User Reviews

Werewolf: Skinwalker starts as Eric (John J. York) tracks Skorzeny down to a native American Indian town where several brutal murders have been committed, however once Eric gets there he finds Skorzeny has left. While talking to some of the locals they mention a mythical creature known as a Skinwalker from their ancient legends, a creature that looks like a human but can change it's appearance. Eric ask's what their ancient elders did about these Skinwalkers & hears that they had a purification ceremony to cure the cursed, sensing a resemblance to his own shape changing problems Eric ask's if the ceremony could be performed on himself in return for finding the killer...

Episode twenty two from the one & only season of Werewolf this originally aired in the US during January 1988, directed by Rob Bowman one has to say that Skinwalker is a pretty forgettable episode all round. You know with the great sounding title Skinwalker I was expecting something really good but it actually turned out to be a fairly boring tale about ancient Indian legends, well I guess Eric was going to meet up with some Indians sooner or later & try their ancient rituals in an attempt to find a cure for his Lycanthropy. Skinwalker is a throughly routine & uninspiring twenty five minutes, the character's are one dimensional stock clichés with the elder tribes man who believes all the ancient legends along the young Indians who refuse to live by the elders traditions & a pretty poor murder mystery subplot as we know one of the Indians is a killer Werewolf but not which one until the end when it really could have been any of them for the amount of effort the makers put into it. Bounty hunter Rogan appears in this episode although he doesn't get to do that much.

With a title like Skinwalker I was expecting some sort of creature other than a Werewolf to turn up in this but I was left feeling disappointed, again. There's a Werewolf on Werewolf fight at the end but it doesn't amount to much & Eric the good Werewolf wins although according to this series a Werewolf can only be killed by silver so why did Eric the good Werewolf kill the bad Indian Werewolf by just biting it? Maybe Eric the good Werewolf has solid silver fillings in his fangs? Even the look of this episode is somewhat flat & dull compared to usual.

Skinwalker is a rather disappointing Werewolf episode, I expected a lot more but instead got a rather dull ancient Indian legends based plot which didn't do much for me at all. Not particularly recommended, especially if your not a fan of the show.

Eric (John J York) had read about a series of slayings to Navajos and believed it was possible that Skorzeny (Chuck Connors) might be responsible for them since the descriptions of how badly mutilated the bodies were sounded very much like werewolf attacks. However, these attacks could have been committed by a skinwalker, even quite possibly a Navajo living in the area. Eric strikes up a relationship with the owner of a popular Navajo bar, where Native American loungers love to hang out, and hopes he might know of a medicine man with the knowledge of a particular ritual that could rid him of the lycanthropic curse that continues to burden him. Jimmie F Skaggs (Puppet Master) is one of the Navajos of this episode with a major ax to grind considering his brother-in-law was a victim of the skinwalker and has a mourning pregnant sister to worry about. There's another Najavo, who went to college and has resentment towards his tribe for "sending him away" to school to be a "White Man's Indian", that is established in this episode of Werewolf. Lance LeGault's bounty hunter, Alamo Joe Rogen, has two quick scenes, a forgettable outing that produces no dividends (he passes off a picture of his quarry to the pregnant Navajo widow, telling her Eric is responsible for the skinwalker slayings--an incorrect assessment that nearly gets Eric arrested by an enraged Skaggs--and he has a brief chance to shoot Eric but the bar owner, our hero befriends, stops him in his tracks).

Overall, "Skinwalker" doesn't quite achieve any level of real success because the running time isn't long enough to allow the mystery of the Navajo killings to have a chance to develop the way it should. There are only a few true suspects to consider, and really only Eric's friendship with the Navajo bar owner has any real merit to speak of. I like the series' nomadic plot of Eric always on the pursuit of the one responsible for his curse, hoping to sever the bloodline by killing the chief werewolf, but because each episode is 22 minutes, stories sometimes have a difficult time building appropriately. I loved the idea of Eric involved in a plot surrounding the Skinwalker and the change of location, having contact with Navajos (and putting the spotlight almost solely on them), seems perfect for this kind of show, but the overall execution is deterred by insufficient time needed to fully flesh out a significant story. It's too bad because I can see a great 54 minute episode here, with Eric joining forces with Navajos to find the skinwalker before it kills again. As usual, the beast is unleashed, and there's the typical werewolf battle that lasts approximately five-to-ten seconds. One episode doesn't define a series, but I wouldn't recommend "Skinwalker" as my first choice as an introduction to Werewolf. In regards to his potential salvation, I can't imagine anyone felt he would successfully find a medicine man who could cure him of his lycanthropy because the show then wouldn't have the same dramatic arc or climactic, week-to-week, werewolf showdown viewers came to expect. Still, it was always cool seeing those werewolf costumes and giant monstrous heads brought out at the end, even if for mere seconds. Eric's use as a "rescue werewolf" was commonplace, here once again halting certain death to his new friend (the bar owner) and pregnant Navajo widow (who had a silver dagger made for the skinwalker with plans to stab it if given the chance). Convenient for Eric, there was always *another* werewolf on the prowl ripping apart humans, giving him an out.