Hello there.
One thing that never seems to stop with the Teen Wolf fandom is questions about the mythology
and characters.
I’m happy to answer those that I can within the comments section, but sometimes there
are broader explanations required.
Thus is the case with today’s entries in our rapidly growing Frequently asked questions
playlist.
I’ll dig into the most confusing aspects of Sebastien Valet’s journey to becoming
the Beast of Gevaudan and we’ll get into why a lot of people seem to think Deucalion
was actually physically afraid of Scott.
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The story of Sebastian Valet becoming the beast is pretty straightforward to me.
While fighting the British in North America during what we in the US call the French and
Indian war, Sebastien and his friend Marcel were on the run.
Wounded, and near exhaustion, Sebastien collapses to the ground and drinks rainwater from the
paw print of a wolf.
The next night we see Sebastien is writing a depressing letter to his sister and seems
healthier than before.
Some time later the pair is on the run again and take refuge in a small house with a woman.
There Sebastian becomes the beast, kills the woman and then kills all the British soldiers.
The two of them then return home to France where Sebastien starts stacking dead bodies
like legos in Marcel’s basement.
Here are the primary points that seem to confuse people.
The paw print drink transformation.
What made the print?
Was it a special wolf’s footprint?
People also want to know why Sebastien became such a monster.
Is he some special kind of werewolf?
I think I can answer all those, whether you’ll be satisfied when I’m done explaining the
canon is a whole other matter.
First the transformation.
We actually heard about this method of becoming a werewolf back at the end of Season 3.
Derek: There's a lot of myths about how people can be turned into a werewolf. Usually a bite, and there's one about rainwater.
Stiles: Drinking rainwater out of the puddle of a werewolf's print.
And while Stiles said “Werewolf”, Sebastien made it clear that it was just a regular wolf.
Sebastien: You've heard the old story of what happens when you drink rainwater from the pawprint of a wolf.
We’ll have to take his word for it since he was there meaning it’s established Teen
Wolf lore that drinking rainwater from a regular wolf’s paw print could result in a transformation.
As to why Sebastien became the beast instead of your run-of-the-mill fuzzy face werewolf, I asked show runner and creator of
the Sebastien Valet character all the way back in 2016.
At the time I too was wondering if it was because of the paw print thing or if The Beast
was some new form of werewolf altogether?
Jeff Davis told me at the time, “We love obscure lore in Teen Wolf and almost nothing
is written about it (paw print/rainwater).
This does not mean he's an entirely new type of werewolf however.
The Beast is definitely a very powerful werewolf, but
that has more to do with just how purely evil Sebastien Valet was.
Sebastien was born a monster.”
Jeff's explanation goes along with how I understand the story.
Sebastien was already evil and a serial killer before he became a werewolf.
It also goes along with my Crazy Werewolf equal Big Monster thesis which I’ve expounded
on endlessly in previous videos on the channel.
I’m sure other aspects of the character still confound and confuse – I might cover
those questions in another FAQ video in future so let me know what you’re interested in
hearing about.
Okay y’all, to be honest, this next question I get so much it’s starting to kind of piss
me off.
There’s apparently this widely held belief that Deucalion was literally scared of Scott
in Season 3.
It’s not true to say that Deucalion was scared of Scott like a little kid is scared
of the dark.
It’s more accurate to say Deucalion thought of Scott the way conservatives think of socialists
– the mere idea of a true alpha is so alien to Deucalion’s emotional status quo that it threatens his
entire way of thinking.
Reducing all these complex feelings to simple “fear” started with Braeden.
Deucalion: But defiant, aren't you.
Braeden: Because I know something.
I know you're afraid of him.
Deucalion: Of a teenage boy?
Braeden: Of the man he'll become.
Deucalion: I'm aware of a certain potential threat.
Okay.
So Braeden believed that Deucalion feared Scott but Deucalion would only admit to knowing
of a potential threat.
Key to this exchange is the fact that neither of them are talking about Scott as he was then.
They’re not even talking about if he becomes an Alpha.
