Fridge / Wolfwalkers

All spoilers are unmarked in Fridge pages. You Have Been Warned!

Fridge Brilliance

• In a yin-yang sort of way, Robyn and Mebh's appearances contrast each other, both human and wolf. Mebh's human form is so wild, she looks more like a wolf pretending to be human. Robyn's wolf form is so mild and out of place in Mebh's forest, she looks more like a human imitating a wolf.
• There's a noticeable contrast between how Robyn and Mebh listen to their parents. Despite being the more civilized of the two, Robyn has trouble doing as she's told, even when her father tells her it's for her own safety. And while she's a rambunctious character, Mebh is good at doing as she's told, whether her mother's telling her to stay put or she and Robyn are agreeing to meet at a rendezvous point. This difference may be a natural result of Robyn needing to disobey in order to be her true self, while Mebh has the freedom to be herself and therefore is content to follow her loved ones' instructions.
• Ever notice Bill's character arc throughout the movie? He starts out one of the most respected wolf hunters there ever was. But the Lord Protector declares him unfit to hunt the wolves for failing to kill one, he's reduced to little more than another of his foot soldiers. Towards the climax, when he fails to fall into line, the Lord Protector has a metal collar and chain clasped around Bill's neck, completing the imagery that he's treated as less than human at this point. The fact it gives an imagery of a dog on a leash is becoming when Bill embraces his newfound nature as a wolfwalker, marking the instant he unleashes himself from the Protector's tyranny.
  • There's also a certain irony with Bill's wolf form strongly resembling the other wolves in the pack. With the exception of his blue eyes, he looks just like all the other wolves. And yet, as opposed to being forced to conform and assimilate as another one of Cromwell's foot soldiers, Bill is more free to be his own individual self than ever before. What's more, there's a strong symbolism as to how he truly does belong in the wolfwalkers' pack.
• Robyn trying to shoot wolf!Mebh the second time they meet (without knowing this mysterious wolf is the same girl) kind of mirrors how Bill later tries to shoot wolf!Robyn without knowing it's her. In a way, this hints at how Robyn will have a parallel relationship with Mebh and want to look after her, the way her father looks after Robyn as well.
• In the scene where Robyn tries to prove herself during the wolves' attack on the sheep, ever notice an irony in how Merlin got shot? It wasn't directly the wolves' fault: it was a sheep that bumped into Robyn and accidentally made her shoot her falcon. In fact, it was possible to think the wolves helped Mebh heal Merlin. It's almost symbolic and/or prophetic of how Robyn falling in line with the town (like a sheep) will cost her personal happiness dearly, while being with the wolfwalkers will grant her the freedom and happiness she's always wanted.
• There's a notable parallel to between Robyn becoming a wolfwalker and the day Bill became a wolfwalker. Both were bitten by a member of the Og Mac Tire family whilst the latter was a wolf, both shot something they weren't supposed to (Merlin/Moll), both involved a cinematic shot of a wolfwalker leaving them while the movie's leitmotif plays, and both followed their respective wolfwalker to their secret hiding place.
• Characters associated with the forest have messier charcoal lines and colors while town-aligned characters have crisper lines and misaligned color. When Robyn gets bitten, her linework changes as soon as she hits the ground to reflect her changed allegiance, while Bill's lines also become messier as he becomes a Wolfwalker as well.
  • Notably, even after getting bitten, Bill's lines remain solid for a while. It's only when Cromwell's about to kill Robyn that (blink and you miss) Bill's lines become charcoal-like. It signifies that the same need to protect his daughter that's made him afraid of Cromwell has also freed him from those constraints.
• Fun fact: we get the phrase "warts and all" from Oliver Cromwell. He told a painter he wanted his portrait with no prettying up his face, "warts and all." Here, Cromwell, besides having a ghastly palor, has a particularly large wart on his nose.
• Wolf vision for Wolfwalkers in their human form is able to show the human soul of a Wolfwalker in their wolf form, but are unable to do so as a wolf. Human!Robyn can see wolf!Mebh as a human, but after she transforms, wolf!Mebh appears as a wolf in Wolf vision. That explains why Mebh was growling at wolf!Robyn until Robyn spoke.
• Mebh couldn't realize her mom was in the town because, as she commented many times, "townies" are smelly, not to mention the odors of the markets and farms around clouding her nose and therefore needing Merlyn to pinpoint Robyn's location.
  • Wolf!Robyn was able to identify Moll's scent because, in wolf form, her nose is strong enough and activity was low at night, while Mebh entered the town in her human form in daylight.
• Like many parents, Bill thinks that keeping Robyn from danger is enough to keep her safe but at the end he does what it's real good parenting: letting her free but defending her from danger when it shows up.
• As a Wild Child raised outside civilization, Mebh grew up with only her mom's word as guarantee of anything so of course she will treat a verbal promise as an unbreakable oath and be greatly upset when it's broken.
  • Robyn also seems to be the first human she has befriended, so her betrayal hurts even more: Robyn confirmed that she couldn't trust in townies, or people in general.
• While an awesome ability to have, the wolfwalker's curse still has subtle regulations that keep it from being too OP:
  • You'll need to live in the fringes of society because, no matter how much you prove otherwise, you still mingle with wild animals that can be a danger.
  • Once the shift to wolf form takes place, a wolfwalker's human body is completely vulnerable with nothing to protect it once the wolf moves away.
• Reflecting the wolf pack mentality, wolfwalkers are stronger and safer when there's at least two of them: one can stay behind as a human to safeguard the other's human body, and they can increase the strength of their magic.
• Cromwell, the self-righteous tyrant he is, is literally on his high horse in the scenes where he lords over everyone else. The times where he isn't is when he is most vulnerable.
• The story has the main characters overcome a certain emotional barrier/cage that they're trapped in: for Robyn, it's her naivete. For Mebh, it's her grief, and for Bill, it's his fear.
• Throughout the story, Bill is shown to be alienated by the Lord Protector, feeling that he will not only fit in even less if he disobeys him, but even be punished. His wolf form is very similar to the designs of the wolves that follow Mebh and Moll around, and it provides more of a metaphor about him fitting with the wilderness.

