Scott Alexander | Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on YouTube.

This week, Monsters tries to be funny and it actually succeeds for once!

Episode 3.2 “Murray’s Monster”

(Dir by Scott Alexander, originally aired on October 7th, 1990)

Murray’s Monster opens with Sherwin (Joe Flaherty) laying on a psychologist’s couch and talking about how much he hates his overbearing wife while Debbie (Teresa Gaznel) takes notes. Debbie suddenly tells Sherwin that they’re out of time because Sherwin has to see his next patient. Sherwin sits up on the couch and Debbie returns to the reception desk. It’s an obvious joke but one that is well-played by both Joe Flaherty and Teresa Ganzel. That’s another way of saying that it made me laugh, even though I saw it coming.

Sherwin’s new patient is Murray (Marvin Kaplan). Murray is nervous and apologetic. He even apologizes for coming to his appointment, offering to come back next week if it’s too much of a bother for Sherwin to see him that day. Murray explains that people have been kicking him around all of his life and he’s sick of it. Sherwin, after telling Murray that he’s less than a man, puts Murray under hypnosis. Sherwin tells Murray to be more assertive. Murray promptly turns into an angry ape-man (Colin Penman). Ape-Man Murray is angry and destructive but, once he calms down, he turns back into Murray.

Frightened at first, Sherwin soon realizes that he can use Murray to his advantage. He invites Murray to have dinner with his wife, Luann (Miriam Flynn). His plan is that Murray will get angry with Luann, turn into an ape, and kill her. Then Sherwin will be free to pursue Debbie. Sherwin’s plan works in that Murray does get frustrated and he does turn into the ape. But, instead of killing Luann, he instead picks her up and runs off with her.

The next day, Sherwin is shocked when Murray and Luann show up at his office. It turns out that, since Murray was sick of people always telling him what to do, Ape Murray decided to disobey Sherwin’s wishes and has instead fallen in love with Luann. When Sherwin gets upset and starts yelling, Murray turns into the ape again. Uh-oh!

(As Luann puts it, “You’re a bad psychologist, Sherwin, because you never listen to your patients!”)

I have to say that I usually cringe whenever Monsters tries to be deliberately funny but this episode actually made me laugh. Joe Flaherty and Marvin Kaplan both had great comedic timing and, even though I saw the final twist coming, the dialogue was still clever enough and the performances sharp enough to hold my interest. This was a good episode. Good for Murray. Good for Monsters!

With the the holidays approaching, this is my final review of Monsters for 2024. My Monsters reviews will return on January 1st, 2025!

This week, Monsters gives us the story of several Arthurs. Unfortunately, it’s not a very good story.

Episode 2.8 “The Demons”

(Dir by Scott Alexander, originally aired on November 19th, 1989)

On an alien planet, an alchemist named Arturus (Richard Moll) is desperate to get more of something that he calls “Drast.” He decides that the best way to do this would be to summon a demon and demand that the demon give the Drast to him. However, when Arturus tries to cast the spell, he makes a mistake and he ends up summoning a human insurance agent named Arthur (Jeff Silverman). It takes a while but Arthur eventually figures out that he is Arturus’s human equivalent and that “Drast” is actually gold. Arthur lies and tells Arturus that he has to go back to Earth to get the Drast.

Once he returns to Earth, Arthur decides to cast his own spell and summon a demon to help him break free from Arturus. Since Arthur uses the same spell the Arturus used, he makes the same mistake and he ends up summoning Arturo (Eddie Deezen), a nerdy, red-skinned, dog-faced creature from another dimension who, it turns out, is just as obsessed with insurance as Arthur is. Arthur sends Arturo to take care of Arturus, which Arturo does. For some reason, Arturo taking care of Arturus largely takes place off-screen. Having the main villain thwarted off-screen really does leave one wondering just what exactly the point of the story was in the first place.

Most of the previous episodes of Monsters had elements of humor to them. This is the first episode to actually be a straight-out comedy and it doesn’t work at all. Richard Moll and especially Eddie Deezen do manage to be amusing but the majority of the episode is centered around Jeff Silverman’s Arthur. Silverman spends a lot of time frantically running around his house and yelling. It gets to be a bit annoying. The episode is so determined to convince you that it’s hysterically funny that it ends up beating the audience over the head with every punchline and basically begging the viewer to laugh. There’s a desperation to the show’s humor and it quickly wears out its welcome. Even potentially interesting ideas — like both Arturus and Arthur screwing up the same spell in the same way — ultimately fall flat. Watching this episode, I was very much aware of the feeling of wanting to like what I was seeing considerably more than I actually did.

As I mentioned earlier, Eddie Deezen is really the only consistently funny thing about this episode. The combination of his nerdiness and his fearsome appearance made me laugh more than I was expecting. Sadly, I know Eddie Deezen has recently had to deal with some pretty serious health issues. I’m hoping the best for him.

Next week’s episode will hopefully be a bit better.