Characters / Monster Blood

Note: The Monster Blood recurs in the Goosebumps Horrorland series.

Evan Ross, Andy, and Trigger

Andy, Trigger, and Evan

Portrayed By: Kyle Labine and Sarah Podemski (TV)

The main characters of the first four Monster Blood books.

• Adaptational Dye-Job: Evan is a redhead in the book but in the TV episode, he is played by the blonde Kyle Labine.
• Adaptation Personality Change: Evan and Andy's personalities are toned down in the TV episode.
• Adaptational Jerkass: In Goosebumps Horror Town, Evan and Andy are both obnoxious pranksters, while they were at least intended to be normal kids in the books.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: Andy and especially Evan are a lot more likable in the TV episodes.
• Aesop Amnesia: Andy never learns that getting involved with Monster Blood will not lead to anything good. Evan learns but is weak willed enough to find himself falling into this in the third book.
• Age Lift: In Horror Town, Evan is a bit younger than 12, while Andy is closer to a teen.
• All of the Other Reindeer: Evan gets off to a bad start by telling everyone about his Monster Blood misadventure upon starting at his new school, resulting in all the kids thinking he's weird.
• Asleep in Class: Evan falls asleep in class at the start of the second book and is woken by his teacher.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Evan and Andy seem to have a preteen version of this.
• Berserk Button: Don't call Andy by her real name, Andrea. And especially don't stretch it out.
• Big Damn Heroes: Evan in the second book, when he eats Monster Blood and grows enough to be able to burst into the classroom, save Conan from Cuddles and fight off the giant hamster. He almost gets his head bitten off but the magic in the Monster Blood runs out right on time.
• Big Friendly Dog: Trigger the cocker spaniel, who's friendly to pretty much everyone.
• Bully Hunter: Andy has shades of this in the first book. She despises the Beymer twins for their bullying and stands up for Evan when they pick on him. She also stands up for him to Conan.
• Butt-Monkey: Evan. Nothing ever works out for him, his parents are always leaving him with other relatives he doesn't like and who don't like him either, he's picked on and beaten up, and he finds himself stuck in situations involving a horrible living blob creature.
• The Cameo: Evan has one in Return to Horrorland, where he appears on TV and shows off the Monster Blood, causing the kids to mock him.
• Cassandra Truth: When Evan tells Andy that no one believed his Monster Blood stories, her response is along the lines of "no shit, Sherlock".
• The Chew Toy: Evan. When he's not being beaten up, he's being used by his obnoxious cousin Kermit for experiments or enduring something horrible thanks to Monster Blood, or just plain treated like crap by his parents, aunt or teacher.
  • Evan becomes a literal chew toy in the third book. When the Monster Blood turns him into a giant he uses his cousins shrinking potion to be restored to his normal size. But later that night he wakes up and to his horror he sees that it worked too well; he's now shrunk to the size of a mouse. And to his greater horror, his dog Trigger notices him in his shrunken state. The book ends with Trigger picking up the bite-sized boy in his mouth and carrying him away.
• Deadpan Snarker: Andy.
  Evan: It's so dark.
  Andy: It usually gets dark at night.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": Andy hates to be called by her full first name, Andrea.
• Iron Butt-Monkey: Seriously, from all the beatings Evan received from Conan, it's a wonder how none of them put him in the hospital.
• Irrational Hatred: Evan despises Cuddles the hamster for some unclear reason, to the point of fantasizing about throwing him out a window or crushing him into a pancake. The feeling is likely mutual when the rodent becomes a giant.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold:
  • While Andy teases Evan constantly and does some other questionable things, it's pretty obvious she does care about him. Her reason for bringing more Monster Blood in the third book is even so he can fight off Conan.
  • For how insufferable he can be around his peers, Evan ultimately isn't a bad person, and he's still willing to help others in danger, regardless if they're grateful or not.
• Kiddie Kid: The first MB book starts off with 12-year-old Evan throwing a tantrum like a child half his age. His mother even lampshades this at some point, scolding him for acting like an infant.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Evan isn't necessarily "feminine" but he's very weak-willed and pessimistic compared to Andy, who is a lot more brash, daring, and idealistic. Andy even protects him from bullies.
