Based on the 1818 gothic romance novel by Mary Shelley, Paul McGuigan’s Victor Frankenstein may be named after the Creature’s creator, but it actually attempts to separate itself from the recent onslaught of Universal Monster movies by focusing the story on Igor, Victor’s assistant. In this adaptation, the two men cross paths late one night when fate places them both at the circus under the same tent. Igor, a hideous hunchback with this face painted up like a clown waits in the shadows for his nightly humiliation; a ritual in which the crowd laughs and cheers while the rest of the circus folk kick and bully Igor in the name of amusement.

While he waits for his turn in the ring, Igor huddles by the benches, and watches as his angel, Lorelei, flies overhead, a master trapeze artist who unknowingly captured Igor’s heart ages ago. Suddenly, the ropes connecting the trapeze bar give way, abruptly and awkwardly dumping Lorelei onto the harsh ground below. As both Igor and the well-dressed gentleman Victor rush to her side, they put their heads together and quickly devise a plan to save Lorelei’s life, resourcefully pulling the lady back from the brink of death, while at the same time cementing what would become a lifelong friendship between these two strangers.

Victor immediately recognizes Igor’s intelligence and talent, and convinces him to leave the circus and come live with him, where many more daunting medical challenges await them. Igor, a slave to the three rings since birth, reluctantly agrees, just thankful to finally have a friend who can see the scientist beneath the clown makeup. Together, the two geniuses seek to permanently put an end to the threat of death, and accomplish the impossible: mastering the art of reanimation.

By setting up Igor and Victor as intellectual equals, director McGuigan touches on something special that’s quite unprecedented for films of this nature. While other Frankenstein flicks opted to focus on the relationship between Dr. Frankenstein and his Creature, or, more recently, just the Creature, this film relies on unexpected homoerotic undertones that surprisingly work to the film’s advantage.

While the Max Landis-lead script tries to highlight the romance between throwaway character Lorelei and Igor, and also, build tension with the head-butting brewing between progressive Frankenstein and throwaway conservative character Inspector Turpin, it turns out that the most interesting twosome in the film (and the one that carries the crowd over the landmine of plot holes), is the love blossoming between Igor and Frank, as they engage in several risky experiments together.

Victor immediately points out that Igor isn’t a true hunchback, but simply suffers from a medical condition that can be easily fixed, but if we’re to believe that Igor spends all of his spare time at the circus reading up on human anatomy, wouldn’t he be able to figure that out himself? Are we supposed to believe that her Lorelei’s mysterious benefactor is giving her enough money to allow her to transition from a circus performer to an aristocrat within the timeframe of a few weeks? Also, was that really a San Diego Comic-Con Hall H joke shoved into a period piece set during the early 1800s?

Yes, Victor Frankenstein is riddled with issues and unexplained moments, but in the end, all of the mishaps are easy to brush off, because that’s not why we’re really here. As the audience quickly learns, this film isn’t as much about the commentary of a man playing god by choosing who lives and who dies, or the Inspector’s Christian perception of Frankenstein’s work, and his insistence that such drastic scientific progress is the work of the devil, although those themes are so blatantly obvious that it sometimes feels like they’re etched onto a baseball bat that is then used to beat the viewers over the head with its messages.

No, the real reason to see this movie is charming bromance between Daniel Radcliffe and James McAvoy, and the power struggle that develops in the midst of their rollercoaster of a relationship. Whether it is intentional or not, their forbidden love flourishes rapidly, and winds up becoming an angle that turns out to be just as prominent as any of the motifs dealing with the consequences of using scientific advancement to prolong life, or society’s determination of a monster. From ripping off Igor’s shirt within the first ten minutes of the film, to sharing drunken nights filled with brainstorming, to a tear-filled finale, these two scientists are concocting much more than the reanimation of a corpse in their basement.

In the end, Victor Frankenstein, although clever and humorous at times, overall still manages to blend in with the myriad of action-packed, CGI-covered, slo-mo enhanced Universal Monster movies that have come out recently With its only real saving grace being the unexpected bromance between Radcliffe and McAvoy, and the lowered expectations of audience members who have been witnesses to far too many terrible Frankenstein films, the latest adaptation is slightly more enjoyable than its recent predecessors, but not by much. Without the romantic undertones between the two male leads, it’s hard to say if this film would be worth catching, but luckily, they provide the much needed chemistry to carry this strange tonal mash-up over its rough patches.