming animated puppetmen, and Bigby once conjectured that even a brick house would most likely be blown to bits by it.
Hanna-Barbera's Loopy de LoopLoopy De LoopLoopy De Loop was the only theatrical cartoon short series produced by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera after leaving MGM and opening their new Hanna-Barbera Studios...
The only theatrical short subject cartoon series produced by Hanna Barbera after they left MGM and formed their own studio, Loopy de Loop is cast as a tuqueTuque
A – variously known as a knit hat or stocking cap among other names – is a knitted cap, originally of wool though now often of synthetic fibers, that is designed to provide warmth in winter...
-topped, kind-hearted wolf who speaks with a bad French Canadian
French Canadian
French Canadian or Francophone Canadian, , generally refers to the descendents of French colonists who arrived in New France in the 17th and 18th centuries...
accent, and whose kind-hearted attempts to assist almost always ended up by being rejected by those he sought to help-or something slightly worse.
Wolf from The 10th Kingdom
In the 2000 eight-hour movie (broadcast as a mini-series) The 10th KingdomThe 10th Kingdom
The 10th Kingdom is an American epic fantasy miniseries written by Simon Moore and produced by Britain's Carnival Films, Germany's Babelsberg Film und Fernsehen, and the USA's Hallmark Entertainment...
, Scott Cohen plays a character called Wolf, which is based on the Big Bad Wolf and there is some speculation to whether he may even be the Big Bad Wolf's descendant (mainly owed to the fact that most other characters in the mini-series are descendants of many well-known fairy tale characters). Wolf recognizes he has a sort of obsessive-compulsive disorder
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Obsessive–compulsive disorder is an anxiety disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts that produce uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry, by repetitive behaviors aimed at reducing the associated anxiety, or by a combination of such obsessions and compulsions...
towards eating lamb meat
Lamb (food)
Lamb, mutton, and hogget are the meat of domestic sheep. The meat of a sheep in its first year is lamb; that of a juvenile sheep older than 1 year is hogget; and the meat of an adult sheep is mutton....
, rabbit meat, or little-girl meat, which he tries to overcome when he falls in love with Virginia, the main character. (Note that her married name would be Virginia Wolf
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a play by Edward Albee that opened on Broadway at the Billy Rose Theater on October 13, 1962. The original cast featured Uta Hagen as Martha, Arthur Hill as George, Melinda Dillon as Honey and George Grizzard as Nick. It was directed by Alan Schneider...
.)
Other "good" Wolves
Sesame Street
Sesame Street has undergone significant changes in its history. According to writer Michael Davis, by the mid-1970s the show had become "an American institution". The cast and crew expanded during this time, including the hiring of women in the crew and additional minorities in the cast. The...
, appearing usually in purple fur (although he originally had blue shaggy fur, as he was a variant of Herry Monster). He is generally puppeteered by Jerry Nelson
Jerry Nelson
Jerry Nelson is an American Muppet puppeteer, known for his wide range of characters, singing abilities, and his frequent partnership with Richard Hunt.-Early years:...
(particularly the blue version) and occasionally by Kevin Clash
Kevin Clash
Kevin Jeffrey Clash is an American puppeteer and voice actor whose characters include Elmo, Baby Sinclair, Clifford, Splinter and Hoots the Owl...
and Marty Robinson.
In the animated series Drak Pack
Drak Pack
Drak Pack was an animated television series. It aired in the United States on CBS Saturday Morning between September 6, 1980 and September 12, 1982. It was produced by Hanna-Barbera's Australian subsidiary, listed in the credits as "Hanna-Barbera Pty. Ltd"...
, Howler, the werewolf
Werewolf
A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...
, has super-breath powers, apparently derived from the Big Bad Wolf's "huffing and puffing" to blow the pigs' houses down.
In the Swedish cartoon and television short films, Bamse
Bamse
Bamse – Världens starkaste björn is a Swedish cartoon created by Rune Andréasson. The highly popular children's cartoon first emerged as a series of television short films as well as a weekly half page Sunday strip in 1966, before being published periodically in its own comic magazine since...
, The Wolf is, as his name suggests, a black wolf who had a thing for pulling pranks on the protagonist as well as his friends (he even won a diploma as "the master of evilness"). He eventually turned out to be a nice guy at heart and was only "evil" because of a problematic life where the only way for him to gain recognition from others was to do bad things.
In the Netherlandic series 'De Fabeltjeskrant', was the role as the Big Bad Wolf portrayed by the short tempered Bor de Wolf. He was, however, very bad at being bad since he wasn't really bad, as explained by the owl, Jacob: The other animals were afraid of Bor because he always got so mad, that's why he was always left out, and that's why Bor got so mad. After being well met by the host at Martha Hamster's birthday party, he got remarkably nicer, but had still some problems with his short temper.
An uncomfortable deconstruction of the "big bad wolf" archetype occurs in Witches Abroad
Witches Abroad
Witches Abroad is the twelfth Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, originally published in 1991.-Plot:Following the death of Witch, Desiderata Hollow, Magrat Garlick is sent her magic wand, for Desiderata was not only a witch, but also a Fairy Godmother. Having given the wand to Magrat, she...
by Terry Pratchett
Terry Pratchett
Sir Terence David John "Terry" Pratchett, OBE is an English novelist, known for his frequently comical work in the fantasy genre. He is best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels...
. In this novel, a rogue fairy godmother
Fairy godmother
In fairy tales, a fairy godmother is a fairy with magical powers who acts as a mentor or parent to someone, in the role that an actual godparent was expected to play in many societies...
, intent on making stories come true, has magically molded a little girl's life to follow the plot of Red Riding Hood. As part of the tableau, a wolf is reconditioned to act as humans perceive it, its mind clouded with human motivations to murder and destroy. Upon being found by the novel's heroines, a trio of good witches, the wolf begs for release from its madness, whereupon it is mercifully killed.
Another interesting interpretation of the Wolf can be found in The Sisters Grimm series by Michael Buckley. In the books, the Wolf is the alter-ego of Mr. Canis, an elderly caretaker for the two heroes and their grandmother. Canis fights with the monster for control over his body and as the series progresses the war is a losing one. Mr. Canis continues to become more wolf-like and in the most recent books is on the verge of losing his identity entirely to the savage beast.
The Big Good Wolf from Timothy Groen's cult short animated film series (16mm, very rare) The Little Pigs and the Big Good Wolf is another example. In this ironic retelling and its sequels, a philanthropist wolf donates money to the town of the pigs in order to develop a central housing authority and safety standards. It is eventually revealed that the big good wolf is actually the brother of the Big Bad Wolf, and is only exacting revenge against his brother for an unsettled debt. The safety standards he develops and implements end up turning the town into a locked-up pigfarm for his own exclusive use, but he has in the meantime developed friendships with the pigs and ultimately becomes their sworn friend and protector.
The Big Brain Wolf from the eponymous game
Big Brain Wolf
Big Brain Wolf is the name of both a game by Frima Studio and the anti-hero of said game. The game was created with the participation of NeuroActive Program and Telefilm Canada. It is available through Steam's portal....
is actually a vegetarian, asthmatic genie-in-training.