This is the life I have chosen to live. · 7:07pm Apr 8th, 2019
Welcome back to my—
I CAN'T EVEN MAKE UP WORDS OR INTROS ANYMORE!
So, I'm sure that by now, you all know that I am a cursed man. Not doomed to die of poverty or loneliness, but rather subjected to a rather different fate entirely. No matter what I do, what I think, or how much I try to resist, I can never ever escape the endless pull of monster themes in shows. What exactly spurred this condition, you might ask? Try watching Scooby Doo and the Ghoul School religiously as a young lad and you can pretty much guess just how deeply-rooted a condition this is.
I don't know why, but this has always fascinated me. The idea of creatures co-existing and mingling with the human race, having more purposes to be alive rather than just scaring, mutilating, or causing dark magic to wash over random people has always appealed to me. It's always interesting to see how these deformed, twisted, transformed people live their lives as if they were trying to do it normally (to a certain degree), not just live solely for the sake of being abhorrent demons that the humans would rather see burnt and destroyed rather than reasoned with. The genre as a whole is a staple that almost never gets talked about unless another Hotel Transylvania movie comes out, and whenever it is talked about, it's not done en masse, so I guess that you can call it my little hidden gem, my secret fetish that I for some reason can never seem to shake off or move on from. I͕̣̟ ̴̢̟̩̝̱͠n̼̮e̘̱e̴̶͔̜̜̼͇͚͙̗͠d̛̹̞ ̴̢̜̖̲̦͉̕h̞̝̮̦̰͔̣̮̤͜͟͞e̕͡͏͎͕̙ĺ̙̮̱͉͠p͕̦̕
Even now, there's a couple of series floating around that I've got a sort of attraction towards. Netflix's Super Monsters which, at this point, given how many times I've dropped it and talked about it I'm surprised no-one else is watching it or asking me about the logistics of how these children never feel tired or go to sleep ever because of the Shrek 1 rules of monstering. And also because the beauty that is Andrea Libman is voicing Katya the Witch.
I suppose I also enjoy Disney's new Vampirina series to some level of degree, if not for the slightest little twinkles of imagination that it sprinkled around in bits and bobs. That and I'm also seriously questioning how in the holy mother of god Vampirina and her family can survive in sunlight, they should be burning to a crisp right at this very moment in time, yet Disney doesn't want to kill kids but they're okay with villain murder in the most horrific and barbaric ways...
So naturally, you would think that the Monster genre as a whole would be a sure-fire way to success when it comes to me. I've seen other series, have some sense of respect for them in one way or another, even going so far as to call Scooby Doo's one a cult classic because of tiny little-kiddywinkle Shadowmane.
But then we have today's topic of discussion, Monster High:
For those of you who've forgotten this...
THING.
Monster High was a range of dolls created back in July 2010, distributed by Mattel and spearheaded by a man named Garrett Sander. And the purpose of this line existing was only to sell toys back in the day, with barely any context unless you bought the sodding things and got invested in the world these lumps of plastic were building for themselves. Since their inception and their place in the toy industry, they have since spawned a Youtube web series that then went on to create a myriad of movies. They in turn then spawned Ever After High and Enchantimals if you ever thought that those may or may not have been a thing that your little girls begged you to buy in your nearest Smyths Toy Superstore or The Entertainer. And, believe it or not, this entire thing then prompted Hasbro to directly create Equestria Girls as a response to this Monster High, Ever After High, Please Help Me I'm High line of dolls that were storming the market, making bank, putting other brands to shame. So yeah. From this, we were given Rainbow Rocks, Friendship Games, Legend of Everfree, and even the specials we have now.
With something creating that big of an empire, it's hard not to take notice of this. I first saw commercials for this thing when I was a teenage boy watching the telly and what I saw seemed interesting, but it was aimed at girls and the line was much more blurred and distorted between genders back in those days. Though, let's be honest, that era of time was drawing to a close anyway. I never saw the original web series or the movies until today. So, considering this is uncharted territory for me, I have no idea what to expect.
Although, if anything, I'm expecting something of substance, given that this was essentially a way of keeping a fading and decaying era of dolls alive after Barbie and Bratz saturated the market and bled every doll dry of creation and innovation, so much so that dolls now in cartoons and movies barely do anything unless they're possessed or some baloney. So with that, I'm giving you my thoughts and opinions of the web series. Not every episode, because hoo boy there were a LOT of them.
