Let’s talk for a bit about The Flintstones character Betty Rubble, shall we?
For a time during the years of 1995 through 1996, the good folks at Cartoon Network seemed to be bizarrely fixated on this character for some reason. Odd cameos, references and allusions to Betty kept popping up on the channel during this time. Some examples:
Cartoon Network once aired a special marathon in the guise of a fake award show in which the categories would be specifically tailored so that only one cartoon character or short could possibly be the winner, thus leading to an airing of said short (see also NBC’s Saturday morning preview special The NBC Yummy Awards). The “show” was titled The Golden Betty Awards, represented by a golden statuette of a miniature Betty Rubble.
CN of this period aired not one, but two promos implying a tryst between Betty and Race Bannon from Jonny Quest, in one of which Betty is nearly caught chatting it up with Race over the phone by Barney, but she quickly covers it up. My mother wasn’t fond of these.
This spot for Space Ghost: Coast to Coast:
Now, these repeated ‘Betty-isms’, we’ll call them, could just be seen as harmless loony non-sequiturs, but they could also give one pause as to what exactly was going on at Cartoon Network Studios during those days. There must have been some pretty interesting water cooler conversations going on there…..
Anyway, apparently CN execs weren’t the only ones hot for Betty, as around this same period of time a long drought was finally brought to an end: namely, Betty Rubble’s 30 year absence from Flintstones’ Vitamin jars.
Fun Trivia Fact: the vitamins were first introduced in 1960 by Miles Laboratories as “Chocks”, the first chewable multivitamin marketed directly for children, and their stop-motion commercials offered a series of fun, though unfamiliar, characters. That all changed in 1968, when Miles swapped the Chocks characters for the cast of The Flintstones. Nearly all the characters were available to be chewed up and swallowed – Fred, Wilma, Barney, Pebbles, Bamm-Bamm, Dino…even that weird green space alien, the Great Gazoo at one time. There was one glaring omission, however – Barney’s wife, Betty!
There were (at least) two possible reasons why Betty didn’t have her own vitamin: First, manufacturers claimed that Betty’s waist was too thin and kept breaking during production. Second, Betty was virtually indistinguishable from Wilma.
Though there was a small Betty for vitamin movement, including an Atlanta rock band that called itself Betty’s Not a Vitamin….
Another Fun Trivia fact: Betty’s Not a Vitamin was named one of the 100 best band names by Paste magazine.
..they may as well have just banged their collective heads against the wall (or banged each other about the heads with clubs, if they wanted to be authentic about it). It wasn’t until actress and comedienne Rosie O’Donnell, who played Betty in the 1994 live action Flintstones film, brought Betty’s plight to the attention of the nation that anything was really done about it. O’Donnell, during a television interview about the film, complained that all the other characters were represented, but not Betty. A savvy marketing agency seized the opportunity to involve the consumer in the direction of the brand and launched a nationwide campaign to determine Betty’s fate. The agency set up prehistoric style voting booths in regional shopping malls across the country, as well as a 1-800 number, to allow consumers to decide whether Betty should be let in the club.
The public didn’t let her down. More than 3,000 kids and their mothers voted in person and more than 17,000 calls were logged, with 91 percent in favor of bringing in Betty. She finally became a vitamin character in December 1995, replacing the Flintstones’ car.
Thus rendering the band Betty’s Not a Vitamin’s name outdated (but if they’re still performing, they can always just swap the ‘t’ in ‘Not’ for a ‘w’ and rename themselves Betty’s Now a Vitamin) and if those Bettyphiles at CN are still around, they can now nibble on a Betty vitamin to satiate their cravings…assuming they don’t just bite down on a rubber hockey puck when it’s time for that high voltage fun.
This is a follow-up to a rebuttal of a review that was written last October. For those who read Monster Mash: A Rebuttal, we noted that witches are one monster archetype that’s frequently left out of monster mashes, and that Mattel’s Monster High doll franchise lacked a witch student. Well, this year, it seems that Mattel has set out to fix this problem. Earlier this year, Mattel introduced a new character to the MH doll line: one Casta Fierce.
One of the mysteries of the universe: Why are green chicks usually hot?
