ScreenAnarchy's Favorite Frankensteins -- And The Monsters They Created

Managing Editor; Dallas, Texas (@peteramartin)

The imminent theatrical release in North America of I, Frankenstein on Friday, January 24, gives us an excuse to express our collective love for the mad scientist known as Frankenstein -- and the monsters he created.

As the title of the new movie indicates, popular culture has often confused Frankenstein (the scientist) with The Monster, bestowing the creature with the creator's name. But Mary Shelley's original novel tapped directly into our primal consciousness, and any confusion about names pales in comparison to the fears, terrors, and thrills that raise goose-pimples when the good doctor cries out "It's alive!" and his monster lumbers to life. Our picks reflect the individual tastes of the writers who contributed; what say you, dear reader, as to your favorite Frankenstein and/or Monster?


Andrew Mack, Ard Vijn, Christopher O'Keeffe, Jim Tudor, Joshua Chaplinsky and Kurt Halfyard contributed to this story.

Boris Karloff, Frankenstein (1931)

Contributed by Ard Vijn

There have been many Frankensteins and many of his monsters in the history of film, but has anything ever been as iconic in horror as the image of Boris Karloff in his make-up, in James Whale's Frankenstein? Not even any of the famous Draculas can even claim to top Karloff's incarnation of the Monster of Frankenstein in sheer recognizability.

It helps that Boris Karloff imbued the creature with pathos, even through all the layers of latex and clumsy movements, giving him more life than was in all the evil humans surrounding him.

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