Mebh Óg MacTíre

*This article is about **the Deuteragonist** of the film.*

* Human
* Wolf

“*I am a Wolfwalker! I’m getting my wolves and coming back for me mammy! Then we’ll eat you all!*”
―Mebh's breakdown.
**Mebh Óg MacTíre**, is a deuteragonist of Wolfwalkers. She's a wolfwalker and Móll's daughter. Her friendship with Robyn and her quest to find her mother drives the story.

## History:

### Early life:

Mebh lives with her mother Móll and the wolves in the forest outside of Kilkenny, until the forest started to be cut down and the encroachment of humans caused conflict between the humans and wolves. Her mother decided they needed to find a new, safer home and travelled to find one as a wolf, leaving Mebh with the pack.

At one point in time she and her mother healed the Woodcutter from an attack caused by her Wolves, but then her and her mother fled as guards came to drive them out.

*To be continued...*

## Personality:

Mebh is very much a wild girl, living in the forest with her Mammy and her pack. She loves who she is, the life she lives, and is proud of being a Wolfwalker while she looks upon humans, particularly the "townies" of Kilkenny with contempt or derision.

She is not devoid of compassion however, as she helped her mother to heal Seán Óg after he'd been hurt by the wolves, and healed Merlyn after he had accidentally been shot by Robyn Goodfellowe.

After her mother left in wolf form to find a new home for their pack, Mebh has dutifully watched over her mother's human body and the forest, but missed her mother deeply, speaking to her mother's human body, hoping she would return after she'd promised. As a result, she became lonely, even surrounded by her pack, and thus became willing to befriend Robyn, despite her being a townie, and the girls became good friends. Their bond grew closer after Robyn was revealed to have become a Wolfwalker due to Mebh biting her, and Mebh, feeling responsible, taught Robyn how to be a wolf and what it means to be a Wolfwalker.

Mebh, being a young girl and because she is a Wolfwalker, is very bold and brazen, and is unafraid of the superstitious people of Kilkenny, until she finds herself cornered and realizes the cruelties of humanity, seeing they had captured and chained up her mother in her wolf form, that she briefly lost all faith in Robyn, whom had broken a promise to Mebh albeit out of good intentions, and Mebh intended to lead her pack to war against the humans until Robyn freed Móll and reunited the mother and daughter. Although she remained sore at her, after hearing Robyn explain herself and because she'd freed Móll, Mebh forgave Robyn and happily accepted her as a friend again.

Mebh also appeared to have a level of arrogance when shortly after she stole some bread from the woodcutters she said to Robyn, "Nobody can catch me townie". Mebh can be stubborn and hard-headed.

## Physical Appearance:

In human form, Mebh is a small 9 year old girl, about a head shorter than Robyn, with a round face, green eyes, lack of apparent eyebrows, long voluminous red-orange hair filled with pebbles, leaves, twigs, and flowers (until Robyn brushed her hair out and removed the debris), and three black dots below each of her green eyes, and she wears a olive green dress, gold earrings with a small notch in her left ear, some kind of brown wristbands or brown wrapping on her wrists, and she walks barefoot, resulting in her feet being very dirty. If one were to look closely, they would see Mebh has some kind of brown eyeshadow around her eyes. She also has some kind of paint on her nose and forehead, probably to resemble that of a wolf's nose and fur.

In wolf form, she has ginger-brown fur, darker on her head and around her neck and on her tail, while she retains her green eyes and the same dot-like markings beneath each of them.

Mebh in wolf formMebh in human formThe colors of Mebh

## Abilities:

In the film Mebh displays abilities from two sources. One is from the blessing/curse of being a Wolfwalker, the other is because she came from an ancient pagan tribe with skills commonly seen in druidic magic.

### As a Wolfwalker

* **Transformation** : When she's asleep, Mebh's spirit is released from her body and physically assumes the form of a wolf. If she bites someone in her wolf form, they will become a Wolfwalker too.
* **Agility** : Having lived her entire life in the wild, Mebh is more agile than average in her human form and much more in her wolf form.
* **Speed** : Already fast to normal, Mebh can run at greater speed in her wolf form and jumped across a cliff in one jump.
* **Increased Smell and Hearing** : In her wolf form, Mebh can see and smell smells much better than her human self. Her hearing is also superior, being able to hear noises and vibrations at several meters around her.
* **Human** : As a human she retains much of these ability's, and is far more skilled then the average human.
* **Strength**: Mebh appears to be very strong, as she was able to pick up Robyn when she was running from her and the wolf pack. She also appears to be strong enough to break the cage bars with the street kids gang on top of the cage.
* **Command Of Wolves:**Whenever Mebh howls, the wolves will stop what they are doing and immediately run to her side. She is able to order and get them to do what she wants.