• Never My Fault: Evan desires payback against Mr. Murphy for making him clean Cuddles' cage, even though he mouthed off to his teacher for not believing a story about evil goop and cat witches.
• Nightmare Sequence: Evan has one at the start of both the second and third book.
• Only Friend: Andy is definitely this to Evan, and Evan seems to be this for Andy as well.
• Only Sane Man: Evan plays this role in the last two books, with Andy's eagerness to use the Monster Blood and Kermit's brattiness and crazy inventions.
• Parental Neglect: Both Evan and Andy's parents constantly abandon them with relatives, with Evan's parents doing so in every book except the second and Andy's parents making her stay with her aunt and uncle in Atlanta near Evan's place.
• Pet the Dog: There's a scene in the first book where Andy finds some bullies tied a cat to a tree and helps untie it.
• Plucky Girl: Andy, who's a lot more idealistic than Evan and refuses to back down over anything.
• Psycho Supporter: Andy, to Evan. While her heart is in the right place she almost always ends up making things worse for him. In the second book, when no one believes him about his Monster Blood story, she tries to prove it by feeding the hamster Cuddles Monster Blood to see if he grows. He does indeed grow, which proves it, but now they have the obvious problem of a giant monster hamster on the loose (fortunately, said hamster goes back to normal at the end. Also, in book 3, she suggest that Evan himself eat Monster Blood so he can get big enough to beat up Conan. He does eat and it does grow, unfortunately, he keeps growing till he's 20 feet tall or so. Fortunately, he also returns to normal at the end.
• Puppy Love: Andy and Evan are the closest thing in the series to an Official Couple, though it's likely neither of them would admit it.
• The Quincy Punk: Andy's redesigned appearance in Goosebumps HorrorTown, which is also a major case of Younger Than They Look.
• Redheads Are Uncool: Evan has red hair and is a colossal loser.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: Andy is much more daring, bold and impulsive than Evan, who is more cautious about using the Monster Blood and breaking into Conan's house.
• She's a Man in Japan: Evan and Andy's genders are switched in the Dutch version of the books.
• Skewed Priorities: When Trigger eats the Monster Blood in the first book, Andy worries that there isn't enough to share.
• Straw Loser: Evan is one of, if not the, biggest one in the whole series. He can not catch a break. Monster Blood II ends with Evan now permanently taking care of Cuddles even though he hates him (with the implication that Cuddles ate more Monster Blood), III ends with Evan shrunken down to a few inches, and IV ends with him facing a horde of angry Conan clones.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: When Evan gets turned into a giant in the third book, he actually has a rather good time after his initial despair, saving kids from getting picked on by Conan, retrieving kites stuck in trees and even getting revenge on Conan by hanging him to a tree the same way he did to Andy and crushing his skateboard.
• Too Dumb to Live: Andy always tries to goad Evan into using Monster Blood to avenge himself on his tormentors, such as Conan, Kermit, and one of his teachers, even though she has firsthand knowledge that these attempts will not work and just make things worse. One time (in the second book) she even goes behind Evan's back and uses the Monster Blood after promising him not to do so. Evan falls into this category in the third book when he decides to go along with Andy's plan to get payback on Kermit, which of course fails.
• Took a Level in Badass: After being a loser for most of the second book, Evan eats the Monster Blood to save the school, becoming a hero and redeeming himself to his teacher and most of his classmates.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Andy was a much better friend to Evan in the first book. Despite teasing him a lot, she stood up for him against the Beymer twins and angrily said they'd get back at them when they beat Evan up. In the sequels, she frequently brings back the Monster Blood and suggests Evan use it, even though it nearly killed her and Evan in the previous books, and even feeds the Monster Blood to Cuddles the hamster in the second book after promising Evan not to.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Evan and Andy regularly banter and tease each other.
• With Friends Like These...: Despite being Evan's best friend, Andy keeps bringing back the Monster Blood and insisting Evan use it while knowing the trouble it caused both of them, and even goes behind Evan's back and feeds it to Cuddles in the second book after assuring him he wouldn't.

