The Mouse and the Monster
Encyclopedia
The Mouse and the Monster was an irreverent animated series created and executive produced by Jerry Leibowitz. The show aired on UPN
network's cartoon block UPN Kids
and the Fox Family Channel
. It featured a mouse named Chesbro, and a monster named Mo. The show subsequently aired on Disney Europe following Disney's acquisition of Saban's library of shows.
golem
bearing a passing resemblance to Frankenstein's Monster
. However, even without a brain, Mo had a mind and personality of his own and did not want his own newly created life to make room for a brain that wasn't his.
An inhabitant of Wackersein's castle, a mouse named Chesbro befriended Mo and helped him to flee. Pals together, they are on the run from the mad doctor.
Wackerstein also has an assistant named Olga, whom he always calls Igor
, much to her chagrin.
UPN
United Paramount Network was a television network that was broadcast in over 200 markets in the United States from 1995 to 2006. UPN was originally owned by Viacom/Paramount and Chris-Craft Industries, the former of which, through the Paramount Television Group, produced most of the network's...
network's cartoon block UPN Kids
UPN Kids
UPN Kids was a short-lived weekday and Sunday morning children's programming block on UPN that launched on September 10, 1995. During the 1998-1999 season, the block was called The UPN Kids Action Zone. The block aired for 2 hours each day...
and the Fox Family Channel
ABC Family
ABC Family, stylized as abc family, is an American television network, owned by ABC Family Worldwide Inc., a subsidiary of the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company...
. It featured a mouse named Chesbro, and a monster named Mo. The show subsequently aired on Disney Europe following Disney's acquisition of Saban's library of shows.
Plot
During what would be his final concert, the brilliant pianist Flatnoteski suffered a heart attack and died. Among the front-row visitors were Dr. Wackerstein and his wife and assistant Olga. Dr. Wackerstein immediately claimed Flatnoteski's brain, so that the Doctor could create a body to place said brain in, and allow Flatnoteski's genius to live on. For this purpose, Dr. Wackerstein created Mo, a cyclopticCyclops
A cyclops , in Greek mythology and later Roman mythology, was a member of a primordial race of giants, each with a single eye in the middle of his forehead...
golem
Golem
In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....
bearing a passing resemblance to Frankenstein's Monster
Frankenstein's monster
Frankenstein's monster is a fictional character that first appeared in Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus. The creature is often erroneously referred to as "Frankenstein", but in the novel the creature has no name...
. However, even without a brain, Mo had a mind and personality of his own and did not want his own newly created life to make room for a brain that wasn't his.
An inhabitant of Wackersein's castle, a mouse named Chesbro befriended Mo and helped him to flee. Pals together, they are on the run from the mad doctor.
Characters
- Chesbro "Chez" Mouse
- An ordinary yellow former lab-mouse. He is Mo's best friend, and travels with him to wherever Dr. Wackerstein isn't. He is a bit pessimistic, and constantly regretful that he quit working at the cheese factory over a laboratory job. Chez is constantly busy keeping Mo out of trouble.
- Mo
- A large blue cycloptic beatnikBeatnikBeatnik was a media stereotype of the 1950s and early 1960s that displayed the more superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s and violent film images, along with a cartoonish depiction of the real-life people and the spiritual quest in Jack Kerouac's autobiographical...
monster. He's cheerful, impulsive, and generally kind. Having been brought into creation rather than being born, Mo possesses sort of a childlike fascination for things he isn't familiar with. He loves drumming on his bongosBongo drumBongo or bongos are a Cuban percussion instrument consisting of a pair of single-headed, open-ended drums attached to each other. The drums are of different size: the larger drum is called in Spanish the hembra and the smaller the macho...
in a true beatnik fashion. His favorite food is GumballGumballGumball may refer to:*A ball made of bubblegum often dispensed from a gumball machine*Gumball , a video game for the Apple released in 1983 by Broderbund Software*Gumball , an alternative rock band from the 1990s...
s, especially the SquidSquidSquid are cephalopods of the order Teuthida, which comprises around 300 species. Like all other cephalopods, squid have a distinct head, bilateral symmetry, a mantle, and arms. Squid, like cuttlefish, have eight arms arranged in pairs and two, usually longer, tentacles...
-flavored ones. Mo truly despises LiverwurstLiverwurstThe German , that translates literally as "liver sausage," is the typical sausage served in Germany, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden and Romania . Liverwurst normally contains pigs' livers, rather than calves' livers and also contains veal...
, and he'll go on a berserk rampage if he even so much as hears the word.
- Dr. Wackerstein
- A short purple man, who is a lunatic scientist with good intentions, but bad means. He created Mo so he could place Flatnoteski's Brain inside of his skull, and when he found out Mo had escaped, he chased after him.
Wackerstein also has an assistant named Olga, whom he always calls Igor
Igor (fictional character)
Igor is the traditional stock character or cliché hunch-backed assistant or butler to many types of villain, such as Count Dracula or a mad scientist, familiar from many horror movies and horror movie parodies, the Frankenstein series and Van Helsing films in particular.-Origins:Dwight Frye's...
, much to her chagrin.
- Olga
- A green woman with a SlavicSlavic languagesThe Slavic languages , a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages, have speakers in most of Eastern Europe, in much of the Balkans, in parts of Central Europe, and in the northern part of Asia.-Branches:Scholars traditionally divide Slavic...
accent and pink hair reminiscent of Marge SimpsonMarge SimpsonMarjorie "Marge" Simpson is a fictional main character in the animated television series The Simpsons and part of the eponymous family. She is voiced by actress Julie Kavner and first appeared on television in The Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987...
. She is Dr. Wackerstein's wife and assistant. Olga is a performance artist, a strange, completely inexcitable woman; practically everything is boring to her. She often keeps Dr. Wackerstein in line, and acts as a very strange voice of reason for his manic behavior. What few pleasures in life she has includes her mother's schnitzels, and interpretive danceInterpretive danceInterpretive dance is a family of dance styles that seeks to translates particular feelings and emotions, human conditions, situations, or fantasies into movement and dramatic expression combined...
paired with her own artsy form of "music" (a combination of a tubaTubaThe tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
playing short notes, and off-keyOff-keyOff-key is a term often used to denote musical content that is not at the expected frequency or pitch period, either with respect to some absolute reference frequency, or in a ratiometric sense Off-key is a term often used to denote musical content that is not at the expected frequency or pitch...
operaOperaOpera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
singing). She hates it when Doc mistakenly calls her "Igor," and corrects him time and time again. "My name is Olga, not Igor, you vertically challenged bupkus of a man!"
- Flatnoteski's Brain
- Flatnoteski has died from a heart attack, but his disembodied brain lives on. It's usually taken along with Dr. Wackerstein in the toddler's seat in the back of the doctor's car. Even though it's a disembodied brain, it can still express its feelings (to the viewer), with a thought balloon that conveys a brainwave frequencyFrequencyFrequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit time. It is also referred to as temporal frequency.The period is the duration of one cycle in a repeating event, so the period is the reciprocal of the frequency...
line, which often changes to reflect what it's thinking, such as short words like "HELP".