Matt Daehler

* Human
* Kanima

**Matt Daehler** was an antagonist and supporting character in Season 2 of *Teen Wolf*. He was first introduced as an amateur photographer who was acting like a paparazzo at Kate Argent's funeral, and whose camera was broken by Gerard Argent after he crossed the press barricade to take better pictures of Allison Argent, the object of his stalker-ish romantic obsession. He appeared to be a mundane high school student and lacrosse player at first, until it was revealed that he had actually become the master of Jackson Whittemore during his time as a Kanima. It was also revealed that he was using Jackson to kill the attendants of a pool party at the Lahey House when he was a child, who indirectly caused him to nearly drown to death, a traumatic experience from which Matt never fully emotionally recovered.

To make matters worse, since Matt was breaking the rules of the supernatural by using the Kanima to kill people who weren't murderers and was actually killing people himself, Matt started to turn into a Kanima as well, worrying Matt so much that he decided to seek out the Argent Bestiary for answers as to what was happening to him.

In *Fury*, Matt, armed with a loaded handgun, infiltrated the Sheriff's station, using Jackson to kill the Sheriff's deputies working at the time and paralyzing both Stiles Stilinski and Derek Hale so they couldn't help Scott McCall and Sheriff Stilinski fight him. After forcing Sheriff to get rid of all of the evidence that incriminated Matt in the murders, Gerard Argent, Chris Argent, and Allison Argent invaded the station as well, forcing him to flee to safety. Unfortunately for him, Gerard secretly followed him outside and drowned him in the nearby lake, which allowed him to take control of Jackson himself and use him for his own vendetta.

Matt was a student at **Beacon Hills High School** and an amateur photographer for the **Cyclones lacrosse team**.

## Early life

Aside from Matt's near-death experience as a child, his life prior to his introduction is virtually unknown. What Matt did reveal about his early life was that when he was a young child, he was good friends with Isaac Lahey, with whom he bonded over comics. One night in 2006, when he was around eight or nine years old, he went to Isaac's house to trade comic books with Isaac on a night when Mr. Lahey had invited the swim team that he coached, who had recently won the championships, to the house for a pool party. At some point, Isaac and Matt made their way outside to the party, where Mr. Lahey had allowed the team to drink alcohol and where they had become pretty rowdy.

Isaac's brother Camden, who was on the swim team, drunkenly grabbed Matt and threw him in the pool despite his desperate protests that he couldn't swim. He fell below the surface of the water and tried to plead for help, but no one was paying attention to him because they were too busy hooking up with each other. Finally, right before Matt could drown to death, Mr. Lahey pulled him out of the water and performed CPR. However, he was furious that Matt's near-drowning could possibly get him and the team in trouble, and blamed Matt for what happened as a result of his inability to swim before bullying him into not telling anyone about the party, the alcohol, and his near-death experience.

Matt did as he was told and didn't tell anyone what happened until right before he died at Gerard Argent's hands. The trauma of the event caused him to have nightmares where he was drowning, and he would awaken in the middle of the night and have panic attacks, which his parents mistakenly believed were asthma attacks, leading them to take him to the doctor to be prescribed an inhaler. He would subsequently hold intense grudges against Mr. Lahey, Camden Lahey, and the rest of the 2006 swim team until he became the Kanima Master in 2011, allowing him to get his vengeance on him. *("Fury")*

