Things that have been rotating around in my head this week:
There is no Ygor in the original Frankenstein novel.
There is a lab assistant with a hunchback in Frankenstein (1931), but he’s named Fritz, played by Dwight Frye
There is a nearly identical character also played by Dwight Frye in Bride of Frankenstein named Karl
In the lesser-known Son of Frankenstein, we do meet a character named Ygor, but he’s nothing like Fritz or Karl at all. He’s the village crazy guy who survived his own lynching and fucked up his neck after being declared dead. He speaks broken English and uses the Creature to kill the jurymen who declared him guilty. He is played by Bela Lugosi.
The pop culture concept of an Ygor character draws from both characters. He usually is a hunchbacked lab assistant who speaks broken English, and a lot of people who haven’t read the book believe he’s part of the story.
In other words, society Frankenstein’d a character into Frankenstein and pretended he was always there