We say, it’s about friggin’ time. If MH is going to have a steampunk robot and a mermaid (who aren’t even monsters) as characters in it’s franchise, you have to have at least 1 witch.
“Witches are awesome, baby! And you know it! We’re green, we’re keen, get used to it! (OK, not all witches are green, but you get the general idea).”
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Here’s the character profile from the Monster High Wiki:
Casta Fierce is a 2014-introduced and all-around character. She is a witch, specifically the daughter of Circe, and the leadsinger of The Spells. Aside from Casta, The Spells consist of three girls who are uniquely immune to Casta’s magic. Like her mother, Casta can turn anyone into any animal, but she has limited control over her powers. One misspoken word or unfortunately phrased sentence is enough to turn anyone hearing it into the matching animal. This has put a damper on her singing career, but Casta and her band keep making music as they look for solutions. Casta is a close friend of Catty Noir, a colleague of hers.
The daughter of Circe? Casta could have been the daughter of Baba Yaga, but Baba is already a character in Ever After High, and I suppose that Mattel wants to keep those 2 worlds separate.
Fun Fact: The name Casta Fierce is inspired by Sasha Fierce, an on-stage alter ego of Beyoncé. Her hair is even styled the same way as Beyoncé’s was in the videoclip of “Single Ladies (Put a Ring On It)”, which is a song released as part of the I Am…Sasha Fierce album.
The Beyonce thing won’t become dated in a few years at all. Interesting, although personally I think that naming the character Casta Spell would have been funnier.
If you’ve been following the news for past few weeks, you’ve undoubtedly heard or read the declaration made by Japan’s Sanrio company that’s shaken up the nation:
In the words of Phillip J. Fry, “I’m shocked! SHOCKED!…Well, not that shocked.
The president of Sanrio goes on to explain that Hello Kitty is not an actual cat, but rather, she’s the personification of a cat. Her actual name is Kitty White. She’s a little girl, but no more an actual cat than Mickey Mouse is an actual mouse. Hello Kitty wears clothes. She stands, walks and talks like a human. She even owns a pet cat named Charmy Kitty.
He almost had up until he said that Hello Kitty owns a pet cat, but more on that later…
So going by that logic, then that means that Gumball Watterson isn’t a cat either, which he isn’t.
Gumball is a human with cat like features. Gumball went “meow!” in one short and was seen hanging out with H-B characters Tom (of Tom & Jerry fame) and Top Cat in one of Cartoon Network’s 20th Anniversary spots, but those are the most cat-like things that Gumball has ever done.
For all intents and purposes, Gumball is an anthro, but definitely more human than animal.
Honestly, I think that fans outrage over this news is no more than a knee jerk reaction. After all, the practice of creating anthropomorphic animal characters who are essentially humans in animal guise is nothing new. Anybody remember this guy?
“Howdy, folks.”
Huckleberry Hound, despite his name and appearance, has done very few canine things in his long career. He was even employed as a dog catcher in one of his original shorts. He must’ve really needed the money.
Heck, among the most famous anthros of all time are the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (granted, the Turtles were ordinary animals who were anthropomorphized through mutation, so they now can be thought of as at least part humanoid, although I’m still not feeling the idea of any of the Ninja Turtles dating human women.
“Humans datin’ anthros is sick! It’s an atrocimity!”
Homophobia, perhaps? Or would the correct term be “bestophobia”? I honestly don’t know what to call sex between anthropomorphic animals and cartoon humans, let alone an irrational fear of such practices. It gets even stranger when you have anthro animals interacting with non-anthropomorphic animals, such as having anthros vising non-anthros at the zoo. Are zoos like insane asylums for cartoon animals? Or how about Mickey Mouse having a dog for a pet and also hanging out with Goofy, another dog?
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As previously stated, the likes of Mickey Mouse, Hello Kitty and Gumball Watterson are not real animals, nor are the generic toon animal sprites in the now defunct video game Toontown Online.
“Check us out! In your face, natural order of things!”
…But even those characters are preferable to THESE animated abominations!!
What has science wrought?!? Someone think of the children!!!
