Monster Buster Club

Monster Buster Club is a science fiction computer-animation television series co-produced by the French-based company Marathon Media, Canadian animation studio Image Entertainment Corporation, Jetix Europe and TF1. The show debuted on June 2, 2008, on Jetix in Europe. The pilot launched on June 9, 2008, in the United States, and in Asia on May 3, 2008. It premiered on YTV in Canada. It was shortly featured on the Disney Channel. Most of the episodes were produced in India by Crest Animation Studios with Autodesk Maya. Fifty-two episodes were produced.[1]

Monster Buster Club
GenreAction
Adventure
Comic science fiction
Police procedural
Science fantasy
Monster of the week
Created byVincent Chalvon-Demersay
David Michel
Developed byMarathon Media
Jetix Europe
Written byJohn Derevlany (Eps. 1-26)
Al Schwartz (Eps. 27-52)
Directed by
Voices of
Theme music composerDavid Vadant
Noam Kaniel
ComposersJeff Fisher
Paul-Étienne Côté
Country of originFrance
Canada
Original languagesFrench
English
No. of seasons2
No. of episodes52 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producersVincent Chalvon-Demersay
Sylain Viau
Co-Executive Producer:
Charles Henri Moarbes
ProducersSylvain Viau
David Michel
Vincent Chalvon-Demersay
Running time22 minutes
Production companiesMarathon Media
Image Entertainment Corporation
Release
Original networkTF1
Jetix
Original releaseJune 2, 2008 (2008-06-02) 
November 14, 2009 (2009-11-14)

Premise

This show is about three human pre-teens and their alien pre-teen friend, who are all charged with saving their town from alien invasions. They reform a secret organization that was founded centuries ago, the "Monster Buster Club," often abbreviated as MBC. The MBC aims to locate alien criminals hiding in Single Town, capture them, and send them to galactic authorities.

Setting

The show takes place in a small, sleepy town named Single Town. Single Town is two hundred years old and was founded by a man named "Addison Single," who is an evil alien in disguise. Unbeknownst to its human inhabitants, Single Town is a meeting place for aliens from different parts of the galaxy.

Episodes

Season Episodes Originally aired
First aired Last aired
1 26 June 2, 2008 (2008-06-02) December 8, 2008 (2008-12-08)
2 26 January 15, 2009 (2009-01-15) November 14, 2009 (2009-11-14)

Characters

Main

  • Cathy Smith[2] (voiced by Andrea Libman) – Cathy appears to be a bubbly, 12-year-old girl on Earth, but she is a 250-year-old[3] (or 700 Rhapsodian-year-old teenager) alien from the planet Rhapsodia. She came to Earth with her grandfather, Mr. Smith, to start the Monster Buster Club (MBC). She is constantly surprised at how different Earth is from Rhapsodia. She has many alien abilities, like the ability to stretch, slight telekinesis, and others. She is the most Optimus of the MBC. Her suit color is pink. In her human form, she has blond hair and blue eyes. Her Rhapsodian form is shown to be a humanoid, white alien with scattered pink spots, with four tentacles for arms and two tentacles for legs, as well as tentacles on her head (like hair), and a long, furry-looking tail[nb 1] Compared to humans, Rhapsodians are incredibly long-lived.[4]
  • Chris[3] (voiced by Samuel Vincent) – Chris is the 12-year-old tech guy of the group. He has indigo-blue hair and dark blue eyes. He is brilliant, with a knack for gadgets. He'll often stay back in the clubhouse and supply intelligence reports while the rest of the group is on a mission. His suit color is blue.
  • Danny Jackson[5] (voiced by Matt Hill) is a 12-year-old boy and a nice guy at heart. He's good at sports and has brown hair, green eyes, and a scar over his left eyebrow. He can get overconfident at times. He has an adamant crush on his schoolmate, Wendy. He has an erratic sense of humor and enjoys cracking jokes even in dangerous situations. He has his own self-proclaimed nickname: "The Danny," and refers to himself as such whenever he's performing a task. His suit color is red.
  • Sam[3] (voiced by Anna Cummer) – Samantha, known by her friends as Sam, is a 12-year-old girl and is the most level-headed of the group with an often serious disposition. She has dark hair tied in buns and hazel eyes. Officially the MBC has no official leader, she'll often be the member to construct battle strategies and procedures for the group. She, at times, can be bossy. She possesses natural leadership. She'll often put MBC first instead of having fun. She sometimes is the shoot first and asks questions later type. Her suit color is yellow.
  • John (voiced by Tabitha St. Germain) – John is Chris' 10-year-old little brother. He sometimes takes over for Chris at the clubhouse when Chris is on a mission or busy. He really wants to be in the MBC but he is too young.
  • Mr. Hugo Smith (voiced by Rick Jones) – Mr. Smith is Cathy's aloof grandfather and came with her to Earth. Like Cathy, he is a Rhapsodian but rarely displays any supernatural powers, and his alien form resembles a mollusk. He'll sometimes aid the MBC from the clubhouse, but often he won't be involved in their missions at all. Mr. Smith loves working in his garden and playing cards with his plants.

