Archive Panic: This franchise has run since 1969, with 16 TV series (almost 400 episodes), five live-action movies, 29 direct-to-video movies and 10 video games.
Audience-Alienating Era: Varies like other Hanna-Barbera shows; some series and characters serve as the jumping on point while some choose to leave at certain points:
The most common is to jump off when Scrappy-Doo arrives, skipping the series in which he appears, then jumping on again.
Some others jump off upon A Pup Named Scooby-Doo.
Even further, some people consider the real end being when the Hanna-Barbera name died, so ending at Cyber Chase.
And an interesting twist: Some people have discounted the TV shows of Shaggy and Scooby-Doo Get a Clue! and Mystery Incorporated but are still in favor of the direct-to-video movies.
Be Cool, Scooby-Doo is controversial due to its radical changes in character design and characterization, leading to some fans jumping off.
One of the most divisive issues in regards to the franchise is whether or not it benefits with Mystery, Inc. encountering and dealing with real monsters and ghosts instead of just criminals disguised as ghosts and monsters. Many fans argue that the point of Scooby-Doo is the skepticism of the supernatural and see the existence of real monsters in the setting as a betrayal of the point of the series feeling it turns it into just another kids show with monsters, while fans supportive of the concept do so because having Scooby and the gang face genuine supernatural phenomenon adds some variety to the formula. A primary reason for the naysayers' contempt is how many of the franchise installments with genuine supernatural elements (such as The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School, and Scooby-Doo! and the Reluctant Werewolf) were part of the era featuring the polarizing character Scrappy-Doo, while defenders tend to point Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island and Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated which contain real monsters and are regarded as some of the finest works on the franchise. A third set of fans argue that real monsters are fine as long as they are balanced with a mystery.
The members of Mystery, Inc. being romantically involved with each other has become a point of contention later on, shippers of course approve and many fans love to see certain characters dynamics being more explored, while other fans interpret the whole Mystery, Inc as platonic True Companions and think adding romance can come up as a distraction of the mysteries, particulary with Mystery Incorporated, Curse of The Lake Monster and especially Velma getting accusations of Romantic Plot Tumor. There are also those who see Fred/Daphne as the One True Pairing but consider making any other character relationship romantic to contradict their characterizations, and on the other hand there are those who find Fred/Daphne to be boring and would love the franchise to explore other dynamics.
The Take That, Scrappy! jokes had become this later on, some fans still find them hilarious mostly out of hatred towards the character, while others (even those who still hate him) feel it has become a meanspirited Discredited Meme that has gone way too far and a lazy way to pander to his detractors. There's also a bit of a Broken Base into whatever the writers should try to Rescue him form his own Heap or if it's too late and is better to leave him alone.
Character Perception Evolution: While Scrappy-Doo from Scooby-Doo may be the Trope Namer of The Scrappy, when introduced in Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo, his popularity saved the show from being pulled off airwaves due to its waning ratings, being the Kid-Appeal Character in a cast filled by teenagers and an adult dog. However the attempt to cash in on this popularity by turning Scrappy into a Spotlight-Stealing Squad in The Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo Show would forever taint fan reception of the character due to Velma, Daphne, and Fred being removed from the cast, along with the series shifting from a half-hour mystery series investigating fake monsters to a Three Shorts format where Scrappy, Scooby and Shaggy face real monsters. By the time of the series revival in the Scooby-Doo Direct-to-Video Film Series, the fandom hate of Scrappy-Doo bled into franchise and any later mention of the character tends to be a Take That, Scrappy! moment. After the 2000s, however, fans turned him into a Base-Breaking Character as a number of them pointed out his nobler traits of bravery and loyalty to his uncle Scooby and him being blamed for ruining a franchise that he actually saved.
The "Shaggy is a stoner" theory uses as evidence that Shaggy is the only one who can hear Scooby-Doo talk among the gang, which isn't true. While Shaggy is the one that interacts with Scooby the most, there are multiple instances through the franchise of Scooby talking with the rest of the Gang, even back in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, one of the earliest episodes ("Decoy for a Dognapper") involves Fred explaining the plan to Scooby for the resolution to happen.
