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TIT

'Scooby-Doo and Scrappy Doo: Season 1'
(Frank Welker, Heather North, Casey Kasem, Pat Stevens, Marla Frumkin, et al / 2-DVD / NR / 2015 / Warner Bros.)

Overview: The first 16 episodes of the 1979 Saturday morning cartoon teaming up everybody's favorite Great Dane and his pipsqueak nephew as they solve ooky-spooky whodunits with the Mystery Machine gang. Episodes include "The Scarab Lives!," "The Night Ghoul of Wonderworld," "The Neon Phantom of the Roller Disco," and others.

DVD Verdict: OK, for those not completely in the back story know, 'Scooby-Doo! and Scrappy-Doo! is an updated version of the classic Hanna-Barbera mystery cartoon. Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy and Scooby-Doo travel from town to town in their van, The Mystery Machine, solving cases of hauntings, monsters and unexplained occurrences. But now joining the gang is Scooby's pint-sized nephew, Scrappy-Doo.

Unlike his uncle, the little pup is constantly looking for a fight, and it is all Scooby and Shaggy can do to keep him from hurtling head-on into every ghost and monster they encounter. Of course, after doing a little investigating, the hauntings always have a more down-to-earth explanation.

As noted above, in this first season (which first aired in 1979) because the entire gang of Fred, Daphne, Velma, and Shaggy were still together solving mysteries, the two part episodes that reunited the full cast in the New Scooby Doo Mysteries of 1984 had to be combined. I'll never forget episodes that featured the Lady Vampire of the Bay and the Minotaur and even the final episode where Shaggy and Scooby are abducted and Scrappy gets two of his old neighborhood pup pals to help rescue them.

The late Lennie Weinrib voiced over Scrappy in this one good season and his Scrappy was known for saying stuff like "Ruff and double ruff!" as well as his "Puppy Power" bugle call. Weinrib's Scrappy at least sounded like a tough pup from the Bronx. At least in this series, the gang had an even number and in split ups, it was simple, you had Fred and the girls and Shaggy and the dogs.

It's also interesting to note that Velma's voice changed during this season. Pat Stevens had been doing her voice since 1976, but she ultimately got replaced (for health reasons only) by a lady named Maria Frumkin. Indeed, I heard that the massive vocal changes had to do with some of the voice actors being involved in the big 1980 strike. So Don Messick ended up playing both Scooby Doo and Scrappy Doo!

Anyway, Scooby, Scrappy and Shaggy's voices are very well done, but the voices of the additional characters aren't. For instance, the 'cat man' (episode 21, season 2) sounds terrible and annoying. Although made ten years later, the animation didn't improve. It actually got worse. The drawing is bad and irregular and the same goes for the animation itself. And there's even more to dislike. Especially if you don't like hearing "p-p-puppy p-p-power" and "I'll splat him" coming from Scrappy every two or three minutes!

A bigger part for Scrappy is probably one of the things which destroyed this series. But this is also the fault of the script writers. Most of the episodes (except the ones from this first season) haven't got anything to do with ghouls and ghosts, the jokes are bad and the characters constantly say basically the same. That said, what GREAT fun it is to watch these 24 episodes back-to-back-to-back, once again on a wet/sunny Saturday morning! These are all Standard Versions enhanced for 16x9 TVs.

www.ScoobyDoo.com

www.WarnerVideo.com







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