Mary Shelley's Frankenhole

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Mary Shelley's Frankenhole is a cartoon series on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim lineup, from Dino Stamatopoulos, the man behind Moral Orel.

Dr. Victor Frankenstein has mastered the secret of immortality, and has created wormholes across time (the titular Frankenholes) leading to his haunted Eastern European village, where he grants requests from historical figures and celebrities alike.

Potential viewers should be aware of the rather twisted humor in Stamatopoulos' works. The creator himself has stated that in a show aiming for all the major horror tropes, the real monsters are the humans who seek out Dr. Frankenstein's assistance. In a funny way.

Needs More Love.

Tropes used in Mary Shelley's Frankenhole include:


  • Actor Allusion: Jesus is wearing a court-appointed alcohol monitoring bracelet around his ankle because his voice actor, Andy Dick, was wearing one in the studio when he came in to do his lines.
  • Adult Child: Victor's sons are extremely old men who act like they're 7.
  • Affectionate Parody: "Jules Verne's Monster Rally Run!" of Cannonball Run right down to the late Dom DeLuis as Dracula's racing partner.
  • Anachronism Stew: Oh yes.
  • Asexuality: Victor has shades of this, preferring to shoot off his own testicles to having sex with Elizabeth. Reportedly, he finds sex boring, and isn't thrilled when others come to him to improve their own sex lives.

"Terrific, another pervert."

  • Back from the Dead: Nobody from the main cast, but many things including Michael Jackson.
    • Nobody but the Monster Creation, anyway
  • Barbie Doll Anatomy: Which gives the characters free range to run around naked, with no censors.
  • Black Jesus: Discussed when Jesus sees a modern portrayal of him and constantly tries to argue against it
  • Berserk Button: Don't call the Creation a 'Monster'...although he's more likely to go into a depression then a rage over it.
    • Also, apparently Ron Howard's just barely dealing with no longer being "Ronny". Don't even think about calling him "Ronald".
  • Bigger Is Better in Bed: Thomas Jefferson's belief that black men benefit from this led him to try to steal Barack Obama's equipment.
    • However, at the advisement of some of history's... black men (Ike Turner and OJ Simpson? Really?) in song, he decides that what really gets the ladies going is being a complete asshole to them.
  • Black Comedy Rape: Thomas Jefferson doesn't know why his slaves don't like it when he has sex with them.
  • Non Sequitur Episode: "Hiralious, Mutant Monster".
  • Came Back Wrong: Many of the people who go to see Victor such as Thomas Jefferson having body parts of African Americans sewn onto him, Gandhi becoming a vampire and JFK (or the guy trying to impersonate him) turned into a werewolf to name a few.
  • Cool Gate: The titular "Frankenholes" which link Victor's realm to various other points in time and space which are also Swirly Energy Thingies. Since Victor works several thousand years in the future, they also count as Portals To The Past. Potentially Our Wormholes Are Different and Our Time Travel Is Different apply here as well.
  • Completely Missing the Point: When Thomas Jefferson has Frankenstein graft a black man's penis onto him that fails to woo the slaves on his plantation, President Brack Obama tries to tell him that charm is more than just being well endowed..

Obama: "Mr. Jefferson, perhaps it isn't the penis, perhaps you need additional black attributes to compliment the penis?"
Jefferson: "Yeah, like two penises!"
Obama: "No look, race is more than just a penis or two.."
Jefferson: "Three Penises!"
Obama: "No! Get past the penises!"
Frankenstein: "I think I know what President Obama is saying.. we need to dissect different specific features from several black men, and make you into a black equivalent of my multi-cadaver-ed creature!"
Jefferson: "Four penises!"