The characters on PBS’ Arthur aren’t animals; they’re mutant humans with animal heads! The females have full heads of hair. They’re fully clothed. They have completely human anatomies (including human fingers and toes). They don’t even have tails. Sorry, but when cartoon animals are anthropomorphiszed to the point where they have human feet, then it officially has crossed over from being cute to creepy! animal heads on human bodies may seem endearing in a cartoon or a video game, but in the real world, not so much.
If you saw these creatures in your neighborhood, they’d soon be chased out of town by angry villagers wielding pitchforks and torches. Talking animals are fine when not being human is part of their shtick, but keep it in Cartoon Country, please.
Twinsanity’s Suburban Dictionary (we’re not cool and hip enough to have an Urban Dictionary) defines Sheldoning as “the practice of agonizing and nitpicking over a tiny, insignificant detail and harping on said detail whenever someone uses it incorrectly”. It’s named after Sheldon Cooper, everyone’s favorite anal retentive nutbag genius on The Big Bang Theory.
Now it’s not something we’re proud of, but we’ve been known to Sheldon about things from time to time ourselves. Here’s a little list of some of things which grind our gears, which niggle our collective noggles and as a result we’ve been known to Sheldon about:
When people mistake ‘telepathy’ for ‘telekinesis’ and vice versa. Example: “Man, I’m tired. I wish I didn’t have to reach for the remote, I wish I could just summon it to me telepathically.” No, you don’t,’cause that’s not telepathy. Telepathy is the ability to read minds, telekinesis is the ability to move and manipulate objects with the power of one’s mind. So unless you’re planning to read the remote’s mind and non-verbally command it to come to you, you mean summon it to you telekinetically.
When people say “I could care less”. Ah, no. The expression is “I couldn’t care less”, as in “I couldn’t possibly care any less than I do now”. To say you could care less means that you could care more.
The way nobody uses the word “thrice”. Thrice is a great word, yet people insist on saying “three times”, which takes longer to say. English created a word that specifically means ‘three times’ (ex: once, twice, thrice), so why don’t people use it? We’re personally on a campaign to bring the word thrice back into everyday usage. So next time you’re about to say something like “I’ve washed this shirt three times and I still can’t get that pesky grease stain out!”, stop yourself and say “thrice” instead.
The expression “You can’t have your cake and eat it too”. Incorrect. Here I have my cake…
…And now (nom nom nom nom nom) I am eating it. What you can’t do is eat your cake and have it too.
When people type the name of super-heroine Wonder Woman as ‘Wonder Women”. It’s Wonder WOMAN. Singular. As in just one. Where did you get the idea that there’s more than 1 Amazon super-lady with a magic lasso and a transparent plane in the Justice League??
When people type the name of the cable channel Cartoon Network as ‘Cartoonnetwork’. It’s Cartoon Network. 2 words. Not 1. When has anyone ever seen the name of this channel spelled like just 1 word? When has this ever happened?
When people refer to all Warner Brothers cartoons as “Bugs Bunny cartoons” or the theme music for the Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes shorts as “Bugs Bunny”. Bugs Bunny wasn’t featured in every single WB short, in fact the character didn’t make his first ‘true’ appearance until Tex Avery’s A Wild Hare in 1940. FTR, the Merrie Melodies theme is titled “Merrily We Roll Along”, while the title of the Looney Tunes signature theme is “The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down”.
When people try to separate anime from cartoons (EX: “I don’t watch cartoons. I only watch anime!” or “List your favorite cartoons and anime”). It boils my blood when people try to separate cartoons from anime when they’re the same diggity-dang thing! Anime IS cartoons! Just cartoons from Japan. Being from Japan doesn’t make it any less a cartoon. This practice is especially pointless when one considers that in Japan the term “anime” refers to ANYTHING that’s animated, regardless of its country of origin. In Japan, Popeye is just as much an anime as Tenchi Muyo! is. That’s right; it just means “cartoon”, so drop the pretentiousness and just call them cartoons.
When people type LOL after everything all the time (ex: “Looks like I’m first to comment LOL”, “I had no idea LOL”, “I just saw this last week LOL”, “The Nostalgia Critic reviewed this already LOL”). This bugs me for 2 reasons: One, if what you were saying was truly funny, then you wouldn’t have to provide your own laughs. Two, every single thing you see, hear or read shouldn’t be making you laugh out loud; if it is, then check yourself into a rubber room, ’cause you’re clearly crazy.