"Scrappy is weak and the joke is that he doesn't know it." The joke actually was that everyone ignored that Scrappy was capable of insane feats of super strength. This was not a gag, Scrappy was frequently shown carrying a passed out from fright Scooby or Shaggy (or both at the same time). Shaggy and Scooby didn't exactly ignore it, as one episode showed them casually having Scrappy act as a living carjack for the mystery machine. They just would rather run away from the monster. Two episodes actually lampoon this by having Scrappy easily catch the crook early in the episode, but having it not stick through some way or another. The first time was in "The Scarab Lives" where Scrappy ran after the Scarab (a fit, grown man disguising himself as a super hero) and drag him by the leg back to the gang, unfortunately the Scarab performed an instant costume change and the gang thought he'd just caught a random guy.note Sadly, despite that it actually became a clue later that nobody ran past the rest of the gang coming down the hall when Scrappy caught the scarab, nobody at all acknowledged Scrappy's contribution-even though he'd just saved Fred, Velma, and Daphne's lives by jumping off a 20 foot tall conveyor belt of doom to cover the Scarab (who had them cornered and was advancing) around his eyes, putting said villain in the perfect position be steamrolled by Shaggy and Scooby. The second time he caught a snake demon in full costume, but Shaggy and Scooby were too scared to think straight, dragged him away, causing him to let go of the monster. He later did catch the monster using an impromptu slingshot (this was, like the last three incidents, again completely ignored by everybody-hence why it's "common knowledge" that he was useless)
Simone Lenoir and Lena Dupree from Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island, despite being one-shot villains, are quite popular for being the first enemies in the franchise to be treated as a serious threat, being both appealing in human form and outright scary in monster form, having a tragic backstory, and for suffering a Family-Unfriendly Death that would give child fans of the franchise nightmares.
Dr. Amelia von Butch from Scooby-Doo Where's My Mummy is a ruthless, scornful tomb raider, but a well-equipped tomb robber dressed like a video game character, who fights back impressively against the mummies. The same is true of her team, to some degree.
Ben and Sarah Ravencroft once the former starts throwing around his magic and revealing his Batman Gambit in Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost and the latter pulls an Eviler than Thou on the former as soon as she is summoned.
The villains of Scooby-Doo: Pirates Ahoy are a billionaire adventurer introduced flying a jetpack and a very competent hypnotist with a Batman Gambit to steal a meteor of solid gold.
With its simple-but-charming formula, the series is perfect for any fanfic writer to jump in and play with. Much like Doctor Who, it's ultimately just about a group of close-knit friends and their never-ending travels in a Signature Team Transport, where practically anything can happen.
Scrappy's background. Who is his father? What happened to his mother? And what were the circumstances behind him leaving to join Mystery Inc.? What were his early days with the group like?
Shaggy, and oftentimes Scooby, as stoners is a long-standing Urban Legend, to the point where The Movie even made jokes about it.
Fred/Daphne started like this before it was canonized in the 1990s.
Dusk's real name being Muffy/Jane St. James and Luna's real name being Kimberly Moss are from a popular fanfiction and have been commonly accepted in the fan community.
While Velma is straight in most cases, many fans tend to depict her as being bisexual or a lesbian, due to in part to her Les Yay with Daphne. It helps that the 2002 live action film originally was planned to make Velma a lesbian (until it was cut out entirely by Executive Meddling) and the idea became Ascended Fanon in Mystery Incorporated via Word of Gay confirming that Velma and Marcie became an Official Couple, and in Trick or Treat Scooby Doo!, which sees Velma crush on new character Coco.
Fair for Its Day: While there have been several instances of Values Dissonance, as shown below, there were several times where the show was remarkably progressive for the time.
While there were a number of times that First Nations were depicted incredibly badly, or their cultures and language was played for comedy, which is cringe-inducing today, the gang shows plenty of respect to the people themselves, and the First Nations people who are interacted with do not have any traditional stereotypes attached to them. This was unheard of in the '60s and '70s and it still rarely happens today.
While Daphne was all too often depicted as being the one who fell into traps and becomes the Damsel in Distress, there were a number of times where she was able to escape by herself, and at times, throw a wrench into the current villain's plan, which did not happen often in the '60s.