Season 2
Matt made his first appearance in *Omega*, where he was seen at his locker at Beacon Hills High School while Allison Argent was preparing to leave school to attend her aunt Kate's funeral. When she pulled out the dry cleaner bag with her funeral dress, he complimented her on it, and in turn, Allison complimented him on the fancy camera he was holding. The two then overheard Harley and one of her friends talking about how Kate was a serial killer and how they needed to avoid Allison as a result, which caused her to rush away in tears.
Matt appeared again that afternoon at the funeral, where he stood next to the press barricade with the rest of the journalist and paparazzi to get pictures of the event, given that Kate Argent's involvement in the Hale House Fire, along with being blamed for the murders perpetrated by Peter Hale, caused the funeral to gain a great deal of media attention. At one point, Matt jumped over the barricade so he could get closer to the Argent family and get better pictures of the visibly-upset Allison, but he was quickly stopped by the arrival of Gerard Argent, Kate's father and Allison's grandfather, who promptly approached him and pointed out how expensive Matt's camera looked. Matt, looking wary, replied that it cost $900, just as Gerard pulled out the SIM card and snapped it in half before asking how expensive the card was. Matt, annoyed that his SIM card was destroyed and all of the photos on it were lost, immediately turned to leave, allowing Gerard to go reunite with his family for the first time in years.
In *Shape Shifted*, Mr. Lahey, Isaac Lahey's father and one of the objects of Matt's fury, was killed by the mysterious new shapeshifter (the Kanima under Matt's control), after having violently attacked Isaac and causing him to reveal his transformation into a Werewolf. However, since Isaac had been constantly abused by his father for years, he was the prime suspect in the murder, allowing Matt to continue his killing spree unhindered.
The next day at school, Jackson, who was clueless about his transformation into a Kanima, asked Matt in chemistry class if he could borrow his camera, as he needed "something that can record in low light, all night long." Though Jackson was alluding to his impending first full moon after being bitten by Derek Hale in *Code Breaker*, believing that he would be transforming into a Werewolf, Matt interpreted this request as needing it for a sex tape and insisted that borrowing the camera would cost him $100, to which Jackson agreed. Before lacrosse practice that day, Scott McCall sensed the presence of a newly-turned Werewolf in the locker room (not realizing that it was Isaac Lahey) and decided to try to figure out who it was by sniffing each of the players one at a time while playing goalie at practice. One of his targets was Matt, who he accidentally tackled in his attempt to see if he was a Werewolf or not, causing Matt to groan in annoyance.
That night, Matt went to the Whittemore House to drop off his camera for Jackson before the full moon, and admitted that he felt weird about it due to the fact that he was still under the impression that he was making a sex tape with it. Jackson insisted that what he was feeling was the sensation of being $100 richer and instructed him to use it to buy a new attachment for his camera. Before he left, Matt hesitantly asked Jackson if what he was planning with the camera had anything to do with Allison, since he saw Allison and Jackson at the Winter Formal together. Jackson, amused by the thought, called Matt out on his crush on Allison before pointing out that he wouldn't be wasting his time on something as "unbelievably ordinary" as a sex tape before Matt finally left. The next morning, Jackson reviewed the footage of his first full moon after being bitten and found, much to his rage, that he seemingly slept through the night with no transformation whatsoever, causing him to furiously throw the camera against the wall.
In *Ice Pick*, a member of the 2006 swim team, Bennett, who had become an Argent Hunter after graduation, was killed once again by the mysterious shapeshifter, who still, unbeknownst to everyone, was Kanima-Jackson being controlled by Matt. The next day, Matt confronted Jackson in chemistry class about his camera, which Jackson had returned with a cracked lens after he angrily threw it against the wall in the previous episode, but Jackson, still trying to figure out what went wrong after obtaining the Bite from Derek, absentmindedly told Matt to send him the bill.
In *Abomination*, after Jackson went to his best friend Danny Mahealani, an expert at computer programming, to brighten the resolution on the video of his seemingly-nonexistent first transformation on the last full moon, instructing him to keep whatever he saw to himself, ultimately Danny sought out Matt for assistance. When the two summoned Jackson to the school library, Jackson was initially furious at Danny for betraying his trust, but Matt told him to relax and reminded him that it was his camera before Danny pointed out that Matt was the one who figured out the issue in the first place. Danny went on to say that they found a nearly imperceptible edit point in the footage, which Matt explained indicated that the video had been looped to hide the fact that there was two hours of footage missing, leading Jackson to realize that he was possibly transforming into a Werewolf after all.
That night at the lacrosse game, Matt was on the sidelines in his lacrosse jersey, but was taking photographs rather than playing in the game. He ended up standing next to Melissa McCall, and when he noticed her concern as an injured Cyclones player was carried off the field by medics on a stretcher, he asked her if the player was her son. She explained that her son was Scott McCall before asking him if he was the yearbook photographer, Matt replied that he was just an amateur photographer. Melissa wondered aloud if he was just a lacrosse photographer or if he liked to shoot other photos as well, Matt smiled and said he photographed whatever caught his eye. He then began to look through the photos on his SIM card, revealing that they were all of Allison Argent, who was in the stands with her grandfather Gerard.
