Zoinks! Scooby-DooNearly four decades after the first introduction of the beloved cartoon to fans, Scooby-Doo & the Mystery Inc. gang were given new life. Scooby-Doo Where Are You?!
Viewers met the Great Dane Scooby and his pals Shaggy, Velma, Fred and Daphne in 1969 — but it wasn’t until 2002 that the characters got a live-action makeover. The film starred Matthew Lillard (Shaggy), Linda Cardellini (Velma), Freddie Prinze Jr.(Fred). Sarah Michelle Gellar(Daphne), stayed true the cartoon in many respects, especially when it was about the bond between members of the crime-solving crew.
“I think the popularity lies in the fact that Scooby and Shaggy are unlikely heroes,” Cardellini told Hollywood.com ahead of the film’s 2002 premiere. “They’re cowards.”
Gellar, who got engaged to Prinze Jr. the same year the movie was filmed, noted that the original series “offered so much more than any other cartoon.” She added: “It was so ahead of its time.”
Prinze Jr. made the revelation during a 2002 appearance. TRL that he really embraced the character of Fred — he even dyed his hair blond. “In the cartoon he was a little bit egotistical,” he explained to host Carson Daly. “As an actor you see that as a chance to be as narcissistic as humanly possible so that’s what I tried to bring.”
The 2002 movie began with the group at odds. But the mystery-solving gang learns that they can put aside their petty grievances after being lured onto Spooky Island to solve an investigation. After Scooby’s (voiced by Neil FanningHis soul is almost stolen by Scrappy Doo’s cousin. Fred, Fred, and Velma realize that they must work together to defeat the bad guys.
Cardellini teased her character’s evolution during a 2002 TRL interview, saying, Velma is “the brains of the operation. She doesn’t quite get the credit she deserves so she’s been bottling up a lot of emotions.”
Gellar chimed in with details about her character, revealing, “Daphne is the perennial damsel in distress. But my Daphne is the hero.”
Lillard said that he channeled his Shaggy side before filming began in 2002. “When it came to the voice and it came to the walk I spent a lot of time with the cartoon,” he explained.
The Scream actor noted that embodying the character meant eating lots of Scooby snacks, which aren’t as tasty as they sound. “Scooby snacks actually taste like cardboard,” Lillard confessed. “It tastes like wet cardboard. Isn’t that delicious?”
The cast’s reinvention of the classic cartoon led to the 2004 sequel, Scooby-Doo 2 Monsters Unleashed. These characters have been featured in many animated series over the last few decades.
In 2021 Mindy KalingAnnounced that she was creating a Scooby-DooHBO Max spinoff series called VelmaThe turtleneck-loving character will be the focus of the story.
Scroll down to see the cast of Scooby-DooNow:
