The Fridging of Velma Dinkley

[brendala]

Now that Mystery Incorporated has ended it's American TV run, I feel the need to post this essay. I know I've ranted about this subject excessively already. But this write up is my attempt to calmly explain why the way this show went down bothers me so much. I hope you all will take the time to read it and let me know what you think. Even if you're not a Scooby Doo fan and never watched Mystery Incorporated, I'm interested in hearing your opinions on the issue of feminism and what's appropriate in a franchise that's marketed toward children.
 

The Fridging of Velma Dinkley

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Gail Simone’s “Women in Refrigerators” theory, I’ll give you a summary. When one says that a female character was “stuffed in the fridge” (or “fridged” for short), it means that a female character (typically one that is a central character and/or the loved one of a male protagonist) was physically assaulted, sexually assaulted, and/or killed off for the sole purpose of adding “drama” to a plot and/or getting a reaction out of the characters around her. The name is derived from a famous issue of Green Lantern where Kyle Rainer comes home to the apartment he shares with his girlfriend only to discover that his arch nemesis has murdered said girlfriend and stuffed her remains in the refrigerator for him to find.
And in case you’re interested, here’s a top ten list of some of the worst examples of fridging in comic books.


Now, Velma was never sexually assaulted or severely beaten in Mystery Incorporated (however, the show was green lit for another season; so I wouldn’t put it past them just yet...); but I still feel confident saying she got the fridge treatment. Emotionally, this show put her through the ringer. Velma was reduced from the vibrant, positive, and intelligent person she’s been for 40+ years and mutated into a soulless plot device that does things because the plot says so and serves as an emotional punching bag in order to add needless melodrama to the show. Here are some examples…



Character assassination

In every Scooby Doo incarnation previous to this one, Velma's defining character trait was her intelligence. Everybody knows her as "the smart one". But, in Mystery Incorporated, her defining character trait/motivation is her ill-fated crush on Shaggy. Most of what she thinks, says, and does centers on her relationship with Shaggy and NOTHING else. And she's willing to sacrifice her dignity and self-respect in order to win the affections of a guy who spends most of the series treating her like dirt.

You think I'm exaggerating? I swear, the viewer doesn’t get to see Velma express an interest in anything besides Shaggy’s penis until the Hex Girls episode. In that episode, we get to see Velma geek out over her favorite band for a few seconds before the plot of the episode becomes “Fred realizes that he loves Daphne after watching her dress up like a goth prostitute and sing about traps”.

Even after Shaggy dumped her, every once in a while the show tried to remind us that Velma is smart by having her squee over Harlan Ellison or fix a computer or whatever. But that was just a cheap way for the lazy writers to avoid developing her outside of the context of her screwed up love life!




Body image issues.

Why did she have to have them? She never had them before. On the contrary; I think the fact that she saunters around in a red mini-skirt is a sign that she’s fairly confident about her appearance (at least where her legs are concerned) and doesn’t care that she’s not “conventionally attractive”. Before Mystery Incorporated, she was never shown lamenting about her appearance or wishing she could be pretty like Daphne. And this was one of the things that I always loved and found refreshing about her character.

However, in Mystery Incorporated, Velma's appearance was regularly the butt of jokes (for example: Fred teasing her about her ugly, pale skin) despite the fact that Mystery Incorporated's Velma design is by far the slimmest and cutest one to date. The show made it very clear that Velma has severe body image issues (i.e. confirming that she wears her trademark turtleneck to cover up her "neck waddle"). And then it all but confirmed Velma's belief that she's a hideous she-beast by making her this show's butt-monkey while Daphne obtained the perfect, Twilight-style love life she always wanted simply by wearing slutty outfits in front of Fred until he fell in love with her (and her skinny, Asian friend Mai-Lee won Shaggy away from Scooby by virtue of being....skinny and Asian, I guess).

Now, I’m not saying that a story about Velma having issues with her body/general appearance should be off limits and can’t be done well. But Mystery Incorporated treated it like a cruel joke. I can remember at least four instances off the top of my head where Velma’s appearance was insulted; but I can’t remember a single instance where she or the audience was reassured that she looked OK or that looks aren’t everything.