Monster Blood

A mass of growing goo and monster of the Monster Blood series.

• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: What results from its consumption.
• Blob Monster: One that resembles Gack.
• Extreme Omnivore: It will devour everything that comes in contact with it, and doesn't discriminate between kids, animals, or even its master Sarabeth.
• Generic Doomsday Villain: This is to be expected, since it's a mindless life form, but its creator, Sarabeth, is a more straightforward example. Other than wanting to keep Evan's aunt as a slave, she has no personality or motivation whatsoever, and is simply in the story to provide an explanation for the ever growing slime.
• Hungry Menace: It exists only to devour.
• Mutagenic Goo: If Monster Blood is eaten, it will make the consumer grow to horrible proportions, but the effects vary. When eaten by Cuddles and Evan, it makes them grow big, but when eaten by Matt in Monster Blood For Breakfast! it causes him to undergo severe Body Horror as his muscles swell and he becomes an inhuman lump.
• Retcon: In the original novel it's stated that Monster Blood really is a mundane novelty toy, and that Sarabeth only cursed the particular can found by Evan and Andy. Since unrelated Monster Blood cans keep turning up in the sequels with identical powers, it's unclear whether Sarabeth's spell somehow affected all cans of Monster Blood everywhere or if this is just an unaddressed Series Continuity Error.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: And some sap always winds up opening it...
• Series Mascot: It forms the title of the series.

Sarabeth

Portrayed By: Joy Tanner (TV)

An incredibly nasty and vicious cat owned by Evan Ross's aunt Kathryn. When Evan has to stay with Kathryn for a few weeks, Sarabeth frequently attacks him. She's actually an evil witch, and she's kept Kathryn as her slave for twenty years. When she couldn't get rid of Evan herself, she made Kathryn enchant the Monster Blood so it would kill him, but she gets killed by her own creation.

• Adaptation Personality Change: The TV show tries to give her more motivation and an actual background beyond being Kathryn's False Friend. Kathryn explains Sarabeth was originally renting a room from her when she walked in on Sarabeth performing some spell with the Monster Blood. In the process of being discovered, Sarabeth panicked and was about to attack Kathryn when she stepped into the Monster Blood and it... did something to her. The implication is the Monster Blood somehow drained Sarabeth of her magic and she turned into a cat, while Kathryn bottled it up and hid it somewhere. By freeing the Monster Blood, her powers got restored and she was able to turn human again.
• Cats Are Mean: Kathryn herself tells Evan that Sarabeth is an evil cat.
• Evil Is Petty: She made Kathryn deaf by magic, and has specifically kept her from learning sign language in order to keep her weak. She's also more than happy to let her Monster Blood kill everyone as long as her secrets remain safe.
• Evil Redhead: Her human form. Though in the TV show her hair's a shade of dark brown.
• False Friend: Kathryn claims that when they first met, she thought Sarabeth was her friend. That was before Sarabeth revealed she was Evil All Along.
• Flat Character: While most antagonists have some backstory or flimsy motivation to justify why they do what they do, Sarabeth has no character beyond being evil and wanting to enslave Aunt Kathryn. She's only in the first book as a last minute villain, and is never seen or mentioned again outside of the comic book story Horrors of the Witch House, the villain of which turns out to be Sarabeth's granddaughter, who invokes Eviler than Thou on the "dearly departed" Sarabeth.
• Forced Transformation: The TV show implies she stayed as a cat for so long because she couldn't change back to human.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Of the Monster Blood books in the sense that it's due to her magic that the toy goo came to life. Though this only extends to the actual Monster Blood and not the fake blue variant from the last book.
• Hot Witch: Her live-action version is a young, conventionally attractive woman.
• The Man Behind the Man: She's the one who brought the first Monster Blood can to life, but it's left ambiguous if her magic enchanted every Monster Blood can or if Monster Blood was already magic.
• Villain Ball: Her death is entirely her own fault. She was afraid Evan would find out her secret and wanted him dead, but if she just left him alone she wouldn't have died.
• Wicked Witch: A shapeshifter.

