When you have a successful property why not do more? After "Scooby Doo Where Are You?" did well, CBS, of course, wanted more and Hannah and ]Barbera liked money it was a match made in heaven. Premiering on CBS on September 9th, 1972, with two seasons with 24 episodes, The New Scooby-Doo Movies.
I loved watching this series when it reran on Cartoon Network on Sunday afternoons (I think it was Sundays). The differences between this series are 1) the length instead of 30 minutes (with commercials ) the episodes were 1 hour (with commercials). 2) It followed the format but with famous people and characters.
The fun thing about this series is that instead of Mystery Inc gang just faffing around and running into mysteries it instead had the Mystery Inc gang faffing around running into mysterious but with celebrities. The fun thing is also seeing the real-life people being put into animated versions like with the first episode with the Three Stooges.
There's 3 of them / Copyright AT&T who owns Warner
It wasn't new for the three stooges to be seen in animated there was animated series in 1965, I've also written about (I think) about a Three stooges animated series in 1977 where the Stooges were a part robot now because why the heck not? Anyway, the 2nd episode was them meeting with Batman Robin. Which wasn't their first run in animation either. In fact, Batman and Robin met with Scooby Doo twice.
Get in the van and don't ask questions/ Copyright Warner Media
They're OOky and they're spooky. It's kind of fun to have this cross over where Scooby and the gang meet the Addams Family. Interestingly enough, the Addams Family didn't have animated series before this episode aired. They were first appearing as comic characters but the frame of reference was the 1960's live-action series. Hanna and Barbera did a series with them in 1973 for NBC. With many of the actors from the 1964 series doing the voices. Going back to the episode, "Wednesday is Missing" John Astin, Carolyn Jones, Jackie Coogan, and Ted Cassidy from the 1964 series came and did the voices.
So apparently the Addams Family in the Scooby, never mind explaining this would just be too weird. I love how this show also was filmed in front of a live studio audience, wait a minute, that's just a laugh track. In this episode, the Mystery Inc gang end up as housekeepers while Morticia and Gomez go on vacation because they really wanted to leave this show.
Ha ha /Copyright Warner Media
I'm mostly breezing through the episodes because there's so much and it why not try a new style for the blog. The next few episodes had real-life celebrities came in be animated and join the cast for whatever mysterious. Johnathan Winters, a famous comedian, Don Knotts (the kids love Three's Company, oh wait that was before, the kids love Andy Griffith ) Phyllis Diller, Sandy Duncan (the kids love Search for Tomorrow) who had a show on CBS the season before that lasted 13 episodes so never mind, and Sonny and Cher. (Who also had a show on CBS)
Don Knotts appeared again then Laurel and Hardy, The Three Stooges. The Harlem Globetrotters even appeared. Meanwhile, while Marcia Brady had a hard time meeting Davy Jones, The Mystery inc just get to bump into him like that. It is kind of sad that so far none of the guest stars were the villains I guess, we'll save that for "Murder, She Wrote".
Davy Jones locker/Copyright Warner Media
Jerry Reed, a country music star, also appeared. Again the show is of its time with the real-life celebrities because well, of course, it was also going to be that way. The season finished up with Batman and Robin's second appearance and The Harlem Globetrotters. Season 2 was shorter than a season which had 13 episodes, the second season had 8 episodes.
Can I see your homework and copy it?/Copyright Warner Media
It's interesting that they didn't think of the idea until later of having other Hanna Barbera characterless appear on this Scooby Doo series. Finally, we got an episode where they meet "Josie and the Pussy Cats" To be fair they are more Archie characters that H&B got to animate but don't you start. Also since some of the Josie characters were voiced by the same people who did Scooby characters it was a match made in episode haven.
A Talking speed buggy, that's silly right Scooby?/Copyright Warner Media
Do you remember there being an animated "I dream of Jeannie"no? Me neither, the decided that might as well have these shows cross over. "Jeannie" was about the same "Jeannie" but she was a high school girl disguise now (because anime) and something something something silly. Tim Conway and Don Adams appeared in the next two episodes, sadly not together. Then H&B did another crossover this time with "Speed Buggy" because a talking dog wasn't silly enough. Plus, it is funny because H&B had the tendency to "rip themselves off" so having characters from a show that kind of copied formula is actually perfect. They ended the series with Dick Van Dyke (no Mary Tyler Moore).
It's a fun series that also shows they were trying to keep "Scooby" fresh so, did this new idea. This was the last new Scooby series for CBS because they didn't order another one, and the next series came out in 1976 on ABC. I decided not to do a thing where I would talk about a specific episode since it really follows the same idea as the first series with the hook of famous people are here and have fun. It's not a bad series or boring but really kind of just it's own thing.
This idea has been done later with Scooby Doo, something we'll get to later I'm sure. But coming in 2019 they are doing a new series called "Scooby Doo and Guess Who?" which brings this format back where it's the gang meeting a famous person or character. It will have updated stars and Batman is back so that's fun.
That's our look tune in next time when we meet Scooby Doo and he doesn't know who we are.
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