An Analysis of the Scooby-Doo Relationships

Those of you who have a good memory will remember I said there was a special Valentine's Day article coming at the beginning of February, but unfortunately, I didn't have the time to finish it...until now that is! (Hey, it's still February, isn't it? :D) 

Obviously Fred and Daphne are the most well-known couple in Scooby. I'll admit they do make a very cute couple and would work well together...however, I've disliked the way it's been handled in recent DTVs (especially Stage Fright). It feels like we just start from square one every DTV now, and there's no continuity or forwards movement anymore. I think this is what makes people go to the "not another pretty-girl-and-dumb-jock dating!" perspective. Though I agree that the relationship is very stereotypical, I think if it went somewhere, I wouldn't mind it. This may be an unpopular opinion, but I think Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated handled their relationship best. Though a lot of Season 1 was Fred obsessed with traps and saying "Why must I feel?" (btw I love that quote! lol), there was some nice forward movement and relationship development towards the end of Season 1 when they kissed and almost got married, plus in Season 2 where Fred had to gain Daphne's trust again after he left her, and so on. Again, it's a very stereotypical relationship, but IMO it's the characters and their interactions that matter, not how stereotypical it is. To sum things up here, I like Fraphne (Fred/Daphne), but only in the case of SDMI, or if it would be done in a non-stale way in the future.

So I suppose the next most logical pairing to talk about is Shaphne (Shaggy / Daphne). Now I'll be honest here and say I find Shaphne fans quite intriguing. It seems like the general opinion is most fans either dislike them or obsessively ship the heck out of them. I've joked to a few people about the more extreme theories like "Shaggy and Daphne looked in each other's eyes for 0.2 seconds...that means they MUST be in love!" Though it may sound mean, some fans are actually like that...where they notice a quick look that either Shaggy or Daphne looked in the other one's direction and assume it means they have some sort of secret "thing" for each other, or even make huge assumptions, the best example of this being Shaggy and Daphne adopting Flim Flam as a son. But don't get me wrong here - I'm not bashing the assumptions or theories at all - they actually intrigue me quite a bit. And in fact, some of my favorite people to talk to are Shaphne fans just because they have such interesting perspectives on the relationship. Enough about other people's thoughts though.

I've been more "meh" on this pairing just simply because there is no real evidence of the two other than in "Night Terrors" (pictured above)...and even that was a hallucination technically. Would I like to see them together? Sure, I'm totally open-minded on the matter. It would be cool to see the two together, and (sorry for the brief semi-self-promotion here) I've written a fanfic that unintentionally brought the two in a relationship together, which is actually quite interesting to write as the characters take the relationship in a direction of their own.

Controversy ahoy! This pairing is one of the most disliked and controversial pairings in the fandom, but some still ship it intensely. Not to offend anyone, but honestly, I hated this pairing for one reason: Velma was a total controlling big meanie. (Another word beginning with "B" came to mind first, but let's just say I forgot what word that was ;) ) Analyzing this on a non-cartoon-world, real-life relationship level, you should NEVER try to change the person entirely! That's what Velma did here, which IMO shows she didn't actually love Shaggy for who he was, but only on a skin-deep level, likely for his looks. Maybe my comparison with real-life relationship etiquette doesn't hold up here as you don't find yourself often having to choose between a person and a dog...but you get my point :) 

Though there's no evidence for this pairing other than a totally out-of-context picture here, I'm still going to analyze it on a hypothetical level. I really think this pairing could work out in an interesting way, especially as in the earlier series, Velma and Fred showed a lot of similarities in solving mysteries. Velma was the brains of the operation, while Fred also had some great teamwork skills and used his own brains to lead the gang in the right direction towards solving the mystery. Is my logic a bit shallow here? Maybe, but I think it would be interesting to see it tried out if it was done right.

What kind of relationship article would this be if I didn't include Marcie and Velma? Though this is another controversial relationship in more ways than one, I'd love to see the two of them together honestly. I'm totally open-minded and would love to see a LGBTQ+ relationship done in Scooby if handled right, IMO it would be revolutionary for something that's technically a children's cartoon (hey, we had Zootopia tackle racism and feminism last year, why can't Scooby have a non-traditional relationship?)

That aside, I think, out of all the relationships, Marcie and Velma genuinely cared for each other the most. Besides the affectionate "V"/"Velm" names, they seemed to be in sync on an emotional level and could confide in each other with secrets and to discuss issues. 

Now I probably sound like I just want this to happen so a lesbian relationship will finally occur in Scooby, but IMO a poorly done lesbian relationship is worse than remaining with straight relationships in the show. I'd be genuinely interested to see how it would play out if the two did get in a relationship, but as always, it would depend on how it was done.

Moving on from one the most controversial relationships to one of the cutest relationships! Nova and Scooby make a perfect couple IMO (I don't know how you can be against something that adorable!) and quite visibly love each other. Scooby was always adorable with Nova and Nova...well...she didn't say much...but was regardlessly cute, especially the bell on her collar!

I could go on all day talking about the non-continuous relationships...there was Shaggy/Googie, Shaggy/Crystal, Scooby/Amber, etc., etc. but I think I'll stop before this article gets too long!

I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did writing it, and if you agree or even disagree with something I've said, post in the comments section and let's discuss it! (I'm always happy to talk about Scooby!)