Western Animation / SCOOB!

Mystery loves company.

Fred: This isn’t about some guy in a rubber mask.
Daphne: This is about one of us.

SCOOB! is a 2020 CGI animated film based on the Scooby-Doo franchise, directed by Tony Cervone (Space Jam and Duck Dodgers) and animated by Reel FX Creative Studios, and is intended to kick off a shared cinematic universe of Hanna-Barbera properties.

Ever since childhood, Shaggy (Will Forte), Fred (Zac Efron), Daphne (Amanda Seyfried), and Velma (Gina Rodriguez) have been solving mysteries together with Shaggy's dog Scooby-Doo (Frank Welker). After all those years, Mystery, Inc. is forced into their greatest mystery yet when the Blue Falcon (Mark Wahlberg) recruits Shaggy and Scooby to stop Dick Dastardly (Jason Isaacs) from using the ghost dog Cerberus to unleash a "dog-pocalypse," all while learning about Scooby's true purpose.

Other voices include Tracy Morgan as Captain Caveman, Ken Jeong as Dynomutt, Kiersey Clemons as Dee Dee Skyes, Henry Winkler as Keith, and Simon Cowell As Himself.

The film was set to be released in theaters on May 15, 2020 but due to the COVID-19 Coronavirus shutting down theaters it instead went straight to streaming that same day, similar to what Universal did with Trolls: World Tour. A few weeks later, it was announced the film would also receive an early premiere on HBO Max on June 26. Despite this, the film received a minor theatrical release on May 21, 2021.

A spinoff film set in Mystery Inc.'s younger years, titled SCOOB!: Holiday Haunt, was set to release on HBO Max in 2022, but appears to have been cancelled by an effort for Warner Bros to focus more on theatrical releases. What this means for rest of the Hanna-Barbera Cinematic Universe they were setting up is uncertain.

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SCOOB! contains examples of:

