Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktakular is a 2003 Canadian computer-animated Halloween comedy film based on the Scary Godmother series of books by Jill Thompson, specifically a community theater stage production of the first book. The special depicts Hannah, while trick-or-treating with her cousin Jimmy and his friends, encountering the titular witch and her many friends for a Halloween party at the Fright Side. It stars Canadian voice actors Tabitha St. Germain, Britt McKillip, Garry Chalk, Noel Callahan, Alex Doduk, Brittney Irvine, Danny McKinnon, Scott McNeil and Adam Pospisil. It was directed by Zeke Norton (credited as Ezekiel Norton) and produced by Kevin Gamble and Sharan Wood with heavy involvement by Thompson.
Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktakular was produced by Vancouver-based animation company Mainframe Entertainment, notable for other computer-animated television series such as ReBoot (1994–2001), and was the company's first production to use a Softimage XSI pipeline as previously they used Softimage 3D; its animation consists of 3D characters and backgrounds that appear 2D (although most of them were actually modeled in 3D and cartoon-edged to appear like 2D water colored backgrounds a la the source material). The special was meant to launch an episodic Scary Godmother series, but the only other Scary Godmother media that has been released is the studio's sequel to the special, Scary Godmother: The Revenge of Jimmy (2005); as of October 2020, a series is still in the works according to Norton and Thompson.
Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktakular premiered at the San Diego Comic-Con on July 18, 2003, before it was released to region 1 DVD on September 3. It aired during that year's Halloween season in most territories except the United States, where it premiered on television the following year on Cartoon Network on October 1, 2004. The special was a ratings hit on its U.S. television premiere, well received by critics, and won Leo Awards for the program itself as well as its score and direction. It, along with The Revenge of Jimmy, continued to re-air every Halloween season on Cartoon Network in later years.
Plot[]
On Halloween night, Jimmy and his friends Katie, Daryl and Bert are planning to scare Jimmy's cousin Hannah Marie. Jimmy is dressed up as the devil, Katie is a cat, Daryl is a piece of candy, Bert is a baseball driver driving his SUV and Hannah is a fairy princess. Jimmy tells Hannah that every Halloween, a new kid must deliver candy to the monsters living in the spook house, or else the monsters will eat all the kids in the neighborhood. Hannah enters the house and Jimmy locks her inside, causing her to burst into tears. This summons a witch known as Scary Godmother, who takes Hannah to the fright side.
At Scary Godmothers house, she introduces Hannah to her friends and roommates, A skeleton living in the closet named Skully Pettibone, a ravenous werewolf named Harry, a vampire family which consists of Count Max, his wife Ruby and their son Orson, and a monster named Bug-a-Boo. Hannah is scared of them at first, but once she gets to know them, she sees that they're not so scary and she really likes them. Meanwhile, Jimmy and his friends are wondering why Hannah hasn't run out of the house screaming. Jimmy insists that they wait longer,
Harry eats all of the food at the Halloween party, so the monsters get the idea to order pizza. Harry orders twelve boxes of pizza, which Scary Godmother can't afford, so Scary, Skully, and Hannah search Bug-a-Boo's fur to find money stuck to him. They are successful and Scary Godmother pays for the pizza. Scary is mad at Harry as he tries to walk away with all the pizza boxes, she stops him and tells Harry that he owes her for all the damage he caused, and he should be able to pay his debt by next Halloween. Hannah is surprised to see that Bug-a-Boo loves pizza with cheese and olives since Jimmy told her that monsters eat children. Scary and all the other monsters get the idea to scare Jimmy and his friends.
Back with Jimmy, he and his friends decide to go into the spook house to get Hannah back, where they encounter Orson. Jimmy tries to tell Orson that he isn't a real vampire, so he calls for his parents, who then show up and scare them. The other monsters appear and scare Jimmy and his friends causing them to flee in terror. Hannah thanks them, and Scary Godmother gives Hannah a key that she can use in any door to return to the fright side to visit them anytime.