It’s safe to say that Scrappy-Doo has not been remembered fondly, at least not by the various people behind the more recent iterations of the Scooby-Doo franchise. When the infamous puppy made a cameo in Scooby: Doo Mystery Incorporated he was treated as a painful memory for Fred. Even that was kinder to Scooby’s nephew than how he was treated in the first live action Scooby-Doo movie: being turned into a villain who wanted to use Scooby for his own ends. But as much as Scrappy has been hated on over the years, it might finally be time to welcome the character back into the franchise, and see if he can be done right.
As a character, Scrappy-Doo could be obnoxious, but his main problem was he was used too often. From the late seventies, to the mid eighties, he shared top billing in the Scooby-Doo cartoons with his uncle Scooby, and was featured as prominently as the franchise’s titular character. That’s just too much Scrappy. His whole shtick can easily get grating after a while, and even if it didn’t, there are only so many places you can go with the whole “puppy almost ruins the plan by trying to pick a fight with the ghost” angle. If the character was brought back as a semi-returning character who had a couple of multi-episode story arcs, it would allow the writers to explore new ground with him while keeping elements of the original version, without running the risk of him overstaying his welcome and putting audiences off the character all over again.
Scrappy-Doo is remembered for two main things; his constant attempts to pick a fight with the ghosts, monsters, and other strange things the gang comes across, and his unending admiration for his uncle Scooby. Both these qualities would be perfect for giving him his own character arcs within a new show. In his first few episodes the writers could have the character show up exactly as he has always been, and learn that it isn’t smart to run headlong into danger. He could then become a Scrappy who is still eager to face obstacles and adversaries rather than run from them, but maybe with a bit of thought put into how he does it It could even be a fun way to show Scooby taking on more responsibility, and having to force himself to be a bit braver for Scrappy’s sake. Having Scrappy around would even be a good excuse for the writers to show him interacting with the other members of the gang besides Shaggy and Scooby. Imagine Fred cooking up plans with the young dog, happy to be working with someone he doesn’t have to bribe with food in order to help carry out one of his elaborate plans. Velma would probably have a lot of fun teaching the young animal, and you just know that Daphne would have her own things to teach Scrappy about problem solving. The writers could even have the puppy finally learn to see his uncle more realistically; still looking up to the older dog, but not outright worshipping him, or thinking that he is much more brave and heroic than he really is.
But the question remains; why? Why go to all the effort to bring back a character that the people behind more recent Scooby-Doo media seem happy to leave in the past? The answer is that Scooby-Doo has always been a franchise which embraces its past, even as newer shows attempt to move on from it and shake things up for newer audiences. More recently, various Scooby-Doo media has been as nostalgic for staples from Scooby-Doo history as the fans who watch it. Old monsters have been referenced or made reappearances. The second live action movie Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (written by James Gunn) even centered its entire plot around a Mystery Inc looking back on their early days after years of successful mystery solving had made them something of local legends in their hometown of Coolsville. That cameo Scrappy had in Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated was during a scene full of cameos to faces from past Scooby-Doo adventures. Yes, Scrappy hasn’t exactly been forgotten entirely, but why not bring him back in a way that shows love for the character and what he could be, instead of having him play the villain or an embarrassing footnote? Doing that would offer something with a lot more going for it than a throwaway joke, and it would certainly age more gracefully than whatever was going on at the end of that first live action movie, even if there is a certain amount of absurd humor in the fact that Rowan Atkinson once played Scooby’s nephew (there has been worst casting, somewhere).
In recent years, Scrappy-Doo has become the unfortunate scapegoat for a time when Scooby-Doo was faltering creatively. But the problems that plagued Scooby-Doo were at the very least, not entirely Scrappy’s fault. Between the way he was mishandled in the days of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo, and the way he has been shunted into the franchise’s rear view mirror, he is probably Scooby Doo’s biggest missed opportunity. The creators behind the various TV shows and movies have been willing to explore the idea of “teenagers and talking dog solve mysteries” from every angle, with multiple styles, tones, and even going as far as to have crossovers with the likes of Kiss, Batman, and Dick Dastardly. With all of that creative thinking on display it is finally time to do the one thing that they seem reluctant to do, and give both the character and audiences, a version of Scrappy that is just as good as he could be.
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