• Actor Allusion:
  • Shaggy tells Blue Falcon to drop some f-bombs (as in Falcon Bombs). Brian is voiced by the normally incredibly sweary Mark Wahlberg.
  • Captain Caveman's Noodle Incident about thinking he was a velociraptor's father may be a subtle nod to Tracy Morgan's own Really Gets Around brand of comedy.
• Adaptational Attractiveness: Similar to the live-action films, Velma's nerdy demeanor is still present but she's nowhere near as frumpy looking as some of her prior animated incarnations.
• Adaptational Badass: Dick Dastardly has a huge, muscular build this time. Jason Isaacs, who voices Dastardly, described this interpretation of the character in an interview as having "a giant simian jaw and a huge kind of Mr. Incredible body. He’s slightly more of a force in this."
• Adaptational Context Change: In some earlier Scooby-Doo media, it was revealed that Scooby Snacks were named after Scooby himself. Here, it's the other way around.
• Adaptational Intelligence:
  • Dynomutt is less of a goofy idiot sidekick, and more along the Hyper-Competent Sidekick alongside Dee Dee.
  • Captain Caveman is not only smarter, but he doesn't speak in broken English.
  • Even Dick Dastardly himself is hit with this. He's gone From Nobody to Nightmare, he's much more of a force to be reckoned with physically and mentally, he has much more nefarious plots and schemes, goes to more extreme measures to accomplish his plans, and even built his very own robot army and warship.
• Adaptational Nationality: Due to her Ambiguously Brown skin and use of Gratuitous Spanish, it's implied Velma may be Latina in this adaption.
• Adapted Out: Although Captain Caveman and Dee Dee feature, the other two Teen Angels, Taffy and Brenda, aren't seen or mentioned.
• Admiring the Abomination: When examining one of the robots that attacked Shaggy and Scooby, Velma gushes that she wants to shake the hand of the person who made it, only backtracking when Fred and Daphne glare at her.
• Adorable Evil Minions: Dastardly's Mecha-Mooks the Rottens can turn into adorable baby looking robots.
• Age-Progression Song: The recreated opening sequence (see Mythology Gag below) cuts from the preteen gang to the teenaged Mystery Inc. midway through.
• Airborne Aircraft Carrier: The film's version of the Mean Machine fits this to a T.
• All There in the Manual: The names of several characters, such as the two cops who investigate the spooky mansion at the start, are only revealed in the credits.
• Alternate Continuity: This film is one in general to the usual Hanna-Barbera continuity flux. It establishes a new version of Shaggy and Scooby's first meeting, ignoring earlier depictions in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! and A Pup Named Scooby-Doo. It also in general uses and alters characters and ideas used past but in a Setting Update.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Apparently two of Dick Dastardly's crimes are tripping over old ladies and using his mother's Netflix, which is viewed as horrible as any other major criminal scheme.
• An Aesop: People change, but that doesn't mean friendships have to.
• As Himself: Simon Cowell appears as himself.
• The Backwards Я: The Greek letters in the movie create nonsense words and names. For example, "Peritas" is spelled ΡΣRITAS. Apart from the S and R (two characters that don't exist in Greek), this would spell "RSRITAS". It should be spelled "ΠEPITAΣ".
• Bait-and-Switch Comment: When Dick Dastardly is chasing Shaggy and Scooby.
  Dick Dastardly: Stop right there, you filthy animal, and your dog, too.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: The gang gets an ally in the form of the Rotten whose head was replaced with a dustbuster when Daphne cleans out his head's filter. The little guy is so grateful afterwards that he helps the gang out several times over the course of the movie and becomes a permanent member by the end.
• Berserk Button: Parodied when the Mystery Machine gets shot out of the sky in Athens; after this Fred (after standing stunned in front of the totaled vehicle) armors himself with parts of the ruined vehicle and charges at Cerberus (to little effect).
  • Blue Falcon finds out the (very) hard way that you DO NOT insult Captain Caveman's height.
• Big Brother Instinct: Fred shows this towards Shaggy and Scooby in the movie. The best examples are when he didn't hesitate to go to their aid when he thought they were in danger and standing up for Shaggy when Blue Falcon was blaming him for Scooby's capture.
• Book Ends: The film begins and ends at the same beach where Scooby and Shaggy first met.
• Brick Joke: When Brian first introduces himself to Shaggy and Scooby, he cuts the introduction early because his engineer Keith never released the balloons at the end. Said balloons are released long after the chase between the Falcon Fury and Dastardly, and Shaggy and Scooby take up Blue Falcon's offer to join them on their mission.
• …But He Sounds Handsome: “Officer Jaffe” specifically compliments Dastardly while questioning Fred, Velma and Daphne. Dick drops the facade when the trio insult him.
• The Cameo: The Creative Closing Credits have a host of them, such as Atom Ant, Jabberjaw, Grape Ape, Rosie (in pictures on blueprints), and Frankenstein Jr. (in a half-built state).
• Canon Foreigner: Brian, Radley Crown's son and the newest Blue Falcon was created for the universe of this movie rather than originating from Dynomutt, Dog Wonder.
