Growing Up Creepie

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
"Wicked."

Growing Up Creepie (2006-2008) is an animated television series made by Mike Young Productions and produced by Discovery Kids. In other countries the series is simply titled "Creepie."

As told in opening introduction and in the episode "Creepie Crawling", Creepie was an orphan left on doorstep of the Dweezwold Mansion, which is home to a family of various insects. The family take her in and raise her as one of their own. However, she must now adjust to a life surrounded by a society of entemophobic humans as she attends Middlington Middle School and keeps her home life secret in order to protect both herself and her family.

Tropes used in Growing Up Creepie include:
  • 555: The phone number of Dweezwold Mansion is 555-0150.
  • Absent-Minded Professor: Dr. Pappas
  • Adults Are Useless: Played Straight with most of the adults. Very subverted with Creepie's parents, who are insects. Chris-Alice's parents may be a subversion to a lesser degree.
  • All Girls Want Bad Boys: Maybe the reason of why Melanie and Carla (among other girls) drool over Harry Helby.
  • Alliterative Name: Creepie Creecher, Budge Bentley, Melani Melisma, Carla Cabrera, Harry Helby, etc.
  • Alpha Bitch: Subverted with Melanie and Carla, despite acting in typical Alpha Bitch fashion and seeming to be two of the show's antagonists, they are (sort of) Creepie's friends.
    • Lovable Alpha Bitch: Sort of.
    • But the Alpha Bitch trope was played straight in the "Bug It On" episode with the Upperborough's Dragonfly cheerleaders.
  • Always Night: Creepie's house seems to be this.
  • Amplified Animal Aptitude: Most insects in this show behave like humans, and even live well over a decade at the least.
    • This gets kind of weird when mistreatment of bugs (and their reaction) becomes an issue, ranging from offhand comments to becoming the basis of a plot. Raised by bugs or not, you'd think someone other than Creepie would notice.
  • And Knowing Is Half the Battle: Creepie presents bug-related factoids between the animated segments.
  • Big Eater: Caroleena, an insect, eats an entire frog whole. How's that for a Karmic Death?
    • Extreme Omnivore: Said frog was a previously dead frog reanimated as a cyborg. She either didn't notice or didn't care and ate the mechanical parts too, as is evident when she burps and light shines out of her eyes.
  • Black Best Friend: Budge
  • Bug Buzz: Considering that there's flies, crickets, mosquitoes, and the Creechur's extended families that buzz around and have wings. This sound is going to be around a lot.
  • Bug Splat: Happens to Gnat a lot...Though this doesn't kill him.
  • Can You Hear Me Now?: Some episodes results with Carla and Melanie loosing receptions/wifi signals/running out of batteries for their cellular phones.
  • Catch Phrase:
    • Creepie: "Wicked!"
    • Chris-Alice: "Soggy Muffins" and "Super Mega Duper"
    • Raven: "Gruesome" and "Gruesomely Awesome"
  • Character Title: "Growing Up Creepie" was just called "Creepie" in other countries.
  • Civilized Insects: Caroleena, Vinnie, Gnat, Pauly, and some of the Creecher family insects are these.
  • The Clan: Being formed by insects, Creepie's family is really big.
  • Clingy Jealous Girl: Melanie and Carla can be this towards Harry.
  • Creepy Aunt: Aunt Rose, who happens to be a huge, dire spider (although we only see her shadow. Also Uncle Jerry, Leader of the Red Fire Ants.
  • Creepy Cemetery: Middlington has one and in some episodes, reveals its ghostly inhabitants.
  • Creepy Basement: Where Aunt Rose lives.
  • Creepy Child: Guess who?
  • Cobweb of Disuse: Kinda averted. Since Creepie is the only human that lives in Dweezwold.
  • Dead All Along: Many of the episodes' stingers are like this:
    • In The Case of the Mysterious Moth, Fibilous Swift/the Mysterious Moth used to live in Dweezwold. But was reveal to the audience that he is a ghost.
    • In Home Is Where the Haunt Is, The Timpsons are actually ghosts, who have taken physical forms since they were searching for a house to buy.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Creepie. Maybe the fact that she seems rather goth helps.
  • Dead Person Conversation: In many of the episodes, it turns out that the living characters have conversations and even conduct businesses with ghosts. But this is only shown to the audiences at the end of these episodes.
  • Dean Bitterman: Who else? Ms. Monseratte
  • Door Step Baby: Creepie's "origin".
  • Dramatic Thunder/Grave Clouds: Usually in Dweezwold.
    • Sometimes when Creepie talks and gets into her "unusual unique way."
  • Dumb Blonde: Melanie
  • Explosive Breeder: Vincent and Caroleena have lots of...um, children.
    • Most, if not all of them are a very diverse array of insects, so they're adopted at best. Plus, he's a mosquito and she's a Praying Mantis...
  • Fake Band: In Season 2, Episode 8: "Going For Brogue", The 3 Goth Kids formed their own rockband calling themselves "Plaid Vapors", with Raven the guitarist, Misery the pianist, & Morpheus the drummer. Their chance to play at the school dance may have got canceled due to it's bagpipers gone batty, but believe it or not their 1st gig was a huge success. This was in large part in their friend Creepie Creecher & her mastery of the bagpipes, Raven Mcfadden herself was so proud of her that night. What she also told Creepie that the bagpipes itself contain the ghost of her great great great great great grandfather Angus Mcfadden, born in Scotland no doubt.
  • Fantasy Kitchen Sink: Ghosts, aliens, living dolls, haunted bagpipes, mythological creatures.
  • Fly Crazy: Gnat
  • Freaky Fashion, Mild Mind: Characters like Creepie, Misery, Raven, and such are this.
  • Funny Foreigner : Ms. Monseratte
  • Gentle Giant: Budge
  • Giant Spider: Aunt Rose
    • Also Marge, Skipper's (presumedly) adopted mother.
  • Goth: Creepie also has a cadre of goth friends/acquaintances. None are really portrayed negatively.
  • Half-Human Hybrid: subverted with Tarantula boy/Skipper, who seems to be half spider, half human, but he's just a normal boy with a costume.
  • Happily Adopted
  • Haunted House: Creepie's house, Dweezwold Mansion.
  • Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Not a couple per se, but Budge and Creepie qualify.
  • Instant Fanclub: "The Return of Tarantula Boy", when Melanie, Carla, and several other kids know of Creepie's date with Tarantula Boy.
  • Intellectual Animals: Many of the bugs, like Vincent, Caroleena, Gnat, Pauly, and many others.
    • Averted, with some animals that showed up, like Mr.Whiskers.
  • Interspecies Romance: Creepie's dad Vincent is a mosquito, while her mom Caroleena is a praying mantis.
  • Mad Scientist Laboratory: Dweezwold has one.

