A Queer Reading of Wolfwalkers
By: Sam Duffy
Tags: Movies, Queer, Apple TV, LGBT, Animation

A Queer Reading of Wolfwalkers

This contains spoilers for the entire film

“Wolfwalkers” Apple

Wolfwalkers is the fourth film by Irish studio Cartoon Saloon and their third to adapt Irish mythology. The story follows Robyn, a free spirited girl who bucks the stereotypes of women in the 17th century, as she discovers that there is more to wolves than the danger she thinks them to pose.

Nature is a heavy focus of the film, and it serves as the primary focus of the film. That said, linked into nature and the freedom it is shown to encapsulate, it is easy to draw parallels between the film and queerness.

Over the course of the film Robyn befriends Mebh, a wolfwalker. Wolfwalkers are mythological beings who are humans when awake and wolves when asleep. This duality flips Robyn’s perception of whether wolves deserve to be hunted as she so gleefully longs to do in the beginning of the story.

As the tale unfolds, and we are fed more and more information about Mebh and her tribe of wolves, we begin to understand the clear line drawn in the sand between nature and freedom and the town and rigidity.

Throughout the film we see more and more clearly the allegories drawn for coming out, realizing your identity, and the oppressiveness of the non-accepting world.

I. The Church

“Wolfwalkers” Apple

The town guard, helmed by the evil Lord Protector Cromwell, seek to annihilate the wolves, dubbing them as pagan and evil.

They cut down and later burn down the forest, destroying the wilderness.

Wolfwalkers does not try to portray the Church in a positive light: its people misinterpret their own desires for dominion as a mission from God. The Lord Protector sees himself appointed by his God to destroy the wolves and make the land acceptable to the Lord.

All of this, along with muted colors and stark buildings, serve to make the town feel oppressive to the viewer.

The forest, on the other hand, welcomes the viewer with open hands. In it, the animation becomes bouncier and less restrained, colors become vibrant, and Robyn can buck off the expectations of the town.

The Church is portrayed as suppressors of individuality. We only know what they think through third parties — there isn’t a priest in sight. What we do know is the effects of their teaching.

They stifle Robyn’s non-traditional expression of herself and try to, unknowingly, kill her once she becomes a wolfwalker. Even her father, believing in the Church, nearly kills her. Clearly, whatever the Church advocates for ought to be scrutinized.

Further, at the end of the film, it is a rejection of the Lord Protectors rigidity, presumably inherited from the Church, that allows Robyn and her father to be happy.

To the characters, the church is not beneficial; it is out to kill and destroy.

II. Identity

“Wolfwalkers” Apple

After being sentenced by the Lord Protector to work in the scullery, Robyn feels the weight of being a young woman in the 17th century. Her sense of boldness and desire for adventure are stifled as she is forced into a position that she doesn’t fit.

Once she goes into the woods, she finds kinship with Mebh. The two unite to save Mebh’s mother from captivity and death at the hands of the Lord Protector and Robyn’s father.

When Robyn is in the woods and with Mebh and the wolves, you can feel her guard go down. She no longer feels the restrictions of the town to be a subservient woman.

Wolfwalkers are stand-ins for societal outcasts. Specifically, I would argue, gay, bisexual, and lesbian people. The wolfwalkers are hated and scorned, the figures that supposedly espouse beliefs of the Church seek them out with vengeance, and they are misunderstood even by their own parents, all through no fault of their own.

They also are invisible. Where it is generally apparent whether two people are of the same race, sexuality is indecipherable. It is what is inside, not out. Likewise, Robyn is not known immediately to those around her as a wolfwalker, it is something she must tell them of.

Robyn quickly finds the company of Mebh and the wolves as freeing and a way to reclaim her independence and find who she is. As she falls into rhythm with the world of the wolves, she becomes more confident in herself and who she is. All of this culminates in her helping to protect them from the Lord Protector.

Throughout the film Robyn and Mebh get closer and closer. They spend time together, teach one another about their respective worlds, and feel a sense of connection to one another.

There is an undeniable tension between the pair. Though they are young, you suspect there is more between them than friendship. They experience the same tropes that, in any animated movie with a boy and girl protagonist, would be read as romantic.

Crucially, there is never a moment where the film says “no homo,” the closest it comes is when Robyn calls Mebh her friend, hardly a disqualification. Instead, the film allows viewers to insert themselves and their experiences just as any typical children’s film with protagonists of opposite genders.

III. Coming Out

“Wolfwalkers” Apple

It takes Robyn a long time to share her newfound identity with the world. The first time she turns into a wolf she debates telling her father but, before she can decide, he sees her, trying to attack.

She quickly learns that being a wolfwalker is something she must hide from her town; even her father.

When she stands in front of her father to protect Mebh’s mother in wolf form, Robyn’s father warns her that she could be put in a cage. Unmoved, Robyn retorts that she is already in a cage. She feels the constraints of a life in the town, the inability to be outside the mold.

It is not until the climax of the film that Robyn comes out as a wolfwalker to her father. When she does, he is confused but comes to understand and sides with her against Lord Protector Cromwell and, by extension, the Church.

Together, they save the rest of the wolves as well as Mebh and her mother. It is this that shouts the film’s thesis of acceptance: it is in uniting against hatred and fear that the Robyn’s father opens his mind and his heart.

Wolfwalkers is now in theaters and will be available via Apple TV starting December 11th.