Before talk of this episode emerged, Reed had been reluctant to return to Teen Wolf. "Allison had such an amazing end to her life, I feel like bringing her back in any way might tarnish that beautiful story," she told BuzzFeed News in a phone interview.

But when Davis called her to talk about the seedlings of what would become "The Maid of Gévaudan," she couldn't resist.

"Basically, Jeff just said, 'France in the 1700s,' and I was in," Reed said of the call that reeled her back. "He was definitely playing into my emotions. He knows that I have been dying to do a period piece and I love getting my head around different accents and different cultures. He didn't even have much of a character worked out other than it was based on the Maid of Gévaudan. And I knew the legend, so before really knowing anything further, I said yes."

Davis created a storyline that not only allowed Reed to return to Teen Wolf, but also informed the present-day plot: Scott (Tyler Posey), Stiles (Dylan O'Brien), Lydia (Holland Roden), Malia (Shelley Hennig), and Liam (Dylan Sprayberry) are trying to figure out how to defeat the Beast of Gévaudan, a supernatural creature that’s been resurrected in Beacon Hills that the Maid of Gévaudan, Marie-Jeanne Valet, faced in 1765.

"She was a peasant girl who had fashioned a bayonet onto a spear and was supposedly one of the first to survive an attack by the beast," Davis told BuzzFeed News over the phone. Allison's grandfather, Gerard Argent (Michael Hogan), recounts Valet's story to Scott's pack in hopes they can deduce the creature's weaknesses.

"Valet is another female warrior, and I think one of the great things Crystal does is she gives our viewers, especially our young female viewers, someone to look up to," Davis said. Plus, he noted, "we also get to see her wielding a crossbow again!"