Other students

  • Wendy (voiced by Tabitha St. Germain) – Danny's crush, a 13-year-old who is the snobby, popular valley girl at the school that the MBC attend. She is known for gossiping and tries anything to get a good scoop. (This is shown in the episode "Bubbleheads" when she follows Cathy to Mark's house because she thinks Cathy's working on another story.)
  • Jeremy Flablotnick[6] (voiced by Samuel Vincent) is a 12-year-old kid who is best friends with Chris. In "Flower King", he fell in love with Cathy and wanted to give her a flower, which was actually Petalia. However, Cathy does not appear to return Jeremy's interest.
  • Mark (voiced by Ian James Corlett) is a 13-year-old who is the richest boy in town and Danny's nemesis.

Faculty

  • Mr. Fusster (voiced by Ian James Corlett) – The MBC's science teacher who thinks aliens don't exist. This upsets extraterrestrial Cathy and she often argues with him on the subject, which gets her in trouble.[nb 2] Later events, though, show that he may know more about aliens than he lets on, and may even be one.
  • Principal Rollins (voiced by Sonja Ball) – The gang's principal who thinks the students are soldiers and often uses terms like "Company halt!" and "About face!". She sometimes gets in the way of the MBC's missions.[nb 3] She has shown in various episodes an affection for Mr. Smith. It is also suggested she used to be a spy and believes Cathy is one too.

Others

  • Matisse, Wendy's dog.
  • Mr. Beatty (Voiced by John Stocker) runs the Happy Mart.

Broadcast

Besides Jetix internationally, the series has also been broadcast on several other networks.

  • In France, the show was first aired on TF1, Canal J and was later rerun on Gulli
  • In the United Kingdom, as well as Jetix, the series was aired on the GMTV-owned (Which Disney held a 25% stake in at the time) Toonattik strand, which itself aired on ITV1 and the CITV channel.
  • In the Arab World, the show was aired on MBC 3 and Al Jazeera Children's Channel (JCC)/Jeem TV, who aired other Jetix programming.
  • In Israel, the show was aired on Arutz HaYeladim.
  • In the rest of Asia (including the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and Greater China), the show was aired on Disney Channel, who aired other Jetix programming.
  • In the Philippines, the show was aired on Q (now known as GTV).
  • In Indonesia, the show was aired on RTV.
  • In Hong Kong, the show was aired on the country's English speaking television network TVB Pearl.
  • In Singapore, the show as aired on the subscription video on demand service Toggle (now known as meWATCH).
  • In Malaysia, the show was aired on TV3 as part of their Bananana! programming block.
  • In Ireland, the show was aired on RTÉ2 as part of the long running children's strand The Den.

Notes

  1. In one episode, Cathy mentions that her alien form has tentacles, and later on her full alien form is revealed.
  2. shown in the episode "The Trouble with Troublemaking", when Cathy gets angry and pushes all his books off his desk getting her a detention
  3. this is shown in the episode "Monster Beaters" when she forces every student to join a school club, leaving the MBC little time to investigate

References

  1. Crump, William D. (2019). Happy Holidays—Animated! A Worldwide Encyclopedia of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and New Year's Cartoons on Television and Film. McFarland & Co. p. 278. ISBN 9781476672939.
  2. "Me Krog, You Rollins!". MBC. 27 minutes in. Cathy Smith to the principal's office!
  3. "Characters". MonsterBusterClub.TV. Archived from the original on 9 July 2012. she is an alien and although she looks like a 10 year-old earthling, she is actually 250 years old, but on the Rhapsodia age scale she is still only a teenager
  4. Monster Buster Club, American episode 29, season 2, New Recruits (28 February 2009).
  5. "A Matter Of Principals". MBC. 1 minutes in. Your temporary commanding officer is Danny Jackson.
  6. "Frogs in Space". MBC. 9 minutes in. Hi, I'm cathy's latest, and final, boyfriend, jeremy flobotnik.
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