In *Venomous*, Matt met up with Danny and Jackson in the high school library to discuss who could have tampered with Jackson's video of his first full moon. Danny joked that it could have been him because he knows the back door in the kitchen of the Whittemore House is often unlocked, and Matt added that he also could have done it because it was his camera that filmed the video; both Danny and Jackson take this statement as a joke, despite the fact that it really was Matt who modified the video footage so that Jackson wouldn't suspect that he was being controlled by him. Matt then joked that he and Danny could have modified the footage together, leading Danny to think that Matt was flirting with him and causing him to blush. When Matt asked Jackson if there was anyone else who had access to his house, Jackson realized that his ex-girlfriend Lydia had a key that he gave her when they started dating.
Later that afternoon, after Jackson left with Stiles, Allison and Lydia to protect Lydia from Derek, Erica, Isaac and Boyd (who believe her to be the Kanima and intended to kill her to protect themselves from being exposed as supernatural to the town), Danny and Matt stayed behind in the library to continue working. While Danny was working on recovering the missing footage from Jackson's video, Matt flipped through photographs he had taken during the last lacrosse game on his tablet and noticed that every photo of Scott had large amounts of lens flare coming off of his eyes. Some time afterward, Matt overheard Scott talking to Coach Finstock about lacrosse pads being left on the field and surreptitiously took a photo of Scott, once again taking note of the fact that there is a huge lens flare over his eyes, which, unbeknownst to him, is due to the fact that he's a Werewolf.
That evening, Jackson, in Kanima form, sprinted toward a Volkswagen Jetta with a bumper sticker that read, "Imagination is more important than Knowledge-- Albert Einstein" and placed his clawed hand against the window, where a person wearing black leather gloves did the same inside the car so that their hands were touching, separated only by the glass of the window. Though it was not known at the time, it would later be revealed that it was, in fact, Matt in the vehicle, which he borrowed from Adrian Harris to cover up his tracks.
In *Frenemy*, Matt sent the Kanima after Danny at the Jungle nightclub (presumably due to the fact that he had discovered that Jackson's video footage was tampered with and was close to figuring out Matt's secret) while he himself stole the tablet with the recovered footage out of Danny's car. Fortunately for Danny, he was only paralyzed in the attack rather than killed thanks to the intervention of Derek Hale, Scott McCall, Chris Argent, and Gerard Argent, the latter of whom saw the Kanima in person for the first time and became determined to find its master to suit his own agenda.
In *Restraint*, Matt sent the Kanima on another hit, this time to kill Sean Long and Jessica Bartlett (the latter of whom was pregnant at the time) at their trailer in the woods. However, though the Kanima successfully killed Sean, when he saw that Jessica was pregnant, he was unable to kill her, either due to the fact that the baby was an innocent and not a murderer, or because Jackson's biological mother died when she was pregnant with him and he couldn't bear to let that happen to her.
Flashbacks to the events of *Shape Shifted* were then shown, which revealed a leather-gloved hand reaching out for Matt's camera in Jackson's bedroom while he was in the shower washing the blood off of his hands after his first transformation.
At school the next day, Matt happened to be in the hallway when a fight broke out between Jackson, who had just attacked Allison in Kanima-mode before being knocked out of it when he was subsequently attacked by Scott, causing Erica and Stiles to break up the fight. They were then all caught by Mr. Harris, who gave all six of them detention that afternoon. During the scuffle, Matt noticed Allison's tablet laying abandoned on the floor with the Kanima section of the Argent Bestiary that Lydia had translated the night before open, and he surreptitiously emailed the information to him before putting the tablet back where he found it.
In after-school detention, Matt was seated at a table with Allison by Mr. Harris, and he began to read the Bestiary excerpt that he had snagged from Allison's tablet. When he asked her what a Kanima is, Allison, stunned by this question, simply ignored him. Meanwhile, Scott and Stiles were seated at a different table and discussed their current predicament for a moment, during which time Stiles suggested that Matt could be the Kanima Master, though he admitted he had no proof to back up his suspicions, nor do they have a motive. Mr. Harris decided to leave the children to stack books in the library and drove away in his car, the same VW Jetta that the Kanima Master was seen driving in *Frenemy*.
At some point, Jackson shifted into Kanima-mode, most likely due to Matt's telepathic orders, and pretended to knock Matt out to give him plausible deniability and to cover up the fact that he was truly the Kanima Master. Jackson then scrawled a note on the chalkboard that said "STAY OUT OF MY WAY OR I'LL KILL YOU" as a warning before jumping out of the window, leaving a destroyed library in his wake. That evening, Jessica Bartlett, who had just given birth to a baby daughter at Beacon Hills Memorial Hospital, grabbed her nurse, Melissa McCall, by the arm and admitted that her husband's killer wasn't human. After Melissa left, Matt sneaked into her room and smothered her to death with his leather-gloved hands to make up for the fact that Jackson was unable to kill her the previous night, though his face wasn't shown at the time.
In *Raving*, Jackson received a text message to go buy tickets for a warehouse rave that were currently on sale (presumably by Matt), and he went to the warehouse as instructed, where he was followed by Scott McCall. Not knowing what was going on, Scott saw Matt in line and asked him what he was there for, so Matt explained that there to buy tickets for the rave, which were $75 a piece. When Scott asked to borrow $75, Matt simply looked at him like he was crazy and shook his head no.
