Three Things I Would Like to See in the Scooby Franchise in 2022

As the year concludes and we look ahead to next year, there are a couple of hopes I have for the future of the Scooby-Doo franchise. So far, we already know Scooby-Doo and Krypto Too! is coming out at some point, the Batman and Scooby-Doo Mysteries comic series will conclude with its final three issues, and we'll likely be getting six more Where Are You comics. It's also likely Velma will be released on HBO Max at some point. There are a couple of more specific hopes I have for the future of the franchise:

1. Less Crossovers
I am excited to see Scooby-Doo and Krypto Too! next year, even not having seen anything with Krypto prior to this film. I also enjoy the vast majority of the crossover films there have been. However, I do feel that the crossovers have become a bit overkill. It's gotten to the point where nearly all of the content is crossovers. Even the films that WB aren't marketing as crossovers are crossovers (i.e. Happy Halloween had Elvira and Bill Nye, Sword and the Scoob had Thundarr the Barbarian). I've enjoyed the crossovers thus far for the most part and enjoyed Guess Who, but after we just had an entire series of crossovers, I think there needs to be a bit of variety. Don't get me wrong, I'm okay with some crossovers, but I don't want it to get to the point where WB is relying so heavily on the crossover that it's all we get, and it feels like we've reached that point this year, with both DTVs being crossovers, Guess Who being a series of crossovers, and even the comic series Batman & Scooby-Doo Mysteries being all crossovers. I'm not saying they can't ever do crossovers, but I do feel like they need to dial it back a bit so that the Scooby franchise isn't being entirely supported by crossovers.

2. Ending Stock Art in Where Are You
I would like to see them continue creating new art for the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You comics like they did in #111. The constant recycling of stock art feels a bit lazy, and I just can't imagine anyone prefers this to new art. I imagine sales would boost quite a bit if they used new art, instead of the same poses over and over. Looking at my previous "hopes for the franchise" posts from past years, this has been a recurring thing that I've asked for every year. It's exciting we finally got it in #111 this year, and I'm hopeful this means it will finally happen.

3. Velma
The newly announced series Velma will be coming to HBO Max likely next year sometime. Not all that much has been announced, but unfortunately, there has been a lot of backlash already. My biggest hope with this series is that people will at least give it a chance. Sadly, this has happened before with Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! where people were so turned off by the different art style that they boycotted the show. Given the fact that this show will be targeted towards adults and seems like it will have some big changes to the Scooby-Doo formula, it's understandable that people are skeptical. What bothers me, however, are the "this show is going to ruin my childhood!" or "the Scooby franchise will end because of this show!" type comments. For the "franchise will end" type comments, I really doubt that this show is changing the trajectory of the franchise; it's just them experimenting with different elements of the franchise than they have before. Nearly everybody hated Get a Clue, but right after it, we got one of the most critically acclaimed Scooby series of all time, Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated.  For the "ruin my childhood" comments, there is still 50+ years of Scooby content to enjoy from the past, even if this series is terrible. No one is taking that away regardless of how this show turns out. The worst that can happen is that you watch an episode of Velma​ and end up hating it, in which case, you'll still have all the previous Scooby series to watch, and you'll just have to wait a little while for the next Scooby series. No one really knows for sure what the series will be like until it comes out, so there's no reason to immediately judge it and turn to the worst case scenario when we don't know much. It's understandable if people are skeptical and it may end up being terrible, but I just wish people wouldn't be so quick to judge and take their fear of the series being bad to such extreme levels. You aren't gaining anything by worrying about it being terrible, so the best thing to do is just wait until we're able to see it.

Looking back on my three hopes for this year (written last December), it looks like we got two out of the three of them (though the two we got were simply that the DTVs this year and last 11 episodes of Guess Who would be good). The only one we still haven't gotten is rescheduling Scooby-Doo and the Lost City of Gold, since it's a shame that the performers spent so long preparing only to have it almost immediately cancelled after a few shows. That couldn't happen for obvious reasons though, with the COVID-19 pandemic.

There's a lot of things I'm hoping for, because I want only the best for the Scooby franchise, but based on what's been announced, these are the biggest three that I'd like to see next year. I hope 2022 is an amazing year for Scooby!