Franenstein

Since it was first conceived by Mary Shelly, the Frankenstein monster has been a mainstay in popular culture. Unfortunately, most people only know the monster movie version: A massive, lumbering, incoherent killer of men who is chased by the villagers of his town with torches and pitchforks, created by a mad scientist in a reanimation experiment gone completely wrong. The science of these experimentations is usually vague, even in the book. With the science of reanimation  remaining theoretical, even in our advanced times, the “Frankenstein Method” of reanimation, made famous by the movie, is an easy, and often comedic, way of cheating any inanimate creature to life.

An inanimate body lies across a table, sometimes tilted up for easy viewing; The figure or object is usually scrapped together from many parts, giving it a broken, monstrous look; bolts are often attached to the head of the subject, just as they were to the movie version of Frankenstein’s monster; Lighting strikes, a mad scientist laughs dramatically; volts of harnessed electricity course through the still figure; Suddenly, the figure awakens, lurches up, and the scientist revels in his success. An inanimate object or figure has just been given life with no explanation as to how pumping electricity through something is enough to make it move and think with its own free will. Commonly used in cartoons for often silly reasons, the Frankenstein pastiche is used as a placeholder for any actual science of reanimation. Through this method, anything can be given life: Toys (especially stuffed animals), dead pets, people, robots, and even food can move and think with electricity fueling it’s brain! Such a method provides an audience with a cheap explanation for life without involving the complex sciences behind reanimation. With all that in mind, the mad scientist’s cry of “Its ALIVE!!” should not fool any reasonable audience member.