Frankenstein to Frankenberry: Morphing of the Monster Myth in Pop Culture

Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, much like the monster itself, entered society ultimately to be transformed into an entity only partially resembling that of its birth. The Frankenstein monster has become an icon of society’s contemporary monster, but an icon Mary Shelley would scarce recognize. Much as Victor’s idealized creation is left to become a horrible wretch at the hands of a society unable to comprehend the true nature of the creature, so too does Shelley’s thematic creation become bastardized at the hands of pop culture. A number of studies have traced the developing image of the Frankenstein monster from its original conception through the contemporary horror film. But the question I wish to posit here is not one that covers this well-traversed material on the changing image of the monster, but a question of how both readers and viewers may internalize the image of the monster and how this internalization reshapes thematic discourse into an ever-emergent construction of fear, and ultimately, parody. The key to such an explication is not so much how the image of monsters has changed, bu