Rick and Tony Beymer

Twin bullies in the first book.

• Adapted Out: They are absent from the episode adaptation.
• Asshole Victim: They get eaten by the Monster Blood when it's in its Blob Monster form. Fortunately, they come out alive when it's defeated.
• The Bully: Even worse than usual for these books. They even give Evan a surprisingly graphic No Holds Barred Beat Down.
• Jerkass: They bully younger kids and tie defenseless animals to trees.
• Kick the Dog: They tie a cat to a tree, apparently just for fun. Thankfully, Andy frees it.
• Laser-Guided Karma: When the Monster Blood encompasses them.
• Teens Are Monsters: They're 14-year-old delinquents who beat up younger children and even torture animals.
• White Hair, Black Heart: They are described as having very light, almost white/blond hair.

Mr. Murphy

Evan's science teacher.

• Deadpan Snarker: "Maybe a science fiction teacher would believe it. Not a science teacher." Afterwards, he sarcastically asks Evan if the teachers at his old school liked it when he called them dumb.
• Fat Bastard: Much like Cuddles. He's a Sadist Teacher and obese to boot.
• Jerkass Has a Point: He was right that Evan shouldn't have fallen asleep in class, told everyone about Monster Blood or called him dumb.
• Sadist Teacher: Apart from making fun of Evan for falling asleep in class, he does nothing to stop Conan's bullying of him, even when he does things like throw a basketball at Evan's face and slam dunk him through the hoop.
• So Proud of You: He says this to Evan when the latter saves the school from Cuddles.

Cuddles the Hamster

Mr. Murphy's pet hamster, who grows to enormous size and goes on a destructive rampage after eating Monster Blood.

• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The climax of the book.
• Breakout Character: Despite only appearing in one book, Cuddles became one of the most prominent of the monster characters featured in the 1990s merchandise. However, he was Demoted to Extra when the franchise was revitalized with the Horrorland series, to the point that Monster Blood II has yet to be reprinted.
• Child Eater: It's implied that he was going to eat Conan before Evan stepped in.
• Fat Bastard: According to Evan - and that's before he grows to the size of a gorilla.
• Here We Go Again!: Monster Blood II ends with him eating Monster Blood brought by Andy yet again.
• Rodents of Unusual Size: After he eats Monster Blood.
• Unskilled, but Strong: After his transformation, he's no smarter than any class pet. He nonetheless poses a danger because of his enhanced size and strength. He almost eats the supposed tough guy Conan and when Evan grows to giant size to fight him, Cuddles is able to overpower him by sheer size alone.
• What Happened To The Hamster?: He supposedly eats more Monster Blood at the end of the second book, but although he's mentioned in subsequent books, we never find out what happened to him or if he became a giant again.

Conan Barber

Portrayed By: Charles Boyland (TV)

The resident bully and secondary antagonist for most of the Monster Blood series.

