Just like a lot of people, I grew up watching the goofier
monster stuff too. I recall watching
reruns of The Munsters on TV and
cartoons about vampire ducks.
But the one comedic/children’s entertainment monster trope I
want to talk about right now is the “school for monsters”. In a way, this post is a spiritual successor
to the post I wrote on Fairy Tale Fandom about “fairy tale schools”. There are a couple of differences, of
course. For one, I don’t have to write
out a whole list of them because TV Tropes already composed a list that’s right
HERE. The other thing is that unlike all
the fairy tale school properties that seemed to pop up over the last few years,
the monster school trope has been around for decades.
Now, keep in mind, I specifically mean schools that are
meant to cater to monsters (with maybe one or two human students as “fish out
of water”). This does not count
situations where monster kids go to school with human kids, like in the Fifth Grade Monsters books I read as a
kid. It also doesn’t include other
establishments for monsters. I am aware
of hotels for monsters, summer camps for monsters and farms full of monster animals, but they’re not taken into account here.
Before we go any further, I’d like to show you the variation
of this trope I had when I was a kid.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is Rick Moranis in Gravedale High:
If there was ever a show that screamed “90s Saturday mornings”
it’s probably this one. It’s even one of
those celebrity tie-in cartoons that were common back then. Why someone thought the idea of Rick Moranis
as a human teacher at a school for monsters was such a winning idea with kids,
I’ll never know. But still, it hit all
the monster archetypes, all the high school stereotypes and then some. There was Vinnie Stoker, a cool greaser
vampire. Reggie Moonshroud, a nerdy
werewolf. Duzer, a sort of valley girl
gorgon. Gill Waterman, a slacker/surfer
swamp creature. J.P. Gastly, a rich kid
. . . um . . . um. Honestly, I’m not
sure what kind of monster J.P. was supposed to be, but he sounded kind of like
Peter Lorre. But yeah, they covered all
the bases, sometimes twice. I mean,
between Frankentyke and Sid the Invisible Kid, they had two different takes on
the “class clown” character. Overall
though, it was just a really average ‘90s kids cartoon that cribs from shows
like Happy Days and Welcome Back Kotter as well as the Universal and Hammer Studios
monsters. Though it does show some of
the standard parts of this trope. One is
juxtaposing classic horror archetypes against everyday school stuff, showing
that the monster students are “just like us” while also being very different
from us. The other is puns. Lots and lots of monster-related puns.
I tell you though, I’ve seen practically every variation of
this trope in researching this post.
I read Marc Sumerak’s graphic novel All Ghouls’ School. It seems
to be something of an underappreciated comic seeing as it ended on a
cliff-hanger with no follow up. However,
it was pretty well-written and had some strong themes in regards to bullying.
I discovered that there’s a pre-school cartoon called Super Monsters on Netflix that uses the
idea of a “pre-school for monsters” but adds a bit of a superhero twist. The show plays up the idea that each monster
kid has a “super-power” and even gives them a transformation sequence that
happens when the sun goes down. It’s a
cute and harmless show.
I found an Australian live action puppet show for kids
titled Li’l Horrors. The show only seems to partially take place
in a school. The rest happens at the
estate of an old horror movie starlet where a bunch of monster kids live. This one has to be seen to be believed. Largely because the puppets in this show seem
to walk a very fine line between cute and creepy. There are a couple of decent gags in it,
though. I love the one about how the
zombie kid is constantly watching TV.
I’ve also long been aware of the variations aimed more at
teens and adults like the webcomic Eerie Cuties and the manga Rosario+Vampire. One
notable thing about those is that they take advantage of their older audience
to touch on more adult, often sexual, situations (both have had a succubi in
their main casts of characters).
The main thing that comes up when looking at all this is the
question of what makes a trope. Or
rather, what makes a trope seem so appealing that people will visit it over and
over again? And what makes any use of
the trope popular enough that it can last for years on end?
