Teen Wolf Season 5 Review

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Teen Wolf is back, and it wouldn’t be a new season without a storm being prominently featured in the premiere. Once again, Scott McCall (Tyler Posey) and his friends/makeshift pack face a new challenge to the normalcy that always seems to conveniently dominate their summer hiatus. And again, Scott’s status as True Alpha has become a beacon for other supernaturals to take up semi-permanent residence in his hometown, posing a threat to plans for non-confrontational senior year.

It’s become unfortunately common for shows to unravel during periods of transition, and with the end of the high school experience being only a hop, skip and jump away, all eyes are going to be on how this season sets the narrative up for that point. What happens after the writers don’t have the safety net of Beacon Hills High School to fall back on? And worse, what does that mean for secondary characters who are tied to Beacon Hills?

Last season, the writers took the story back to the beginning, recycling elements of the show that were staples in season one. This time around, however, the established central cast sets a different tone and strongly reinforces the element of unity, even more so than fans have seen with any other combination of characters. Scott has finally found his groove it appears, and naturally, there’s a long list of unknown supernaturals waiting to knock him off his pedestal.

Every season of Teen Wolf brings with it a new antagonist, or at least a new version of an old favorite, and season five looks to be introducing the most complex one, or ones, yet. The writers pulled a curve ball in the season five premiere when they put the cart before the horse and presented fans with a mere henchmen in the wake of revealing the actual threat. It was a little misleading, but was a strong creative choice. In turn, it showcased the lack of compassion present in the hive-like collective aiming to make a name for themselves as bad guys in the Teen Wolf universe.

Like so much of the rest of the season, the identities of the new villains are hidden under an obscure mask – literally. There’s something very disarming about their appearance, even with the limited vantage point. Their cruel tactics aren’t unlike other antagonists Teen Wolf has presented to fans in the past, but the robotic nature of these new characters offers a twist to what we’ve come to expect from MTV’s hit supernatural drama.