"The Monstering" is the first episode of the first season of Nickelodeon's Monster High. It is the first episode of the series overall. It premiered on October 28, 2022. It was written by Shea Fontana.
This episode is considered a "special episode" as it is 20 minutes long, instead of the usual split.
- For the episode's transcript, see here.
Premise[]
Human girl Clawdeen follows her instincts and discovers Monster High; when she isn't allowed into the school because she's human, she devises other ways to get into Monster High.
Summary[]
Part 1[]
Clawdeen Wolf is a teenage human girl who has a love and admiration for monsters since she was a child and wishes to prove they exist, but due to this, the other humans her age make fun of her, so she doesn't have friends. Her mother Selena disappeared 10 years ago, now Clawdeen lives with her father Apollo and her pet dog Crescent. On her 15th birthday, (August 30th) Clawdeen is reading about Onikuma, bear-like monsters with the ability to throw rocks but can be subdued by tickling them. Clawdeen is planning on going to the cemetery, believing there might be monsters there, but before she leaves the house, Apollo decides to give her, as a birthday gift, her mother's moon claw necklace, knowing Clawdeen always loved it. Clawdeen sees her mother's motto carved in the necklace: "Trust your instincts".
Once in the cemetery, Clawdeen tries to find some monsters, but has no luck. She then cross paths with Blair, Raine and Buddy, a trio of goth teenagers who "talk" to ghosts, who are, at the moment, trying to contact the ghost of their deceased fish. Although their uncommon interests are almost the same to Clawdeen's, these kids often bully her, calling her "monster girl". Clawdeen tries to forget the bullies and focus on her search. Suddenly, she hears a voice calling her name that, according to Clawdeen herself, she'd been hearing her entire life. Then, her moon claw necklace starts sparkling and, both the necklace and voice signal her to go into the woods, although reluctant at first, Clawdeen goes in. She faces many obstacles in her way, but she surpasses them with success while a creature is following her. Suddenly, Clawdeen hits in what seems to be an invisible wall, but the necklace is able to show her that there is a gate behind it, she opens the gate's door and arrives in another world, where there's big building. Suddenly a ghost girl named Spectra Vondergeist appears out of nowhere to scare Clawdeen away, but Clawdeen is overjoyed, now seeing that monsters really exist. Spectra is sad she didn't manage to scare the human girl and floates back to the building. Clawdeen tries to go after, but encounters Glawackus, the feline guardian of the gates. He reveals the building is Monster High, a high school for monsters. Clawdeen is really excited but is forbidden to go in. While hiding, Clawdeen smells rainbow sprinkles, she follows the smell and is able to climb the school's wall and finally get in.
She finds herself above the school's clawditorium (auditorium) and is overjoyed on seeing all the monster students having eye-scream (monsters' version of ice cream, having eyeballs on it) with rainbow sprinkles, what she smelled earlier. In the clawditorium, the vampire Student Bloody President Draculaura, introduces the monster teenagers to the new student Frankie Stein, a non-binary frankenmonster. Frankie says they're really exicted to be at Monster High and starts a speech they wrote, but then, Clawdeen falls right on top of Frankie, leaving eveyone in shock. The two teens didn't get hurt, but when everyone realize Clawdeen is a human, all monsters run away scared, except for Draculaura, Frankie, Cleo de Nile, Lagoona Blue, Deuce Gorgon and Toralei Stripe (who is disgusted by Clawdeen). Draculaura and Frankie, instead of scared, are interested in meeting Clawdeen, they nicely greet the human and introduce themselves. Since her instincts brought her to Monster High, Clawdeen believes the school is where she belongs to be.