My point here is this: Mystery Incorporated shouldn’t have heavily implied at Velma having such a serious problem if they weren’t going to tactfully address it. The shoddy way they handled that plotline only lead to the implication that Velma deserved to be put through the ringer because she’s not as pretty and skinny as Daphne or Mai-Lee.



Velma: The Plot Device

Like I said before, Velma was treated as this show’s emotional punching bag. Shaggy breaks her heart multiple times. Her break up with Shaggy negatively impacts her relationships with her other friends. She becomes the team’s fifth wheel once Fred and Daphne get serious. She makes two friends outside the gang (Mai-Lee and Amy) only to have them immediately betray her. She has a creepy stalker. She hates her body (and thanks to Fred’s teasing, she probably hates her skin and freckles, too). And, when the crap hits the fan in the final episode, Daphne blames VELMA for everything that went wrong.
And, last but not least, the whole Shaggy/Scooby/Velma love triangle that caused most of Velma’s grief in this series was ENTIRELY POINTLESS to the main plot in the end. Let me elaborate…

Back in the Renaissance Faire episode (and in other episodes, too), it was heavily implied that Shaggy, Scooby, and Velma's bizarre relationship issues were integral to the overarching plot because they mirrored Ricky, Pericles, and Cassidy's issues. And it was also implied that said issues played a role in dooming the original Mystery Inc. Well, the show is over now. And aside from that old diary full of bad poetry, we never see any signs that Cassidy and Ricky (aka Angel and Mr E) ever liked each other at all! We don't see them show affection to each other in the modern day scenes nor the flashbacks to their youth. And we also find out that the old gang disappearing was all Mayor Jones' doing anyway.

Sure, you could theorize that Pericles decided to screw his friends over because Ricky chose Cassidy over him. But that's just a theory because the show itself doesn't tell us squat!

The way I see it, the show could have kept Velma and Shaggy platonic friends throughout the entire series, and it wouldn’t have impacted the major plotline all that much. Let me provide an example:
Velma’s alienation from the group could have stemmed from feeling left out once her best gal pal Daphne became all about Fred. And her decision to keep Angel’s secret could have been born from resentment caused by feeling like the gang is using her for her intelligence and doesn’t really appreciate her as a friend. I could also see her thinking “Why is a meat head like Fred the team leader when I’m clearly the smartest one here!?”. That resentment could have been developed, hinted at, and built on early on in the series and would have made for a great character arc for her. And it would have provided a believable reason for her to keep crucial information from her friends.  
There! I just re-wrote the story so that Velma’s motivations make sense instead of causing her to come across as a bi-polar feminist nightmare who is primarily motivated by a desire to get a stupid hippie’s penis in her.


So, basically, Velma's character was dragged through the dirt (and, to a lesser extent, so were Shaggy and Scooby's) and she was transformed into an unrecognizable shrew, stripped of the character traits that made her lovable and unique lo these 40 years (i.e. her intelligence, confidence, and sweet demeanor), and used as this show's token emotional punching bag just so the writers for this show could amp up the angst and the drama on a whim. The main plot would have been COMPLETELY unaffected if Velma and Shaggy had remained platonic friends for the duration of the series. So why did the writers bother changing this beloved character so drastically in a way that all but guaranteed the audience would hate her? Do they hate this character because they can’t fap to her the way they can with Daphne? Did Mindy Cohn do something to piss them off and this show was just an elaborate attempt to punish her?

The thing that gets to me the most - both as a feminist and a person who grew up loving and relating to Velma's "classic" characterization - is the fact that her character was twisted and warped into a looney, vindictive, boy-crazy, bunny-boiler twit who tolerated being treated like dirt by a boy she was crushing on in the hopes that said boy would make her life complete by sticking his penis in her. We very rarely got to see her acting smart (and, no, typing on a computer while vomiting up exposition doesn't count. Even Shaggy was able to do that!) or showing an interest in things that weren't connected to Shaggy's crotch. Even after he broke up with her; she constantly whined about how not having a date on Saturdays made her a loser. As if a girl is NOTHING without a boyfriend on her arm! The “having a boyfriend is EVERYTHING” message of this show is especially disturbing once you remember that the target audience for all things Scooby Doo is children. VERY young children!