• Cast as a Mask: As per usual for the franchise, Dick Dastardly, who's voiced by Jason Isaacs, disguises himself as Officer Jaffe, who's voiced by Christina Hendricks.
• Close on Title: Like the previous Warner Animation Group films (with the exception of The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part) this film's title appears just before the credits.
• Comically Missing the Point: Young Shaggy mistakes young Velma's Ruth Bader Ginsburg costume for Harry Potter, resulting in this exchange:
  Shaggy: And are you... Harry Potter?
  Velma: I'm Ruth Bader Ginsburg, obviously.
  Shaggy: Which house is she in? Hufflepuff?
  Velma: She's a Supreme Court justice.
  Shaggy: Oh. Slytherin.
  • After capturing Fred, Velma, and Daphne:
  Dastardly: The poor man's Hemsworth stays with me.
  Fred: How dare you- wait, Chris or Liam?
• Crush Filter: Fred, who loves the Mystery Machine, gets a brief one when a hot blonde cop pulls him over. It is subverted soon after when revealed as a disguise.
• Cry into Chest: Velma and Daphne sob sadly in Fred's chest when Shaggy sacrifices himself in Scooby's stead going into the portal.
• Dastardly Whiplash: When one of the Trope Namers is in this film, it's a given. Dick Dastardly retains his signature handlebar mustache, but he's ditched his hat and goggles while still retaining his red gloves and purple coat.
• Deadpan Snarker: Daphne asks whether Scooby & Shaggy were kidnapped by her father when Velma finds a hair containing mustache oil and cheap aftershave.
  • Dynomutt of all characters seems to have become one thanks to Adaptational Intelligence.
• Digital Piracy Is Evil: Daphne and Velma talk about how heinous a villain Dick Dastardly is after they find out that he watches Netflix without paying for it by using his mother's account.
• Divergent Character Evolution: While Scooby and Dynomutt did have differences in prior incarnations, the two filled very similar roles in their respective series, and neither were very bright. In this film, Scooby remains the same, whereas Dynomutt has been made smarter and snarkier, and his design was overhauled to play up the Robot Dog aspect.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Dick Dastardly is, obviously, a dastard, but his entire motivation is to get Muttley back from the underworld. When the two finally reunite, Dick can't even keep up his usual Bad Boss routine for long after Muttley pranks him and gushes over how much he's missed his partner-in-crime.
• Exactly What I Meant to Say: When Shaggy and Scooby find themselves on what seems to be the Falcon Fury:
  Shaggy: Look around, man! The clean modern aesthetic, the cool blue color palette! We're in....
  Scooby and Shaggy: IKEA!/The Falcon Fury!
  Shaggy: (instantly) Did you say IKEA?
  Scooby: Nope, I said "Falcon Fury." Just like you.
• Foreshadowing: In the film's opening, puppy Scooby steals an entire piece of gyro meat from a Greek restaurant called Alexander's Great Gyros. Scooby is descended from Alexander the Great's dog, and the climax is set in Athens, Greece.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus:
  • Taking a closer look at Dick Dastardly's bio reveals that he doesn't even remember his own date of birth. It also says that his hair is "greasy black" and that his skin is pasty.
  • When Shaggy and Scooby are holed up in the arcade of the abandoned Romanian amusement park, the posters and arcade machines contain references to other Hanna-Barbera cartoons like Hong Kong Phooey, Laff-A-Lympics, Space Stars, The Banana Splits, Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost, Jabberjaw and Wacky Races.
• Halloween Costume Characterization: When the group are shown as kids at Halloween, Shaggy and Scooby are their favorite superheroes, establishing their fandom for Blue Falcon and Dynomutt (which goes on to factor into the plot). Daphne is also a superhero as Wonder Woman, while Fred is a Knight in Shining Armor. Meanwhile, Velma goes for the obscure nerd reference by going as Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
• Heel–Face Turn: One of the Rottens, who was mistreated by Dick after one of his failures (and had his head replaced with a vacuum) ends up allying with the kidnapped Mystery Gang, letting them out of their jail. After the climax, he ends up being a permanent part of the gang, looking after their new building.
• Hell on Earth: Velma uses these words verbatim to describe the result of what will happen if Dick Dastardly opens the gates to the underworld to get Muttley back. It's the most hardcore scheme Dastardly has ever pulled, even if the apocalyptic Cerberus ends up being "more than he bargained for."
• Hypocritical Humor: If you accept the Fanon that Simon Cowell was Dastardly throughout the movie, then his claim that anything is more valuable than friendship is this, considering he literally goes to hell and back for his dog.
• Inadequate Inheritor: Dynomutt's opinion of Brian for most of the movie, as it's quite clear he misses the original Blue Falcon very much.
• In a World…: Parodied by Scooby in the teaser.
  Scooby: In a world destroyed by evil... discover the epic origin story... of the greatest team of heroes... in the history... of mystery!
• Ink-Suit Actor: Downplayed, but Fred's facial features sightly resemble Zac Efron's, while Velma's skin is Ambiguously Brown to give her a closer resemblance to Gina Rodriguez.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Dynomutt often puts Brian down but at the climax of the film, he's the one to give him a pep talk to give Brian the push he needs to help out Shaggy and Scooby.
