Story: Werewolves stalk the country. Uh oh. Better call out the posse!

Scares: Only for the very n00b, or the extremely faint-of-heart.

Splat Factor: Lots of body parts a’poppin off. And since one of the posse is a doctor, there’s plenty of Post Traumatic Stress Gore.

“Shock” Ending?: Nothings shocking here.  You’ll be guessing everything that happens waaaay before the reveals hit.

Remake, Sequel or OG (Original Ghoul)?: This is a melange of a lot of werewolf mythology (and a rip-off of many genre cliches), but Werewolf is an original.

Trick or Treat?: A Universal horror movie? Mmm, tasty time, right?  Don’t get too excited; Werewolf: The Beast Among Us is straight-to-video and director Louis Morneau (Bats, Carnosaur 2) isn’t exactly known for his quality output.  The motley crew o’ hunteres aren’t given much (or any) of a backstory, so there’s very little to give a shit about when they start to go down. The “who’s the beast?” mystery is bloody well obvious, and even two of my favorite actors — The Crying Game‘s Stephen Rea and Nia Peeples (TV’s Fame, Pretty Little Liars) — isn’t enough to give me the happy.  As for the love story tossed in, Rachel DiPillo’s Eva has more chemistry with smarmy hunter Stefan (Adam Croasdell) than with fresh faced young doctor Daniel (Guy Wilson).  What does give me a chuckle is the IMDb page doesn’t even bother to list the names of many of the characters.  That’s a hint and a half for yo’ ass, people.

The “hero hunter”  (Ed Quinn, Eureka) uses lines ripped straight off of Quint in Jaws. And, of course, there’s the famous “even a man that is pure of heart” bit from the original The Wolf Man. I guess that since this film is also by Universal, copyright infringement isn’t an issue.  But the werewolf transformations and gore FX?  Top-notch.  There’s even a vamp here — not a spoiler because you’ll figure something’s up early in — and that’s got some great makeup too.  Pity there’s only a bit of toothy action before his character shuffles off.

Best to reach back into the Universal catalogue for the real goodies.  For “movie in the background” times, but otherwise this is sadly lacking.

Score: out of 5 pumpkins.