The Sexualization of Daphne

Part of my issue with how Velma was handled is connected with how Daphne was handled. The EXTREME sexualization of Daphne combined with the relentless way this show tore Velma down for being fat, ugly, nerdy, and pale combines to create a very disturbing message for all the young kids who are watching this mess because they want to see the cute talking dog.

Basically, Daphne got hosed in this show, too. Her treatment wasn’t quite as horrifying as Velma’s because, let’s face it, up until the 90s Daphne was little more than the token bimbo of the franchise. But, like Velma, the focus of her character and her primary motivation in Mystery Incorporated is a guy she’s crushing on. Even the opening credits feature her snuggling a photo of Fred instead of a featuring a hobby like the others.

However, even though they didn’t have a messy, melodramatic break up like Velma and Shaggy did, the Fred/Daphne relationship is disturbing in it’s own way. In later episodes, Fred exhibits behavior that, in real life, is a HUGE red flag for abuse (i.e. wanting to keep Daphne on a schedule and know where she is 24/7). The show plays it for laughs and blames it on Fred’s mommy issues; but that stuff isn’t funny. I hate to play moral crusader again, but KIDS WATCH THIS SHOW! If the writers just HAD to put that in there, they should have also added a scene where Fred is called out on how messed up that kind of behavior is. And, after a month long relationship where Daphne makes 99% of the compromises and sacrifices; Fred asks her to marry him and she says “Yes”!? Do I even need to point out how insane that is?
 
Daphne is now officially dumber than Bella Swan. Say what you will about how messed up the romance in Twilight is (and I’ll agree, cause Twilight is awful); but at least Bella had enough sense to play the field a little bit before she decided to marry her creepy stalker Vampire boyfriend. Daphne dated Fred officially for, at most, three or four months. He’s her first steady boyfriend. And she spent most of that relationship being pissed off at him because she had to make all the compromises. And she thinks committing to an engagement while they’re still in High School is a good idea!? Even Bella would slap her across the face and tell her that she’s an idiot.

Speaking of Twilight, one episode of Mystery Incorporated poked fun at Stephanie Meyer. And watching the Mystery Incorporated writers rip on Meyer felt like listening to OJ Simpson get indignant over the fact that Casey Anthony got let off the hook. Just sayin'



The series in general

Another thing this series screwed up was the sense of friendship that every previous Scooby show had. The characters all feel...isolated from one another. Velma spends the first half of the series trying to hump Shaggy’s leg and the latter half of the series sulking by herself and constantly alternating between loving Shaggy, hating Shaggy, and being somewhere in the middle. Daphne is CONSTANLY trying to hump Fred’s leg (and eventually succeeds after wearing him down for 20+ episodes). Fred just wants to trap things. Shaggy just wants to eat. And Scooby, judging by his behavior in episode 9, wants to make out with Shaggy.
BTW, THANKS FOR THAT MENTAL IMAGE, MYSTERY INCORPORATED WRITERS! I’m sure the furries love you for it. Now excuse me while I go throw up.



In Conclusion

The reason this issue has me so worked up is that Velma is a character that meant a lot to me growing up and still means a lot to me today. She was inspirational and relatable in a realistic way. And, while most female nerds in fiction have a tendency to look like hot actresses with some frumpy clothes and glasses slapped on (see: Linda Cardilinni), Velma actually looked offbeat and dorky in all of her animated appearances. And as far as I know, no Scooby canon ever implied that her looks had a negative impact on her ability to function, live her life, feel good about herself, and be loved by her friends (and her various doomed love-interests). Mystery Incorporated, on the other hand, makes it very clear that Velma sees herself as fat and ugly and that even her best friends think the same thing. Again, what kind of message does that send to all the little girls watching this who identify with Velma the same way I did as a child?