• Karma Houdini: The two boys who threw Young Shaggy's Halloween candy in the haunted house do not get punished in any way. Ironically their actions are what led to the founding of Mystery Inc. seeing as the haunted house was actually a front for a thief that Shaggy and his new friends soon discover.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: When it appears that Dick Dastardly has escaped from the porthole to the Underworld with his dog and a small sum of treasure, his robots that he built apprehend him.
• The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Scooby and Shaggy are huge fans of Blue Falcon.
• Lampshade Hanging: Velma responds to the bowling alley attendant who comments that Shaggy and Scooby probably wouldn't have gotten kidnapped if the rest of the gang had been with them by saying "Okay, can you skip the emotional punishment?"
  • In the same scene, the attendant describes Shaggy's way of talking as "like a middle-aged man's idea of what a teenage hippie sounds like."
• Latex Perfection: Dick Dastardly is a master of this. He manages to capture the rest of Mystery Inc. this way by disguising as a female police officer and pulling them over for speeding. He also imitates Fred in Messick Mountain. It happens again at the end where after he and Muttley were defeated, Shaggy actually pulls off his mask to reveal that it was Simon Cowell the whole time, to which Velma points out that it doesn't make sense at all, and pulls off that mask as well to reveal that it was Dastardly.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: When Shaggy suggests dropping "some F-bombs" (as in Falcon bombs), Brian tells Shaggy to "keep it PG." The film itself is rated PG.
• Legacy Character: The Blue Falcon in the movie isn't the original one, Radley Crown, but actually his son Brian who has taken over the mantle after his father retired.
• Let Me Get This Straight...: Dee Dee has this reaction upon learning Brian thinks the anonymous tip he received came from somebody named "Anonymous". Brian says her question made him stop believing it.
• Licked by the Dog:
  • In the trailer, when Shaggy first gives Scooby his collar, Scooby licks Shaggy while they hug. When Shaggy does so in return, Scooby tells him to never do that again. Interestingly this is not in the final film.
  • Scooby licks Daphne shortly after their first meeting.
  • Near the end, Dynomutt tries to lick Blue Falcon. Doesn't come off as well, since Dynomutt's tongue is metal with no lubrication.
• Line-of-Sight Name: When pushed by a dog-catcher, Shaggy names Scooby after a nearby box of Scooby Snacks. However, he initially chooses "Snacks" instead of "Scooby".
• Logo Joke: The WB and WAG logo are set in the sky above the beach where Scooby and Shaggy meet for the first time.
• A Minor Kidroduction: The first 10 minutes or so shows Mystery Incorporated as children.
• Mythology Gag: There's enough to give this a separate page.
• Never Say "Die": Several times throughout the film, people think that a character is dead. However, the original Blue Falcon retired, and Muttley was just sleeping.
• Never Trust a Trailer: The first trailer leaves out the fact that it's a crossover with other Hanna-Barbera franchises, aside from vaguely hinting at it with a cameo from the Mean Machine and Shaggy being a fan of Blue Falcon, things that people unfamiliar with their cartoons outside Scooby-Doo wouldn't catch immediately. The second trailer, however, shows footage of Blue Falcon, Dynomutt, Dee Dee Skyes, and Dick Dastardly.
• Nutritional Nightmare: As a Freeze-Frame Bonus, Shaggy's box of Scooby Snacks labels the treats as "high fructose flavor" and despite being bite-sized, they apparently contain 850 calories, 37.5 grams of saturated fat, 1,000 milligrams of sodium, and 8,000 grams of sugar each. Not per serving, each. Might just be due to Rule of Funny.
• Oblivious Guilt Slinging: Played for Laughs and Lampshaded. The girl manning the counter at the Bowling Alley correctly guesses that Shaggy and Scooby were there because of friendship troubles and assumes that maybe they wouldn't have been taken if their friends were there to help them.
  Velma: Okay, can you skip the emotional punishment and describe the robots, please?
• Origin Story: The beginning of the movie shows how Shaggy and Scooby first met, how they met Fred, Velma and Daphne, and how they solved their first mystery, forming the Mystery Inc. team.
• "Pan from the Sky" Beginning: The camera pans down from the WB shield logo in the blue sky to the beach where Scooby and Shaggy first meet.
• Pet the Dog: Dastardly's motives, and the ways he regards Scooby, show that he apparently prefers dogs over people.
• Plot-Mandated Friendship Failure: Growing insecure about Scooby's sudden big importance, Shaggy stays behind after forcing his best friend to choose between him and destiny.
• Police Code for Everything: Like getting kidnapped from a bowling alley by a transforming Mecha-Mook army. It's even in Velma's handbook!
• The Power of Friendship: The entirety of the movie's major plots is all about it between the various characters. The entire plot is started from the villain's friendship being separated and by the end multiple friendships were stronger than when they started.
• Potty Failure: Implied in this piece of dialogue.
  Fred: The Mystery Machine needs a whole new… everything. And I'm never gonna get that smell out. (glares at Scooby)
  Scooby: I told you, I needed a walk.