"My dad likes to tinker."

  • Monsters of the Week: This happens whenever the Creechur extended family comes over to visit.
    • Or the stingers of some of the episodes were it's shown to the audience that the monsters (i.e. Bugfoot) actually exists.
  • Multicolored Hair: Creepie Creecher and Raven Mcfadden
  • New Transfer Student: Regina in "Wanna Bee."
  • Nightmare Fetishist: Creepie, Raven, Misery & Morpheus, & Tarantula boy/Skipper. "How Wicked is that?"
  • No Social Skills: Chris-Alice was shocked after Creepie admitted the truth behind her talking to inanimate objects excuse, unfortunately Ms. Monseratte didn't believe in her story and she had to visit the principal's office for therapy.
    • This is never brought up again. Chris-Alice must be convinced it was due to her stress over the school event.
  • Odd Friendship: It's unknown why Creepie and Chris-Alice are friends, having clashing personalities and hardly anything in common.
  • Official Couple: Creepie and two-episoder Skipper (aka Tarantula Boy).
  • The Patriarch: Vincent
  • Perky Goth: Creepie. She's not that perky, but not so mopey either.
  • Pun-Based Title: All the episodes' titles are puns of other titles, mainly horror movies mostly.
  • Punny Name: Chris-Alice
  • Real After All: All. The. Time.
  • Real Men Wear Pink: Budge wanted to be a cheerleader. However, he should conform with being the team pet (No, not that Team Pet)
  • Rival Dojos: With Upperborough Middle School.
  • Scary Black Man: When Budge is introduced in the first episode, he appears to be this, but is quickly subverted.
  • Scooby-Doo Hoax: Many of the episodes are these, then the stinger is shown to be actual supernatural beings or cryptids were behind it all or they do exist.
  • Secret Keeper: Bugde. Eventually, Creepie also tried to confide in Chris-Alice, but...well, see No Social Skills.
  • Shallow Love Interest: Skipper for Creepie. At first she was only interested in him because she thought he was a half-spider hybrid and she lost all interest in him once she found out he wasn't. Then later she became interested in him again only because his adoptive mother is a spider.
    • They have something in common after all, since they're both raised by bugs. Even before she found out, she had fun on their second date.
  • Shout-Out: The Tarantula Boy movie trailer is somewhat similar to Spider-Man.
    • Many of the episodes' titles also count.
  • Species Surname: Creecher, the surname of Creepie's adoptive family, is based on the pun of "Creature."
  • Stern Teacher: Ms. Monseratte, She's always spying on Creepie and the other students at Middlington Middle School and is a stickler for rules. She's obsessed with cleanliness. She will usually hand out a detention slip if a student even so much as accidentally bump into her. Creepie's homeroom teacher, Dr. Pappas like Ms. Monseratte is stern too.
  • Strong Ants: The Red Fire Ants, led by Creepie's Uncle Jerry
  • Three Amigos: Creepie, Chris-Alice, and Budge.
    • The school goth kids: Raven, Misery, and Morpheus, Creepie's other best friends of course.
  • Two-Teacher School: Dr. Pappas and Ms. Monseratte
  • Why Did It Have To Be Clowns?: Creepie is afraid of clowns, complete with the same line.
  • The Worm That Walks: In The Tell-Tale Poem, a teacher had to visit Creepie's home. In an attempt to appear "normal", Creepie's bug family crammed into a bathrobe, with a speaker attached, and called themselves her "mom".