My Pet Monster - Animated Series

Animated Series

My Pet Monster also spawned a children's cartoon series that ran for one season on ABC, produced by Ellipse (France), Nelvana (Canada), Hanna-Barbera, and Hi Tops Video in association with Golden Books. The show follows Monster who lives with a boy named Max. When Monster wears his handcuffs, they turn him into a stuffed animal. Max often does this as a way to maintain the secret of Monster’s existence from others. Max's sister, Jill (Alyson Court), and his friend, Chuckie, are the only ones that know this secret.

The two main adversaries in the show are Mr. Hinkle, a neighbor who always thinks Max is up to something, but is not quite sure what, and Beastur, a large monster who hates light and wants to bring Monster back to Monster Land. Beastur, though immense and fierce, is sadly quite incompetent. He can be stopped by the magic cuffs—which reduce him to a smaller, though still "alive" monster—or by his own bungling, and sent back through the warp portal to his own world. He wears dark glasses to protect his sensitive eyes, which he can use to see in the dark.

Beastur appears in nearly every episode as either a primary or secondary foe. On one notable occasion, he was scared back through the portal to Monsterland not by light or the cuffs, but by the affections of a smitten female gorilla. In the final episode, it is also shown that Beastur hates to be hugged, even more so than being exposed to light.

Much of the voice cast of My Pet Monster returned several years later for Beetlejuice, another cartoon show with a surreal theme and a supernatural world populated by fantastic monsters.

Reruns of all 13 half-hour episodes aired on Teletoon Retro in Canada from September 5, 2011.