After this incident, Clawdeen has to go to the office of Headless Headmistress Bloodgood, a headless horsewoman and Monster High's principal. There, Clawdeen wants to be enrolled in the school, but Bloodgood refuses to let her in, because Monster High doesn't accept humans and demains Clawdeen to go back to her town, she also explains that when an uninvited human arrives to the school, they complety forget the monsters' existence once they pass the gate. Clawdeen realizes it's because of the Glawackus on the front door, showing her vast monster knowledge to the Headmistress, in hopes that she will change her mind, but it doesn't work and Bloodgood takes Clawdeen to the exit. While it, Draculaura, Frankie, Deuce, Cleo, Heath, Lagoona and Spectra follow the two to listen to their conversation, due to being interested in Clawdeen, being caught in act two times. Clawdeen tries to explain to the Headmistress about her love for monsters, her mother's monster stories and even begs to be accepted, although feeling sorry for Clawdeen's fitting in the human world problem, she still refuses to let her study in Monster High and sends her out. Clawdeen seems to have given up and walks to the gate, but suddenly, she hears a wolf howling. Then she hears her instincts telling her she belongs in Monster High. Clawdeen realizes she can't forget about everything that just happened, so she calls her father to tell him she will be late for dinner, as she walks back to the school.
Part 2[]
Clawdeen has a plan to stay in Monster High: disguising herself to look like a monster. First, she rolls up her entire body with toilet paper to look like a mummy. She walks by Cleo de Nile, a real mummy, who quickly realizes who Clawdeen actually is. Clawdeen tries to convince Cleo is wrong, but suddenly, Clawdeen is unrolled and dragged to the wall close to the bathroom's door, because Deuce Gorgon, Medusa's son, had used the toilet paper. Draculaura, the vampire Clawdeen met earlier, is impressed. Suddenly, Headmistress Bloodgood arrives, and is not happy to see Clawdeen in Monster High again, so Clawdeen is kicked out of the school, literally. Clawdeen then returns to Monster High, she is in what seems to be a dressing room, seeing the costumes there, looking for one that will make her pass as a monster. Then, the ghost Spectra Vondergeist appears from the mirror, trying to scare Clawdeen again, but again with no sucess, to her sadness. Clawdeen then tries a witch disguise, she walks into the mad science lab, but she accidentaly scared Draculaura and the new simulacrum student Frankie Stein, making they drop off some ingredients, creating a big pink caterpillar-like creature with the behavior of a kitten. Bloodgood appears again, not only she kicks Clawdeen out again, but explains to her that witches aren't considered monsters and monsters are forbidden to do witchcrafting.
After many failed attempts, Clawdeen is upset, believing her instincts were wrong there is no place for her to belong, so she finally decides to leave the school and accepts to forget the existance of monsters. But Frankie and Draculaura stop her. Draculaura explains she has a little knowledge about monsters, she's been watching Clawdeen and says that although she doesn't look like a monster, she has a fierce determination, something pretty "monsterious". This makes Clawdeen feels better, Frankie decides they should discover what is Clawdeen's monster side, so Bloodgood will accept her in the school. As they're talking, Deuce is watching everything from afar. His snakes tell him to not be nice to the human, but he claims he doesn't want to be bad as most gorgons are, he wants to be friendly to Clawdeen. Once he realizes she, Draculaura and Frankie had noticed him, Draculaura invites him to help them test if Clawdeen's a monster, which he accepts. The four teenagers walk to the lab, but Clawdeen lets the gate open, and the creature that has been following Clawdeen on her way to Monster High is standing near it.
On the lab, Deuce offers a brain to Clawdeen, to see if she's a zombie, she declines it, so Deuce discards the zombie theory. Frankie asks Clawdeen if she has either special skills, inhuman qualities or birthmarks that look like famous monsters. Clawdeen shows she has enhanced strength (by lifting a desk with Deuce sitting on it), she also tells she has enhanced smelling, being able to smell Draculara's special Creature Newar wing pit deodorant on Frankie. She then tells them about the voice she's been hearing her entire life. Deuce sympathizes with it, as he always hears the voices of his seven snakes. Deuce asks her what her "voice" is saying in the moment, after stopping to listen, she realizes her "voice" is warning her about trouble, so the four run outside to see what's going on.
Once outside, they see a big bear (the creature that has been following Clawdeen) had entered the school's yard. The other students are running away, Bloodgood tries to scare him off with garlic, but it eats it. The bear roars to her, knocking her head out. The teenagers run to behind some rocks to shelter. Draculaura flies to the bear to try to scare him off, but its garlic breathe causes her to feel unwell, and she flies away. Deuce asks his snakes what to do, they suggest him to turn the bear into stone with his stone stare, he manages to turn the bear into stone, but it breaks free from it after 3 seconds. Scared, Deuce tries to run, but the bear catches him, making him drop off his glasses (that prevent him from turning other into stones) and his powers are left out of control, making him accidentally turn the headmistress' body and a bug-like monster into stone. Clawdeen is worried about Deuce' but neither she or any monster knows what to do. Suddenly, her moon claw necklace starts sparkling again and hears the voice telling her to "take the fierce step".