### As a Druid

* **Healing** : Mebh comes from an ancient pagan tribe that had the power to heal. Becoming a wolfwalker enhances this ability as she can draw strength from the wolf pack to heal wounds faster. She was able to heal her mother's critical wound with the help of the pack, Robyn and Bill.
* **Ability to communicate with animals** : At one point, Robyn sends her pet bird into the forest to warn Mebh that she needs to take her pack away from the forest as they are being hunted. Mebh hears and understands this warning showing that she has some sort of communication between birds and possibly other such animals.
* **Control of Weather:** A great deal of magical energy was summoned when Mebh, Robyn, Bill and the wolfpack were working to heal Móll’s injury. Their focus on healing also summoned a rain storm to put out the fires in the forest and allow it to start healing.

## Relationships:

### Robyn Goodfellowe

Robyn is Mebh’s best friend though the two did not have a good start, (Robyn thought Mebh was going to eat Merlyn, and she accidentally bites Robyn.) However, the two get closer as Robyn turns into a wolf and they howl together with the rest of the Wolves. Mebh at one point felt betrayed by Robyn but later forgave her even thanking her for helping her heal Móll calling her Mo chara, my friend.

### Móll MacTíre:

Little is seen in the film interacting between the two, but they seem to have a strong bond between mother and daughter. When her mother wasn't there, Mebh was very worried and once the two got together they hugged. When Móll was pierced by an arrow, Mebh was shocked and very worried.

### Merlyn:

*Merlyn and Mebh may have a positive relationship, as she healed him when he was shot and seems to be able to understand him.*

### Wolves:

*Mebh protected the Wolves while her Mammy was gone and looked after them. They were under her command as well three of them coming to protect her when Robyn tried to follow her into the woods.*

## Books:

* *The Art of Wolfwalkers*
* *WolfWalkers: The Graphic Novel*

## Trivia:

* Through some camera perspectives in most scenes, she looks almost like an actual “hairball”.
* The cover of the graphic novel and the cover of the art book incorrectly have the notch in Mebh's ear in her right ear instead of her left one.
* Mebh is similar to Aisling from Tom Moore`s past work, Secret of Kells.
	+ Both can turn into wolves.
	+ Both have long hair that drags on the floor behind them.
	+ Both have green eyes.
	+ Both were rude to the protagonist at first but later befriended them.
	+ Both are a part of Irish mythology.
* Mebh's name is probably derived from Medb, a queen in the Irish mythology, who is described to be a wolf queen.
* "Mac Tire" is an old Irish Gelic word for wolf, which means "son of the land."
* Mebh is also similar to San, the deuteragonist of the 1997 Studio Ghibli film, Princess Mononoke:
	+ Both wear earrings.
	+ Both ride wolves.
	+ Both are trying to stop people from ruining their habitats (San- Lady Eboshi, Mebh- The Lord Protector.
	+ Both are friends with foreign people(San - Ashitaka, Mebh - Robyn)
* However San, is from the late Muromachi era (1336-1573) and Mebh is from 1650, also San is from the island Yakushima, and Mebh is in Ireland.
* We only see Mebh and her mother's wolf spirit returning to their bodies and never leaving
* During "Running with the Wolves" (AURORA) Wolf Robyn leaps the gully and smashes into Wolf Mebh. They form a ball and roll down the hill. With each rotation, the look on Mebh's face is priceless. One of the best is the bugged-eye look on Wolf Mebh right after they collide.

## Gallery:

The **Wolfwalkers Wiki** has a collection of images related to ***Mebh Óg MacTíre/Gallery***.

## Quotes:

*"You don't need your eyes to see!"*

*“I told you, I’m not leaving without me Mammy.”*

”*The forest is ours at night, wait till you see.”*

” *You can come out now. We can smell you. Yeah, ya stink. I knew you were here. Come out of your hidey-hole. Let’s see ya.”*

*”I was trying to get ya out of that trap! And anyway, you came into my woods.”*

*”Those town tasties are mine.”*

*”How can ya stand living in there? All the smells, bleh!”*

*”Why do you want to be a human? Being a wolf is way better, I’ll show ya!”*

*”Yeah! There’s two of us now!”*

## References:

1. ↑ The Art of Wolfwalkers by Charles Solomon, page 17