Though it’s Scott McCall’s pack who gets most of the attention on Teen Wolf, his pack wouldn’t even be possible without the Hale family. It’s a Hale who bites Scott and turns him into a werewolf. A Hale also trains Scott in werewolf ways. Hales become some of his best allies. Without the Hale family, Scott and his pack would have been lost.
Most of the Hale family is long gone by the time Teen Wolf takes place. Derek and Peter Hale are the with the most screen time, but the audience also gets to know Tali, Laura, and Cora over the course of the show. With bits and pieces of backstory revealed over six seasons of the the pack they create, can get overlooked.
UPDATE: The character Talia Hale's name was incorrectly spelled in an earlier version of this article.
They Aren’t All Born Wolves
Though the Hale family appears to be a family full of werewolves, one interesting line about the fire that destroyed their home reveals that’s not the case. When the fire is recounted by different characters, the point is always made that both human children and werewolves perished in the fire.
It’s not clear if this means the children hadn’t reached an age to shift for the first time, or if they were children who would never be werewolves. Laura, Derek, and Cora Hale were all born shapeshifters, so the audience never met a Hale who wasn’t a wolf outside of Malia. Malia’s mother, however, was a werecoyote, so she inherited her mother’s abilities instead.
The Pack Was Destroyed In 2005
The timeline of Teen Wolf can be pretty confusing. While it takes some working out, the event that destroyed the Hale pack can be pinned in late 2004/early 2005. That event was the Hale fire.
The fire is said to have killed about a dozen of the Hale’s extended family. Among those dead was the Alpha of the Hale pack, Talia. Laura Hale then became the Alpha, but since she left Beacon Hills for a while with Derek, it was just the two of them. Two doesn’t exactly constitute a pack. Peter and Derek both attempted to grow the pack ranks during the run of the show, but it never happened, marking the official end of the pack as the year 2005.
The Hales Helped Build Beacon Hills
Next to the Argent family, the Hales are the oldest family associated with the supernatural in Beacon Hills. Fans don’t know exactly when the Hale family became werewolves, but they do know it was before the town of Beacon Hills was even established.
The wealth of the Hale family was actually what helped build up Beacon Hills. Before the town became too populated, they established secret vaults for the family around town - including one under the property where Beacon Hills High School would eventually be built.
How Laura Became The Alpha Isn’t Clear
When Talia Hale died in the fire, Laura became the Alpha werewolf - or did she? Just when Laura became the Alpha, and how, isn’t clear during the events of the show.
What fans can see in Teen Wolf is that Talia seemed to know Laura would become the next Alpha. Talia had Laura accompany her to meetings with other Alphas. She seemed to be grooming her daughter to take over. As Talia's first born, it’s possible that Laura would have inherited her mother’s abilities upon her death. It’s also possible that Talia somehow gave her daughter the Alpha status without Laura having to kill her for it. The series, however, never explicitly states how Laura ended up as the Alpha that Peter killed to gain power.
Derek Took A Life Before Peter
Peter Hale is a charismatic character, but he’s still a selfish villain. Always out to manipulate events to suit his own ends, it’s hard to trust Peter unless you have to. That’s why it’s surprising that Derek Hale took a life before his uncle.
When flashbacks in the series revealed just how a wolf’s eye color ended up changing from gold to blue, it was revealed that Derek took the life of his girlfriend to end her suffering when he was still in high school. At the time, his uncle Peter still had golden eyes, not blue. Perhaps Peter had simply manipulated people into doing his dirty work up until that point.
Cora Appeared To Be The Only Hale Who Hadn’t Killed An Innocent
Speaking of werewolf eye color, another member of the Hale family had a surprising shade. When Cora was introduced to the series, her eyes were still gold.
This is only surprising because Cora seemed ready and willing to kill anyone who got in her way - or her big brother’s way. She managed to survive the Hale fire and travel all the way to Brazil at only 11 without ever using her claws to take an innocent life. Some fans have theorized that doesn’t mean Cora hasn’t killed, just that she hasn’t killed any innocent people.
Laura Knew Who The Pack Emissary Was
The druid emissary of a werewolf pack was supposed to be a secret. Only the Alpha typically had a close relationship with their emissary. At least, that’s how Talia Hale ran her pack.
Talia's emissary was Alan Deaton, the same man who helped Scott McCall and his friends via his veterinary clinic for the run of the show. The series revealed that Talia wasn’t actually the only one who knew. Laura also knew he was the emissary, another reason it seemed likely Talia wanted her daughter to take her place.
Cora Hale Belonged To Another Pack
Leaving one pack to another is a relatively common action in Teen Wolf. Boyd and Erica intended to a new pack when they left Derek. Isaac ed up with Scott. Ethan and Aiden wanted to Scott. Cora finding her way to a new pack when she thought her entire family was dead isn’t out of the ordinary.
When Cora made her way from Beacon Hills down into South America at only eleven years old, she didn’t survive alone. For the next seven years, Cora survived with the help of an unnamed pack. We never learn anything about this other pack, but they’re at least connected enough to other werewolf communities for Cora to get word of a Hale Alpha back in her hometown. We do have to wonder why she didn’t seek out Satomi’s pack, who had also lived in Beacon County a long time - since at least World War II.
It’s Not Known If Smaller Packs Of Their Family Still Exist
Derek makes the remark in the series that there are still Hales all over the country. That means Talia Hale wasn’t the Alpha of an all encoming Hale family pack, but of her small corner of the world in Beacon Hills.
That also means that Derek and Cora could still have family with their own packs out there. It makes Cora running to Brazil make a little more sense if she thought there was another Hale pack there for her to .
Their Evolution To Full Wolf Is Rare
Throughout Teen Wolf, most werewolves only partially transform. Glowing eyes, claws, fangs, and a ridged brow are part of the most common transformation. There are special cases, like Ethan and Aiden, of twins whose DNA combines to create one big werewolf. A full transformation into a wolf, however, is a lot less common.
Termed the “evolved wolf” form by the Teen Wolf fandom, when a werewolf reaches a certain level of power, they’re able to fully transform. It’s a sign of how powerful the Hale family bloodline is that Talia, Laura, and Derek are all able to do it. Derek even does it when he’s technically a beta. Peter transforms into a monstrous looking wolf when he’s the Alpha. Those are some serious werewolf genes.