Also, oddly enough, these were published to Youtube before July 2010, so...
Nah, what am I worried about? Worrying is for squares.
Well, first of all, we have an intro. And it's much less of an intro and more of a mantra that you may or may not be chanting to yourself tonight if you were to watch it. It's kinda like the Nutshack intro but in only 14 seconds, so be thankful for that at least. Unfortunately, it explains nothing. It adds nothing. And even after watching it, you'll have no idea what to expect because it's just bog standard for stuff like this. Nothing but shots of the cast and the school. Nothing more. Nothing less.
As for characters, we have a list of characters that seem straight out of a Phoenix Wright game, Frankie Stein, Draculaura, Clawdeen Wolf, Lagoona Blue, Cleo De Nile, and Ghoulia. The show, much like the other ones I've subjected myself to revolve around life at Monster HIgh. And that's it. Literally, that's it. No build-up, no origins, no explanation, just living there. Did you expect anything else out of a line made for the single purpose of selling merchandise to an audience? If you said no, congratulations, you're one step closer to winning absolutely bloody nothing. Personality wise, there's almost no personality. It's as generic and stock as you could get for a teen high school series. There's the smart girl, the queen bee, the friends, the boyfriends, if there are more, then don't expect anything more.
In terms of how an episode of this web series is structured, well, it's a formula that's not too hard to understand. An episode happens. There is a problem. That problem is solved instantaneously. Life goes on. That's it. All the while, there are lots of puns themed around monsters and stuff that makes it seem like Ghoul School's punderland was a sign of things to come and we as a species didn't listen and chose to bathe ourselves in the pool of puns that have since devoured our natures and caused us to think that a pun is the best way to make humor a thing. Puns are essentially the memes of cartoons these days They're sodding everywhere and no-one wants to do a thing about them. And oh lord, are the puns obnoxious. Let me tell you, bat jokes, wolf-man jokes, zombie jokes, frankenstein jokes, the list is rolling out of my house as we speak and I am close to getting serious counseling for this thing that I am bearing witness to right now.
And this is only season 1.
This is only season 1.
THIS IS ONLY SE—
To be fair, though, Season 1 is considered the pilot season of a show for many reasons. It's establishing the world, it's creating these characters, it's essentially the building blocks that the show itself is made out of. It can be structured however it wants to be structured, with future seasons rectifying any issues, changing perspectives if needs be and even making some things that started out bad seem better later on. Or, in the inverse, it can make things worse as they go along. But, in a sense, Season 1 of any show ever is meant to be taken with a pinch of salt. It is not the final product by a long shot if there are more seasons going for it. But if it's a one season wonder show—which this isn't, thank god—then it has to make do with the stuff that it does have, which is kinda sad, but at the same time, there must be a reason for something only having one season for it to just stop like that.
With that being said, I kinda expected this level of cringe and mayhem from a Season 1, seeing as how it doesn't know what to do with itself just yet. But does that excuse the other facets of the show? Well, from what I've seen, this is one of the most plastic series I have seen in my life and I have only just survived a handful of episodes. The characters' bodies are strangely disproportionate and never have one base model for all of the characters to be built upon. Some seem like they have chunkier arms, legs, or heads from each other, while some overall just have jagged, bladed designs at times. Like, seriously, Clawdeen especially looks like at least some part of her body is jutting out the wrong way. I can't tell whether or not this was intentional, but it looks like it's going to break out of the screen at any moment.
If they're trying to recreate the art style of the dolls in the form of this, well, it's slightly commendable, to say the least, but it doesn't help the visuals whatsoever. It's just soulless, lifeless as if they were trying to say that cartoons shouldn't differentiate from the products they make whatsoever. Seriously, there's a reason why the ponies in My Little Pony never look like the toys do. If you saw Twilight or her friends with that kind of design in the show, would you have watched it for this long, for nine seasons now? Also, considering the gothic, dark and twisted art style's been done in many different ways, it feels like this is just trying to drag on the coattails of those other shows like Beetlejuice, Growing up Creepie, Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy even...