Meanwhile, Chris Argent brought Allison to the hospital morgue and reminded her that there was not only a Kanima running around the town killing people, but also a human Kanima Master who had killed as well, forcing Allison to tell him what she knew about the Kanima being Jackson. Over at the animal clinic, Derek Hale, Isaac Lahey, and Scott met up with Alan Deaton to also discuss what they knew about the Kanima in hopes of finding its master as well. They determined that whomever was controlling Jackson had a fear of water, since Jackson, as the captain of the swim team, was obviously not suffering from hydrophobia. They also determined that the Kanima, as a weapon of vengeance, was indeed being used to kill murderers, which helped them connect the victims before Deaton realized that if the Kanima and the Kanima Master were connected, the latter would probably be affected by Mountain Ash just like the former.
The next day at school, Matt approached Scott and Stiles upon their arrival and asked them if they knew why none of them were getting in trouble due to their disastrous detention the day before, and when Stiles remarked that nobody had gotten hurt, Matt complained that he had a concussion and spent six hours in the emergency room. He then brought up the fact that he had managed to score two tickets to the warehouse rave online and insisted that Scott and Stiles find tickets somehow because of how good the party was apparently going to be. Later, Allison admitted to Scott that Matt had invited her to the rave, which Scott wholeheartedly supported in order to help convince Allison's mother Victoria that they were no longer together; he even gave Allison permission to kiss Matt, preferably in front of her parents.
At the rave that night, Erica and Isaac attempt to seduce Jackson to distract him from their intent to sedate him with a syringe of ketamine, but Matt and Jackson both catch on quickly. Matt then took control of Jackson, forcing him to claw them in the side before speaking through Jackson's voice to tell them that Jackson belonged to him. Allison and Matt dance together on the dance floor while Jackson, who was finally sedated by Isaac, was brought into a backroom so he, Erica, and Stiles could question him. Matt was then able to keep talking to them through Jackson by stating that all of the people Jackson killed were murderers because they had killed him, though the three had no idea what to make of this information due to the fact that they still had no idea who the Kanima Master was.
While Matt and Allison were talking in the bleachers, Allison cryptically asked him if he ever felt like he had the best intentions but was still screwing everything up, feeling guilty for her forced confession about Jackson to her father messing up Scott's plans. Matt jokingly replied that he had never felt that way because he was perfect before leaning over and kissing her. Allison was visibly taken aback by the kiss, leading Matt to apologize for being so forward, and Allison admitted that though it wasn't okay that he did it, she wasn't mad, before rushing away to get some air. Matt then presumably forced Jackson to transform, allowing him to overcome the effects of the ketamine and causing Stiles, Erica, and Isaac to flee to avoid being harmed by him. He then sent Jackson to kill the organizer of the rave, Kara Simmons, by slicing her throat open with his claws. Though Stiles' Mountain Ash barrier proved effective at trapping all of the supernatural creatures in attendance inside, he was forced to break the barrier before they could learn the identity of the Kanima Master so Derek could rescue Scott, who had been poisoned with Wolfsbane by Victoria Argent.
In *Party Guessed*, Allison dropped Matt off at his house after their disastrous date at the warehouse rave, and Matt apologized once again for kissing her without her permission before asking her if she was still in a relationship with Scott. Allison replied that they weren't really together anymore before amending her answer to "it's complicated." Matt then said his goodbyes and went inside, accidentally leaving his camera and bag in her car. Allison, unable to resist her curiosity, pulled out the camera and looked through the photos through the screen. As she glanced through them, she became more and more horrified and uncomfortable when she saw most of Matt's pictures were taken of her while she wasn't paying attention, including pictures of her at school, at the lacrosse games, and even inside her bedroom, which he captured with a telephoto lens.
She managed to put the camera back in the bag just before Matt came back to retrieve them, but he seemed to know that she had looked through them since she hadn't driven away yet. He asked her if she wanted to come in to see some of the candids that he took of her that he has stored on his laptop, and when she declined, he became more insistent, which did nothing to make Allison less anxious around him. She finally made it clear that she needed to go home and drove away before he could say another word.
Meanwhile, Sheriff Stilinski and Stiles continued to work together to figure out who the murderer (who, unbeknownst to Sheriff, was the Jackson and the still-unknown Kanima Master, Matt) was and what kind of murder would connect all of the victims, since they were all twenty-four years old except for Mr. Lahey, who was much older. Sheriff informed Stiles that they brought Adrian Harris for questioning after they discovered that his car was present at three of the crime scenes; the trailer where Sean Long was killed by the Kanima (in *Restraint*), the hospital where Jessica Bartlett was killed by Matt (also in *Restraint*), and the warehouse rave where Kara Simmons was killed (in *Raving*). Stiles then noticed a photograph of the 2006 Beacon Hills High School swim team and realized that not only were all of the murder victims on the team, but Mr. Lahey was also their coach.
That night, Lydia Martin threw a birthday party at her house, which happened to fall on the full moon (specifically, the Worm Moon, or the full moon in March) in which all the juniors were invited; those who attended included Scott, Stiles, Allison, Jackson, and Matt, among many others. Stiles informed Scott that he discovered that the Kanima Master apparently hated the 2006 swim team, though they still had no idea what the master's motive was for killing them. Stiles then stated that Scott needed to make up with Allison, because with everything bad that has happened to them lately, he would stab himself in the face if he had to watch Scott lose his beloved girlfriend to a "stalker like Matt."