I realize that this write up may make me come across as a bra-burning, feminazi, moral-crusader who combs through innocent TV shows looking for stuff to rage about. So I want to conclude by saying this…
I am not accusing the writers of this show of being chauvinist pigs who are intent on turning back the Women’s Suffrage movement. I cannot make an accusation like that because I don’t know them and I can’t see into their hearts. I want to make it clear that I am NOT trying to get on a soapbox and demonize them. I don’t think that they’re horrible misogynist monsters; just lazy writers. VERY lazy writers.

However, I do feel safe saying that these writers are guilty of the same thing that the average 12-year-old fan fiction writer is guilty of. Just like the average pre-teen at Fanfiction.net, they are guilty of re-writing established characters to fit their desired narrative instead of creating a story that naturally fits the characters. And they either don’t realize or don't care that their desired narrative transforms the entire cast into a bunch of unlikeable, out-of-character jerks.

The way I see it, if they were so dead set on creating a teenage romantic melodrama, they should have just made Degrassi: The Animated Series and left the Scooby gang in the hands of writers who could do them justice and write a romance without turning everybody into crazy assholes. Stephanie Meyer could have done this reboot better than the Mystery Incorporated writers. Stephanie. F**KING. Meyer!

Or, better yet, these writers should have scrapped the romantic angle entirely and stuck to what they’re good at: creating atmosphere and writing comedy. The few episodes of this show that ignored the romance angle entirely were a lot of fun. And Mystery Incorporated could have been the best Scooby incarnation since the original if only these writers had stuck to what they were good at (or hired someone who actually knew how to write a romance without turning the females into textbook examples of why The Bechdel Test exists).

Needless to say, I don’t have much hope for the second season. And I don’t plan on watching it unless it begins with a Dallas-style “Patrick Duffy is in the shower and last season was just a bad dream” ret-con.

Comments

[dj-rocca.livejournal.com]

My icon summarizes my feelings on your essay.

[brendala.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you (and Hayley) liked it! Just out of curiosity, did you see the finale yet? Good Lord, that thing had plot holes so big you could drive the Mystery Machine through them! O_o


And now that I've got your attention. I wanna get your opinion...
I'm a bit torn on whether or not I should post this essay in our Scooby comm. Even though I believe my complaints about Mystery Incorporated are legitimate; I don't want to alienate the people who do like the show and/or make them think the mods have a vendetta against MI fans. Especially since some members got upset when I made all those MI gag comics.
What do you think?

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Amen.

I despite fridging of any kind. We have very little cool females as it is. Why ruin them? WOULD KORRA LET HERSELF BE FRIDGED? NO. VELMA SHOULD NOT EITHER!

[brendala.livejournal.com]

Thank God for Korra! Here's hoping that show is successful and we get more shows about badass female characters who care about something besides getting a boyfriend.

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

*claps* I love this because this states everything that is wrong the female characters with this show. When you compare this show to a show with positive female characters (like Avatar or MLP) the differences become really clear. Heck, I would even argue that Totally Spies had more positive characters, even though that show is stereotypically girly. (It annoys me how every girl in that show is boy crazy.)

Also, looking back on it, that Twilight parody just felt shoehorned in. Think about it, they didn't really poke that much fun at it or do much with it. If the author in the show was an entirely different series it wouldn't have made a difference. It just felt like they put it in because it's popular and they figured fans would like it. @_@

[brendala.livejournal.com]

MLP is impressive because it's one of the few shows I can think of that has a majority female cast (the only others are Jem and Facts of Life). And NONE of the girls are defined by being boy-crazy or having some unrequited crush or whatever. And I love how the "Brony" movement has proven that a show with an entirely female main cast can be embraced by men if the writing is good and doesn't wallow in clichés.

