By Maya Salam

Ever since the mad scientist Frankenstein cried, “It’s alive!” in the 1931 classic film directed by James Whale, pop culture has never been the same.

Few works of fiction have inspired more adaptations, re-imaginings, parodies and riffs than Mary Shelley’s tragic 1818 Gothic novel, “Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus,” the tale of Victor Frankenstein, who, in his crazed quest to create life, builds a grotesque creature that he rejects immediately.

The story was first borrowed for the screen in 1910 — in a single-reel silent — and has directly or indirectly spawned hundreds of movies and TV shows in many genres. Each one, including Guillermo del Toro’s new “Frankenstein,” streaming on Netflix, comes with the same unspoken agreement: that we collectively share a core understanding of the legend.

Here’s a look at the many ways the central themes that Shelley explored, as she provocatively plumbed the human condition, have been examined and repurposed time and again onscreen…

…And in the 2019 psychologically bleak thriller DEPRAVED, an Army surgeon, grappling with trauma, pieces together a bundle of body parts known as Adam…

Read more at the NYT