Eddie Quist
Encyclopedia
Edward 'Eddie' Quist, also known as Eddie the Mangler is a character in the 1981 horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...

 The Howling
The Howling (film)
The Howling is a 1981 werewolf-themed horror film directed by Joe Dante. Based on the novel of the same name by Gary Brandner, the screenplay is written by John Sayles and Terence H. Winkless...

, which is based on the 1977 novel of the same name
The Howling
The Howling is a 1977 horror novel by Gary Brandner. It was the inspiration for the 1981 film The Howling, although the plot of the film was only vaguely similar to that of the book....

. He is portrayed by Robert Picardo
Robert Picardo
Robert Picardo is an American actor. He is best known for his portrayals of Dr. Dick Richards on ABC's China Beach, the Emergency Medical Hologram , also known as The Doctor, on UPN's Star Trek: Voyager, The Cowboy in Innerspace, Coach Cutlip on The Wonder Years , Ben Wheeler in Wagons East, and as...

.

History

Eddie Quist suffers from lycanthropy
Lycanthropy
Lycanthropy is the professed ability or power of a human being to undergo transformation into a werewolf, or to gain wolf-like characteristics. The term comes from Greek Lykànthropos : λύκος, lykos + άνθρωπος, ànthrōpos...

, as do his two younger siblings Marsha and T.C. At one point in their life, the Quists had been found by therapist (and fellow werewolf
Werewolf
A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...

) Dr. George Waggner. Waggner was a reformist, believing that the old habits of preying on humans was a practice that could not fit in the modern world. He set up a secluded resort in the Tehachapi Mountains
Tehachapi Mountains
The Tehachapi Mountains , regionally also called The Tehachapis, are a mountain range in the Transverse Ranges system of California in the Western United States...

 known as "The Colony", where other lycanthropes could retreat from the outside world and learn to channel and control their energies and violent impulses. The therapy proves to be problematic for the Quist siblings, particularly Eddie, who is more than comfortable with the "old ways"
Cannibalism
Cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh of other human beings. It is also called anthropophagy...

.

Eddie leaves the Colony and moves to Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

, where he uses his powers to rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...

 and butcher women, earning him the nickname of "The Mangler". He soon begins to stalk
Stalk
Stalk may refer to:* Plant stem, one of two main structural axes of a vascular plant* Leaf stalk, also known as Petiole* Flower stalk, also known as Peduncle* Stalking, an act of intrusive behavior or unwanted attention towards a person...

 television news anchor Karen White, which the LAPD
Los Angeles Police Department
The Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...

 exploits to their advantage. Having set an appointment in a porno theatre, Eddie forces Karen to watch a snuff film
Snuff film
A snuff film is a motion picture genre that depicts the actual death or murder of a person or people, without the aid of special effects, for the express purpose of distribution and entertainment or financial exploitation. For-profit snuff films are generally regarded as an urban legend, whose...

 while hiding behind her in the shadows and transforming. Karen turns around and screams, prompting immediate action from the police who shoot Eddie as he is about to assault
Assault
In law, assault is a crime causing a victim to fear violence. The term is often confused with battery, which involves physical contact. The specific meaning of assault varies between countries, but can refer to an act that causes another to apprehend immediate and personal violence, or in the more...

 Karen. A seemingly fatal bullet wound to the head incapacitates him, but he is actually in a dormant state as his body regenerates
Regeneration (biology)
In biology, regeneration is the process of renewal, restoration, and growth that makes genomes, cells, organs, organisms, and ecosystems resilient to natural fluctuations or events that cause disturbance or damage. Every species is capable of regeneration, from bacteria to humans. At its most...

 the injury.

A few days later, Eddie escapes from the morgue
Morgue
A morgue or mortuary is used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification, or removal for autopsy or disposal by burial, cremation or otherwise...

 and tracks Karen down. There, he brutally murders Karen's friend Terri Fisher while tape recording her screams after she discovers the truth. Later, he confronts Karen, angrily tearing out the bullet still lodged in his skull
Human skull
The human skull is a bony structure, skeleton, that is in the human head and which supports the structures of the face and forms a cavity for the brain.In humans, the adult skull is normally made up of 22 bones...

 and graphically transforming in front of her. Before he can attack, however, Karen throws acid
Acid
An acid is a substance which reacts with a base. Commonly, acids can be identified as tasting sour, reacting with metals such as calcium, and bases like sodium carbonate. Aqueous acids have a pH of less than 7, where an acid of lower pH is typically stronger, and turn blue litmus paper red...

 in his face and escapes. The now disfigured Eddie is met by Terri's boyfriend Chris Dugan armed with a gun which, unknown to him, is loaded with silver bullet
Silver bullet
In folklore, the silver bullet is supposed to be the only kind of bullet for firearms that is effective against a werewolf, witch, or other monsters...

s. Eddie taunts Chris and begins to shapeshift. Chris fires his gun at Eddie's throat, killing him.

Personality

Eddie is a true sociopath
Psychopathy
Psychopathy is a mental disorder characterized primarily by a lack of empathy and remorse, shallow emotions, egocentricity, and deceptiveness. Psychopaths are highly prone to antisocial behavior and abusive treatment of others, and are very disproportionately responsible for violent crime...

 who views himself as above the law of mere humans. This arrogance also manifests itself in his habit of taunting the police by leaving calling cards
Calling card (crime)
A calling card is a particular object sometimes left behind by a criminal at a scene of a crime, often as a way of taunting police or obliquely claiming responsibility. The name is derived from the cards that people used to show they had been to visit someone's house when the resident was absent...

 at his crime scenes in the form of yellow smiley face stickers. He delights in terrifying and tormenting his victims before killing them.

Little else of his personality is explored in the film, although his apartment in Los Angeles is filled with drawing
Drawing
Drawing is a form of visual art that makes use of any number of drawing instruments to mark a two-dimensional medium. Common instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, inked brushes, wax color pencils, crayons, charcoal, chalk, pastels, markers, styluses, and various metals .An artist who...

s of landscapes in his former home and portraits of people in varying stages of werewolf transformation. His cabin in the colony had similar pictures, as well as an assortment of animal flesh and bones kept as trophies.

Differences from the book

Quist's character differs a lot from the source in Gary Brandner
Gary Brandner
Gary Brandner is an American horror author best known for his werewolf themed trilogy of novels, The Howling. The first book in the series was loosely adapted as a motion picture in 1981...

's novel upon which the film is based. In the book, his first name is Max and though he does sexually assault the leading heroine (albeit without police intervention), he is in no way connected to the werewolf community central to the story.

Scholarly reception and analysis

James F. Iaccino, noting that before "the rest of the Howling story is disclosed, the character of Eddie Quist should be examined a bit more thoroughly," describes the character as a "'rebel' figure" and an "archetypal wanderer."
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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