100% Wolf is a 2020 Australian animated Supernatural Fantasy Adventure Comedy film, adapted from the 2009 Jayne Lyons novel of the same name.
Freddy Lupin is a young werewolf with a problem. He’s finally old enough to experience his first official transformation and become a real werewolf, but when the moonlight hits him he turns into a poodle instead. With the threat of being banished from his pack unless he can prove he’s a real wolf by sunrise, he has to evade dog-catchers, a werewolf-hunting ice cream man, and an evil uncle who wants him dead and show his worth to the pack.
It was released on May 29, 2020.
A spinoff series started airing on December 28, 2020. It takes place after the movie and focuses on Freddy attending a school for werewolves.
In addition, a sequel to the movie, 200% Wolf, has been announced for a 2024 release date.
Tropes in this film include:
- Adaptational Dumbass: Bruno could speak full sentences in the book. In the movie, he's a simpleton who can only say "ball".
- Adaptational Dye-Job: Freddy's poodle form had black fur in the original book prior to being dyed. In the movie, his poodle form is white.
- Adaptational Wimp: In the book, Foxwell Cripp was a feared self-taught werewolf hunter who got his beliefs when he saw his neighbor turn into a wolf as a kid. In the movie, he's reimagined as a goofy ice cream man who becomes a hunter after misunderstanding Hotspur in wolf form dragging away a young Freddy (who back then was too young to transform), occasionally talking to a sock monkey.
- Aerith and Bob: For wolf names we have Flash Heart, Hightail, Hotspur and… Freddy…
- Appropriated Appellation: Freddy's fur is partially dyed pink by Hotspur's kids as a way to belittle him, but given how he keeps the pink fur for the rest of the franchise, presumably he decided to own the look rather than let it return to its natural color.
- Age Lift: In the original book, Freddy was 10 years old. Here, he's a teenager.
- Big Bad Ensemble: Hotspur, Mendelson, and Cripp.
- Canon Foreigner: Twitchy was not a character in the original book.
- Deadpan Snarker: Batty. Hardly takes Freddy seriously. Usually replies with a snarky comment if he needs her to do something for him.Freddy: I need to get to this guy, a human.Batty: Wow, excellent story.
- Disappeared Dad: At the beginning of the film, Freddy’s dad Flasheart falls off a cliff while saving Foxwell and is declared dead. Turns out that's not the case.
- Disney Death: Flasheart survived the fall from the cliff, but was captured and taken to the Coldfax Pound to be held captive so Hotspur can take over the pack.
- Dude Looks Like a Lady: Freddy gets mistaken for a female poodle sometimes, mostly due to the pink dye in his fur.
- Everyone Has Standards: As much as the other werewolves look down on dogs, they do not agree with Hotspur and Commander Mendelson's plan to kill and turn them into wigs.
- Evil Uncle: Lord Hotspur Lupin, who is the main enforcer of the werewolf-dog animosity. He's more than willing to screw over his own nephew to achieve his own goals, starting with encouraging the pack to shun Freddy and going so far as to leave him for dead once he's of no further use.
- Fantastic Racism: Dogs fear werewolves and werewolves look down on dogs. This is one of the main reasons why Freddy becoming a poodle is seen as a problem.
- Freudian Excuse: Batty has an abrasive attitude and trust issues because she used to be a pet store puppy until, after all of her siblings were adopted except for her, the store owner abandoned her on the streets.
- Karma Houdini: Hotspur's punishment for secretly having Flasheart imprisoned, leaving Freddy to die at Coldfax, and nearly executing a plan to turn dogs into wigs is being forced to be a caretaker for the dogs, and nothing else. He doesn't even get banished from the pack!
- Liar Revealed: Played with. When Freddy first meets Batty, he tries to tell her that he's human, but she doesn't buy it. At the dog pound, he accidentally reveals his werewolf heritage in front of her and the other dogs when Hotspur abandons him and takes the moonstone for himself. This time, Batty believes him and feels betrayed.
- Magic Pants: Subverted, a werewolf's clothes vanish into thin air when they transform with a puff of smoke, but with Freddy's case at least don't return when the wolf turns back.
- Missing Mom: Freddy's mother is implied to be dead during the scene where he and Flasheart are looking up at the moon.Freddy: I wish mum was still here.
- Never Trust a Trailer: The first teaser
makes the movie seem like a horror-comedy portraying the werewolves as chaotic neutral at best. They're actually night vigilantes.- The promo material also for the most part obscures the werewolf-dog rivalry, making it seem like Freddy is only shunned because a poodle is often seen as a ridiculous breed.
- Noble Wolf: The werewolves are the unseen protectors of their town, doing nightly patrols to keep things safe.
- The Nose Knows: Dogs can deduce a werewolf's true identity through scent.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: Werewolfism is a hereditary thing here. They’re the mostly-quadrupedal kind, but can walk on two legs and grab things with their paws. They transform after a certain age, when moonlight hits them, and can be locked in their wolf form with silver collars.
- Plot Hole: The wolves apparently fear humans and don’t wish to be seen by them in their wolf form… yet at the very beginning of the movie, they’re shown actively helping them in the midst of a building fire where they’re very clearly exposed, not to mention the fact that Ms. Annie Mutton, the housekeeper, is a human who knows entirely about the werewolves' existencenote . This never gets brought up again and they act as though humans are a curse to them, in addition to the fact that they had no reason TO save them in the first place.
- Part of this change could be due to Freddy's uncle taking charge and encouraging a more distant policy after his brother disappeared.
- Plot-Mandated Friendship Failure: After getting put in a cage with other dogs, Freddy admits to being a werewolf which causes Batty to declare that she is not friends with him anymore. She changes her mind and quickly becomes friends with him again after Freddy is put in the same cage as his father, Flasheart.
- Pounds Are Animal Prisons: To say that the Coldfax Pound doesn't like dogs would be an understatement. Their real goal is to turn dogs into wigs.
- Psycho Poodle: Averted for the most part, but played straight once. Freddy is usually a docile Poodle who wouldn't hurt anyone, but he goes berserk when he sees a cat.
- Riddle for the Ages: Freddy being a werepoodle has yet to be given a concrete explanation. Hotspur posits to the rest of the pack that Freddy might have been cursed by the Moon Spirit for losing the Moonstone, but whether this is true or just him making something up to turn them against Freddy isn't ever clarified. Flasheart himself is surprised that Freddy isn't a wolf, implying it's not hereditary or at least not to the extent Freddy's own father would know about it. The sequel sees Freddy become an actual wolf after summoning the Moon Spirit directly, implying his transformation was incomplete, but this has yet to be explained either.
- Urine Trouble: Freddy unleashes this to give the dogs a distraction to escape the pound.
- Wonderful Werewolf: Most werewolves in this movie are night vigilantes who actually help people and act as unseen protectors of their town. However, there are exceptions.
Tropes in the series include:
- Academy of Adventure: Wolfington Academy.
- Humanity Ensues: Batty becomes human in this series thanks to the Moonstone.
- MacGuffin: The Moonstone, which causes transformations.
