To keep the scope of this poll manageable, I'm only including villains that were presented as robots the entire episode. Villains that were unmasked as robots at the end of the episode are not included.
Last week's "best Mexico episode" poll wasn't even a slightly close race lol. Here are the results: Monster of Mexico - 49 The Fiesta Host Is an Aztec Ghost - 13 El Bandito - 8 Twenty Thousand Screams Under the Sea - 2 Scooby's Bull Fright - 2 The Dinosaur Deception - 2 Acapulco and England - 1
42 Comments
Becker
5/12/2024 08:14:20 am
Howl of the Fright Hound and Midnight Zone are high quality SDMI eps as per. Computer Walks Among Us and Me, Myself & A.I are also great, among the best of their respective shows. But ultimately it comes down to Foul Play in Funland and High-Tech House of the Future, two of favorite eps of the entire franchise. Foul Play is one of the most iconic episodes, monsters and settings of the franchise, while High-Tech House is in contention for my 2nd favorite WNSD ep behind Simple Plan (and maybe a bit underrated in that sense). I think I will give the slight edge to Foul Play here for how incredibly timeless and entertaining it is, there's a really cozy nature to it, but it could honestly go either way for me.
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Becker
5/12/2024 08:22:14 am
Btw, shouldn't Night Ghoul of Wonderworld, Go West Young Scoob and Big Appetite in Little Tokyo count too? Three very underrated/less talked about eps imo.
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Mr Neither
5/12/2024 09:04:16 am
Oh yes, Night Ghoul of Wonderworld is a classic. Giant Problems is another missed one. 5/12/2024 11:05:36 am
The first two would count and I added them! "Big Appetite in Little Tokyo" would not though, as we don't discover it's a robot until the end of the episode. Like I mentioned in the post, since there are so many episodes where the villain turns out to be a robot at the end, I didn't include those to keep the amount of options manageable. The same would go for "Giant Problems."
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Mr Neither
5/12/2024 08:14:44 am
Unpopular opinion most likely but I see Robot episodes as pretty meh as it removes the suspense of working out who's behind the mask. Howl of the Frighthound though was absolutely terrifying and Foul Play in Funland had some funny moments. Went for Terminator Scoob in the end.
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Becker
5/12/2024 08:17:57 am
It doesn't remove the suspense of working out the culprit, cuz there's still the mystery of who is controlling the robot(s).
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Mr Neither
5/12/2024 09:01:00 am
There is that but it just doesn't feel the same. 5/12/2024 11:06:34 am
I found the list to be a mixed bag. My top 5 is amazing, but the rest range from decently good to fever dream tier (in the case of "Robot Ranch" lol).
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Shadowscooby
5/12/2024 09:15:48 am
Foul Play In Funland
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Shadowscooby
5/12/2024 09:23:55 am
Where’s Go West Young Scoob and When Urkel Bots Go Bad?
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5/12/2024 11:01:21 am
15. Robot Ranch
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5/12/2024 11:07:35 am
I would put "Night Ghoul of Wonderworld" at #6 between "The Computer Walks Among Us" and "Go West Young Scoob."
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Becker
5/12/2024 12:22:29 pm
I just realized, shouldn't it be High-Tech House of Horrors?
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5/12/2024 12:59:59 pm
There are two different titles for the episode, for some reason. I think it originally aired as "Horrors," but similarly to the "Who Was That Cat Creature I Saw You With Last Night?"/"Make a Beeline Away from that Feline" situation, WB later started referring to it as "High Tech House of the Future" on streaming, DVDs and reruns. Wasn't really thinking about it when I set the poll up, tbh. I can switch it, since I think I usually refer to Beeline by it's original title, but both are accurate.
Becker
5/12/2024 01:02:29 pm
I might be misremembering, but I don't think I had seen it called High-Tech House of the Future before. I didn't even realize it had two names. It was always High-Tech House of Horrors to me. 5/12/2024 01:06:03 pm
I looked it up and it appears it's kind of a mixed bag. Boomerang and Tubi refer to it as "Horrors," but Amazon and Apple TV have it as "The Future." I know the season 2 DVD also lists it as "The Future."
JakeSDfan27
5/12/2024 11:26:07 am
Foul Play in Funland (Great)
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Shadowscooby
5/12/2024 12:57:48 pm
Me Myself and A.I:
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5/12/2024 01:02:14 pm
This was a fun episode, and it's one of my favorite Be Cool episodes. I really liked the villain here! I also liked the message of the dangers of being too dependent on technology. Yeah, the remote control arm was neat! The reference to Charlie the Robot/the gang's classic designs was really cool.
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Matt
5/12/2024 03:17:32 pm
Won't rank Party Arty, but can rank the rest
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5/12/2024 03:25:33 pm
14. Same for me. It was initially a favorite of mine because I thought making the voice actors the guest stars was cool, but over time, it shrunk on me due to the Where Are You villains not being used in a creative way at all. I also thought the gimmick where the gang just keeps saying the villains seem "familiar" was kind of a weird tease, considering it didn't lead to anything.