Fan Nickname: In Mexico, Scooby is nicknamed as "Stupi-Doo", a pormanteau of "estupido" (stupid) and "Scooby-Doo", due of his perceived stupidity.
Friendly Fandoms: Due to the number of crossovers they have had, Scooby-Doo fans tend to get along with Batman fans. However this is usually limited to more light hearted portrayals of the Caped Crusader.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Like many of Hanna-Barbera's shows, the franchise has a strong fan following in the United Kingdom.
Scooby is also one of Hanna-Barbera's biggest franchises in Latin America, rivaling only The Flintstones, and Top Cat.
He Really Can Act: Any time Don Messick has to voice both Scooby and Scrappy, a prominent character combo whenever the latter showed up. He plays off of himself so well, a first-time viewer would not at first guess that the two are voiced by the same guy.
The last scene of the What's New episode "Pompeii and Circumstance". Supping on a plate of spaghetti, Shaggy and Scooby are sucking in the same noodle, and... well, you know what happens next. Of course, they're both repulsed by the result.
In "Bravo Dooby Doo", when Daphne suggests they split up, she says she and Velma will search the basement. Fred gives her a knowing smirk, so she goes with Fred instead while Velma goes with Scooby and Shaggy with Johnny. Although this is mainly ship tease for Daphne and Fred.
Hollywood Homely: Played depressingly straight in a few episodes of Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. Though that series redesigned Velma to give her a more slim and petite look, there were a few episodes where it was constantly pointed out how fat and unattractive she was. It's particularly jarring, as Mystery Inc. is so often praised for good writing.
Mystery Incorporated had a recurring sub-plot that had Scooby being jealous of Velma as Shaggy's girlfriend. This given as a Take That! towards Curse of the Lake Monster: Shaggy develops a crush on Velma and it has Scooby feeling a bit left out at times only for Velma and Shag to kiss and realize relationships aren't for them. Of course, Scooby's jealousy is completely played for laughs.
Scooby: Hmph. Velma, Velma, Velma.
The live-action movie Daphne And Velma is about when the two girls of Mystery Inc. first met. LGBT fans ate it up.
From Jeepers, It's the Creeper: At the school's barn dance, Shaggy is dancing with Velma when Scooby enters and asks Shaggy to let him cut in. To Velma's shock and disappointment, Scooby goes off dancing with Shaggy.
Velma: Well, I've been a wallflower before. But this is ridiculous!
In "The Haunted Showboat," the episode where they meet Josie and the Pussycats, after they ran into the gang Velma just happens to have her hand on Alexandra's leg. Alexandra then shook Velma's hand off her leg.
Daphne and Velma are shown sharing a bed and huddled close in The New Scooby-Doo Movies episode "The Mystery of Haunted Island".
In Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! "Greece is the Word", Daphne (her Greek counterpart with the same name) is very protective of Princess Velmonia (Velma's Greek counterpart), even calling her "beloved" at one point.
Despite having a number of male love interests in the cartoons, there's been a long-standing theory that Velma is lesbian and is considered to be an icon of sorts amongst the lesbian community, due to her character and design fitting many lesbian stereotypes, on top of her Les Yay with Daphne in a few works. Her lesbian following has since exploded in the 2010s and 2020s, thanks to Word of God confirming her to be a lesbian in a relationship with Marcie in Mystery Incorporated following her failed romance with Shaggy, on top of Trick or Treat Scooby Doo! having her explicitly fall in love with a woman in the form of Coco.
In the 2000s and especially the 2010s, Daphne caught on as a bisexual icon. This largely has to do with her and Velma becoming a Fan-Preferred Couple.
Memetic Badass: Amusingly enough, despite the fact that he's canonically a cowardly goofball only capable of bravery when there's an edible payoff involved, Shaggy eventually developed this reputation, with many fans arguing that he's actually an entity of godlike powerwho deliberately keeps his true strength at bay so to protect the criminals and other members of Mystery Inc., with many drawing fanart of him beating the tar out of obviously stronger characters like Goku, Superman, Sasuke, Dio, or Thanos. Some people have even proposed that Scooby Snax don't make Shaggy stronger, they actually make him weaker for the protection of everyone else.
Memetic Molester: Hoo, boy. Do not Google the Ghost Clown without SafeSearch on.