When people refer to the entirety of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic‘s fan base as “Bronies”. Can we please stop calling ALL MLP fans Bronies, please? Being a Pony fan doesn’t automatically make you a Brony; they’re not the same thing. All Bronies are Pony fans, but not all Pony fans are Bronies. Only the adult male Pony fans are Bronies, as the MLP franchise is tailored specifically towards young girls. Little girls who like MLP are not Bronies. Women who like MLP are not Bronies. For that matter, little boys who like MLP aren’t Bronies either. Only adult men (i.e., bros) who like MLP fit the definition of Brony. Everyone else are just Pony fans. What do the first 3 letters in the word spell? There ya go.
When people call puppets who aren’t the creations of Jim Henson’s Creature Shop ‘Muppets”. All Muppets are puppets, but not all puppets are Muppets, dig? The Henson Company is King of the Puppetry Hill, but they’re not the only puppet making studio on the planet.
When people write or type Spider-Man’s name as ‘Spiderman’ or Iron Man’s name as ‘Ironman’ or Wonder Woman’s name as ‘Wonderwoman’. The former’s a 2-word name with a dash in the middle and the latter are 2-word names. They’re not John Spiderman from Accounting or Bill Ironman from Human Resources or Irene Wonderwoman from Legal. Similarly, it bugs when people type the names Superman, Batman and Starfire as 2 words (EX: Super Man, Bat Man, Star Fire or StarFire). Ah, no. Those are just 1 word names, not 2.
When people write or more commonly type (’cause let’s face it, who writes anymore?) about the characters of Lois Lane or Lois Griffin and call them “Louis”. It’s LOIS. LOUIS is a man’s name. THIS is a Louis:
When people type the word ‘lose’ with 2 ‘o”s, as in “The Miz is going to loose at WrestleMania tonight!”. ‘Loose’ doesn’t mean the same thing as ‘lose’. If you think it does, I know where you can get a dictionary cheap.
When people put the word “the” in shows’ titles where it doesn’t belong. EX: The Rugrats or The Animaniacs. No, it’s just Rugrats and just Animaniacs, dammit! Incidentally, The Warner Brothers and their sister Dot aren’t the Animaniacs that the shows’ title refers to. Rather, the title Animaniacs refers to the unhinged nature of the show itself (I’m just nitpicking now).
When people refer to the DC comics character Captain Marvel as SHAZAM!, which is the name of the wizard who gave 12-year-old Billy Batson his powers and also is an acronym of the powers that Captain Marvel has: the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the stamina of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles and the speed of Mercury. Even DC in recent years has began calling the super hero by the name SHAZAM in order to avoid confusion with Marvel comics’ Captain Marvel. I don’t know why DC thinks that naming the hero after the wizard who gave him his powers would somehow be less confusing.
When people refer to the DC company as “DC Comics”. DC stands for Detective Comics, so when you say “DC Comics”, you’re saying “Detective Comics Comics”. Don’t do that.
When people refer to The Simpsons as “Bart Simpson” or just “Bart”. Mind you, this hasn’t happened much, if at all, since the shows’ writers shifted the central focus from Bart to Homer.
When people call the Ninja Turtle Raphael by the nickname “Ralph”. Wha? It’s RAPH. Where are these people getting the extra ‘l’ from? His name isn’t RaLphael, it’s Raphael. The Ninja Turtle with the red headband is Raph. Ralph is this guy:
When people, when asked to name their favorite shows from a particular network, cite 3rd party acquisitions as their choices (EX: “Among my favorite Cartoon Network shows are Dragon Ball Z and Rouroni Kenshin” or “My favorite Nicktoons of all time were Tiny Toon Adventures, Beetlejuice and Inspector Gadget“.). Invariably, when you point out that those shows aren’t first-run originals from their respective networks and therefore can’t or shouldn’t be counted, these people usually come back with, “I first saw Inspector Gadget, Beetlejuice and Tiny Toons on Nickelodeon, so I consider them Nicktoons”. Yeah, both Tiny Toons and Beetlejuice have also aired on Cartoon Network, so following that logic, that would also make them Cartoon-Cartoons.
