Think Return to Zombie Island is the first film to have a member of the gang obnoxiously deny the existence of the supernatural? Think again!
In "Who's Minding the Monster?" from The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show, Daphne is insistent that there are no such thing as monsters and shrugs off Frankenstein's Monster as "not a monster, he's just the babysitter!"
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During the Super Bowl LIV show today, the character designs for Blue Falcon, Dynomutt and Dee Dee Sykes were revealed. Mark Wahlberg will be voicing Blue Falcon, Ken Jeong will be Dynomutt, and Kiersey Clemens will play Dee Dee Sykes (from Captain Caveman). Gary Miereanu also posted these designs on Twitter, pictured above.
So far, I think the new designs look pretty good. What is everyone else's thoughts on the newly revealed character designs? For this week's question, I'm going to ask a controversial question just for something different! Interestingly enough, Wikipedia and Scoobypedia both say different things, so this is totally your opinion! (And no, this isn't an invitation to go edit Scoobypedia or Wikipedia to get it to say what you want).
Here are the results for last week's poll. Note that a few people chose to vote for multiple sets, which I allowed this time. If anyone voted twice or more times for the same option (there was someone who really wanted The Scooby-Doo Show Season 2 to win this week), all their votes (even the first one) were deleted automatically by Weebly with a notification email sent to me saying that they had done so. The same will happen with this week's poll, so even if you're 200% sure that it's episode 3 and want to vote for that option a billion times to make sure it wins, in the end, it will mean you have no say at all in the poll, so it's in your best interest to only vote once. The people have spoken, and it looks like season 2 of Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! is the most sought after release! Get on that, WB! Which out of the following would you most like to see be released next on DVD? Be Cool, Scooby-Doo Season 2 - 22 Scooby-Doo: Complete Cartoon Network Specials Collection - 13 The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries Complete Series - 12 The Scooby-Doo Show Season 2 - 12 Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? - 11 The New Scooby-Doo Movies Complete Series - 7 The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show - 3 The Richie Rich / Scooby-Doo Hour Volume 2 - 2 The Scooby & Scrappy-Doo Puppy Hour - 1 Laff-a-Lympics: The Complete Collection #2 - 1 After rewatching a bunch of The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries episodes lately for my prior article, as well as The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show, I can definitely understand people's argument that "11 minutes is just too short to come up with a valid plotline." However, people seem to forget that there were a few standout episodes among the more rushed plotlines (IMO), so much so that I would argue that, if they were to be done in the right tone (don't think Curse of the 13th Ghost or Zombie Island), I wouldn't mind seeing them as direct-to-video films. I can already hear people scoffing behind their screen, "What? How could a horrible 11 minute episode being drawn out even further make it any better?" With the episodes I'm about the break down, I offer the opposite argument: 11 minutes didn't do the episodes justice. The episodes were a bit rushed, but I feel only because of the time constraint placed on them. Here are the four episodes that stand out to me that would be greatly benefitted by a longer runtime: Scoobygeist This episode starts off with Daphne, Shaggy, and the dogs going to a haunted house. Daphne is determined that the hauntings are just rumors, and wants to debunk them once for all for a story she's doing as a journalist. Upon entering the house, Daphne begins reading a journal kept by whoever previously lived there, and reads terrifying tales of poltergeist hauntings. While Daphne and Scrappy never see any of these spooks, Shaggy and Scooby encounter spook after spook, eerily right as Daphne reads them. When Shaggy and Scooby sit down by the fire, they meet "The Fireplace Fiend," a terrifying face that comes out of the fireplace in the living room when you least expect. After going to bed, Shaggy and Scooby encounter four ghosts (pictured above), who perform various mischievous acts with their bed in order to scare them away. Shaggy and Scooby then flee downstairs, where they see some terrifying animal heads that fly off the wall, and Shaggy runs into a living skeleton and fall through a secret passage to the basement. In the basement, they find coffins full the same types of journal that Daphne reads, which is pretty terrifying if you think about it. Pretty quickly, they run into a stone statue that comes to life and chases them out of the basement, so they go back upstairs. Shaggy and Scooby see also immediately see another ghost playing the piano, and try to take a picture of it so Daphne will have to believe them. Despite getting a picture with the ghost, somehow the photo flips around and takes a picture of Shaggy and Scooby, despite the camera clearly not pointing in their direction at all. Last but not least, a painting of a ghost ship comes to life and floods the house. Daphne, unsure what happened, gets caught in the flood with Shaggy and the dogs, and is swept outside, as the house descends into the Earth. You could certainly view this as a meaningless 11-minute romp where they run into ghost after ghost, which I know some people don't like. Personally, I thought this episode was really spooky, and just sort of gave us a glimpse into this house that was plagued with all sorts of spirits. It seemed