In Shudder's The Cycle, when the body of a man missing for thirty-six years is discovered at the scene of a horrific crime, it’s up to his estranged daughter to unravel his dark past.
The horror movie is rated 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, and we recently sat down with writer and director Jordan Downey (The Head Hunter, V/H/S/Beyond) to discuss the terrifying werewolf movie.
Daredevil: Born Again star Deborah Ann Woll plays a forensic investigator drawn into a disturbing case that takes a monstrous turn. With Trevor Newlin (Alien: Romulus) bringing the werewolf to life, The Cycle also features a jaw-dropping transformation sequence inspired by the practical-effects magic of An American Werewolf in London.
We caught up with Downey to discuss why Woll was the perfect fit for the lead role, the challenge of seamlessly blending crime drama with full-blooded horror, and the painstaking work that went into creating the film's unforgettable creature transformation.
You can check out the full interview with The Cycle writer and director in the player below. You can also SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel here for more exclusive interviews.
Deborah Ann Woll leads this movie, and a lot of our readers are going to know her from Daredevil, but I'd love to know what it was that drew you to her and why she was right for this story that you wanted to tell.
I was always a fan of her, and I thought that she would bring a certain levity and warmth and heart to the character because on the page it could read as very dark and gloomy. I didn't want it to be a depressing experience to watch, but at the same time it's being filmed in the Pacific Northwest. It's going to be atmospheric. The subject matter is heavy—losing, revisiting the past with your father, he's naked and dead and the autopsy. So all of that stuff could lead to a not enjoyable experience.
And I like movies that can be dark and scary, but still have a heart and soul to them that make it kind of a pleasant experience. And so I thought very early on, okay, Deborah is going to bring something to this movie that will take it off the page and make it something that is even a little bit more unexpected. What I didn't realise was how much of a natural interest she had in the field of forensic anthropology and science and stuff. So I think she brought a natural interest in that profession to the role that was just in her as a person as well.
This story starts as an almost Scarpetta-like crime story, and then it evolves into a terrifying, gory creature flick. The tones are balanced really well, but how challenging was it for you to make sure it worked and it didn't feel like two separate movies?
It's a really good question, and yeah, that is really tricky. I had to think about a lot. Usually with a true crime film, it's not going to go into anything folkloric or monster or pure horror. You see hints of that with, of course, The X-Files or even True Detective season 1 kind of hints that maybe it's going to go someplace, but the ultimate destination on a lot of those shows isn't 1980s horror. And so I had to make sure that those earlier scenes needed to work in some specific shots, some pieces of music. The tone has to feel like it's hinting at what's coming.
And then when you get to the stuff that's coming, you also can't lose sight of the character and the dramatic elements because that's what the first 60 minutes of the movie are going to be like. So there's no science. It's just really me kind of watching a lot of both things and just being such a fan of this stuff and trying to think like, okay, here's a shot that I would normally see in this kind of movie, not this one. Put that one up front, and here's a shot or a moment, a character-driven moment that I normally would see in this. Put that at the end. And in the end, then hopefully it just kind of sifts together.
I've got to bring up the creature because the practical effects are insane. That transformation scene is awesome. What was it like to put that together?
Yeah, it was very important to us to get that right. I love transformation scenes. An American Werewolf in London has the best, in my opinion, of all time. And to my surprise, no one has really attempted that in those 40 years since that movie came out. So we thought early on, when we had this concept, that, okay, we need to make sure that if we're going to do this, we've got to do that scene and we've got to do it right. And because we have the corpse transforming, it instantly was something original that we hadn't seen before. So it didn't feel like we were stealing something. It'll be more original without us trying. And then it was just a matter of storyboarding, storyboarding, storyboarding, figuring out every little element. We did a whole Unreal Engine previs that Kevin Stewart, the cinematographer, built. So there's a 3D version.
Hopefully I can release that at some point in the whole scene. And then I broke that down further with Patrick McGee, who spearheaded that whole sequence and his team, and we broke it into 18 steps. I forget how many parts there were, but it was a lot of parts to make, you know, just a hand or just a foot or just this one torso. And some have 10 syringes that are pushing air and all the bladders. Patrick is really who gets all the credit for breaking down: "Here's how we're going to do it. You want this kind of a shot? Okay, great. Now let me go and do it." And he had studied transformation scenes for his entire career. So he knew in the back of his head, here's what worked before. Here's what we could do in 2026. And yeah, we just gave them a lot of time to get it right.
You've got Trevor Newlin as the werewolf, and he's on a great run after Superman and Alien: Romulus, playing some really iconic character. What was it like to collaborate with him in bringing this creature to life in the film?
Well, Patrick suggested him early on, and I thought, "Wait, we can get Trevor, the guy who was in the Xenomorph suit in Alien: Romulus?" I didn't think that would be possible. He was like, "Yeah, I know him. I think so. Reach out to him." So I did, and Trevor was great. He says this is his favourite experience of making a movie, and it was ours. So that means a lot to me. The movie being of quality is equally important as the cast and crew that work on it having a good time, to me. That matters. And Trevor was amazing. I mean, he brought so much of what he wanted into it. I think he didn't feel constricted by "I'm either stepping into some sequel where this is how this thing moves and walks, and I have to just replicate that" or "I'm so constrained that the suit is dictating how I move and walk."
I think it was a perfect combination of it being an original monster specific to this movie. We've seen that monster before, but it's an original monster and Trevor had the flexibility to give it some movement. So yeah, I mean, he was crawling around up on that cage and doing all of the just everything in there. There's a lot of Trevor's performance and personality that comes through that suit. And his physique is just perfect for the concept of the monster. So it was awesome. And he was a trooper. I'd always be like, "Trevor, you doing okay?" Like, "Yeah." He'd just be real quiet because he's trying to stay in the zone. It was always hard to know if he needed to tap out, but he never did.
The Cycle will be released on Shudder on October 23.