General Mills Monster Art

I framed the Mash. I framed the Monster Mash

Back in the 80s, the walls of my bedroom were covered with posters — movie and music related, mostly. Like any kid my tastes changed over time — my E.T. poster got swapped out for one of Yoda and posters of Pantera eventually replaced the ones of Iron Maiden I got from the fair by popping balloons with darts — but it’s fair to say my sense of decorating wasn’t, ah, sophisticated. I always assumed that some day as an adult I would develop taste and, if there’s one thing you can say about what hangs on my wall today… they are indeed tasty.

The idea for this art project came about in 2021. By the fall of that year we had been in lockdown for a year and a half and while people had started venturing outside their homes again, social distancing and wearing a mask was the norm and every time we made eye contact with another human being it was to say, “please don’t kill me.”

It was a time when local businesses were dying from a lack of patrons and even larger chains were desperate to bring people back. The Walmart near my house taped arrows to the floor to control foot traffic and prevent people from walking past one another. My wife and I went to dinner at a local restaurant and were told we had to show our vaccination cards before dining. It was a wild time and the whole country was a little stir crazy.

In the middle of all of this, General Mills announced they were releasing a limited edition version of “Monster Brand Cereals.” You see, when I was a kid, the monster brand cereals (Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry) were available year round. Count Chocula for Christmas? Yes! Franken Berry for Easter? Why not! For some unknown reason in 2009, General Mills stopped selling the monster cereals year round and began offering them only for two months a year (September and October) around Halloween. This would be as ridiculous as only selling Lucky Charms around St. Patrick’s Day. Nobody ate Count Chocula because they associated it with Halloween. We ate it because it was full of sugar and marshmallows and turned our milk chocolatey brown and gave us an excuse to talk like Bela Lugosi while eating breakfast.

As early as 2013, General Mills began releasing limited edition runs of the monster cereals. One year they brought back some of the older, abandoned monsters (Frute Brute and Yummy Mummy) and re-released them. People bought them. And they released all the other monster cereals too, and people bought them. Literally to this day I have no idea why General Mills began offering limited runs of cereal, turning Boo Berry and friends into the McRib of the breakfast world.

2021 marked the 50th anniversary of Monster Brand cereals and to commemorate the event, General Mills released limited edition versions of Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry cereals along with a brand new offering — Monster Mash, which was all three cereals mixed together.

I was afraid of catching COVID. I did not want it. I was worried my kids would catch it. People were dying from it. Very few things could get me to risk my life and leave my house during that time. Limited editions of Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry were one of those things. Our local Sam’s Club was selling them in large combo packs and so that’s where I got mine. They were a bright light in a dim world. If we were all going to die, I wanted to go out with a spoonful of vampire cereal in my mouth. Sue me.

I’m a sucker for anything that says “limited edition” and so even after every last bite of cereal was gone, I hung on to the boxes. I need to start collecting cereal boxes like I need a hole in the head, but there was something about them that I couldn’t let go of. I loved horror movies as a kid but I was also a fraidy cat. Monster Cereals were a calorie-packed gateway drug into that world. Was Frankenstein scary to a kid? Yes. Was Franken Berry? No. That strawberry favored steampunk version of Frankenstein’s monster wouldn’t hurt a fly.

I ordered some 11x14 frames from Amazon (which are insanely cheap — like less than $5 a frame) and began cutting apart the boxes. I soon realized that even with the included matte, the boxes were too small for the frames. To solve this problem I dug through my wife’s art supply cabinet and stole several sheets of colored construction paper. I picked two sheets that complimented each box and placed them in the frames. Nothing fancy, just a fun little touch. Again, we were in the middle of lockdown. It’s not like I was leaving the house much.

With my little project complete I hammered four nails into the wall and hung my new creations on a wall that’s both directly outside my home office and facing the guest bathroom. They’ve been there for four years now. I see them every single day and they still bring me joy. Suck it, Kondo.

Whenever people use the guest bathroom in our house, these cereal boxes are what they see when they exit. Like the cereals themselves, I won’t leave them there forever. Maybe I’ll swap them out for something else soon and only bring them out for a couple of months around Halloween each year. For now though, that’s where they live.

Sometimes, after everyone has gone to sleep, I swear I’ve heard the sound of cereal crackling in milk coming from the hallway. I have even faintly caught a whiff of chocolate and strawberry when passing by the pictures even though these boxes were never scented in the first place. Once, I thought I heard the ghoulish howls of a blue ghost coming from just outside my office door. You don’t think they could be… no. They can’t be.