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Becker
5/12/2024 04:18:18 pm
14. That's just Guess Who in a nutshell, it does nothing creative.
Matt
5/12/2024 06:52:57 pm
14. Yeah for me, once the "Wow! It is the voice actors!" effect wore off, I realized how I thought nothing else in the episode was worth returning to and was actually pretty bad 5/12/2024 08:38:19 pm
Although the episode has grown on me and I like it a lot now, I still wouldn't say Charlie stands out to me as one of the better villains from Where Are You. He is a good villain but I wouldn't put him among my favorites of the franchise or even that series.
Becker
5/12/2024 04:19:49 pm
I know it's probably meaningless to ask, but is there any reason why the Guess Who episodes are in that order or was it just the flip of a coin lol
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Matt
5/12/2024 06:56:48 pm
They are kind of ordered, but I'm not too attached to them being moved around, I think pretty much every episode in that series is at least bad. Urkel gets last because I think he is a really annoying guest star, Haunt of a Thousand Voices is next for wasting the voice actor plot on a weak episode, and I give the edge to Jeopardy out of the two remaining
Carson Maitland - Smith
5/12/2024 06:14:59 pm
A Haunt of a Thousand Voices
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Jacob Staggs
5/12/2024 06:39:27 pm
15) Howl of the Fright Hound - It is a Mystery Incorporated episode.
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5/12/2024 08:39:28 pm
Surprised to see you rank two Scrappy shorts so low, but I completely agree with you that the series doesn't use robots in a comedic or interesting way.
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Jacob Staggs
5/13/2024 12:02:10 am
How in the world did I forget Party Arty? That would have the number 2 spot for sure.
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Dzsasztin
5/13/2024 04:54:09 am
I seldom do a full ranking like this, but this time I just couldn't help myself, since it's such an amazing line-up of episodes.
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Dzsasztin
5/13/2024 05:03:26 am
Oops, so I made a pretty big mistake, stating the culprit only appears after the fact in Foul Play in Funland, they have a scene earlier, but everything else stands.
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5/13/2024 04:17:58 pm
8. I don't think anyone needs to apologize for liking Guess Who. I don't hate it as much as Becker and especially Matt do, but I have grown to consider the series quite bland when I've rewatched it. Definitely don't agree the characterizations are better than Where Are You though, but to each their own.
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Dzsasztin
5/15/2024 08:09:41 am
Ok, I don’t exactly remember what got left out 😅, the main point was that the reason why people keep trying to reinvent the franchise is that Where are You is a masterclass in atmosphere creation, and no other series ever managed to bring quite the same mood. Some later Scooby series came close, like some of The Scooby-Doo Show, but even Hanna Barbera could never do that magic again and they tried countless times, as did Joe Ruby and Ken Spears later, but something special happened at the production of Where Are You, because everything worked out for that show overall, and that there is also a very a good reason why 1969 episodes almost always seem to win these weekly polls.
Dzsasztin
5/15/2024 08:23:33 am
As much heart and personality the original Daphne and Fred had in Where Are You, their unique traits weren’t capitalized on, unlike in Guess Who for instance, which gives them plenty of genuine character moments, like when Fred gives the money they earned away in the Penn & Teller episode, which is something the original incarnation would have done without the gang’s sarcastic reaction. This is why I compared the two, since Mystery Incorporated and Be Cool actually goes overboard and builds the stories on the characters’ personalities, in Guess Who they are reserved, but still show it off regularly. Velma, Shaggy and Scooby-Doo had plenty of these character moments in the first season of Where Are You, but Daphne and Fred got to shine a lot more later, like in The New Scooby-Doo Movies, and even in Guess Who. 5/15/2024 11:14:44 am
I completely agree that Where Are You had an incredible atmosphere that no other series managed to match. I'd say The Scooby-Doo Show had a slightly different type of atmosphere, but it was equally amazing imo.
Becker
5/15/2024 01:44:01 pm
I vibe with The Scooby-Doo Show's vibe more, but I can't deny Where Are You's atmosphere is unique in this franchise. Top notch, no other installment has that same type of atmosphere (though there are some with really amazing atmosphere on their own too).
Becker
5/15/2024 01:45:37 pm
I meant vibe with TSDS's style, not vibing with vibe lol.
Becker
5/14/2024 12:37:59 am
8) To each their own, but I disagree hard with those comparisons. It's a more rushed and formulaic New Movies at best, not worst, in my opinion; while the other two comparisons don't ever apply for me.
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Matt
5/14/2024 09:45:33 am
I definitely agree with Becker here. Everyone is welcome to their opinion on the show, to each their own, but I disagree HARD with those comparisons as well. And even calling it a rushed and more formulaic New Scooby Doo Movies episode at best might even be a bit generous for my personal disdain of this show lol Leave a Reply. |
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