In canon, Scrappy had super strength and was actually the one to put away the monster for the gang on many occasions. His Hatedom tends to portray him as a Boisterous Weakling with a massive Napoleon Complex. This can be partially blamed on Standards And Practices putting a limit on how much Scrappy could do to help combat-wise, the reasoning being that having a child being so capable would give kids the wrong ideaabout their own capabilities, and the fact that the writers realizing that if Scrappy were able to reliably act on his super strength the story would be significantly shorter. Thusly, they resorted to handing Scrappy a major Idiot Ball to keep him from being too overpowered, or, more often, writing Shaggy and Scooby to carry Scrappy away from the "scary monster" before Scrappy could actually fight it. Due to the fans' hatred for Scrappy, many of them took this at face value.
Shaggy and Scooby are, in canon, fairly goofy and uninvolved in the mysteries, but fairly clever when it came to evading monsters (The only reason they didn't stay far away in the first place was them being pushed or bribed into it by their friends) and Scooby is known to be fairly fierce with spooks when his friends are in danger. They're commonly portrayed in fanworks (And some post-WB reboots) as complete morons who would literally be unable to function without Fred, Daphne, and Velma holding their hands every single second of their waking lives.
Mis-blamed: Many people blame Scrappy-Doo for ruining Scooby-Doo (specifically, dumping half the original cast, switching to a Two Shorts format, and the franchise's first clumsy attempts to lose the "Scooby-Doo" Hoax) due to the timing of his introduction.
Ironically, Scrappy is what saved the show from cancellation way back in 1979. The writers did work to save Fred, Velma, and Daphne (in the form of giving them spotlight episodes such as "The Night Ghoul of Wonderworld" for Velma, and "I left my neck in San Fransisco" which has Daphne being a victim of a frame-up by the monster of the week and Fred and Velma to carry the investigation B-Plot themselves.) Without Scrappy, they would have faded. With Scrappy, their show was able to survive and they were able to be preserved and return at a later date with stronger characterization (Such as Pup). And the success of that new incarnation of Scooby-Doo is likely what has kept the franchise going on for some 40 years. It doesn't help that nearly everyone hates the poor character as if he had destroyed an entire planet despite the fact he was only created by mandate. To put how much people don't like him is ... an understatement.
Moral Event Horizon: There have been some villains that were people dressed as monsters that have actually attempted to murder or critically maim the gang in order to keep their schemes safe (The Snow Ghost, Mr. Hyde, the Ghost of the Red Baron, among others). This explains why Shaggy and Scooby are Lovable Cowards.
Frank Welker is often misattributed of having voiced Scooby-Doo since the original series in 1969. While he has in fact voiced Fred since the beginning, he did not start voicing the titular dog until 2002, starting with What's New, Scooby-Doo?.
Daphne is often believed to have always been the rich member of the Scooby Gang. While it is true that ever since A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, she has been consistently shown to come from a wealthy family, before then, her wealth status was actually unknown, but there wasn't any indication that she was any richer than her friends, implying that she came from their same economic bracket.
Once Original, Now Common: The sheer number of tropes and conventions the Scooby Doo franchise is responsible for might rival the number of stars in the sky at this point, including "Scooby-Doo" Hoax, You Meddling Kids, Blind Without 'Em in Velma's case, The Scrappy, Scooby-Dooby Doors, and more. Because of this, if one should watch the earlier installments of Scooby Doo, those shows with all these elements might feel really dated, cliche, or cheesy. But it's because of Scooby Doo in the franchise's formulative years that many of these storytelling conventions even became tropes today and because of that, the Scooby franchise has had a massive influence on Western Animation and even some live action shows and movies today. And even the Audience-Alienating Era where Scrappy became prominent was influential in being the Trope Namer that allows fans of all entertainment mediums today to identify and codify a certain type of character that they universally hate. Simply put, without the Scooby Doo franchise, the way we identify and codify tropes might be a lot different today.
Parody Displacement: How many modern viewers (heck, how many viewers period) know that the main human characters are all based on the main characters from The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis (Fred = Dobie, Shaggy = Maynard, Daphne = Thalia, Velma = Zelda)? Considering that one was a reasonably popular sitcom from the early 60s and the other is one of the longest-running media franchises of all time, chances are slim to none.
