In 1891, Ben Talbot is attacked by a wolf-like creature. Shakespeare in performance Lawrence Talbot returns home after receiving a letter from Ben's fiancée, Gwen Conliffe, informing him of Ben's disappearance. Lawrence reunites with his estranged father, Sir John, who informs him that Ben's body had already been found, mutilated. At a local pub, Lawrence overhears the locals believing it to be a wild animal, but many blame Gypsies who are camped outside the town, while another claims there was a similar murder 25 years earlier, and a werewolf was the suspected killer. Lawrence has Flashback (psychology) as he tours his family's home where his mother, Solana, committed suicide when he was a boy. Lawrence saw his father standing over her dead body; afterwards he was sent to Lambeth Hospital in London for a year, having suffered from delusions connected to the event.