Clawdeen realizes it's her instincts and that she has to trust them. She walks up to the bear, the moon shines into her, her necklace sparkles again and suddenly, Clawdeen transforms into a werewolf. She's able to knock the bear down, she lifts Deuce up and gives him back his glasses. The two shout in celebration together for a moment before Clawdeen puts Deuce in a tree for his safety, she jumps into the school's tower and howls in happiness for seeing she is indeed a monster, with Draculaura and Frankie happily watching. Clawdeen then turns her attention back into the fight. Cleo, Lagoona Blue, Toralei Stripe and Heath Burns are watching everything inside the school through a window, Lagoona, Cleo and Heath are surprised and excited seeing that Clawdeen has turned into a werewolf, but Toralei is still disgusted, because she hates both humans and werewolves, and walks away. The bear throws a big boulder in Clawdeen, but she catches it and trows it away, unknown to her, the boulder fell close to those three goth teenagers who make fun of her, they run off after that. Seeing the bear is always throwing rocks at everyone, Clawdeen realizes the bear is an Onikuma (the monster she was studying about at her house), she remembers from the book that to stop an Onikuma, it takes to tickle it. Clawdeen tickles him, the two laugh together and finally had calmed down. Clawdeen realizes Kuma's monster instincts brought him to Monster High, just like hers, she offers to help him fit in, he accepts.
Headmistress Bloodgood walks over, she welcomes both Clawdeen and Kuma in Monster High. On Bloodgood's office, she apologizes to Clawdeen for not seeing her inner monster before, she makes a DNA test on Clawdeen and discovers she's 50% werewolf. Bloodgood asks where her monster side comes from. When thinking, she realizes her father must be worried about her, but Bloodgood explains they have enchanted letters for situations similar, Apollo will know Clawdeen is in the school, but the enchantment will make him not know further details, the Delivery Dragons then flies to send the letter to Apollo. The moon claw necklace sparkles again, seeing that werewolves change forms, Clawdeen believes maybe her mother was a werewolf, but was always in her human form around their family, which would explain her motto on the necklace. Bloodgood finds it interesting and promises they will look for answers.
In the morning at Clawdeen's house, Crescent welcomes the Delivery Dragon by licking it. Apollo walks outside and finds the dragon, turns out he knows about Monster High, about Headmistress Bloodgood and Clawdeen's werewolf side, he's happy his daughter was able to find Monster High and asks the dragon to keep an eye on Clawdeen and to tell Bloodgood to keep the enchantments to herself, knowing Clawdeen will they him everything when she's ready. The dragon eats the letter, accidentally burping fire on Apollo's feet. On Monster High, Clawdeen is talking on the phone with her father, Frankie and Draculaura are now her dormitory roommates and she's happy in the school. They finish their talk, Kuma is now a student in Monster High too, Spectra finally manages to scary Clawdeen for her hauntonomics class and Frankie and Draculaura walk with Clawdeen. Clawdeen is happy she finally is in a place where she fits in.
Characters[]
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Trivia[]
- This is the first episode narrated in Season 1.
Milestones[]
- This is the first 30 minute-special episode.
- Clawdeen (as both a human and a werewolf), Lagoona, Heath, Cleo, Frankie, Headmistress Bloodgood, Deuce, Toralei, Draculaura, and more characters make their animated debut.
- This is first time since humans will be allowed in Monster High as a warm welcome for Clawdeen before she became a werewolf.
Continuity[]
- Clawdeen found Monster High through her mother's moon necklace that she left behind.
- This episode reveals Draculaura is the Student Bloody President at Monster High.
Errors[]
- For a moment, Frankie is in their 2022 basic outfit instead of the animated show one.
- When Clawdeen is in the library in the beginning of the episode, she is seen wearing the Moonclaw. However, she receives it from her father shortly after this scene.
- When Frankie removes one of their ears, the lightning bolt earring disappears.
Gallery[]
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Videos[]
