Guillermo del Toro’s creatures often function as vessels for human longing, loneliness, and otherness. Frankenstein follows the same emotional path. It is a story about not belonging and about the dehumanization of a being capable of feeling. Feelings, no different from those of any other character in the film. And yet the creature is never allowed to truly become part of their world. It remains an “it.” Because without a name, there can be no humanity.

This process of dehumanization does not begin with society. It begins with the creator himself. Victor Frankenstein, the obsessive scientist, who thinks only of the moment of creation, never of what comes after. The first heartbeat is not followed by care, but by shock. Not by responsibility, but by abandonment. For the viewer, this absence of empathy becomes a source of frustration.

Built from the “best” body parts of fallen soldiers and executed criminals, Victor creates something that stands in complete opposition to nature. A human being assembled by hand. To his own surprise, one who feels, who carries empathy, desire, and the ability to form genuine human connection.