The main cast as of season 3.
Sun down... monsters up!
Super Monsters
Super Monsters is a Netflix original preschool series which started on October 13, 2017.
The series is about a group of preschoolers who are the children of famous monsters. Each episode revolves around the characters solving common problems children their age have, from being nervous about attending a new school to learning to overcoming their fear of animals. The show currently has three seasons and six specials, as well as two spin-offs, Monster Party and Monster Pets. As of February 2020 to October 2024 reruns were aired on Discovery Family.
Super Monsters provides examples of:
- All Witches Have Cats: Discussed in Furever Friends. Katya's mom Amy explains to Mr. Gabmore that, just like other monsters, witches can have any kind of monster pet, not just cats.
- Ambiguously Human: New teacher Mina looks like an ordinary human, but she later reveals she's a winged monster. However, it's not clear what kind of monster she is since she just looks like a human with wings.
- The veterinarian's name is Dr. Jekyll, but if she does have a Ms. Hyde, we've never seen it.
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Sami Snow and her mom are yetis.
- Blow You Away: Cleo's main power is whipping up and controlling strong winds.
- Dark Is Not Evil: Despite being monsters, they are all nice kids. The same goes for their parents.
- Daywalking Vampire: Count Dracula. Played with in regard to Drac as he's human during the day but a vampire at night.
- Dracula: This version, Count Dracula Shadows Sr., is the father of Drac Shadows. Similar to Hotel Transylvania, Dracula's much friendlier and nicer here.
- Fantastic Racism: In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines," it's revealed that both humans and monsters are prejudiced towards ogres, believing them to be unintelligent and odorous. The same episode also revealed that, just like in many other monster media, there are humans who are prejudiced against monsters as a whole, even going so far as to think they don't have feelings.
- Fantasy Kitchen Sink: In addition to classic horror movie monsters, Super Monsters has dragons, mermaids, unicorns, griffins, centaurs, ogres, phoenixes, and gargoyles.
- Fearsome Critters of American Folklore: Jerry the Jackalope.
- Frequently Full Moon: The Moon is full in every episode.
- Gender Flip: Dr. Jekyll is a woman here. Curiously, she doesn't appear to have a monster form like the original.
- Get Out!: In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines," Luigi says this point blank to the Super Monsters, Esmie, and Igor after they make one too many mean ogre jokes. It's because he's an ogre himself.
- Hiccup Hijinks: Katya the witch gets witchy ups in "The Witchy Ups", where her magic goes wrong when she hiccups. She's cured at the end, but then Spike gets dragon hiccups.
- Intangibility: Zoe has this as her main power. As of Furever Friends, she can also make others intangible.
- Jekyll & Hyde: Subverted. There's a (female) Dr. Jekyll but no Hyde that we know of.
- Jerkass Realization: In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines", when Luigi brings up that ogres have feelings and ask the Super Monsters how they think an ogre would feel if they heard their meanspirited comments, Esmie is the first to realize the exact error of their ways.Esmie: Oh dear... we were being prejudiced!
- Lunacy: Luna the Moonicorn's powers are, unsurprisingly, based around the Moon.
- Monster Mash: The Super Monsters and their families are comprised of werewolves, mummies, Frankenmonsters, vampires, witches, zombies, and skeletons.
- Nighttime Transformation: The kids turn into their monster forms at night.
- OOC Is Serious Business: In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines," Luigi becomes uncharacteristically angry at the Super Monsters, Esmie, and Igor for making hurtful jokes about ogres. This culminates in him kicking them out of his restaurant before calming down to civilly talk them into a realization. It's later revealed that the reason for his behavior is being an ogre himself.
- Our Dragons Are Different: Spike Gong is mostly based around Asian dragons (weather powers, culture), though his wings, spikes, and snout are based around European dragons.
- Our Mermaids Are Different: Melusine, who (unlike most mermaids) has wings.
- Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Abigail and Olive. In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines," it's revealed that Luigi, Abigail's fiancé and later husband, is also an ogre.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: Lobo Howler and his whole family, save for his cousin Vida, who's a skeleton instead of a werewolf.
- Our Zombies Are Different: Zoe Walker can walk through walls, a trait more associated with ghosts than zombies.
- The Phoenix: Phoebe the phoenix.
- Rainbows and Unicorns: Luna the Moonicorn's mane and tail are braided in rainbow colors.
- Seductive Mummy: Downplayed with Cleo's mom Cleopatra Graves Sr. She's certainly conventionally attractive, but more attention is paid to her being royalty and a loving mother to her daughter.
- Shock and Awe: Mr. Mash has this courtesy of his Monster Pet Shocker, who's an electric eel. Frankie has a milder version of this.
- Shout-Out: In "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines," Katya says she and her mom Amy "play ogre" by donning fake crooked green noses, not unlike those of a stereotypical Wicked Witch. Katya then cackles as she says I'll get you, ogre, and your little kitty, too!.
- Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome: In "Super Monsters: The New Class," Sami and Zane are now four years old, even though they were just babies in the previous season.
- Spin-Offspring: The main characters are children of famous monsters such as Dracula and Frankenstein's Monster.
- Super-Speed: This is Lobo's main power. Drac Shadows is also fast, at least while flying.
- Super-Strength: Frankie's main power. Drac and Lobo are also mildly super strong.
- Teleportation with Drawbacks: Drac gains teleportation of himself and anything in his hands as his power in Furever Friends.
- Transformation Name Announcement: The children's transformations are followed by announcing their names.
- Talent Show: "Stage Fright Tonight" focuses on Frankie's father getting stage fright at one.
- Two Shorts: Outside of specials like "Putting On A Show," "Monster Heart-Friend Night," "An Ogre In Pitchfork Pines," episodes are made up of 2 11 minute segments.
- Very Special Episode: "An Ogre in Pitchfork Pines" deals with prejudice.
- Weredragon: Spike, but it's not clear whether his human or monster form is his true form.
- You Mean "Xmas": Monster Heart-Friend Night is clearly the Super Monsters version of Valentine's Day, which may or may not exist within the setting.