Two Frankenstein films landing within a year — del Toro’s Frankenstein and Gyllenhaal’s The Bride — signal a shift: horror characters are escaping Halloween, becoming year-round vessels for cultural anxiety. Moving beyond the old “mad science” metaphor, these versions cast the creature as a symbol of inherited damage, self-reinvention, and the struggle to be understood. In their second collaboration, actress Jessie Buckley is Gyllenhaal’s Bride, and the director’s vision pushes the notorious couple’s story toward questions of autonomy in a world that can’t contain them. These off-season monsters are reanimated as emotional tools for a culture trying to talk about alienation, repair, and rebirth.

Behind the seams:

• del Toro gets personal with his adaptation of the age-old tale
• Rick Owens’ extraterrestrial SS26 collection’s exalts creature-like beauty
• Romero Jennings details Kim Shui’s SS26 “Renaissance Goth” looks