Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed: Ten Years Later
With it being the ten year anniversary of Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, I thought I’d post a quick review of the movie. I saw Monsters Unleashed in the theatre opening weekend and enjoyed it. I still enjoy it, In many ways, Scooby 2 is better than the first, succeeding in areas the first did not. But there are a couple things I think don’t hold up so well.
When Mystery, Inc. are guests of honor at the grand opening of the Coolsville Museum of Criminology, a masked villain shows up and creates havoc before stealing the costumes of the gang’s most notorious villains: Black Knight Ghost, Pterodactyl Ghost and Tar Monster. Could it be that their nemesis, mad scientist Jonathan Jacobo has returned and is trying to recreate their deadliest foes? Velma has a crush on the hunk / museum curator Patrick Wisely but why is he acting so suspicious? The Mystery Gang is hard pressed to succeed this time, since pesky TV reporter Heather Jasper-Howe insists they are buffoons.
As I mentioned in my previous review{which you can read here}, I found the editing of the first Scooby-Doo film to be a bit off. Like they were going to make the movie a little more edgier, but they decided at the last minute to make it more family friendly. Monsters Unleashed doesn’t have that problem. There’s much more of a focus here to make it more like the cartoon, which I think was the right move. We get many references to the show itself, from the classic monsters being brought back to the flashback to A Pup Named Scooby-Doo. They really did a fantastic job capturing the tone and spirit of the cartoon. It also helps that Mathew Lillard makes a great Shaggy. Linda Cardellini.does a pretty decent job at portraying a nerdy Velma. Sarah Michelle Gellar and Freddie Prinze Jr? Well, they’re Sarah Michelle Gellar and Freddie Prinze Jr. All I can say is at least Freddie Prinze has better hair in this movie,
My biggest problem with Monsters Unleashed though, because they went more family friendly, there is a lot more poop and fart jokes. Now I know I’m not really the target audience for this movie, but what rubs me the wrong way is that Scooby has never had to rely on toilet humor to be funny. There was some of it in the first movie, but here it’s just overdone. It took me out of the movie.
The CGI monsters look alright. The Tar Monster in particular looks pretty terrible.There’s also CGI Scooby. I’ll admit, I never liked the look of Scooby in these movies. To me, the CGI looks kinda bland and ugly. In fact, I think it’s only gotten worse over time. I prefer the CG Scooby in The Mystery Begins, since he at least looks more like his cartoon self.
Is Monsters Unleashed better than its predecessor? Does it hold up after all these years? Yes, with all the references to the series and Mathew Lillard’s great performance as Shaggy. I just wish there was less toilet humor and better CGI. 3.5/5.
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The monsters were a big disappointment for me. I wanted to see these classic monsters as they appeared in the show, instead of that we got a weakly redesigned set of monsters that looked silly. Even the monster costumes in the museum looked terrible. Which makes me wonder why the gang was even afraid of these monsters in the first place when they all look like discount Halloween costumes. I mean would it really have been that hard to allocate some money to make these costumes look good, real or scary? No, instead we have a museum full of sloppy dime store costumes and CGI abominations running around.
On top of their poor appearance for some reason all of the monsters are funny, which is not a characteristic I usually associate with them. Usually the monsters are supposed to be scary and threatening, chasing the gang around and putting them in danger. These monsters while dangerous (I guess) are hard to take seriously and ultimately are kind of lame.
At the end of the day I like the idea of what they were trying to do, I like the plot, but the execution was weak. What made the first Scooby movie so good was that it was textured and creepy when needed but also funny. One of the most unique elements of the original series is that it was meant to be a bit dark and creepy, these monsters were meant to be legitimately creepy, but this movie just doesn't get that right. it's an enjoyable movie certainly, but it failed to be all it could have been.
But on the other hand I liked Scooby Doo 2 Monsters Unleashed because of the Sound FX from Hanna Barbera, including the Scrambling Feet sound when Scooby was running in the air trying to catch the control pannel before he landed on the ground to put it back in the machine to destroy the Monsters and save his friends, Good thing Mystery Inc saves the day in the end when solving a Mystery all the time.
WB wouldn't make a movie featuring Larry Harmon, nor would they do one featuring Laurel and Hardy. Mostly because many kids don't really know who they are. The best you could hope for is a reference or cameo (Like the Don Knotts lookalike in SDMI or the brief mention of him in SDTM) otherwise though WB wouldn't feature them.
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