Are You Afraid of the Dark is one of Nickelodeon’s most legendary television shows, following the campfire stories of the Midnight Society. With the collection of kids routinely sharing tales to keep viewers up at night, the series would eventually receive a reboot with a new cast of characters. While Are You Afraid of the Dark remains one of “Snick’s” most popular series to this day, it’s far from the only Nickelodeon production that focused on creatures that go bump in the night. In fact, a Nicktoon had plenty of creepy crawlies that deserve another chance at the big time.
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Aaahh!!! Real Monsters first arrived on Nickelodeon on October 29th, 1994, introducing a monstrous school that exists to train young monsters how best to scare humanity. Years before Harry Potter and Monsters Inc. arrived in the public eye, Ickis, Krumm, and Oblina were the only supernaturally powered beings attending university. With each monster needing to attain wildly creative scares to do well in school, the trio of creatures were routinely trying to one-up one another and themselves to make their headmaster, The Gromble, happy. Should they fail at their daily assignments, not only will Gromble give them deadly punishments, but the silent behemoth The Snorch would do the same.
Three years following its premiere, the story of Aaahh!!! Real Monsters would come to an end after four seasons and over fifty episodes. Unfortunately for Oblina, Ickis, and Krumm, this series finale proved to be the grand finale for the franchise as a whole, outside of the characters making appearances in various video games and promotional material. Nicktoons being brought back for a revival is nothing new for Nickelodeon, with the likes of Rugrats, Fairly Odd Parents, Doug, and more remaining prime examples. As we continue to celebrate the spooky season, we can’t help but think about how the Real Monsters would work in the present.
The Real Monsters’ Return
Things have changed quite a bit in the decades since we witnessed this spooky Nicktoon on the airwaves, so there should be plenty of territory to explore if Aaahh!!! Real Monsters made a comeback. When it comes to other school-themed animated series, such as Tiny Toons, for example, a revival will age-up the characters and throw them into higher education. Seeing Krumm, Oblina, and Ickis in a college setting, attempting to get their scares while dealing with more adult-oriented themes, might make for an interesting twist. What made the series so much different from Disney’s Monsters Inc, which had a similar plot, is that it truly was a school for young monsters rather than focusing more on adults, so there’s plenty more new avenues to explore.
The final episode of the series didn’t end on a cliffhanger, though many Nickelodeon cartoons did end in such a way that it didn’t even acknowledge a grand finale. In the last segment of the Nicktoon, the show recalls how the trio of monsters had originally met before they became best friends at their school. This, once again, means that a potential revival wouldn’t necessarily be as constrained when it came to the events of the past series.
Unfortunately, there has been no word on Aaahh!!! Real Monsters returning for either a sequel series and/or a reboot, but this isn’t to say that the Paramount animated series wouldn’t fit right into the cable network’s current roster. Luckily, if you haven’t heard of the series or never got the chance to check it out the first time, you can watch all four seasons streaming on Paramount+. With the episodes having little in the way of continuity for past events, the Nicktoon is a series that can be jumped into from any point, so whichever episode seems the most appealing, give that one a try.
What do you think of a potential Aaahh!! Real Monsters revival, and which other Nickelodeon series need a return to the screen? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
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