“Quick, what’s he wearing?”
Fraggle Rock #3
Star Comics (August, 1985)
“The Monster That Could Be Anything”
ADAPTATION: Stan Kay
ARTIST: Marie Severin
LETTERER: Grace Kemer
EDITOR: Sid Jacobson
An adaptation of the episode “Believe It Or Not” from the Muppet-made HBO series, but still drawn in the NBC Saturday cartoon art style. Red convinces Wembley to join her in an adventure in the area at the Gorg side of Fraggle Rock. There they meet a shapeshifter Red names Skinfret, who changes based on the imagination of those around him. Meanwhile, the Gorg’s basement is flooded and Ma wants Pa and Junior to clean it out. With Red imagining Skinfret with pigtails and loving to swim, he jumps into the water. Unseen but heard, Ma Gorg imagine him as a monster, with a form that even scares Red. It’s Wembley who manages to convince both Ma and Red to imagine him back to his true form, where the Gorgs adopt him as a pet. Meanwhile, Uncle Matt’s latest postcard is about assuming the Beefeater’s hat in London is actually a sleeping pet.
What they got right: We get some good interaction between the Gorgs and Fraggles as Wembley actually reaches out to Ma, the one who is scared of Fraggles as much as the monster she imagines Skinfret into. The comic takes advantage of the medium change and allows Skinfret’s monster forms to visually tie into the others.
What they got wrong: However, too much is changed. The final act of the episode sees Ma trapped in the basement with Skinfret and the Fraggles, without a sudden dragon form attacking the outside of the castle like in the comic. This makes it easier for Wembley to talk to her and calm her down. Kay adds a scene with Gobo, Mokey, and Goober that wasn’t in the episode since they don’t appear at all, and the addition is unnecessary. It’s issue #3. We can have a story without the full cast. I can see not having time to connect the Doc & Sprocket segment, where Doc is trying to get Sprocket over his fear of bugs, but later showing his own fear of bats, so it was removed. It only tangentially connects to the story, while the only connection with Travelling Matt’s adventure is the addition of Skinfret hanging out on Junior’s head at the end while he does his chores. It’s mostly there to torture Red and because the Uncle Matt segments are part of both shows.
What I think overall: Unnecessary additions aside the adaptation itself get the important details right (though I think the basement idea works better than the dragon attacking the castle). It’s a good episode to adapt and a good story on its own.
BW Media Spotlight 
[…] The Monster That Could Be Anything: Red and Wembley meet a creature who changes form and personality based on people’s beliefs. When Ma Gorg thinks he’s a monster, he becomes one but Wembley convinces her to stop seeing him like that and he turns back to himself. It’s an adaptation of the HBO episode “Believe It Or Not” with few extra scenes to establish Wembley had heard Uncle Travelling Matt’s postcard (for some reason) and excluding the scenes with Doc and Sprocket. No adaptation credit is given like episode adaptations usually are, even in other Star Comic adaptations. It’s a fair story but I credit the source material considering the first two stories. […]
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