Upon Jackson and Matt's arrival, Lydia plied them both with glasses of orange punch, which she was insisting everyone in attendance drink. Jackson drank his quickly, but Matt seemed to sense something was off with the punch and dumped it in the trash; this would ultimately be a good move, because unbeknownst to anyone, Lydia (who was being manipulated by the spirit of the dead Peter Hale) had spiked the punch with wolfsbane flowers.
Matt then followed Allison inside the house and asked if he could talk to her, and though it was clear that she had no interest in doing so, she agreed and walked into a side room. She gave him a look when he went to close the door, leading the now-uncomfortable Matt to leave the door open before he launched into his attempt at justifying the pictures he took of her. When Allison pointed out that she had no idea how he even got some of the photos, like the ones in her bedroom, he admitted to using a telephoto lens and claimed that photographers called the photos "candids," leading Allison to snark back that police officers call it "stalking." This seemed to offend Matt so deeply that he snapped at her to get over herself, though when she started walking toward the door, he started to backpedal and take back his harsh words. However, when he grabbed her by the arm to try to stop her from leaving, Allison's Hunter-training kicked in, and she grabbed him by the shoulder before shoving him flat on his back on the ground. Matt was appalled by this reaction and demanded to know what was wrong with her, but Allison left the room without further comment.
Later that evening, the party attendees became so intoxicated by the wolfsbane-alcohol punch and started to get very rowdy; many were making out with each other in various nooks in the backyard, while others started jumping into the swimming pool. This quickly led to people throwing each other into the pool, and Scott and Stiles, who were just starting to get over the effects of the punch, heard a man begging not to be thrown into the pool because he couldn't swim, which got their attention, given their hypothesis that the Kanima Master was afraid of water due to Jackson's aversion to it when he was in Kanima form.
The boys then watched in shock as the man, who was revealed to be Matt, was thrown into the pool despite his desperate pleas. He struggled to stay afloat in the water until Jackson dove into the pool to save him. Matt's face was furious when he was pulled out of the water, but the arrival of the police caused all the party guests to scatter. Scott and Stiles were making their way through the chaos in an attempt to find Lydia in front of the house when they found a scowling Matt staring at them, with Jackson, in full Kanima-form, standing protectively beside him. Jackson hissed at them before both disappeared in the blink of an eye, leading Scott and Stiles to finally realize that Matt was the Kanima Master all along.
In *Fury*, Matt first appeared in flashbacks to the events of *Shape Shifted*, when he stopped by the Whittemore House that night to drop his camera off to Jackson, who, unbeknownst to Matt, was planning to record his first full moon transformation after having been bitten by Derek Hale in *Code Breaker*. It was clear that he was concerned about what Jackson planned to do with his camera, but when he implied that he believed Jackson was making a sex tape involving Allison, Jackson called him out on Matt's own crush on Allison before Matt finally relented and handed the camera over, taking Jackson's payment of $100 dollars in exchange. However, instead of leaving, Matt simply got into his car and used an app on his smartphone to connect to the camera so he could watch the live feed of whatever Jackson chose to record.
At first, it appeared that Jackson was simply filming himself sleeping, and Matt scoffed at the fact that Jackson had borrowed his camera for something so simple, but Jackson soon began to transform into a Kanima, and Matt began to freak out at the sight of it. Scared to the point of tears, Matt was startled when Jackson, in full Kanima form, scampered outside and creeped outside of Matt's car, but when Jackson reached out to lay his taloned hand on the window separating them, Matt hesitantly reached out and placed his hand on the other side of the glass so that they matched. When Matt shared a memory of Jackson/the Kanima killing Mr. Lahey the night before, indicating that Jackson and Matt had somehow formed their supernatural bond prior to that evening without either of them realizing it.
Meanwhile, Scott and Stiles began presenting their evidence to Sheriff Stilinski that Matt was the one who was truly behind the murders and not Adrian Harris as they previously believed. Though Stilinski, who was still suspended from his job at the Sheriff's Department, was skeptical of their claims, when both Scott and Stiles insisted that Matt had been borrowing Harris' car to take the suspicion off of himself, he decided to take the boys to the station to review the evidence they had already collected. After convincing the deputy at the front desk to look the other way while they worked, the three determined that there was evidence of Matt being at all of the sites of the various murders, and even found surveillance footage that showed Matt at the hospital the night of Jessica Bartlett's death, leading them to call Melissa McCall to summon her to the station to give a statement that she had seen him that night.
However, when Stiles went to the front desk to tell the deputy to expect Melissa's arrival, he found her laying dead on the floor behind the desk, having been mauled to death. Just as he looked around for the culprit, he found Matt standing in front of him with a handgun pointed at Stiles' head. Matt went on to lead Stiles back to Scott and the Sheriff at gunpoint, and though the Sheriff tried to talk him down, Matt rejected his attempts to sway him and instead handcuffed Stilinski to one of the cells before leading Scott and Stiles back to the office. When they see several more mauled deputies on the floor, Stiles asked him if he really planned on killing everyone, to which Matt replied that he didn't have to kill anyone-- all he had to do was *think* about killing someone, and Jackson, who then revealed himself in his partial-Kanima form, would do it for him.
