Scooby-Doo! The Mystery Begins
The computer-generated dog and its human companions return for more Mystery Inc action. Matthew Lillard, Sarah Michelle Gellar and Freddie Prinze Jr star
A lazy, cash-hungry sequel stitched together in haste with little care for such niceties as entertainment, enjoyment or audience respect, Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed simply adds insult to the original's injury. This time round the kids of Mystery Inc and their CGI hound are investigating a host of digital villains - including the 10,000 Volt Ghost, Miner 49er and The Black Knight Ghost - who have been brought to life by an evil genius (Green) intent on wreaking havoc in the town of Coolsville. With the gang being blamed for the chaos and Shaggy (Lillard) and Scooby feeling that the rest of the group doesn't appreciate them, the scene is set for some ghostly hi-jinks intertwined with a moral message. Or perhaps not, since this disastrous sequel manages to botch almost every funny moment. With an over-emphasis on some atrocious CGI effects, this is far from the impressive spectacle it ought to be. Scooby himself is pretty much the same as in the first film: a lolloping digital dog who occasionally looks evil enough to start chomping on the target kiddie audience should the Scooby snacks run out. Yet the assorted ghostly villains are rendered so poorly (with green, ectoplasmic effects) they could have been leftover from a 1950s sci-fi flick. The ratio of atrociously lame gags to hilariously funny ones is definitely skewed in favour of the former. Facing off against The Black Knight Ghost, Daphne (Gellar) reprises her Buffy-esque martial arts role and delivers a kick to the armour-plated groin, prompting the Knight to yelp "right in the roundtables". A far funnier sequence has Shaggy and Scooby decked out in 1970s Saturday Night Fever gear - Scooby complete with Afro - for some dance floor shenanigans. A later, inspired moment has the cowardly couple snaffling a series of potions that turns Shaggy into a woman with huge breasts while Scooby becomes a monster, a brainiac professor, then a 2-D Tasmanian devil with each additional sip. Ultimately, it's the cynicism of the whole enterprise that grates. Only five seconds pass before the product placement begins (spot the KFC logo, kids), quickly reiterated a few minutes later with shameless crudity: "Another creepy crib," moans eternal coward Shaggy as the gang pull up outside a haunted mansion. "How come we can't investigate a KFC or something?" Well, like, there's always Scooby-Doo 3. Verdict Who let the dog out? Franchise filmmaking at its worst, this lazy, uninspired and deeply cynical sequel delivers little that's new or even entertaining. |
