The Wolf Among Us - Opening Sequence

After the release of Telltale’s The Walking Dead last year, the humble adventure game studio created a high bar to live up to. They perfectly adapted the world of Robert Kirman’s zombie apocalypse while snagging numerous Game of the Year awards. Luckily, lightning seems to strike the same place twice. The Wolf Among Us manages to create a flawless adaptation of Bill Willingham’s Fables to the point of maybe even surpassing the source material. Hit the jump to read more.

Imagine a world where the fairytales we all read as children truly existed, and you’ll have the basis for Fables. After living peaceful lives for thousands of years, the fairytales were pushed into our world by a creature known as the Adversary. Now they live in present day New York City where they must hide their existence from us mundies (mundane people or humans).

Talking animals are a regular occurrence among fables.

Keeping a whole race of magical beings full of talking pigs, giants, and dragons hidden from the human world is no simple task. Imagine the pandemonium that would ignite if we found out that genies and talking mirrors truly existed. We’d be at war with these creatures in no time, which is why secrecy is their greatest rule. Thankfully, Fabletown found the most unlikely of heroes to enforce the law, the Big Bad Wolf.

Bigby (as he is referred to by his fellow fables) has changed substantially since his huffing and puffing days. He now stands as a man whose job is to enforce the laws he would have scoffed at in his former life, but you can never really escape your past. His Big Bad days live as a constant reminder to his peers of what he is capable of doing; they aren’t afraid to bring it up. Bigby does the best he can to keep the wolf side in check, but the beast inside never really goes away.

The Wolf Among Us conveys all of the information from the first issue of the comic within the first twenty minutes with similar events starting with the visit to Mr. Toad. The apartments that Mr. Toad owns have an unruly visitor, so he calls upon Bigby to put an end to it. During the visit, Mr. Toad is a visible three-foot, talking toad. This is in direct violation of Fabletown law that states to live in the city you must appear human.  If Mr. Toad cannot afford the glamour spell to look human, then he must go live in the rural farm area with all of the other fables who refuse to stay hidden.

Yes. That is a three-foot-tall, swearing toad.

This conversation perfectly mirrors the one between Snow White, Beauty and the Beast in the first issue. The more that Beauty becomes upset with her husband, the more Beast-like he appears. Snow reminds them that if they can’t afford glamour, then they must move to the farm. The responses that Snow and Bigby give are almost identical. They reiterate constantly that secrecy is their most vital rule and the fact that some fables cannot afford glamour is not their problem. These comments seem cold, but show an adherence to the laws of Fables more than anything.

Bigby coming to the aid of the abused call girl.

The next similar moment rises from Bigby’s altercation with the Woodsman. Yes, this is the same man of Red Riding Hood fame that cut Bigby open, stuffed him full of rocks, and threw him in a river. As you can imagine, there is a bit of a rough past here. The Woodsman is beating on a call girl in his apartment room when Bigby shows up to stop him. Upon arrival, they trade verbal abuse about past confrontations. Jack, of the giant killing kind, shares similar verbal blows with Bigby in the first issue when he asks Bigby if he’s blown any pig houses over recently. With these tiny comments, the people of Fabletown show their disdain and distrust of Bigby, but the confrontation between Bigby and the Woodsman takes it a step further.

This fight gets a little out of hand.

When Bigby tries to stop the Woodsman, a fight breaks out. They fling each other around the room, shatter furniture, and are eventually launched out the window. Eventually the Woodsman begins to choke Bigby to death. As he struggles against the Woodsman, Bigby’s eyes begin to switch to a vivid yellow before the woodsman is stopped by a nearby ally. The fight highlights the ferocity of Bigby and how he far he can be pushed before he goes Big and Bad.

The first 20 minutes of The Wolf Among us hits all of the same plot beats of its comic predecessor, but manages to go one step further and establish the Big Bad side of the Big Bad Wolf. In doing so, it allows the uninitiated to the series a quick understanding of how Fabletown operates and what playing as Bigby will be like.