Matt aimed his gun at the two boys as they put all of the evidence connecting him to the murders in the paper shredder. When they heard a car pull into the parking lot, Matt led them out front at gunpoint so that Scott could tell Melissa to leave. However, when they opened the door, they found Derek on the other side, which briefly relieved Scott and Stiles until they found that Jackson had already paralyzed him to prevent him from helping them fight Matt. Matt began taunting Derek about how powerless he must feel now as a result of the Kanima venom before revealing to the others that he had learned a lot about the supernatural lately, including the existence of werewolves and Kanimas. When he sarcastically asked Stiles what he was, Stiles joked that he was the "Abominable Snowman," which led Matt to order Jackson to paralyze him as well, showing his amusement at the fact that Stiles landed right on top of the paralyzed Derek.
When Melissa pulled into the parking lot, Matt told Scott to send her away, driving his point home by flipping Stiles on his back and putting his foot on Stiles' neck to choke him, not releasing him until Stiles' face turned purple and Scott promised that he would do as he said. Unfortunately, when Scott insisted that Melissa leave, Matt didn't even give her the opportunity, instead simply shooting Scott in the side with his gun in front of her. Melissa began to freak out and begged Matt to let her check on his wounds despite Scott's protests that he was okay, and Matt seemed to find it hilarious that Melissa had no idea that Scott was a werewolf who would be able to heal the gunshot in moments.
He then forced Melissa into the jail cell next to where Sheriff was handcuffed before returning back to a frustrated Scott, who didn't understand what Matt's motives were and believed he was simply just trying to cover up his involvement in the murders. Matt, exasperated by Scott's confusion, pointed out that he didn't care about the evidence-- what he really wanted was the Bestiary in its entirety, and not just the small section he stole from Allison's tablet. When Scott pointed out that it belonged to the Argents and asked him why he wanted it, Matt lifted up his shirt, revealing that the skin on his torso was starting to develop Kanima-like scales. After Matt forced Scott into another room to contact Allison about the Bestiary, Derek and Stiles quietly discussed this newest revelation, during which time Derek speculated that Matt had been cursed to be a Kanima because he broke the rules of the creature by using it to kill people who weren't murderers and by killing people himself.
In the other room, Matt explained to Scott his motives for killing all of his victims, insisting that they were murderers because they nearly let him drown when he was a child. He detailed a pool party Mr. Lahey was having for the swim team (including Bennett, Kara Simmons, Jessica Bartlett, Tucker Cornish, and the other Kanima victims) after the championships in 2006 while he was at the Lahey House hanging out with Isaac; after trading comic books, Matt and Isaac made their way to the pool, where Mr. Lahey had allowed them to get drunk despite being underage. According to Matt, Camden Lahey decided to throw Matt into the swimming pool despite his desperate pleas that he couldn't swim, and the other teammates were too busy hooking up to notice that he had sunk under the water. He was eventually saved by Mr. Lahey, who was furious that Matt had nearly gotten them into trouble and who blamed Matt for not being able to swim before insisting that he never tell anyone what happened.
After informing Scott that his near-death experience caused him to suffer night terrors, panic attacks, and flashbacks that his parents and doctor mistook for asthma, Matt explained that he became the Kanima Master at Kate Argent's funeral when he saw Mr. Lahey and took a photograph of him out of anger at what he had done to him. That night, the Kanima killed Mr. Lahey, and when Matt witnessed Jackson's transformation in the earlier flashbacks, he realized that all he had to do was take a picture of who he wanted to kill and think about it in order to instruct Jackson on what to do. He compared this ability to the Furies of Greek mythology, who, like Kanimas, were weapons of vengeance who were summoned to Earth to punish Orestes, and he scolded Scott for not knowing the story.
Just then, the Hunters (led by Allison, Gerard, and Chris) infiltrated the Sheriff's station, first by shutting off the electricity to disorient everyone before throwing smoke bombs through the windows. Scott, expecting this response, dove under a desk, but played dumb when Matt demanded to know what was going on. While Allison was fighting Jackson, now in full-Kanima form, Matt telepathically ordered Jackson to paralyze her before insisting that if he couldn't have her, no one could. He was about to kill her when he suddenly heard a loud noise nearby, leading him to flee for safety rather than attempt to face whomever was approaching. Matt then rushed into the holding cell rooms to find that Sheriff Stilinski had just broken out of his cuffs, forcing him to knock the Sheriff out with the butt of his gun. However, once again, when Derek, now fully-wolfed out, showed up and roared menacingly at Matt, he got scared and ran away, leaving Jackson to fight Derek and Scott alone.
Unfortunately for Matt, he had just made it near the lake behind the Sheriff's station when he was caught by Gerard, who wasted no time attacking him. Since Matt had little to no practical training in fighting, the more experienced elder Hunter easily threw him into the lake, holding him down and drowning him to death, which was an ironic end for a teenage boy who had nearly died once by drowning and who developed a fear of water as a result. Matt's death then broke the connection that allowed him to control Jackson, allowing Gerard to usurp Matt's former position as Kanima Master in order to achieve his own goals. As a result of the change in "ownership," Jackson's inner Kanima lost the fear of water that he had developed due to adopting Matt's own fear.

