Curse of the Werewhale

Despite how preposterous they seem (or perhaps because of it), werewhales enjoy quite a bit of popularity in fiction, art, and even heavy metal music.

The graphic novel The Curse of the Werewhale from Artgasm Studios includes four stories about werewhales. I particularly like Gugliotti's artwork for the story Arriuk Auminal.

Cover art by Chris Gugliotti

Werewhales also are mentioned in the Wereworld series of YA novels by Curtis Jobling.

Pop culture aside, these creatures also exist in real-world mythology. The self-proclaimed world expert on "whale-ish lycanthropy" is Lyonel Perabo, who's master's thesis about pre-modern Fennoscandian literature (available as a pdf from Skemman) includes a section on Sámi werewhales.

The creatures mentioned in the thesis are typical of real-world mythological were-creatures, in that they take on a full animal appearance, as opposed to the typical modern depiction of a creature that is halfway between man and beast.

I don't think that there are any miniatures of werewhales being made at this time, but WizKids produces the HeroClix Giganto (Avengers Infinity #G007), which would be a great representation of a modern-style werewhale.

This version of Giganto is green, which seems a bit odd for a whale, but perhaps it is a relative of the troll werewhale that is mentioned in Perabo's thesis.

The figure stands at a bit over 3½" tall, which would be over 21' tall in 1/72 scale. This would be approximately the size of the Giganto that appeared in Fantastic Four #149 as opposed to the much larger original beast from Fantastic Four #4 (who was killed with a nuclear bomb).

Take that comrade!

I haven't been writing much lately because the cold weather this last couple of months has put me into a state of hibernation. However, I plan to start posting more regularly again when the temperature starts to warm up around here.