Giacchino, it should be noted, is better known for his musical scores than his directing. He won an Academy Award for his work on “Up,” and has composed exhilarating scores for many super-high-profile films like “The Incredibles,” the “Mission: Impossible” movies, a few “Star Trek” movies, a few “Star Wars” movies, a few MCU movies, a few “Jurassic World” movies, and, of course, “The Book of Henry.” Prior to “Werewolf By Night,” Giacchino’s only directorial efforts were a short called “Monster Challenge” in 2018 and a 2019 animated episode of “Star Trek: Short Treks.” “Werewolf By Night,” while only a 53-minute TV special, was to be his highest-profile directing gig to date. 

And it was kind of a dream project. It was Feige who approached Giacchino about the possibility of directing a Marvel project, and Giacchino had just the project in mind. He recalled his conversation thus: 

“I was just talking with Kevin one day and he was like, ‘There’s a lot happening. If there was anything you’d want to direct, what would you want to do?’ […] I remember saying, ‘I like the fringe characters. I like the ones that are off the beaten path because you can do more interesting things with them. So … Werewolf by Night. It was a Marvel comic I had as a kid [and] I loved it.’ He looked at me like, ‘Werewolf by Night? Wow … okay …’”

It was an odd choice. Werewolf by Night is not a well-known character except amongst a few fringe-dwelling Marvel readers. It was part of a wave of Marvel horror comics that were very in vogue in the 1970s, a wave that included “Dracula Lives!,” “Monsters Unleashed!,” “Tales of the Zombie,” and “The Legion of Monsters.”