Even though I never liked Totally Spies, it never bugged me all that much. Yeah, it annoys me that ALL the female characters were boy-crazy dingbats; but "stupid valley girls as secret agents" was the whole point of the show. You knew that going into it. So anyone who watched and got offended by it would only have themselves to blame.
With Scooby Doo: Mystery Incorporated, I went in expecting a show about a group of BFFs/Nakama solving mysteries together and I got f***ing 90210 instead! >_<


Aside from the rank hypocrisy of a show like Mystery Incorporated ripping on a terribly-written romance, another thing that got to me about the Twilight parody is that jokes about how dumb/awful Twilight is are becoming just as annoying as Twilight itself. Like Totally Spies, Twilight is one of those things that at least has the decency to not lie about what it is. It's a dopey teen romance with some super-natural elements thrown in. Meyer may have royally screwed up Vampire lore; but at least she didn't ruin any beloved cartoon icons or shove any awesome women into a fridge.

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know the show is a parody and I will admit it's not a terrible show, it's not a great show, but it's not terrible either. I just don't care for shows when they make every single girl crazy about boys and fashion. Having one character be interested in fashion and boys is fine, it's normal because there are girls like that, but I know plenty of girls in high school who could care less about either subject. With that said, I will state that I prefer the characters in Totally Spies over MI Daphne and Velma. (At least the totally Spies girl knew when to dump a guy for being a jerk.)

I ended up renting New Moon last night for laughs with a friend and we came to this conclusion. While Bella and Edward are very annoying, Meyer did write interesting and amusing characters like Charlie and Alice (she's just awesome). Maybe we wouldn't think so much if they were the main characters, but still it does prove that Meyer isn't all bad. It's just too bad that the characters that are good get cast to the sidelines.

Plus, I think half the "fun" of Twilight is how cheesy and over the top it is, you can tell by just looking at the covers and reading the summaries. Heck, I like watching the movies just so I can laugh at it. It's really the crazy fan girls for it that I think gets the most heat and hate. And like with every fandom, this really stinks for the fans that are sensible about it because they get grouped in with the crazy ones.

[brendala.livejournal.com]

A while back, the subject of the Bechdel Test came up in a discussion at the Scooby comm. Everyone racked their brain trying to remember if MI-Velma and MI-Daphne ever talked to each other about ANYTHING besides their love lives. Turns out the only time they did was when Daphne asked Velma what fertilizer smelled like. That's a pretty apt metaphor for this show, isn't it? XD


I've heard that Twilight has some awesome side characters (heck, my sisters have told me that they actually liked the books before they became all about Bella and Edward's stupid romance). And I agree that most of the hate for it stems from the fandom and not the series itself (after all, it's not like Meyer is the first person to get romance and Vampire lore laughably wrong).

[slyfoxesq.livejournal.com]

...........Whaaaaaaaat D: D: D:

(Hi, I saw your post linked while I was lurking in equestriamlp and was curious!)

I didn't even know there was a new SD cartoon, but as another lifelong Velma fan (the last Halloween that I actually dressed up, I talked my whole friend group into being the Scooby gang just so I could be Velma), this situation distresses me greatly ‐ and congrats to the creators, you have ensured that I have no desire to watch this show, ever. :|

her character was twisted and warped into a looney, vindictive, boy-crazy, bunny-boiler twit...

Despite its rage-inducing nature I loved this whole post, but I have to say the "bunny-boiler twit" absolutely killed me. :)

[brendala.livejournal.com]

HI! Don't worry, I was hoping that my sly digs at this show would get noticed by someone over there (that was my little ulterior motive LOL). ~_^

Unfortunately, Mystery Incorporated really is as bad as I said it was. This show is so sexist and horrifying that it got me on a big "feminist kick" and now I over-analyze the hell out of every show I watch (specifically, how the female characters are treated). It's part of the reason I fell so head over heels in love with FiM. After watching this abomination destroy a beloved childhood icon, it was a GODSEND to see a show that actually knew how to write females properly (and also managed to reboot a series from my childhood without pissing on my childhood memories).

