MYTHICITY: (1) *poor* (2) *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological* I'd never seen either of these TV-specials before, despite their being separated by over thirty years of Scooby-history. HOLLYWOOD, timing out at 50 minutes, feels like Hanna-Barbera reaching into their bag of very outdated tricks to celebrate the Great Dane's tenth anniversary. This may be the only story in the franchise not to deal with the amateur sleuths investigating some sort of crime/mystery, and is more like an episode of YOGI BEAR or something where the main character gets a taste of moviemaking. In this world, Mystery Inc has become so famous for solving crimes that they've been given their own Saturday-morning TV show, in which they have adventures like in the actual show. But Shaggy gets the idea that his doggie buddy ought to expand his horizons. To that end he makes a bunch of amateur films showing Scooby acting out various roles from other familiar movies and tv shows-- HAPPY DAYS, SUPERMAN, SOUND OF MUSIC, CHARLIE'S ANGELS-- all to comic effect, though apparently Shaggy's not aware of the humor. He pitches these terrible flicks to his studio boss (rather than to the producer of the TV show that Scooby and his gang star in) and if this repetitive humor wasn't bad enough, the script throws in three or four mediocre songs. Fred, Daphne and Velma have nothing to do in the story but to try convincing their goony buddies not to ruin their sweet deal. Some of the jokes might work for grade-school viewers who don't realize how moldy the humor is. However, someone working on the script may have dropped an indirect comment on the Hanna-Barbera idea of contemporary humor. In a scene where Scooby visits the famous "concrete handprints" exhibit in front of Graumann's Chinese Theater in L.A., most of the names one can make out are extremely obscure actors from the thirties, like "Sally Eilers" and "Nat Pendleton." Since neither of the credited writers was much past thirty, I can only assume this was a concealed jape at the expense of Hanna and Barbera, who actually started making cartoon shorts in the 1930s.
As a complete contrast, SCOOBY DOO AND THE BEACH BEASTIE is a nicely plotted trifle that, at about half an hour, does nothing to overstay its welcome. The Scoobies take a trip to the beach to help Daphne's weird uncle Sandy (the always welcome Adam West), whose beachfront resort has been attacked by a variety of weird water-monsters. The mystery part of the story, and its inevitable "rational" conclusion, is de rigeur by this point. But the writers won points from me because they confined themselves to two quickie subplots. The lesser one involves the Great Dane giving all his attention to a girl-type dog and making Shaggy jealous for not palling around as usual. The better one plays off a conceit offered (I think) by one of the TV shows: that Fred had become obsessed with setting traps and now had to undergo "net withdrawal." Except everything at the beach reminds him of nets. I actually laughed at that one, something I can hardly ever say of a Scooby-show from any era.
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