When people say “irregardless”. That’s not a word. You mean to say “regardless”. While we’re on the subject, “I seen” is also incorrect; it’s either “I saw” or “I have seen”.
When people refer to the 2003 Cartoon Network Teen Titans series as “the original Teen Titans show” or “the first Teen Titans cartoon”. That’s incorrect. The very first animated adaptation of Teen Titans was in fact the Filmation animated shorts which aired in the 1960’s and starred Wonder Girl, Speedy, Kid Flash and Aqualad (but not Robin, since he was appearing in the Filmation Batman shorts around the same time). By the same card, it bugs me when these same people refer to the team from the 2003 cartoon as “the original team”. No, that’s not the original team; the original Teen Titans were the then sidekicks of various Justice League members: Robin, Speedy, Wonder Girl, Aqualad and Kid Flash. The team consisting of Starfire, Cyborg et al was a TV version of the New Teen Titans comics from the 1980’s, written and illustrated largely by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. I have to remind myself that most of the 2003 Teen Titans‘ fan base consisted of kids (at the time) who have never picked up a comic book in their lives; heck, some of them didn’t even know that Teen Titans was a comic book long before it was a TV show!
When people type questions and then punctuate them with a period (.). Why deprive the question mark of it’s only job?
When people pronounce the main character of Street Fighter Ryu’s name as “Rye-you”. It’s “Rhee-u”.
When people pronounce Super Mario’s name as “Mary-o”.
When people refer to half hour prime time TV specials as “movies”. If it’s under 90 minutes long and was made for television, it’s a TVspecial, not a movie!
When people refer to any and all forms of CGI animated projects as “3D”, as in “I prefer 2D animation over 3D!”. CGI and 3D are not the same thing! Even animation that’s rendered by computer graphics are still shown in only 2 dimensions, one for each eye. An example of 3 dimensional perspective would be video games such as Super Mario 64, where the player is able to move in several different directions, not just from left to right. 3D is a visual perspective, not an animation style. What you mean to say is you prefer hand drawn animation over CG.
When people say “Two twins”, as in “Look! There are 2 twins!”. Incorrect. The word “twin” by definition suggests 2, therefore “two twins” would be 4, which would then be quadruplets. What you mean to say is “One set or one pair of twins”.
Now, we know what many of you are thinking right about now, so before you post it in the comments, we’ll do it for you:
Today’s Talkin’ Nerdy is a direct response to a recent video: the latest Vampire Review by Chez Apocalypse internet personality Maven of the Eventide (aka Elisa Hansen), The Monster Mash. (If you haven’t seen Maven’s video yet, check it out first; it’s really good. If you’ve already seen it, we can press on.)
Now, far be it for the likes of us to question the wit and wisdom of Maven; we’re big fans (BTW, Elisa, congratulations on your marriage to Paw Dugan of Music Movies and best of luck to you on your pregnancy, may both of you know nothing but happiness), but if you’ll indulge us, we have a tiny little nitpick or 2 with some of the opinions expressed in this video, and we’d like to submit a few of our own:
First, the matter of Beetlejuice not being a real monster. Really? You don’t think Beetlejuice counts as a real monster? Why not? We think the ‘B’ Guy fits the bill quite well. For one thing, he’s a ghost. For another, he has dark powers, he can perform black magic. For another, he’s scary; in the movie the guy worked as a bio-exorcist. If that’s not a monster, then I don’t know what is.
“I’m not a monster? My neighbors say different! Pfft!”
Anyways, Beetlejuice must be doing something right in pop-culture monster lore, since he’s got an imitator: anyone who doesn’t think that Flabber from Saban’s Big Bad Beetleborgs wasn’t at least partially inspired by Beetlejuice is a moron.
Elvis pompadour and Jay Leno chin aside, let’s examine the facts, shall we? Flabber is a manic “phasm” (as in phantasm) from the 7th Dimension who can do magic, is known for his schizophrenic transformations and basically acts as a landlord to a haunted house full of movie monsters. Sound familiar? I actually think the Beetlejuice archetype should become a trend in monsterdom: maybe if Casper could perform magic, he probably wouldn’t be such a wuss.