And, believe it or not, I wasn't trying to be funny with the "bunny-boiler twit" line. So I'm REALLY glad you liked it. ^_^


P.S. I'm such a dork that I have TWO Velma costumes (one "classic Velma" and one based on her Pup Named Scooby Doo outfit).

P.P.S. Sorry if it sounds like I'm tooting my own horn. But if you liked this essay, you'll LOVE this comic I drew to cheer myself up after this show made me question my faith in humanity:
<http://brendala.livejournal.com/78583.html>

[timbeon.livejournal.com]

'nother one who wandered over from equestriamlp

...Wait wait wait wait wait. They did what to Velma? Velma was the best back in the older Scooby shows. D: In the original series, Velma kind of felt like the glue that held the Fred+Daphne duo and the Shaggy+Scooby duo together, since she'd switch which pair she went with whenever the gang split up.

Nerd girls in fiction-land usually fall into one of 3 categories (or a combination of the first two):
-The punching bag that everybody picks on and has no characterization beyond that
-The "ugly duckling" in a makeover story
-A scientist with 5 phDs in unrelated subjects who looks like a Victoria's Secret model who just turned old enough to legally drink last month and is wearing a slutty scientist Halloween costume and half or more of her lines are "my eyes are up here ugh men."

What made Velma so awesome for 40 years was she was a nerdy girl who was fine the way she was, the other characters respected her, and she wasn't there to be glorified fap material for the guys watching. She made me feel awesome about being a nerdy bookish girl.

I read up a bit on the new Scooby series, and the whole thing pretty much just sounds like LOOK HOW EDGY WE ARE SCOOBY-DOO IS EDGY NOW WE TOOK THIS CAMPY WACKY SHOW AND MADE IT EDGY AREN'T WE HARDCORE AWESOME WRITERS. Which is disappointing, because the campy wackiness was what made the Scooby-Doo franchise endearing- heck, that's probably why A Pup Named Scooby-Doo was my favorite incarnation, it knew the wackiness was a big part of the appeal, and it was just gloriously zany and self-aware and now I'm going on a nostalgia trip.

[brendala.livejournal.com]

Nerd girls in fiction-land usually fall into one of 3 categories (or a combination of the first two):
-The punching bag that everybody picks on and has no characterization beyond that
-The "ugly duckling" in a makeover story
-A scientist with 5 phDs in unrelated subjects who looks like a Victoria's Secret model who just turned old enough to legally drink last month and is wearing a slutty scientist Halloween costume and half or more of her lines are "my eyes are up here ugh men."

THIS! Before this show came along, Velma was one of the few "nerdy girl" characters who didn't fit into any of those boxes. I related to her when I was in my young, awkward phase and loved how unique and awesome she was. And it makes me sad to think that, for a lot of little girls today who feel those same insecurities, this version of Velma will be the first one they get to know. A girl whose defining character traits are her obsession with a boy who treats her like dirt and her belief that she's too fat for people clothes.


heck, that's probably why A Pup Named Scooby-Doo was my favorite incarnation, it knew the wackiness was a big part of the appeal, and it was just gloriously zany and self-aware and now I'm going on a nostalgia trip.

Pup is my favorite Scooby series, too! Believe it or not, it holds up REALLY well when you watch it as an adult!
Shameless self promotion time:
A while back, I did a review of my favorite Pup Named Scooby Doo episode to illustrate how to do a reboot right. And I used it as an example to illustrate why Pup succeeded where MI failed. Since Pup is your favorite, too, I thought you might like it. ^_^
Here's the link:
<http://brendala.livejournal.com/69178.html>

[lelenmargyle.livejournal.com]

I also followed ya from equestriamlp.

I've only caught episodes here and there of Mystery Inc. I think I first saw it like 9 months to a year ago. My impression was that it was fairly well done, except for one thing I just couldn't understand: "What? Got to be a joke? Velma and Shaggy??!?! Beyond weird. Ew. ...What?" I'm sorry to hear it only went from bad to worse!