## Personality

On the surface, Matt appeared to be an average teenage boy, who had many friends, was a player on the lacrosse team, and had a passion for photography. However, it was soon revealed that he had become vengeful, unhinged, and obsessive as a result of nearly drowning to death as a child. This traumatic event initially caused him to develop hydrophobia (fear of water) and panic attacks, which ultimately grew into an insatiable desire to get revenge on those who harmed him.

Upon becoming the master of Jackson Whittemore during his time as a Kanima, a mythological reptilian creature who was used as a weapon of vengeance to kill murderers, he used Jackson to kill all of the people who were involved in his near-drowning, as he believed them to be murderers due to their disregard for his life. During this killing spree, he demonstrated a lack of concern about the lives he was taking, as he felt his actions were justified due to the wrongs they committed against him. He also proved he had no problem with breaking the metaphysical laws of the supernatural when, after Jackson was unable to kill a pregnant woman due to the fact that the child was innocent, Matt killed the woman himself just hours after she gave birth. He was willing to do whatever it took to destroy the evidence that proved he was the killer and to gain access to the Bestiary to figure out why he was becoming a Kanima himself, even if it meant harming or killing people who had not wrong him at all, such as the numerous Sheriff's deputies he made Jackson kill, or Scott McCall, who he shot in the abdomen to force his mother Melissa to comply with his demands.

He also demonstrated a similar behaviors with regards to his romantic feelings for Allison Argent, whom he stalked and took hundreds of pictures of without her knowledge throughout the time they knew each other. He became incredibly jealous of any other men who showed interest in her, such as Scott and Jackson, and when Allison rejected his advances, he had Jackson paralyze her and attempted to kill her, claiming that if he couldn't have her, no one could.

## Physical Appearance

Matt was a reasonably attractive young man of medium build and stature, who had pale white skin, light brown hair, and light blue eyes. He typically dressed in a trendy yet comfortable style, with v-neck t-shirts in shades of blue or other neutral colors, well-fitting jeans, leather boots, and hoodies or blazers. He also, like most members of the lacrosse team, often wore his lacrosse jersey on game days.

## Powers and Abilities

### Powers

At first, Matt, as a human, had no supernatural powers to speak of, but upon bonding with the recently turned Kanima, Jackson Whittemore, Matt became Jackson's master, giving him a telepathic connection with him that bound them so closely that Jackson, the captain of the swim team, inherited Matt's fear of water. Initially, this connection was tied to Matt's love of photography; it manifested when Matt would take a photograph of someone who Matt wanted to die, which would send a telepathic image of the person to Jackson so he could carry out their murder for Matt. Over time, their connection only became stronger, to the point where all Matt had to do was think about who he wanted to kill in order to have Jackson fulfill his wishes, making taking a photo of the person unnecessary to the order and giving Matt an increasing amount of control over the Kanima. Matt was even eventually able to speak to Stiles Stilinski, Isaac Lahey, and Erica Reyes through Jackson's mouth via their master-subjugate connection, despite Matt being nowhere near Jackson at the time.

