Morbid 90s Children’s Show Is A Blast From The Past, Stream Without Netflix

Aaahh Real Monsters centers on three primary protagonists who all have physical attributes that are equally disturbing and hilarious.

Ickis, voiced by Charlie Adler of Rocko’s Modern Life fame, is a clumsy red monster with giant ears who’s often mistaken for a rabbit by the unsuspecting humans he tries to terrorize. Krumm (David Eccles) is a naked and care-free walking torso who’s covered in stubble and has to carry his eyeballs around with his hands because he doesn’t actually have a head. Oblina (Christine Cavanaugh) is an overachiever not unlike Harry Potter’s Hermione Granger, and looks like an upside-down black and white candy cane with giant lips that I can only describe as Rolling Stones-esque.

These three amateur monsters all study at the Monster Academy under the guidance of The Gromble (Gregg Berger), their aggressive and unforgiving headmaster who demands only the best from his students.

Most of the humor in Aaahh Real Monsters comes from the gang’s ill-fated scaring assignments that almost immediately go off the rails, resulting in an egregious amount of chastising from The Gromble in the form of public humiliation. Ickis is the son of a famed scarer named Slickis who you never see on screen even though his legendary status is often alluded to in the series. Living in his father’s shadow, Ickis is more often than not reluctant to deliver the goods, much to the chagrin of Oblina, who wants nothing more than to be praised for her inventive scares, like posing as an umbrella before ambushing an unsuspecting child with her giant fangs on a rainy day.

Krumm is the most laid back monster in the Aaahh Real Monsters gang, and I’d liken his delivery in most scenes to that of Seth Rogen from an alternate dimension. He’s got that stoned slacker vibe that you’d see in movies like The 40-Year-Old Virgin, but since we’re talking about a kids show, his mellow countenance isn’t attributed to the intake of any illicit substances that I know of. His carefree attitude is the perfect foil to Ickis’ high-strung skittishness and Oblina’s by-the-books commitment to monster academia.

Using a device known as the Viewfinder to replay his student’s various outings, The Gromble stomps around the lecture hall with his red high-heels, more often than not ready to scream at his class for messing up an assignment, or even worse, exposing the Monster World to the humans they’re trying to scare.

As Aaahh Real Monsters progresses into its later episodes, you’ll learn more about the inner workings of The Monster Academy and what’s truly at stake. While The Gromble may seem like the only antagonist you’d need in such a series, there is a recurring monster hunter named Simon (Jim Belushi), whose calling in life is to prove that monsters actually exist after years of failing to track down and capture cryptids like Bigfoot. As long as Ickis, Krumm and Oblina can stay one step ahead of Simon (with the help of their human friend, Bradley) they can continue to pursue their studies without incident.

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Aaahh Real Monsters is rated TV-Y7, so it’s suitable for children. However, similar to series like Rocko’s Modern Life and Ren and Stimpy, there is plenty of toilet humor and straight-up adult humor that will fly over most kid’s heads while they’re distracted by the slap-stick elements that the show has to offer. In my opinion, Aaahh Real Monsters is the perfect show to watch with your kids on Paramount+ because it’s innocent enough to not cause any nightmares, but raunchy enough to keep your attention as an adult.