Gravedale High
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Gravedale High was an animated series produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions and NBC Productions. The series premiered in the fall of 1990 on NBC and lasted thirteen episodes, under the title of Rick Moranis in Gravedale High.
The show was developed as an animated vehicle for Rick Moranis, who had star appearances in the Ghostbusters movies and the popular film Honey, I Shrunk The Kids, and would later appear in the 1994 live-action film adaptation of another H-B series, The Flintstones (released by NBC's now-corporate sibling Universal Studios).
[edit] Storyline
The show revolved around the misadventures of human teacher Max Schneider, who had unwittingly taken a job at Gravedale High, a school for monsters built inside an old cemetery. Schneider, the only human in the school, presided over a group of ghoulish teenagers that were latest-generation versions of classic movie monsters. These included resident vampire and all-around cool dude Vinnie Stoker (a hip version of Dracula, but had no problem going out in broad daylight), mischievous Frankentyke (reminiscent of Frankenstein's monster), nerdy werewolf Reggie Moonshroud, zombie J.P. Ghastly the III, lagoon creature and surfer dude Gill Waterman, tubby mummy Cleofatra, invisible Sid, undead Southern belle Blanche, and the snake-headed Valley girl Duzer (based on Medusa). The geeky, bespectacled Mr. Schneider had his hands full with his new students, but he had Gravedale’s spooky staff to help out, who initially did not trust Schneider due to his human status but developed a camaraderie with him as the overall story developed. These included headmistress Ms. Crone, Coach Cadaver, principal Mr. Tutner, and others.
In addition to Moranis, the show featured a star voice cast, including Jonathan Winters, Tim Curry, Eileen Brennan, Shari Belafonte Harper, Brock Peters, and Hairspray star and future talk show host Ricki Lake. Other longstanding voice actors, such as Howard Morris, Robert Ridgeley (who had voiced both Flash Gordon and Tarzan for Filmation), Frank Welker, Maurice LaMarche and Barry Gordon were featured.
The show was somewhat akin to Galaxy High as both shows were intended to be shown to young audiences and was about humans in an environment unlike their own (extraterrestrials for Galaxy High; monsters for Gravedale High). However, whereas the main human characters in Galaxy High were often isolated from other humans (as they were millions of miles away from Earth), Max Schneider did not feel the same way as it was more of a "day job" for him to teach. In fact, episodes frequently revolved around the monster students somehow interacting with the human population, who were often terrified at them, although some humans thought the monsters would be good attractions, such as a surf instructor who say potential in Gill's surfing, or a cowboy who considered Duzer's snake attire to be a good fit to her job as a cowgirl-themed waitress. The faculty was more mistrusting of humans than were the students, although one certain episode dealt with a parents' night combined with a talent show, where Frankentyte makes a robot father to hide his embarrassment as to his true parentage. However, the false father turns out to be a sleazy Hollywood agent type who causes Frankentyte more problems. He decides it would be easier to reveal to everyone that his true father is Dr. Frankenstein, a human, which shocks the entire school, but Mr. Schneider makes an impassioned speech on the importance of acceptance of differences.