However, after Matt began breaking the metaphysical rules of the Kanima, such as having Jackson kill people who weren't murderers and killing non-murderers himself, Matt began to transform into a Kanima himself, evidenced by the fact that he was starting to develop reptilian scales on his side. Despite this transformation, Matt did not demonstrate any other Kanima powers, such as superhuman physical attributes (strength, speed, agility/reflexes, durability, senses, healing) or more advanced shapeshifting, and since he was killed shortly afterward, it can be assumed that he was only in the early stages of the transformation.

### Abilities

* **Photography**: Matt had a passion for photography, and was not only skilled in the artistic side of the hobby, but also the technical aspect. He was very knowledgeable about camera attachments and lighting equipment, and was shown using telephoto lenses in order to take photographs of Allison Argent through her bedroom window from outside the house. This ability also extended to cinematography as well, as he was able to help Danny Mahealani figure out that the footage of Jackson Whittemore's first full moon had been tampered with (although it was later revealed that he was the one who tampered with it in the first place to ensure that Jackson wouldn't realize that he was being controlled).
* **Firearms Training**: Since Matt was seen wielding and shooting a handgun, it can be assumed that he had at least a basic understanding of how guns work and how to use them, as he was able to shoot Scott in the side with the gun with an impressive amount of accuracy for a teenager.
* **Criminal Skills**: As the person who orchestrated the Kanima murders, Matt was able to avoid detection by the police for several months despite being at the scene of nearly all of the crimes, though this is probably due in part to the fact that few police officers would have expected a teenage boy to be a serial killer. He was smart enough to break into Adrian Harris' car and use it to drive to the sites of the murders to ensure that Jackson was able to kill them as planned so that the police would assume it was Harris rather than himself, and he seemed to be surveying the Beacon County Sheriff's Station so that he would know if and when he was discovered to be the mastermind behind the murders.

## Weaknesses

Matt was, for the most part, a mundane human, and as a result, he possessed the common vulnerabilities of his species, namely mortality, as he was prone to both illness and injury that could lead to death. However, as the Kanima Master, Matt gained supernatural weaknesses as well, most notably a vulnerability to mountain ash, since his connection to the supernatural Jackson Whittemore made it so that he could be trapped in an unbroken circle of mountain ash, which was evidenced in *Raving*.

## Equipment

* Digital camera with additional SIM card, telephoto lens, and wifi access
* Samsung Galaxy 3 smartphone with UStream application

## Etymology

* **Matt**: The name Matt is the short form of Matthew, the English form of the name *Ματθαιος* (*Matthaios*), which itself is the Greek form of the Hebrew name מַתִּתְיָהוּ (*Mattityahu*), meaning "gift of Yahweh" or "gift of God." The Greek name was also Latinized as *Matthaeus*, which is what led to the English name Matthew. It is also sometimes thought to be an Anglicization of the Irish name *Mathún,* meaning "bear." Saint Matthew, also known as Levi, was one of the twelve apostles, a tax collector who was thought to be the author of the first Gospel in the New Testament. The name Matthew as an English name has been in use since the Middle Ages.
	+ Variants of the name in other languages include: Matia (Basque); Matthaois, Matthias (Biblical Greek); Matey (Bulgarian); Mateu, Matej, Mateo, Matija, Matko, Mato (Croatian); Matthias, Mathijs, Ties (Dutch); Makaio (Hawaiian); Mateusz, Maciej (Polish); Matheus, Matias (Portuguese); Matei (Romanian); Matfey, Matvei, Motya (Russian); Mateo, Matías (Spanish).

* **Daehler**: Daehler is thought to be a Swedish family name, but a meaning for this surname remains unknown at this time.

## Trivia

* It was because of Matt's actions at the Sheriff's station in *Fury* that caused Scott McCall's transformation into a Werewolf to be revealed his mother Melissa, who was also one of Matt's hostages.
* Ironically, Matt went on his vendetta using Jackson as a weapon of vengeance to get back at the members of the 2006 high school swim team for letting him almost drown as a child, but this ultimately led him to be permanently killed in the exact same manner when Gerard Argent drowned him in the lake to end his reign of terror as the Kanima Master and to take control of the Kanima for himself.
	+ Because he almost drowned as a child due to not being able to swim, Matt became afraid of large bodies of water, which was also passed to the Kanima when Matt was in control of Jackson. Once Gerard took control of the Kanima after Matt's death, Jackson no longer had a fear of water.

## Gallery

*Teen Wolf Wiki* has 18 images related to ***Matt Daehler***.