[brendala.livejournal.com]

I've actually been a huge fan of the Shaggy/Velma ship since I was a little kid. That was the main reason I stuck with Mystery Incorporated even after it became clear that the show was terrible. I wanted to see if they could salvage the romance; but they just kept making it worse and piling on the misogyny. This is one of the few shows that I would forbid my children from watching if I had any.

In fact, the way that couple is handled is one of the reasons I'm so pissed off. They did this really sick "love triangle" with Scooby/Shaggy/Velma and had Scooby and Velma HATING each other for a good chunk of the series (fyi, in almost every other canon, Scooby and Velma are characterized as being really close)!! In doing so, they transformed the previously innocent and cute relationship between Shaggy and Scooby into something really disturbing and gross. XP

[lelenmargyle.livejournal.com]

Oh I agree; I saw enough to notice that the way Scooby was being handled was extremely disturbing. Poor guy seemed horribly stranded from everyone else...and yes...creepy... He's always been sort of a mutant dog/human hybrid IMO, but he was always mostly Dog, and in this series he was like...Really Pathetic Human.

I must admit I'd never thought of Shaggy/Velma before. But I'm also pretty much a casual viewer. I caught one of those recent live-action TV-movies on Cartoon Network a few months ago. I liked that actress for Velma, and it was actually really kind of cute the way they handled the romance.

[snapdragon76.livejournal.com]

*wandering over from the link you left in Joanne's LJ*

Ugh. Why would they drastically change a character like that?! Not just Velma, but the others as well. I mean, in the original series, nothing was made of anyone's appearance in any manner. It was mostly all about the mystery or the personalities. This saddens me to no end...

[brendala.livejournal.com]

Apparently, the writers of this thing thought that saddling these upbeat characters with misery and romantic angst would make them more "realistic" and "3-dimensional" teenagers. And the scary thing is that a lot of fans agree with them (which makes me wonder about teenagers these days...).

Mystery Incorporated is one of the worst examples of a reboot missing the point that I have EVER seen! If you're interested, I did another review comparing it to a better Scooby show to illustrate the difference between a good reboot and a bad one.
....normally, I don't self-promote this much. But I REALLY love that review. ^_^;

[agentverona.livejournal.com]

All I can say is until you made the comment about Degrassi: The Animated Series, I just assumed that someone had made a live action Scooby Doo show. This was all about a CARTOON?! Friggin serious?! That is kinda immensely gross of them.

[brendala.livejournal.com]

All I can say is until you made the comment about Degrassi: The Animated Series, I just assumed that someone had made a live action Scooby Doo show. This was all about a CARTOON?! Friggin serious?! That is kinda immensely gross of them.


Oh, it gets worse. A few months after I wrote this article, the second season premiered. And that season had one episode dedicated to fat-shaming Velma and another where Daphne was essentially date raped. This show isn't just bad or sexist. It's fucking evil.

[atton-bomb.livejournal.com]

I realise that I'm just a random person, so sorry about that, but I just feel that I should let you know that I agree strongly with everything you've said here. Having grown up with Scooby Doo nad the gang, it's painful to see the abomination which is 'Mystery Incorporated' and it sends out terrible messages, completely different from the 'good beats evil', 'friends are everything' messages of the old Scooby Doo.
Again, sorry for the out the blue comment. :)

[brendala.livejournal.com]

Don't feel like you need to apologize. I'm glad that this message is still getting out. Though I am curious to know how you stumbled on this essay (since it's pretty old and Mystery Incorporated is long gone).

Seeing this essay get a new comment really made my day. Thanks so much for the ego boost! :)

[atton-bomb.livejournal.com]

Glad I could make your day!

I'm ibn Britain, where Mystery Inc. is actually still airing on kids' channels, and I got my first glimpse of it the other day. Having not ever seen it before, and being a massive fan of anything Scooby Doo, I thought 'Horray!', until I'd actualy watched some of it. At that point I decided to see what other people's reactions were and to desperately hope it wasn't just me that hated it.

I believe I got here via the Scooby Doo Community and pic-spam reviews, which were great fun. :)