Mother Nature Worked Overtime To Destroy Teen Wolf's Pilot Episode For MTV

MTV's 2011 supernatural drama "Teen Wolf" was based on the 1985 Michael J. Fox movie of the same name, but apart from the name and werewolf premise, it drew more from 1980s classics like "The Lost Boys" and "Stand by Me," which made for an effective combination that carried the show for a cool six seasons. Getting "Teen Wolf" from script to screen was no easy feat, though. As the team behind the show told Entertainment Weekly in 2021, filming the pilot episode was a very arduous experience. Mother Nature, in particular, seemed to be so opposed to the show that they had a hard time getting anything done. 

"It was absolutely freezing that day," series creator Jeff Davis spoke of the very first day of filming, which took the action to the Beacon Hills lacrosse field. "I think it was 25 degrees. We were so unbearably cold, and we started late because one of the cameras broke on the first day and we had to get one sent to us really quickly. We were behind right from the beginning. We barely got any footage that day and it was terrifying." 

The icy weather was an especially big problem because they were filming at the crack of dawn and the actors' clothes were decidedly not weather appropriate. Things didn't get any easier during the meet-cute scene between Tyler Posey's Scott McCall and Crystal Reed's Allison Argent, which took place in similar conditions but with the added delight of a rain machine. Per Posey, it was the coldest filming day in his whole career. Amazingly, this wasn't the only time the pilot was sabotaged by freak weather. The episode's pivotal opening scene, in which Scott has his fateful encounter with a werewolf, was sabotaged by a flash flood.

If you have fond memories about the scene where Scott is searching for a dead body and is attacked by the alpha werewolf in the woods, here's an interesting tidbit: the aforementioned flash flood destroyed some equipment and forced the show's crew to film parts of the scene in some seriously strange conditions. 

"We finished the scene inside the catering tent," director Russell Mulcahy said. "Jeff and I moved the tables, we dug the hole, and we filmed the image of the dead body with people eating their salads watching us do it."

Likewise, the pilot's werewolf attack scene ended up requiring extra creativity, partially because of the weather conditions and partially because they were filming on a shoestring budget. "If you look back at the opening werewolf-attack scene, parts of that scene were shot in a producer's garage," Davis told Entertainment Weekly. Mulcahy went on to elaborate that the garage had been adorned with dead foliage he pilfered from a park.

But great things sometimes grow from humble beginnings, and with its battles against overblown weather and underwhelming budget, "Teen Wolf" definitely falls in this category. The toothy drama quickly established itself as must-watch TV, and even benefitted from a 2023 film ("Teen Wolf: The Movie," on Paramount+) that continued the story after the series finale's curious ending. 

Still, cast and crew members told Entertainment Weekly that they had great memories of filming the pilot, and Davis even attributed much of the show's success to the difficulties they endured while filming the first episode. "When a pilot goes really well, you're doomed," he said. "When it's one disaster after another, you know you're going to series."