Monster High: The Movie (2022)
Monster High, where we accept all, unless you are a stinky human or nasty witch
March 5th, 2024
Today I will be doing a mini review for Monster High: The Movie (2022). I prefacing all of this with saying I am not the intended audience for this film, and I know that. I am a full grown adult watching a kids movie. My review will reflect that.
This is a live action, direct to home movie. It came out on October 6th, less than a week after the g3 Monster High dolls started being available for sale. It has some similarities in the storyline and characterization to the g3 animated series, but at the same time there are also things that are wildly different.
This review is not spoiler free! If you want my spoiler free version, here it is: The movie is good fun and something I know kid me would have watched again and again. There are some really weird choices made characterization/story wise that some old time fans may not like, and that’s about my only criticism. It is nothing outstanding, but I still enjoyed the time I spent with it. Okay. Now anything after this is going to be spoilers for realsies.
We begin the movie with seeing someone doing some sick skateboard tricks at the skatepark. Everyone stops to stare, some pull out their phones. All eyes are on our mysterious skater, when suddenly they are bumped and their helmet falls off, revealing their true identity. It is our movie’s protagonist, Clawdeen Wolf herself. Everyone is startled by seeing this half wolf girl skating and chases her off.
She arrives home and her father has prepared a nice cake for Clawdeen’s 15th birthday. Unless I missed something, it really isn’t talked about what happened to Clawdeen’s mother. It isn’t as important of a plot point here as it is in the animated series. We also see no sign of Clawd. Clawdeen has an invitation to Monster High and wishes to attend, as she believes she will be more accepted there. Clawdeen’s dad worries about her attending, as she is half wolf and half human, and monsters do not like humans. However, he still agrees to let her attend.
Clawdeen arrives at Monster High. We have a little solo musical number as Clawdeen passes through the portal from the human world to the monster world, and then another after Clawdeen enters the school. I will be honest, I kinda…. Zoned out during the musical numbers. I forgot to turn the subtitles on before the movie started, and I was too stubborn to restart the movie and add them. Auditory processing disorder, ya know? Nothing about any of the musical numbers really stuck out to me, just what I would normally expect from a kids film.
After this we go through some scenes that introduce the rest of our cast. Abbey and Ghoulia are here. They mean nothing to the plot and are just background characters. Lagoona means slightly more, but she is just a pet to bully Cleo, similar to how she is towards Torelai towards the beginning of the animated series. Also yes, Cleo is a bully, which is very different from what the animated series did with her. I did not like Cleo during g1 because she was mean, so I didn’t care for them making her mean again in this. She is an antagonist, but not The Antagonist. We learn Cleo has broken up the Deuce, but she is “totally over it”. Oh yeah Heath is there too. He is also a background character, mostly used as someone for Deuce to talk to, but Deuce is our leading male here.
Clawdeen enters her dorm to find out she will be staying with Frankie and Draculaura. I will say here, Clawdeen and Frankie’s personalities are pretty similar to their animated series counterparts. However, Draculaura is totally different. We start this scene with Clawdeen meeting Frankie first. Frankie introduces themselves with they/them and that they were made just 14 days ago! After Clawdeen introduces herself back with a she/her, Frankie goes on to let Clawdeen know the origin of the word werewolf. Lovely. Love them. We then meet Draculaura who makes it very clear that her space is her space, and is pretty standoffish. Of course this is so that we can have some fun character development later on in the movie, it is very jarring compared to how we usually see Draculaura depicted.
We soon learn everyone is accepted at monster high,,,, um, unless you are one of two things.
- A human
- Someone who practices witchcraft
After seeing this song and dance and seeing everyone who Clawdeen just thought was her friend sing about how much they would be happy to kill a half human, Clawdeen is naturally upset. She asks her teacher about doing a report on this Jekyll Hyde guy (Btw I had to look up his name. Eddy. Edward Hyde.), as the teacher also mentioned he had made a potion that would allow a half monster half human to become a full monster.
Around this time Clawdeen learn’s something rather unfortunate, when she is scared or under stress, she transforms back into a human. Uh oh! This could be problematic. Clawdeen asks Frankie about this “for a friend”, but eventually Frankie finds out that Clawdeen is half human. However, they don’t reject her. Instead they agree to help them find the potion so that Clawdeen can become a full monster.