Casper: Jeepers. I don’t like black magic. the dark arts aren’t friendly!”
Hairy Scary: Kid, from now on I’m gonna start callin’ you ‘Vacuum Cleaner, ’cause you suck so @#$%in’ hard!
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Talking Point #2: why the Phantom of the Opera is so often passed over in Monster Mashes. I tend to think the Phantom gets the shaft so frequently is because when you get down to the bare bones of it all, the Phantom isn’t technically a monster. He’s just a disfigured human. He doesn’t come from any supernatural species or tradition, he has no powers, he’s just a REALLY passionate artist who got the Two-Face treatment and fled to the sewers beneath an opera house to noodle on the pipe organ. Of course, the Phantom has turned up in some Monster Mashes: he was one of the monsters emulated by the Backstreet Boys in their video for the song “Everybody”, and he has a knockoff character in the Monster High franchise, Operetta.
What is with the half-mask obsession? Artists!
But we’ll dig a little deeper (see what i did there?) into Monster High later.
Another character whom we personally don’t think qualifies as a real monster is the Invisible Man. Yes, I know that the Invisible Man has appeared in a number of movies and is often included in Monster Mashes, and sorry, but even as a kid, I’ve always thought that the Invisible Man was lame. He doesn’t have a centuries old lineage. He has no dark powers. He’s just a dude that no one can see. On top of that, he can’t make his clothes invisible, so his one trick only works if he’s starkers. The Invisible Man is just a guy who invented a serum that makes him invisible. How is that a monster? Sorry, Invisible Man, but I have to quote Tony Stark in The Avengers here:
“Everything that’s special about you came from a bottle!”
“But,” you say, “What about Mr. Hyde? He’s the result of of chemistry too!” Mr. Hyde is different. He counts as a monster. First, he’s scary; he’s a brutal fiend who murders people. Second, his alter ego, Dr. Jekyll, is a scientist; the Mad Scientist is a staple of horror movie lore. So yeah, if this guy counts as a monster….
…Then so does Mr. Hyde.
Also not a monster in our opinion: the Hunchback. Same principle as the Phantom of the Opera. Not a monster, just a human with a physical deformity.
“Clam up, dude! I gotta be considered a monster! How else am I gonna get invited to monster parties to score with hot vampire chicks??”
Earlier I mentioned Monster High, which features several monster and horror movie types, although it’s clear that they ran out of good or interesting monsters a while ago. Let’s examine some of their leftovers:
Rebecca Steam, a steam powered robot. No. Not a monster. Robots aren’t monsters. Robots are sci-fi, everybody knows that. If we’re going to start counting robots as monsters you might as well throw a space alien in there too. Aliens aren’t monsters either, but there have at least been classic horror movies about aliens. When was the last time you were watching your local horror movie show on your local UHF channel and saw Attack of the Steampunk Robot?
Jinafire Long, a Chinese dragon. OK, I’ll give you that one, although it’s generally only Western culture that treats dragons as monsters. In eastern culture, dragons are wise and benevolent beings revered as gods.
C.A. Cupid, the adoptive daughter of Eros. Again, not a monster. Greek gods aren’t monsters. Do a Mount Olympus High if you want to do the children of Greek gods. Obviously, Mattel realized this, and the character was subsequently transferred to Ever After High. Granted, Greek gods don’t count as fairy tale characters either, but she’s a better fit there than she was at Monster High.
-In the video, Maven states that the Phantom of the Opera is the most frequently overlooked monster in Monster Mashes. If you’re asking us, there’s another monster type that’s even more overlooked and frequently (and wrongfully, in our opinion) passed over…..
WITCHES.
Why are witches so frequently left out of Monster Mashes? Witches are awesome. They can do magic, they’re typically female (so there’s your gender balance right there) and they’re often dead sexy! So why do you see so few witches on Monster Mashes?