Well, in terms of the former question, I think I can echo
some of the same things I said with the “fairy tale school” post. For a young audience, there’s a certain
relatability connected to putting characters in a school setting. However, the fairy tale school concept plays
somewhat on the idea of school as a journey from “once upon a time” to “happily
ever after”. The monster school trope
has an undertone that plays more on the idea of school being an ordeal. To some extent, especially when adolescence
is reached, there can be a certain amount of anxiety associated with
school. In other words, school can be a
scary place. So, why not play on the
idea of school being “a living nightmare” in a tongue-in-cheek way by depicting
it as literally being “a living nightmare”?
Who the nightmare is for changes depending on who is the viewpoint
character for the series. In All-Ghouls’ School, the main character
is a normal girl named Becca Norman. In
that case, the anxiety is about her classmates and fitting into social
situations. In Gravedale High, the primary character is the human teacher Max Schneider. While the students do have their own
storylines and parts to play, the main source of anxiety seems to come from
whether or not Mr. Schneider can help the misfit class of monster teenagers he’s
been assigned. You get the gist of what
I’m talking about here.
As for the second question, for that I think we should look
at probably the most successful take on the monster school trope: Mattel’s
Monster High.
Monster High started as a line of fashion doll line launched
in 2010 (sidenote: For a 30-something guy with no kids, I seem to blog about
fashion doll lines more than you’d expect).
Naturally, with the line’s runaway success, it also spawned a web
cartoon, straight-to-DVD movies, books and other merchandise. The line originally started with five
characters: Frankie Stein (Frankenstein monster), Draculaura (vampire),
Clawdeen Wolf (werewolf), Cleo DeNile (mummy), Lagoona Blue (sea monster) and
Deuce Gorgon (gorgon). Though, many,
many more were eventually created. Now,
I have dabbled in watching some of the Monster High media through the magic of
the internet. It’s an interesting
phenomenon if nothing else. The idea of
marketing monsters to little girls seems unusual and daring, especially as conventional
(read as: kind of sexist) logic dictates that little girls don’t like things
that are creepy. It’s also probably the
first line of dolls to embrace a slightly goth aesthetic. It was one of the first toylines for girls
that questioned exactly what young girls were into and would respond to. After it proved successful, a number of other
unconventional lines of dolls would be spawned.
And it seems that the line isn’t ready to stop anytime soon as it just
got a fresh coat of paint this year with a reboot of sorts. Before the reboot, the media associated with
the line had much more of a “slice-of-life” slant. This is probably because they were originally
set in a world that was very monster-oriented, right down to there being
monster versions of real places (Boo York, Boo Hexico, Scaris, etc). The post-reboot Monster High seems to be a
bit more adventure-oriented as Monster High is now located in the human world
and a lot of the web cartoons seem to focus on seeking out and recruiting new
monsters to go to the school. But the
one thing that’s consistent in both versions and the thing that I believe makes
it so popular for seven years is a strong sense of theme. And that theme is “self-acceptance”. Basically, the line equates being a monster
to being a flawed and unique human being.
The idea is that everyone feels like a monster sometimes. Everyone feels strange or freaky or like
their flaws are too great. The theme is
that that is a good thing. It’s good to
be a unique, flawed, dynamic human being.
In other words, it’s good to be a monster. I think that is what kids respond to most
and keep this property going. It’s also
what a lot of the other “monster school” properties lack and the reason that
most of them didn’t last all that long.
I can’t speak for some of the foreign properties, but the American
versions usually don’t have much of a shelf life. The only one that I think comes close in
terms of having as strong a theme is All-Ghouls
School and I feel that one failed more because it couldn’t find an audience
among comic book readers (it probably would have done better as a cartoon
show).
I’m afraid that brings us to the end, though. And now I’ve examined and dissected another
facet of the “special school” storytelling trope. The only other type that’s done nearly as
much as fairy tales and monsters is the “school for superheroes”. But that’s a post for another day.
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