• Product Placement: A rather subtle example — the chimes heard when the lights come on inside the Falcon Fury? That's the AT&T jingle (as they own the entire company now).
• Race Lift: Velma is Latina in this incarnation to better befit her voice actor.
• Refusal of the Call: At one point, Blue Falcon mimes a phonecall to adventure for Shaggy. Shaggy's response is to talk into the receiver and asks "adventure" to take his name off the list. Thankfully, Scooby convinces Shaggy that this is their chance to prove to Simon Cowell that they're not Mystery Inc.'s weak-link.
• Rogues' Gallery Transplant: Both Mystery Inc. and Blue Falcon go up against Dick Dastardly and Muttley, the main villains of Wacky Races.
• Scooby-Dooby Doors: Unusually for the Trope Namer, we get a pretty brief version with Scooby, Shaggy and Cerberus between two rows of Grecian columns.
• "Scooby-Doo" Hoax: Well, duh. The prologue has the gang as kids investigate a haunted house and eventually unmask a ghost to be an ordinary man, complete with the classic "You Meddling Kids" line.
• Sequel Hook: The Creative Closing Credits has Muttley breaking Dastardly out of prison.
• Shaking the Rump: When Scooby-Doo is in front of a mirror trying on a costume, he shakes his butt at one point.
• Shout-Out:
  • Kid Daphne dresses up as Wonder Woman for Halloween, Kid Velma dresses up as Ruth Bader Ginsburg (whom Shaggy mistakes for Harry Potter), and Kid Shaggy and Puppy Scooby dress as Blue Falcon & Dynomutt, respectively.
    • This isn’t the first animated film by WB and WAG that mentions Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
  • In the second trailer, Shaggy claims that he wants to be played by the Rock. Scooby says that it's never gonna happen.
  • Scooby and Shaggy sing “Shallow” at one point.
  • The portal to the Underworld is pretty much the Dark Portal from Warcraft.
  • When Scooby and Shaggy are abducted by a ship, Shaggy guesses they're in Blue Falcon's Falcon Fury. Scooby, instead, excitedly guesses IKEA.
  • Velma learns that Dick Dastardly has apparently been stealing Netflix by using his mother's account.
  • In an arena, Captain Caveman gives the, "Are you not entertained?!" quote from Gladiator.
• Shown Their Work: There really was a Peritas, and his owner was Alexander the Great.
• Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer: Prior to the film's release, Captain Caveman wasn't shown in any of the trailers or promos, possibly to avoid spoilers.
• Skewed Priorities: When Dyno-Mutt is somehow hacked by Velma hotwiring a really old radio.
  "Stay out of my search history!... Who names their kid Velma?!"
• Speech-Impaired Animal: Scooby as usual, though it's downplayed like in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. Notably, when Dick Dastardly tells him to call him "Dick", Scooby keeps calling him "Rick", while Dick tries to correct him.
• Stock Sound Effect: Don Messick's laughs for both the Spooky Space Kook and Muttley are used for their respective characters in this film. Otherwise averted with Muttley as his dialogue, what little of it there is, is provided by Billy West.
• Tag Line: "His epic tail begins."
• Take That!: The film gets a good jab at Netflix.
  Velma: (researching Dick Dastardly) Jinkies! Apparently he's been stealing Netflix by using his mother's account.
  Daphne: That is so unfair for the rest of us who have to pay for Netflix.
  Fred: You have to pay for Netflix?!
  • At one point Dyno-Mutt tells Brian that the last time he trusted the internet, he thought, "Tinder was a place where they sell firewood".
• Tastes Like Friendship: Here, Scooby was a stray puppy until he wandered onto Shaggy having a picnic on the beach. Shaggy offered him half of his sandwich then claimed Scooby was his dog upon being confronted by a dog-catcher.
• Toilet Humour: Mild. Along with a Potty Failure mentioned above, there's a moment with pterodactyl droppings.
• Tractor Beam:
  • Scooby and Shaggy narrowly escape a small army of drones by being uplifted with one of these.
  • Reversing the tractor beam is how the Falcon Fury initially escapes from Dastardly.
• Unreliable Narrator: Dastardly's flashback to his motives contradicts his narration of the event, as villainous characters are prone to do.
• Unsettling Gender-Reveal: While Fred is disturbed that the attractive cop turns out to be Dick Dastardly, he admits that the disguise itself was pretty hot.
• Vocal Dissonance: Even as a puppy, Scooby sounds just like his adult self.^note Granted, puppy Scooby also sounded like his adult self in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo...
• Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?:
  Dyno-Mutt: Who names their kid "Velma"?!
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Strangely enough, Dick Dastardly ends up being this; originally Dastardly and Muttley were simply trying to create a portal to the Greek underworld to plunder the treasure found within. Dastardly, per the norm, makes Muttley go in ahead of him. Unfortunately, Muttley is unable to go back through the portal, and before he or Dastardly can do anything to get Muttley back through, the portal malfunctions and collapses, trapping Muttley in the underworld. Dastardly's motivation for his entire scheme to gather the skulls and open the portal in Athens turns out to have been an attempt to rescue Muttley the whole time; once he's finally through the portal himself, Dastardly doesn't even care about the treasure until he makes sure Muttley is alright first.

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