• Adaptational Heroism: In the TV episode More Monster Blood, he helps save the day and becomes much nicer at the end.
• Big Man on Campus: Evan remarks that he looks 32, even though he's only 12.
• The Bully: He loves tormenting Evan and getting him in trouble with their teacher.
• Bullying the Dragon: Literal example on the "bullying" part. Even after he sees Evan as 12 feet tall, he still mocks him on his height. This ended as well as you would expect.
• Crushing Handshake: He gives three of these to Evan in Monster Blood II, and each is more painful than the last.
• Dirty Coward: He's not so tough and badass when it comes to heights and giant hamsters.
• Disproportionate Retribution: On his first encounter with Evan, he once told Evan, "We don't like wise guys here in Atlanta" and beat him up afterwards, right after Evan told him about Monster Blood.
• Hate Sink: He's a stereotypical bully who takes every opportunity to make Evan miserable and never gives him a break, even after he saves his life.
• Hidden Depths: Word of God says that he sleeps with a teddy bear named Fluffster (who makes an unnamed cameo in Monster Blood II) and gets a bedtime story every night.
• In-Series Nickname: "Conan the Barbarian", unsurprisingly.
• Jerkass: He'll beat up on Evan even if he never even did anything to him.
• Jerkass Has a Point: He was right that Evan telling everyone about the Monster Blood was something that no one would legitimately believe, though that doesn't justify his bullying.
• Jerk Jock: He actually slam dunks Evan through a basketball hoop in one part of Monster Blood II.
• Manipulative Bastard: He's very good at convincing Mr. Murphy that he's entirely innocent and Evan was the one picking on him.
• Misplaced Retribution: Every time Kermit's experiments backfire on Conan or he does something else unpleasant to him, Conan takes it all out on Evan. In the fourth MB book, after Kermit sprayed Conan's new sneakers with water from a Super Soaker, Conan took his anger out on Evan as the latter protests he didn't do anything to him. Conan's response? "It came out of YOUR squirt gun!"
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: He constantly gives these to Evan thanks to the trope mentioned above.
• Shout-Out: If his name is too subtle for you, he's even nicknamed Conan the Barbarian.
• A Taste of Their Own Medicine: He hangs Andy to a tree after beating up Evan, and gets hung to that same tree by Evan when the latter turns into a giant.
• Took a Level in Kindness: In the TV adaptation, anyway. He not only helps defeat the Monster Blood, but becomes friends with Kurtis, one of the kids he used to bully.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Even after Evan saves him from getting eaten by Cuddles, he still bullies him at every opportunity.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: He's afraid of heights.
• Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Since he doesn't hit girls, he sticks Andy on a high tree branch instead after he beats up Evan.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Somehow, he's able to convince Mr. Murphy that a wimp like Evan can hurt a much bigger and more muscular bully like Conan.
• Younger Than They Look: As stated above, he looks far more muscular and broad than the average 12-year-old, making him look more like an adult than a preteen.

Kermit Majors

Evan Ross's bratty cousin, a self-described child genius and inventor who uses Evan to test his experiments on when he's not deliberately getting Evan in trouble. First appears in Monster Blood III.

• Adaptational Nice Guy: In the TV episode, Kurtis just might be Kermit but with an Adaptation Name Change. He is friendlier than Kermit in the book, and eventually becomes friends with Conan.
• Bratty Half-Pint: To an extreme degree.
• Child Prodigy: More of an Informed Attribute since his inventions rarely work, though the fact that he can create any at all despite being only eight is rather impressive.
• Consummate Liar: His mother believes everything he says whenever he talks about Evan provoking people.
• Creepy Child: The way he delights in torturing Evan and manipulating his mother makes him come off as this.
• Hate Sink: Has no personality traits beyond being a lying, obnoxious brat and only exists to make Evan's life even worse. What makes him even less likable is that he usurps the supporting protagonist role from fan favorite Andy in the Monster Blood books.
• Insufferable Genius: Creates weird concoctions and experiments with Monster Blood. Both often end in failure.
• Jerkass: His only purpose in the story is to make Evan suffer and get him in trouble with no remorse or hesitation.
• Karma Houdini: Almost never gets punished for his experiments backfiring or getting Evan in trouble.
• Kick the Dog: Not only does he get Evan in trouble on purpose multiple times, he offers to do Andy's math homework and gets all the problems wrong intentionally, seemingly just to be a dick.
• Lack of Empathy: He actually laughs when Conan starts beating up Evan.
• Mad Scientist: A kid one. He even self-identifies as one in Monster Blood IV.
• Manipulative Bastard: He'll goad Conan Barber into beating Evan up by antagonizing Conan and hiding behind Evan. He'll tell his mother Evan was picking fights to get out of any blame.
• Pet the Dog: Helping Evan shrink back to his normal size in the third book. He also attempts to help Evan get back at Conan in the fourth book.
• The Sociopath: He takes delight in making Evan miserable and tormenting him and shows no remorse for the horrible things he does or for lying to his mother.
• Spoiled Brat: His mother practically lets him do whatever he wants while always blaming Evan and Andy for his actions.
• Troll: He agrees to do Andy’s math homework for her, claiming that he loves math. It’s only when she turns it in the next day does she find out that he deliberately gave her all the wrong answers, humiliating her in front of her teacher.
• White Hair, Black Heart: He has white-blond hair and is a total jerk.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: He pulls this off on Evan and Andy in the third book when he blames them for the horrible mess around the yard to his mother, who automatically believes him.