Eddy has a secret lab somewhere in Monster High that contains the potion Clawdeen needs, Frankie helps Clawdeen find the location of this lab and the two of them head out. While out searching, they also find Draculaura who is. Oh no! Practicing magic! Except Frankie and Clawdeen think it is cool. They agree to keep Draculaura’s witchcraft a secret if she will help them break into Eddy’s lab
This leads to kinda meat of the movie where the three of them work together to help Draculaura get together the ingredients she needs to make a potion to break into the lab. Oh, I am realizing I am forgetting something here, but it is okay because it is relevant again now. Clawdeen and Deuce are love interests. They get a little song and dance. Tension because Clawdeen can’t truly look him in the eyes. After they finish collecting the ingredients they go to break into the lab, but uh oh once again, Draculuara’s magic isn’t strong enough.
The trio call it a night and head back to the school, where uh oh (again), Cleo has tattled to Bloodgood and their teacher about Draculaura practicing magic. The school begins to quake as it is becoming unsafe for monsters. Bloodgood blames this on magic, and Clawdeen blames it on herself. Clawdeen vows to leave the school, but we will quickly learn that this isn’t Clawdeen’s fault.
Clawdeen attempts to leave the school, but of course her besties Frankie and Draculaura stop her and bring her back to the monster world. In this event Clawdeen transforms back into a human and they notice something, Clawdeen’s human hand is the same as the hand lock on Eddy’s lab. Sure enough, they go to check and Clawdeen’s human hand unlocks the door.
After some investigating the three find the “true” lab, the door behind them mysteriously locks, and they don’t notice. Clawdeen finds the potion and goes to drink it, but hesitates. She thinks of her father, is she really ready to leave him behind? While this happens, the person who locked the doors is revealed. Their teacher (Who I also had to look up. Mr. Komos) appears and reveals that he is also half human, and convinces Clawdeen to hand the potion over. Only for!! Oh no!! He drinks it and reveals he is Eddy’s son and he wants to get revenge on Monster High for what they did to his dad. (this has a lot of implications. Was Eddy a teenage father? Did he like…. Get to live for a while after being sent back to the human world that he got to grow old and have a family and then one day someone found out he was a human? Lots to think about)
Mr. Komos is now a full monster who is actually a monster. This part of the movie was so odd to me. It felt very not Monster High to me. Mr. Komos is about the only person who actually looks rather grotesque with some special effects facial prosthetics going on. He has the ability to take monster’s powers away from them, and starts by taking away Draculaura’s ability to turn into a bat, weakening her. The three attempt to leave, but oh no! The door has been locked. Thankfully, Draculaura only lost her monster skills, not her magic skills, and she is finally able to break the lock to the door, revealing their friends waiting for them.
Mr. Komos then takes away Deuce’s gorgon abilities, allowing him to turn Deuce to stone. But all is well, because Clawdeen and Deuce finally get a chance to look each other in the eyes in a heartfelt moment. Aw. But this heartbreak turns Clawdeen back into a human! In front of all of the other monsters! But they are just kinda okay with it. Cleo helps Clawdeen and she approaches Komo with an iCoffin on selfie mode. When Mr. Komo sees his reflection, he turns to stone. Everyone has their powers back. Deuce is no longer a statue. All is well now.
However, our poor protagonist Clawdeen doesn’t understand what she has just done, and is prepared to leave Monster High for good. Her dad shows up and she begins to say goodbye to her friends, thinking it is time to go. However, Bloodgood intervenes to let Clawdeen know that she has a true monster heart and is welcome to stay at Monster High. Mr. Komo was not of good heart, and now that he is gone, the sudden structural issues Monster High was having are all gone. Dracula accepts that Draculaura is practicing witchcraft. We have a finishing musical number. All is well in the monster world.
A real Rudolf story if you ask me “We rejected you, but then you had a way you could help us and that is cool and we like you/your kind now :)”. But it is fine. It is a fine message for kids. Oh also we get the set up for our next movie. Which is out already I think, I will watch it if I see a DVD for it. We see some witchy hands scrying on a crystal ball. She orders someone to bring her Draculaura so that they can end the war between witches and vampires.
I had fun watching this movie, and I think non judgemental Monster High fans might feel the same. If you are a returning fan, and watched any of the g1 movies, expect something like that. I did find the introduction of Komo as the main antagonist very strange and felt out of place compared to most monster high media, but maybe that is just a me thing. I think the intended audience for this film will enjoy it, but it also isn’t like… a High School Musical or something. The musical numbers are kinda just there and outside of the Monster High theming, it isn’t a new or profound type of story. I would watch it again if it was on TV or something, but I don’t think I would go out of my way to watch it again anytime soon.
Oh goodness well I guess that ended up being much longer than a mini review. Anyways, I hope you have fun with my storytelling lol. Have a good one!