They’re literally talking about Scott years in the future.
The man he will become.
There’s another exchange that’s important to this aspect of Deucalion'/Scott dynamic.
Morrell: He want's a true alpha in his pack. He thinks it's you.
Scott: Then what is he waiting for? What does he want me to do?
Morrell: He wants you to make a killer out of you. That's what he does.
Scott: But if I kill someone, i can't be a true alpha, right?
Morrell: You want the psychologist's perspective? He's an obsessive who both desires you and is threatened by you.
Morell does a good job explaining Deucalion’s specific brand of crazy.
He is desperate to possess the rare thing but at the same time he can’t bear for the
rare thing to exist.
The latter part of that psychosis is the key to answering the overall “fear” question.
Why does the idea of Scott as a true alpha fuck with Deucalion so much?
My own diagnosis of Deucalion, based on how he formed the Alpha pack and their subsequent
reputation, is one of deep trauma leading to psychosis.
The incident with Gerard and the subsequent physical trauma of blinding paired with the
betrayal of his beta trying to take advantage of his weakness, created the Deucalion
we met at the start of Season 3.
The person that emerged from all that was psychotic in the classic sense that he's
no longer in touch with reality.
No, that’s not quite right.
He rejected the reality that he’d known before and made a new life around an entirely false
reality that all power only comes from violence and destruction.
He quite literally became a zealot of his own religion.
He convinced Ennis to join him by promising that Deucalion’s way was the only way to
gain enough power to stand toe to toe with the hunters and to seek revenge.
Ennis in turn brought Kali into the fold.
She was apparently blinded by love for Ennis because her actions with Jennifer suggest
she wasn’t actually on board with Deucalion’s whole philosophy.
Then Deucalion began looking for unique alpha’s to join the pack, thinking this would somehow
increase his power in a new way.
He found the twins and, in some unexplained manner, figured out that they could merge.
The boys had been abused in their pack so they were totally on board with killing everybody
once they had the power to do it.
But they too showed doubts in the truth of the church of Deucalion.
So now we come to Scott McCall.
A bitten werewolf who managed to defeat an insane and powerful Alpha, stop a Kanima and
bring Deucalion's nemesis Gerard Argent to his knees.
Rumors spread quickly.
The werewolf community in Northern California is apparently small enough for word to travel
and Deucalion set his sites on possessing Scott.
But here’s Deucalion’s dilemma, a true alpha, which everyone agreed Scott had the
potential to become, would be a powerful addition to his pack but a true alpha also
proves definitively that violence and destruction are not the only way to gain power.
In other words, Scott - by his mere existence proves that everything Deucalion stands for
is a lie.
For Deucalion’s worldview to stand, Scott must not become a True Alpha and must only
gain power the way Deucalion did, by killing.
Any other outcome is unacceptable because it shatters his delusions.
This overwhelming desire to preserve his altered reality leads Deucalion to make stupid and
self-destructive moves.
Like wasting all the time advantage he had before the lunar eclipse in a futile attempt
to get Scott to kill Jennifer.
It’s not until the scales are literally lifted from his eyes that he sees the results
of his life’s work.
Seeing Scott’s elevation to alpha status through only moral superiority and will power
weakens Deucalion’s resolve further.
This, along with the mercy shown by Scott and Derek at the end, results in the character
we came to view as a hero in later seasons.
Of course, in a truly twisted turn – viewers at the time were vocally unhappy with this
almost happy ending.
Jeff Davis: When the fans were angry about Scott and Derek not executing Deucalion at the end of Season 3,
I'm like, "Wait. Hold on. Was I supposed to write a scene where they straight up murder him?"
It’s amazing to me that people still misunderstand the primary messages of Teen Wolf.
The show isn’t about fights and monsters.
It’s about finding your pack and protecting friends and family.
It’s about showing the violent world around us that there’s a better way of life through
positive actions and intelligence instead of brute strength.
Oh, boy! That got a little heavy for a second.
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I’ll see you next time we go Back to Beacon Hills.