Fridge Horror

• Regardless that he didn't mean to, there's still the more than implication that Bill will have to live with the fact he tried to kill his own kid.
  • Worse still, what if he succeeded? He would have killed the wolf "threatening" his daughter but then Robyn would have mysteriously died as well and he wouldn't know why.
  • Even if he had only injured her, he would have come home to a daughter with an arrow-less arrow wound in the same place as he shot the wolf standing over her. In an undisturbed house, either still fast asleep, dead, or on her way to it. Ample evidence for horrifying conclusion that makes no earthly sense & feels like an old ghost story?
• Padraig's father is likely imprisoned throughout the course of the story. Judging by what he says/how he reacts to Robyn's fairly modest boasting about her father being brought in: Padriag's father was imprisoned for being an Irishman who excelled with long-ranged weapons (a side effect of being an accomplished hunter).
  • It's possible that all of the bullies that are roaming the streets with nothing resembling supervision are the children of one or more imprisoned or executed rebels (or innocent people accused of being rebels) trying to force out the English. Given the time & place, they might be 100% entirely on their own.
• The death of Oliver Cromwell, who is already the Lord Protector, happening this early compared to his real-life natural death will no doubt have massive ramifications for the British Isles and the world at large. There is also the possibility of his supporters attacking Ireland out of vengeance and/or England being plunged into a second civil war between said supporters and rebels due to the power vacuum generated.
• The last wild wolf in Ireland was killed in 1786, 136 years after the events of the movie. Unless the Wolfwalkers left for elsewhere, their victory would be rendered meaningless in a few generations.
  • Unless, as mentioned below, the Artistic License – History taken by killing the Lord Protector (i.e. Cromwell) earlier than history records and before he fully subjugated Ireland allowed for an Alternate History to emerge where the extinction of wolves is not a foregone conclusion.
  • Well, at the end of the film we can clearly see them do just that as they get on a horse-ridden carriage, clearly moving someplace else after all the aftermath. They would likely not be welcome home at all, so moving would be the best option for the both of them. So there's a pretty good chance that they built a boat and sailed to England.
• If it weren't for Robyn bringing Moll back at the last second before she attacked the town, Mebh would have likely died in the attempt and with the belief she could never trust in normal people.

Fridge Logic

• The story applies some strong artistic license to history in having the Lord Protector (aka Oliver Cromwell) die in Ireland in 1650, just at the start of his conquest of Ireland meaning he never solidified his self-imposed title of "Lord Protector" which took place in 1653. In addition, while wolves had been considered a problem requiring legislation as early as 1584, it was Cromwell's occupation of Ireland that kicked the financial rewards for killing wolves into overdrive. Given that the movie ends with Cromwell dying early before the large-scale extinction of wolves becomes a priority with considerable financial incentive and the story leaves a large pack of wolves under the guidance of four surviving Wolfwalkers, the movie creates the possibility of a Alternate History setting where the extinction of wolves in Ireland is not a foregone conclusion. Historical records show that during the 1700s into the 1800s there were still large areas of Ireland that had very little human contact and if the Wolfwalkers made a dedicated effort to foster a wolf preserve in those areas, it's possible that there would still be a sizeable wolf population by the time civilization had grown to the point where keeping wolf and human separated was no longer possible. It's hopeful that by that time, however, the Irish government would be more willing to deal with this interaction in a way that didn't require the extinction of the wolf.
• There's something beautifully ironic about the Lord Protector claiming Wolfwalkers to be witchcraft (which, by the way, witchcraft is considered evil in Christianity because some passages have been linked to the devil) despite the fact that St. Patrick, a Christian, is responsible for the creation of Wolfwalkers.
  • It's an irony mostly for those audience members that are aware of the origins of the Wolfwalkers being blessed/cursed by St Patrick. The Lord Protector being an arrogant, stalwart Protestant likely did not know or care about that legend and, if he did, would not consider Catholic mysticism to be that much off from witchcraft.
    • More likely he'd consider it 'Pagan slander'? Anglicanism is one of the Protestant faiths that did not eliminate the veneration of saints and Patrick is a big honking deal for very good reason. If anything, with his misguided faith the Lord Protector probably looked to Patrick's monumental impact on Ireland as proof he could change it.
  • Nothing in the film showed that the Lord Protector even knew about the Wolfwalkers. In the forest he just referred to the strange events as witchcraft or works of the devil. The legend itself says that it's unclear if the Wolfwalkers were blessed or cursed by St. Patrick, so if the Lord Protector did hear the legend, he'd likely see that they were cursed by the Holy Saint.
    • Even more likely is that, as noted above, he'd label St. Patrick as a Paganist. Had he found this out, he'd likely burn or bury everything St. Patrick and his supporters had to offer from history and label it as Paganism.
• There really was no reason for Robyn to head to the castle at night. She already put two and two together that Mebh's mother was in there and knew what room she was being kept in. It would have been a lot safer to come back in the day to investigate further when her duties would likely put her the same hall, unsupervised, again. Of course, being a kid, she probably wouldn't have thought about this and thought that she could resolve everything that night.