  • Celebrity Impersonator: Wayne Newton. Both a real Wayne Newton impersonator and a fake one.
  • Couch Gag: The visitor of the week looks into a hall mirror on their way to see Dr. Frankenstein.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Victor and Polidori
  • Death Is Cheap: Victor's opinion of it after achieving immortality. Death tried to change that by reaping his sons, not realizing that Victor hated them.
  • Design Student's Orgasm: All the characters are made of almost entirely of paper, instead of the traditional clay. Despite this, they all look very and act very flexible, almost creepily so.
  • Deus Ex Machina: A good deal of the first season episodes ended with the visiting character being turned into a vampire or werewolf.
  • Dirty Old Man: Gandhi
  • Dracula: Here, he's Victor's annoying neighbor who's having an affair with Elizabeth.
  • Dramatic Thunder: So much of this that it punctuates nearly every scene.
  • Fake Crossover: At the end of the last bumper for Adult Swim's Frankenhole Halloween marathon in 2011 Victor reveals to the audience that he's not actually Victor but Orel of Moral Orel fame dressed as his favorite Adult Swim character. The clip ended with Victor doing a Shout-Out to Orel's dad Clay and Orel telling viewers to keep their eyes peeled for a Moral Oral special in the near future.
  • Fascinating Eyebrow: Jim Belushi desperatly tries to imitate John's trademark arched eyebrow to the point of tying a balloon to it.
    • Also, Victor often sports one as can be seen in the above picture.
  • Fate Worse Than Death: Victor's children, who he hates, while not proper immortals still won't die because Death refuses to take them, just to punish to Victor for mocking him. Have some irony.
  • Frankenstein's Monster: Obviously. Acts more like a mopey teenager than a monster though.
  • Hates Everyone Equally: Stated by Victor himself in the episode Death, but actually subverted when you consider he seems to enjoy Polidori's company when coming up with new experiments and then usually ending those experiments lives shortly after (ex.batshark). He even gives him a affectionate nickname (Polly Dolly).
    • Michael Jackson due to him showing encouragement and awe towards Victor's ability in creating such interesting experiments. Unlike his father who wished he was normal.
    • Other then that he seems to hate everybody, he even grew to hating his own family.
    • Except for John Belushi. Victor admits he's Belushi's greatest fan.
  • Hey, It's That Guy!: Jeff Davis is Dr. Frankenstein.
  • Historical Domain Character: Most of the people who visit Victor are this or classic horror characters.
  • I Call Him "Mister Happy": Jefferson referred to his penis as his...ahem, John Adams.
  • Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: In Season 2, the episode names are "(19th century author)'s (whatever the plot is that week)!". For example, the premiere was "H.G. Wells' Scary Monster Contest!".
  • Immortality: Victor, Elizabeth, and Polidori all are immortal.

(Victor slips the immortality potion into Elizabeth's drink at her wedding reception)
Henry: A long life! To the three of us!
Elizabeth: To the three of us!
Victor: Two out of three of us!

    • Victor's sons are immortal as well, but only because Death refuses to take them in order to get back at the immortal Doctor.
  • Immune to Drugs: Due to aforementioned immortality, Polidori drinks straight up poison because normal alcohol doesn't have any kick when you're immortal.
  • Invisible Man: The Universal Horror version himself. His Invisible Streaking is discussed.
  • It Amused Me Victor and Polidori spend most of their time bringing horrible hybrid beasts to life, only to shoot them moments later and laugh.
  • Jekyll and Hyde: Berated by Victor for his work because "No one wants to become his own monster!" Dr Jekyll's formula is responsible for turning John Belushi into Jim Belushi.
  • Jesus Was Way Cool: Jesus turns out to be jokey and amicable and while most visitors want some horrid surgical perversion performed on themselves, Jesus just wants some socks.
  • The Jimmy Hart Version: Lampshaded when Jesus sings a Styx song with slightly changed lyrics and an entirely changed melody specifically to avoid paying royalties.
  • Large Ham: Victor has his moments.
  • Last Request: Victor's father specifically asked to never be brought back to life.
  • Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: Of Count Chocula, The Count from Sesame Street and Blacula.
  • Mad Scientist: Victor, of course, and his assistant Polidori.
  • Medium Awareness: Jesus calls Victor "Paperface".
  • Missing Episode: The never-aired "Mother To Be-sa."
  • Morally-Ambiguous Doctorate: Victor apparently isn't a certified doctor.
  • Mummy: There's one in "Robert Louis Stevenson's Belushi!" whose entire schtick is making 'wrapped up' puns.
  • Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot: In the pilot, Michael Jackson is merged with The Elephant Man, then Blanket accidently fuses with Michael. Finally, they scratch their hand on a werewolf skin rug and then turn into a rug too
  • N-Word Privileges: Only Vampires are entitled to use the word 'Nightwalkers'.
  • Older Sidekick: Possibly. Polidori certainly looks older than Victor, but both being immortal(And when Polidori became immortal being unknown) Victor could be chronologically older.
  • Only Sane Man: Polidori.
  • Opposite Gender Clone: Tom Hanks.
  • Our Werewolves Are Different
  • Our Vampires Are Different: Dracula.
  • Parental Abandonment: Victor has grown to resent his sons, and actively tried to goad Death into reaping them. Becomes really depressing after seeing "Attack of the Were-Lawrence!", where Victor and Polidori laugh at one of his young son's gun-toting antics rather warmly.

Victor "What could be better than having your own children die before you?
Elizabeth "Maybe not everyone feels the way you do"
Victor "EVERYONE'S AN IDIOT!"

"So ze Jews... Not so bad!"

  • Universal Horror: Heavily inspired the look of the show. Plus, a good deal of the recurring characters are versions of characters from them.
  • Unusual Euphemism: In a show unafraid of very explicit language and scenes, we get LBJ describing his desires.

LBJ: I want to taste Jackie O's perfumey privates, feel her jiggly-wiggly jaglies, and then dingle my dongle in her hobbly wobbly.
Polidori (taking notes): ...'Jiggly-wiggly jublies'...
LBJ: That's 'jaglies'.

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