While
they are in Brazil, maybe the Scooby gang can solve the mystery of the missing light-rail.
They started construction to service the 2014 World Cup, but it remains
unfinished. At least you can see long stretches of rail going nowhere. That is
more than the state of California has to show for the $15.7 billion spent on its
light-rail boondoggle. However, Mystery Incorporated has a more pressing
monster to unmask in Victor Cook’s Scooby-Doo! Ghastly Goals, which
premieres tomorrow on Tubi.
If ever
there were a man and a dog who could appreciate Brazilian churrascaria, it
would be Shaggy and Scooby. Instead, they partake of that famous Brazilian street
food, pancakes-on-a-stick. Seriously? Frankly, every Brazilian who visits
America wants to have a big lumberjack stack of pancakes because they believe
(not unfoundedly) that is a very American thing to do.
However,
there is plenty of soccer/football. Ghastly Goals was an original
episode-length Scooby mystery commissioned for a sports-themed boxset to tie-in
with the then upcoming World Cup in Brazil. To be fair, they do a decent job
recreating the sights and colors of Rio. The monster, the Eshu, is of Yoruba
origin, which does indeed have a place in Afro-Brazilian tradition and lore. Perhaps
the lab they visit, thanks to an empty test-tube clue, also appears to be somewhat
inspired by Oscar Niemeyer’s flying saucer-looking Niteroi Contemporary Art
Museum.
Obviously,
this is a cartoon featuring a talking dog who likes to eat, so you should judge
it by those standards. However, screenwriters Eric Maher & Kay Reindl’s ultra-frenetic
caper, involving a missing autographed football injected with a dangerous
super-bouncy formula, lacks the spookiness of the best Scooby episodes. It also
ignores the best of Brazilian cuisine, like feijoada, coxinha, pao de queijo,
and picanha. They can blame the Eshu, but Scooby and Shaggy do Brazil all
wrong.
For 52 years, Scooby and Mystery Incorporated have been unmasking monsters.
If you haven’t kept up with their recent Cartoon Network series and straight-to-DVD
animated features, you might not realize they are as busy now as they ever
were. They haven’t aged a day in all that time—it must be those giant dagwood
sandwiches keeping Scooby and Shaggy youthful. There is a diet book somewhere
in that, but their next project is a reunion special. They never broke-up, but
reunion specials are hot, so Warners booked studio time for their
reminiscences. Yet, wouldn’t you know it, they end up with a haunted soundstage
in Scooby-Doo, Where are You Now?, a new hybrid animated-live-action special
premiering Friday on the CW.
A
gig is a gig for Mystery Incorporated, so they are happy to sit down with the
host and producer (both “real” people) in their old soundstage to discuss their
past cases. However, weird noises keep interrupting them. The Warner employees
did not want to admit it, but reportedly the studio is haunted. Recently, their
old nemesis the “Snow Ghost” has been scaring away productions, so they
naturally ask Mystery Incorporated to sleuth it out.
Even
by the standards of the early Saturday morning cartoons, this mystery is pretty
simple, but the “reunion” format facilitates some amusing self-referential
humor, including testimonials from the likes of Batman, Johnny Quest, Jabberjaw,
and the Power Puff Girls. There are also clips and soundbites from the
real-life voice-over artists, including Frank Welker, who has portrayed Fred
since the show’s inception and Scooby himself, for almost twenty years.
