Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

In writing reviews of werewolf movies I found on YouTube for the next several days, here is one on a production made by the lowest of the Poverty Row studios-PRC. George Zucco is the Mad Scientist wanting to create wolfmen so they can aid in the fight during World War II! But he also wants revenge against his former fellow colleagues at his previous institution. His patient is a mentally challenged farm hand played by Glenn Strange who would later take over the Frankenstein monster role at Universal after Boris Karloff didn't want to do it any longer. Also in tow is Zucco's daughter Anne Nagel who I just reviewed in Man Made Monster. Like in that one, she also falls for a reporter here played by a former Our Ganger from the silent era, Johnny Downs. One notable appearance is that of Mae Busch-formerly a usual Laurel & Hardy antagonist-as Susan who I think was the mother of that little girl who's fate was not good...My verdict: this movie seems to lumber it's way through 77 minutes with not much of a music score, too many repetitious lines, and not much action till the end. In fact, part of me felt like sleeping while watching. So on that note, The Mad Monster is worth a look but no more than that.

Spurned mad scientist George Zucco stands at the head of a long table lined with empty chairs. What do his enemies think of him now? His experiment is a success! He gloats over the empty seats—his imagination filling them with former colleagues cringing before his eloquent, triumphant and vengeful lecture.Yes, Zucco is not only a mad scientist, but an angry one, too. The frightening product of his unconventional research will soon be his means of wreaking his revenge on the former colleagues who disgraced him and his "crazy" ideas.Hired hand Glenn Strange is the unfortunate focus of Zucco's research and experiments. A mysterious transfusion involving a captive wolf transforms Strange from a large but weak-minded handyman into a—well, a wolfman.Also part of the plot is Zucco's daughter (Anne Nagel), who doesn't like this spooky house and wants to go back to the city so she can see her boyfriend (Johnny Downs), a newspaper writer who takes a professional interest in the strange goings on down in the swamp country where Zucco has set up shop.Zucco is happily ruthless as the revenge-driven genius; he lets loose one of the all-time great mad scientist laughs around the one hour mark. Strange has a somewhat unique role: as the big dumb handyman who doesn't understand the strange "dreams" he is having, he's part Lenny Small from Of Mice and Men, part Lawrence Talbot from The Wolf Man.The story and script are never especially surprising, but the cast give it their best shot. At 77 minutes, the picture is actually a bit longer and more ambitious than many PRC productions; it does include a fair amount of philosophizing about the true aims and responsibilities of Science (nothing too inspiring, however). A big finish is actually pretty exciting…even if any viewer thinking ahead would probably have seen it coming.All in all, it is a pretty standard 1940s B horror movie—and thus good fun for those of us who enjoy such nonsense.

This Is A Truthfully Boring & Stupid Movie. I Only Saw It Via MTS3K...The Only Thing Not Turing My Brain Into Liquid Was The Breaks That Joel & The Bots Took. I Thought That I'd Eventually See The "Manos" Episode...I DON'T WANNA LIVE! The Movie Is Quite Easily One Of The Worst I Have Ever Seen. The Wolf Guy Stated At One Point That He Hardly Had An Education...He Made It Abundantly Obvious To Everyone. The Mad Scientist Does A Performance In The Movie So Bad That It Would Make Dolph Lungren Think Better About Himself As An Actor & Mean It Truthfully. This Underacted Piece Of Crap Should Only Be Watched Via MTS3K. You Can Watch The Film Unedited On IMDb For Free But Its Not Worth The Time.

"Low budget" doesn't always mean "low entertainment value." (Horror fans, in particular, have gotten used to slogging through the Grand Guignol ghetto in search of something to write home about. It ain't always pretty, God knows, but, then, beggars can't be choosers...) THE MAD MONSTER happens to be one of those no-budget gems that makes all the searching worth the effort. Zucco is as delusional as his predecessor, DR. MABUSE (he even talks to folks who ain't on hand, as did the not-so-good doctor), and (like Bruce Dern in THE INCREDIBLE TWO-HEADED TRANSPLANT, to mention another) he picks the nearest hulking handyman to experiment on. His intentions are good (to create an army of werewolves to battle Derr Furor), but even good intentions are no guarantee things'll go as they should. (Note: see the episode of MONSTERQUEST that deals with some supposedly genuine experiments along these very lines- only with gorillas instead of wolves!) Like the later low-budget gem THE WEREWOLF (1956?), THE MAD MONSTER is definitely worth tracking down.