Blue Monster Blood

A weird, blue variant of Monster Blood found by Andy in Monster Blood IV. This version of the slime turns into small creatures that consume large amounts of water, and they aren't exactly picky about where they have to get it. After doing so, the creatures drink until they burst and multiple, and as they do so, they become increasingly aggressive. They aren't actually Monster Blood. They were an underwater biological weapon developed by a group of scientists that went bad, and their creator disposed of the experiment's remains in an empty Monster Blood can.

• Blob Monster: Ones shaped like weird blue slugs with razor teeth.
• I Am Not Weasel: The only reason Evan and Andy think these creatures are a form of Monster Blood is because they were found inside an old Monster Blood can.
• Mix-and-Match Critters: They're like a cross between slugs, leeches, and bottom feeders made out of blue slime.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: They have razor sharp teeth which allows them to bite through anything, and they can also use them to latch on to people and animals so they can suck them dry.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Are said to be the size of chipmunks, and when they multiply enough times, they are able to bite and cling on very hard.
• Self-Disposing Villain: When there are finally enough of them, the creatures will turn on each other and start to kill themselves in a manic frenzy before nothing is left.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: The creatures are fairly tame and benevolent at first, but they more they multiply the angrier they get. The same thing happens to Conan Barber after he eats some of the creature's residue, leading to Evan facing an army of angry Conans.

Bradley Wormser

Matt's obnoxious next door neighbor in Monster Blood for Breakfast!

• Asshole Victim: At the end of the book, when the ivy plants Matt owned that Bradley stole and falsely stated he caused to grow in order to win the science fair start snaking their tendrils around him.
• Big Eater: Matt says it's hard to believe he's so skinny with how much he eats.
• Catchphrase: "No biggie", much to Matt's irritation.
• Hate Sink: His whole personality revolves around how annoying and obnoxious he is.
• Hero-Worshipper: Despite how badly he treats Matt, he's also said to worship and admire him, "borrowing" his T-shirts and ideas for science projects.
• In-Series Nickname: The start of his last name, "Worm".
• Jerkass: He's almost as bad as Conan and Kermit.
• Laser-Guided Karma: At the end of the book, the ivy plants he stole from Matt and presented as his science project start wrapping their tendrils around him. Matt notices this and congratulates him for winning the science fair instead of warning him. Considering everything else he did to him as well as stealing his science project, this is understandable.
• Lean and Mean: Matt notices how skinny he is, and while not evil, he has few redeeming qualities.
• Pet the Dog: When Matt is about to be suspended for attacking him, Bradley stands up for him, saying they were just goofing around.
• With Friends Like These...: Claims to be Matt's "friend", but acts like anything but, constantly getting him in trouble for things Bradley did and showing little remorse for doing so.