like the episode was setting us up to believe that we couldn't begin to imagine all the horrors in that house, which is a pretty disturbing premise. All those journals in the coffins in the basement also back my interpretation up, as presumably, they were filled with writing about more frightening things that happen in this haunted house. Atmospherically, this episode is top notch and one of the biggest reasons I think this would be a great DTV. I think the episode's only issue was the constant scares happening one after another, which sadly took away a little from the suspense. I think, if the plot were spaced out a little more for further plot development, this is a real hidden gem that could be developed into a great DTV film. Happy Birthday, Scooby-Doo "Happy Birthday, Scooby-Doo," albeit a 22-minute episode, I think could have benefitted from a longer story as well. The episode revolves around Scooby being tricked by the gang to go to a TV station to investigate a "howling ghoul." It turns out, they were actually trying to get Scooby to the TV station to be featured "This Is Your Life" birthday program. The beginning of the episode delves into Scooby's most frightening case ever, The Red Skull Curse Case. Remember that case? Of course you don't...because we never see it. They just made up a case that didn't actually occur. After we hear the story, The Red Skull returns by literally jumping out of a television screen (pretty freaky!) and tries to harm Scooby. Problem is, we're already 11 minutes into the 22 minute episode when The Red Skull first appears, which makes the rest of the episode incredibly rushed. I think this is a lot of people's favorites of The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries, but the rushed plot in the second half of the episode does it a real disservice in my opinion. I think an extended version of this (not the exact same thing, but something similar) could have been a great 50th anniversary film, or just a great film in general. The beginning of the film could show the gang actually solving the case of The Red Skull, then maybe 20 or so minutes in, we could flash forward a few years and then get to the Red Skull returning, fleshing his character out more, so it would create more of a sense of surprise and suspense. The element of surprise they were going for was really ruined by us never meeting the villain before. The Red Skull is a super cool villain and I think just cramming him into the last 10 minutes didn't really work as well as it could have. Having this be a 70 minute movie would also allow The Red Skull to do more once he'd returned, and you could even develop the plot about Fred being framed more in-depth. The Nutcracker Scoob I've heard from a lot of fans that they've always wanted a full-length Christmas film, and I think if you were hypothetically going to extend any Christmas episode so far to make a DTV, this would be the one to do it. This episode has a lot going for it, but again, the execution of them trying to parody The Nutcracker and A Christmas Carol at the same time comes across really rushed. It feels like at times they're so focused on the plot with Mr. Nickelby that we don't see much of the ghost, or get much of a development of what he wants until the very end. I think a clever plot device could have been the gang thinking Nickelby and the ghost were the same person for most of the film, maybe even do some false foreshadowing, then only realizing at the end that he wasn't at all related to the ghost, as a twist ending. This is easily my favorite Scooby Christmas special, but it comes off as rushed with trying to parody so much at once, and I think it could be better developed in a film-length adaption. A Halloween Hassle at Dracula's Castle When the Scooby Halloween film was announced for 2020, this is immediately the episode I thought of in terms of what I would want to see. I truly hope we do get a movie adaption of this someday. This episode starts off with a very spooky feeling fall wind, and has the gang going to a costume shop, where are invited to a Halloween Party by the owner. It turns out, the attendees of the Halloween party are not people in costume, but rather real monsters who need the gang's help. It turns out, their castle is being haunted by the Ghost of Dr. Van Helsing, Dracula's age-old enemy. I love the lore behind the villain they chose, as this was actually Dracula's enemy in the original lore and books, not just some random person they picked. We also get a seemingly side-plot of Chandra searching for the Moonstone Medallion, which turns out to be the main plot when she captures most of the gang and then uses the medallion for dark magic purposes.
Did my summary sound a little rushed? Well, that's because it was. All this was crammed into a 22 minute episode, and we don't even get to the stuff with Van Helsing's ghost or Chandra until the last 10 minutes of the episode, which doesn't do the episode any favors. Honestly, I love the classic Halloween feel of this episode, and all the cool lore and dark magic behind it, and I think this would be better as a film, where it could be properly fleshed out and we could actually have time to truly understand everything that's going on. I'm also a huge fan of the classic Universal monsters, haunted castles, and Halloween, so this is just a huge win for me. Side note as well, the background score of this episode is just exemplary IMO, one of the best of any Scooby episode. This episode may seem a little odd to some, but I feel everything it has going for it fits perfectly with the Scooby-Doo formula. I hope you enjoyed this article. If you have any thoughts on these, or any other episodes from either of these series, I'd love to hear people's thoughts in the comments! |
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