Periphery Demographic: To some people, the franchise is mere formulaic kid stuff, but science pundit, Carl Sagan, loved the show in the sense that it basically promoted a skeptic point of view of the supernatural with the heroes continually exposing paranormal incidents as mere elaborate hoaxes and providing logical explanations instead.
Popularity Polynomial: This applies to Scrappy-Doo, believe it or not. He wasn't terribly hated at the time of his debut, but as time went on, he went down in history as the Trope Codifier for the trope he named. Nowadays, though, more of his fans have come out of the woodwork (and even some of his haters have warmed up to him slightly) and believe that Scrappy could be rescued from his own heap if someone actually tried to improve him as a character. People are more willing defend the little guy, as well, such as pointing out how he actually saved Scooby-Doo from petering out. Of course, that isn't to say people don't still hate him now, but the reception to the critter is warmer than it has been in years.
Popular with Furries: Scooby is extremely popular in the furry crowd. Which is a no-brainer, seeing as he's a very cute and lovable dog.
Ironically, it's not Scrappy but Daphne and Fred in recent TV shows and DTV movies. While neither character was ever disliked, they were seen as more generic than their friends early on, but moving forward they were given their own unique personality traits and quirks to better set them apart.
Funny enough, Scrappy himself was rescued for several shows. He matured somewhat and showed capability to actually handle some of the bad guys, unfortunately this largely goes unnoticed and as a result, this didn't stop him from being the Trope Namer for a character that a large amount of people hate.
The Trope Namer himself, Scrappy Doo. While the vitriol isn't nearly as bad as it was originally, it's undeniable that he was one.
Before Scrappy, there was Scooby-Dum. Though generally speaking, people didn't seem to mind him as much, as he had a low-key personality in contrast to Scrappy, who started out as high-strung and obnoxious. Scooby-Dum even made it into the Laff-a-Lympics team over the other gang members.
Self-Fanservice: While Daphne is the resident Ms. Fanservice, most fanartists or cosplayers pay more attention to Velma. Seriously, check any pornographic/Rule 34 site and chances are Velma has TWICE the amount of pictures Daphne has, let alone more that any other character in the franchise.
Sacred Cow: Although there are ups and downs within the franchise, the first series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! is considered to be the best installment of the franchise and fans will get defensive if criticism is bought up about it,
Tainted by the Preview: Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! was met with disdain before it even aired, due to its Family Guy-like design and humor.
The girls in Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School, especially Patty Maloney as the mummy girl.
"Fred Bat" in the What's New, Scooby-Doo? episode "The Vampire Strikes Back".
Values Dissonance: Given the franchise is 50 years old, some of the older shows have depictions and plots that would make modern viewers cringe.
Depicting Daphne as a constant Damsel in Distress in the '60s and part of the '70s would be very hard to get away with in the current decade due to the rise of several powerful female protagonists. However it should be noted as time went on, HB's You Meddling Kids roster included a lot more strong minded and strong willed females, and by the '80s, Daphne had been reformed to being a role model leader. This is a fact that often gets overlooked by people less familiar with the roster.
Several episodes, especially in the '60s and '70s, have played Indigenous culture and language for cheap jokes, or them being used for gags. The increasing awareness about how many Indigenous languages and cultures are imperilled with extinction, along with the issue of cultural appropriation, would make any such depiction impossible today.
The series had numerous Asian caricatures, and extremely stereotyped accents, along with Shaggy having mimic such accents during his many Bavarian Fire Drill against the Chinese-themed villain of the week - none of these would fly today.
The reason the creators made Velma Hollywood Homely was because, back then, the idea of a woman being both beautiful and intelligent was unrealistic.
Vindicated by History: Scrappy-Doo's relentless mockery, as expected for being the inspiration for The Scrappy, is slowly starting to dissipate, to the point that some people want to see him implemented into the show again outside of being the butt of the joke in various cameos. In hindsight, it's generally regarded that he helped prolong the show and the decline in quality was largely outside of the existence of the character, and even those who find his antics obnoxious in his early appearances warmed up to him when they watch later series with him such as The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo and the three made-for-TV movies.
