The full moon is rising again, Accursed Ones.

In Part 2 of Cursed Creatures: Werewolves, Daniel and Angela return to the woods to finish unpacking one of the most enduring monsters in folklore, mythology, horror movies, and our collective fear of what might be lurking under the skin.

This time, we follow the werewolf legend beyond ancient myth and medieval trials into the Beast of Gévaudan, the rougarou of Louisiana folklore, Irish wolf-warriors, Argentina’s lobizón, Romanian vampire-werewolf hybrids, and other strange shapeshifter traditions from around the world. Along the way, we ask how a creature once tied to divine punishment, mob hysteria, and moral panic became the full-moon monster we know today.

Spoiler Alert: a lot of it comes from Hollywood just making stuff up until we all decided it was ancient lore. Silver bullets, full moons, tragic transformations, cursed bites, and the tortured wolfman all owe more to movies like The Wolf Man and Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man than most of us probably realized. Apparently, our deepest monster mythology was heavily shaped by sequel logic. Naturally.

We also dig into possible real-world explanations for werewolf stories, including rabies, clinical lycanthropy, ergot poisoning, and the very human need to explain horrifying behavior by turning people into monsters.

Are werewolves cursed creatures, misunderstood victims, sexy supernatural love interests, or just one of humanity’s oldest ways of asking what separates man from beast?

Maybe the real curse is not that a person could become a wolf. Maybe the real curse is that we invented the wolf to explain what people were already capable of doing.

https://www.shetlandmuseumandarchives.org.uk/blog/the-real-story-behind-the-shetland-wulver

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/29/argentina-kirchner-adopt-child-werewolf

https://paulsullivan216.substack.com/p/howling-at-the-moon-a-complete-history

https://www.medievalists.net/2013/04/the-rage-of-the-wolf-metamorphosis-and-identity-in-medieval-werewolf-tales/

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.

In Part 1 of our Cursed Creatures deep dive, Cursed...ish heads into the woods under a full moon to ask a deceptively simple question: where did werewolf legends actually come from?

Before silver bullets, full moons, and shirtless men chaining themselves to basement pipes, werewolves were already prowling through ancient mythology, folklore, and some deeply cursed corners of human history. Daniel and Angela trace lycanthropy back to the Old English roots of “werewolf,” the Greek origins of “lycanthrope,” and one of the earliest Western werewolf stories: King Lycaon, the mythological ruler cursed by Zeus to become a wolf after committing a dinner-party crime so horrifying it should have voided his hosting privileges forever.

From there, we follow the wolf trail through the Epic of Gilgamesh, Norse wolf-warriors, medieval fear, and the terrifying reality of European werewolf trials. Along the way, we meet Peter Stumpp, the infamous Werewolf of Bedburg, whose story may be part murder trial, part scapegoat panic, and part tabloid nightmare. We also meet Old Thiess, the self-proclaimed “hound of God” who insisted the court had werewolves all wrong.

So are werewolves cursed monsters, misunderstood victims, or just another story humans invented to explain the darkness in ourselves?

Maybe cursed. Maybe not. Definitely hairy.

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.

Why can no Hogwarts professor survive more than one year teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts?

In this very unofficial Harry Potter episode of Cursed...ish, Daniel and Angela return to Hogwarts to investigate one of the wizarding world’s most suspicious job openings: the cursed Defense Against the Dark Arts position. Across seven books, Hogwarts burns through professor after professor, from Quirrell and his deeply inadvisable Voldemort head-share to Gilderoy Lockhart’s fraudulent little memory-wiping empire, Remus Lupin’s tragic exit, Fake Mad-Eye Moody’s disturbingly committed lesson planning, Dolores Umbridge’s pink-cardigan fascism, Severus Snape finally getting the job he absolutely should have known better than to want, and the full Dark Arts nightmare of Voldemort’s Hogwarts.

Along the way, we talk Dumbledore’s questionable hiring practices, Barty Crouch Jr.’s bizarre commitment to education, whether anyone at Hogwarts understood red flags, and why this revolving door of cursed professors became one of the most effective recurring patterns in the Harry Potter series.

Was the Defense Against the Dark Arts job cursed because Voldemort hexed it after Dumbledore rejected him? Was it cursed because Hogwarts HR was apparently run by owls and vibes? Or was the real curse simply letting children attend a school where every year’s teacher came with a new trauma package?

Maybe cursed. Maybe not. But this time, honestly, pretty cursed.

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.