And how about that voice acting? Well, this is an absolutely chaotic series, so of course, the voice acting is going to be rushed, jittery, even worth a few laughs if you can consider how little time the VAs had to put all this out before the next one. Not to mention, accenting yourself does not work whatsoever unless it fits with the character that you're trying to play. Clawdeen sounds like one of Numbah 5's distant relatives from another part of America, Lagoona sounds like she's from the Australian outback rather than from the ocean, Draculaura is obvious, if there are others that I'm missing, then I probably had no time to drink them in given how fast a pace this series runs at and this was in 2010! When Adventure Time and Regular Show started; when Toy Story 3 was launched in cinemas; hell, even when Friendship is Magic as a whole was launched! WHAT KIND OF TWISTED, PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPERIMENT TO MAKE PEOPLE BUY TOYS IS THIS?!
By the way, let's go back to another facet quickly. The "MONSTER" aspect. You know, what this show prides itself on and struts its' stuff for like it's on the catwalk. Aside from everyone looking the part and doing what they can, the whole thing just feels more of a layer of skin to disguise the fact that this is just another high-school series. There are some characters who do the roles that they have just fine, but outside of that, there are monsters who barely do anything related to themselves whatsoever, especially Lagoona and Cleo De Nile. What is their relation to this series aside from looking like a mummy and a lagoon creature? Even Draculaura, despite looking and acting the part, where's the flight, the bat-transformations, the pain when in sunlight, ANYTHING?!
Here's the thing with monster-shows. When your main protagonists are the monsters themselves:
Whenever we're talking about the monster parts of this show, while it looks like it can do these things it just... doesn't. It's just one of those things that's more of a show don't do rather than a show vs tell. And that can really bring down the quality of a show like this on another regard; imagination and creation. What do I mean by this, well, let me go back again to another show that I will keep on talking about until the end of my life; Super Monsters.
See, there, where it's a simple concept of monsters and humans co-existing, the premise is made unique out of the gate with the idea that these kids only take on their monster sides at night, meaning that whenever the sun's out, they seem like regular kids at a regular preschool, thus leading to some wonder as to what could happen whenever the sun does make way for the moon and let the kids show off their other side. But that was just the tip of the iceberg there, as there were even some episodes in the series that capitalized on the Super Monsters and their powers, some of my favorite examples being Blue Eyes Surprise dealing with Zoe's power to see through things acting as a hindrance; Case of the Witchy-Ups and Spell Help showing that Katya's magic, while immensely powerful, isn't always going to work or can misfire whenever she's got a bad case of the hiccups; even Team of One where Drac could be a successor to Rainbow Dash with how cocky he gets with the power of flight, ultimately leading to him getting himself recklessly tied up. It's basic stuff, but it's done with imagination, creativity, and is made so believable with what powers they have and how it fits in with the kind of mythos that you would associate with creatures of darkness like this.
But Monster High, well, from the episodes I've seen in Web Series Season 1, I think the only one with some kind of special talent is Frankie Stein, purely because of the whole detachable and sentient limbs scenario, and even then, it's like you're taking Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas and making her into some twisted plastic creature from another world. Cleo De Nile only looks Egyptian and that's it, there's barely any pool time for Lagoona at all, Draculaura's completely shafted and wasted, Ghoulia's just annoying with the lifeless nature (though I think that's what they were going for, so props for them), and even Clawdeen, even when the moon's out or something similar to it, it's just not really that special because she's technically a wolf-lady, not a real werewolf. There's a fine line between wolf-man and werewolf and this is not it, folks.
I would watch more of this series to see if it does get any better, but right now, my brain is on the verge of self-destructing. This show is going way too fast for me and it's going to crash into everything it can see on the road before smashing into the first non-destructible object it can find, ultimately killing the driver and causing everything to come to a screeching halt. As for the movies, well, if you guys want me to watch the movies and review them, I suppose I can do that, seeing as how they're much longer and should have a lot more fleshed-out stuff and content for me to digest and absorb at a steady pace.
If you like Monster High, then good on you. Keep on displaying your love for it for all of the world to see, but as for me, I got myself caught on a fast-moving object known as the web series and now the G-forces are playing hell with my body, so I can't stomach any more of it at the moment.
And with that, I think it's time for me to lay down...
*falls on the bed so hard that it creates a hole in the room, causing it to tumble down into the other room.*
Oh great, I've done it again. See ya soon, guys.
Oh, oof. It's OK, just have a break, and release your stress. Go to sleep, even in your (at the moment) - worried, coco-block, and cold mind. Snow problem. And, great interesting blog and funny title.
M-o-n-s-t-e-r's...
Monsters monsters yes we are..