One reason could be because Universal Studios never made a classic horror movie about a witch. There wasn’t an Attack of the Witch, Revenge of the Witch, Night of the Witch, Return of the Witch, etc. Note I didn’t say that there haven’t been any famous literary, legendary or cinematic witches for anyone to use, because we know that not to be the case. A popular witch character in folklore is Baba Yaga, there was also the Wicked Witch of the West (but The Wizard of Oz was produced by MGM, so she couldn’t be a Universal Studios monster), and Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty (OK, Maleficent was technically a dark fairy, but she was along similar lines). But the evidence speaks for itself:
Hanna-Barbera’s Drak Pack had no witch.
HB’s Rick Moranis in Gravedale High had no witch, yet they had a Doozer (a Gorgon), Blanche (a zombie) and….whatever the heck J.P. Ghastley was.
Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School: no witch student.
The Monster Tails segments from Wake, Rattle and Roll: No witch, but they had Catula, Dracula’s cat, who could perform magic and transformations. And he wasn’t a witch’s cat because…?
No witch among the House Monsters on Big Bad Beetleborgs, but they did have Flabber, so the producers must have figured their magic user quotient was covered.
No witch in Mainframe’s Scary Godmother TV specials, though SG herself was a sort-of witch, or at least witch/fairy-esque.
No witches in Rankin-Bass’s Mad Monster Party or Mad, Mad, Mad Monsters.
Hotel Transylvania had no witch as a major named character, but there were witches as background characters, working as chambermaids.
No witch mascot for General Mills’ Monster cereals, although they have not 1, but 2 mascots for fruit cereals: Frute Brute (who’s evidently not the best speller in the world) and the Fruity Yummy Mummy.
No witches on the Monster Bash segments which aired between shows on the USA Cartoon Express.
No witch critters on Saban’s Monster Farm.
There aren’t even any witch girls in Monster High! (Though they do have a witch teacher.)
Getting back to Monster/Ever After High, they’ll probably never do this since she’s a main character on that franchise, but I personally think that Ever After High‘s character Raven Queen would be a good fit for Monster High. EAH instantly gets props just for featuring Baba Yaga as a character.
That is not to say that there haven’t been any witches at all in modern-day Monster Mashes:
The Groovie Ghoulies had a witch character, Hagatha.
The Mini-Monsters, one of the regular rotating segments from Rankin-Bass’s The Comic Strip, featured a witch, Jinx, as well as Melvin, the son of Merlin. Merlin’s not really a monster, but he is a powerful sorcerer, so we’ll give that a pass.
The “Boo Crew”, a promotional campaign that the Hershey company did for Halloween for about 2 years or so, had a witch among its’ members.
Scooby-Doo and the Reluctant Werewolf had a pair of witches among its’ contestants: Witch Sisters Dreadonia and Repulsa (not Rita).
As previously stated, Monster High has no witch, but never to pass up an opportunity to jump on a passing trend, MGA tried to replicate the success of MH with their own doll line called Bratzillas, depicting the “cousins” of the Bratz, who were all witches, despite their group name being a spoof on Godzilla.
“Yeah, I don’t get it either.”
-One thing about Bratzillaz: each one had a particular magical power that they specialized in: Yasmina could see the future, Cloetta could change people into anything they wanted, Sashabella could command and communicate with animals, Jade could do love spells, and Meygana had the power to…fly? Um, can’t all witches basically fly, either by their own power or via broomsticks? Isn’t being a witch boasting that they have the power to fly kind of like a human boasting that they have the power to dial a phone?
And I’d be remiss to not mention the 1979 TV special, The Halloween That Almost Wasn’t, in which a witch (played by Mariette Hartley) was not only featured as one of the major monsters, but was also integral to the plot.
Finally, honorable mention goes to the anime Rosario + Vampire, basically a mix of Monster High and a harem comedy, which featured a number of monster girls, among them Yukari Sendo, a bratty young witch.
Rosario + Vampire also sports the character of Mizore Shirayuki, a somewhat stalker-y snow fairy.
Snow fairy? Most likely that’s an archetype that’s more common to Eastern mythology than here, but I kind of wish we had that for a monster type. Mizore is easier on the eyes than Sasquatch.
“Whachu talkin’ ’bout? The ‘Squatch rocks the sexy an’ you know it!”
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