Main cast: Daniel DeSanto (Dwight Hancott), Noam Zylberman (Stu Hancott), Lorna Wilson (Mrs Crumm), Don Dickinson (Frank Hancott), and John Kassir (The Crypt Keeper)
Director: Laura Shepherd
Yes, this is a kid-friendly version of Tales from the Crypt. It ran concurrently with the forgettable fifth season of that other show, which suggests that the folks behind the show were really running out of ideas at that time and decided, hey, kids love those Goosebumps books, right, so let’s do a Goosebumps version of this show!
So, we have the Crypt Keeper, still voiced by John Kassir, but he’s less decayed and frightening, so yeah #notmycryptkeeper but I understand why they had to make that change. Can’t have the likes to Tipper Gore to have their pantyhose in a bunch, after all!
Also, no gore, no nudity, no sex obviously. All the better for parents to assure themselves that their kids are not sneaking off to watch the more adult version of this show, clearly.
Well, the show ran for three seasons, so I suppose things worked out for a while for this thing. So, how is it? Well, that’s what we are all here for, to find out, so let’s start with the first episode of the first season. Kids, While the Cat’s Away…
We have two kids, Dwight and Stu Hancott, who dream of trading their puny bicycles for a P-11 Baja Sandslicer dirt bike. Unfortunately, their father doesn’t have the cash, as the family tour agent business is tad slow these days. So, what can these siblings do for money? This is the pre-Internet days, so sadly they can’t grift on social media. Working part-time jobs for the money? Oh please, what is this, a pre-World War 2 show?
When they overheard a millionaire client of their father planning to go abroad for a trip, older sibling Stu has an idea. They will break into that fellow’s place while he is away, steal something valuable, sell off that thing, and voila, they will have money to buy themselves a dirt bike each!
This fellow lives in a large, creepy manor with gargoyles and such all over the place. The front gates are wide open and the front door is unlocked, as if the fellow had been expecting these kids. Now, what could go wrong from here, hmm?
Everyone… here… talks… so… slowly… ugh. This show is clearly made by and done by adults that believe children are imbeciles that need to be spoken down to like they had problems deciphering things said on TV, If that isn’t annoying enough, Dwight hiccups when he’s scared, so he… speaks… slowly… and… goes… hic… hic… every… ot… oth… other… word… too. Oh, and he also squeals “STU!!!” every other ten seconds, as if he weren’t irritating enough already.
The rest of the episode is just booby traps and improbable scare scenes after scare scenes! Werewolf! Tentacle monsters! Frankenstein’s monsters! Vampires! They just show up because kids are dumb and they are so easily scared! Of course, this means Dwight just keeps screaming Stu’s name and hiccuping and saying the same things over and over in a super slow manner and I end up screaming for the whole thing to just end so that I can get some peace and quiet.
While the Cat’s Away is what happens when rejected scenes from a Scooby-Doo episode are spliced together nilly-willy, done using low-tier animation efforts, only without actual humor, charm, or zaniness. The whole thing is like a troll effort to get the audience to feel as dumb as can be. Well, maybe kids below 10 may like this one, but for everyone else, it’s best to stay away.
