When I was a kid I LOVED Scooby-Doo. Heck, one year I even dressed up as Scooby for Halloween in one of those really old fashioned costumes with the annoying plastic masks (no fun to wear when you have glasses, lemme tell ya) and rayon suit that you wore over your regular clothes.
So when I found out that there was going to be a Scooby-Doo screening and panel at Comic Con 2010 this past weekend, I jumped at the chance to go and check it out.
Now I haven’t actually watched any Scooby-Doo cartoons in years, but I really liked the episode we got to see. Normally I’m not a huge fan of any animation these days but I enjoyed the fact that this new series (actually titled Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated) looked a lot like the original ‘Scooby Doo, Where Are You?‘ series I grew up on as a child. But it also had a lot of modern elements too, including the music which I thought was great – very rock/alternative.
After they aired the episode the guests were brought out, including art director Dan Krall, head writer/producer Mitch Watson, producers Tony Cervone and Spike Brandt, and the voice of Shaggy himself Matthew Lillard.
Highlights from the Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated Sneak Peak and Panel discussion at Comic-Con 2010…
When he was introduced to the stage, Matthew jumped up on to the table to egg on the audience into giving him bigger applause, which totally worked.
Tony and Spike said that the idea for the show came about after they did some research and found out that the age of the original Scooby gang was supposed to be around 15 to 16 yrs old. They also found out that all of them were from Laguna Beach, which cracked me up for some reason. Guess I never pictured all those spooky stories happening in a place like Laguna.
The show is being shot so that each of the 26 episodes is a stand-alone, but there will also be an underlying mystery to be solved at the end, throughout all of the episodes.
Some of the episodes will be mysteries and some will be more like “mini monster movies”.
The creators have seen the speculations that a lot of the fans are posting online about the final mystery and were quick to point out that, so far, no one is even close to solving it.
Tony remarked that he never thought of Matthew as imitating Shaggy, he simply IS Shaggy.
Tony and Mitch said that they often run ideas by Frank Welker (who has played the voice of Fred Jones since the original series in the 60′s) as they want his opinion and approval on where they are going with this new version of Scooby-Doo.
Most of the questions from the audience came from really little kids who were so adorable they melted the hearts of every adult in the room, including me and every one on stage. Some of these kids asked better questions than some adults at some other panels I attended over the weekend.
When asked what Scooby snacks taste like, Matthew said that he was asked by props to choose something (when filming the movie) and decided on something wheat based. He also said they tasted terrible.
Matthew said he had never done voices or imitations before playing Shaggy so at first he would scream himself hoarse before every take in order to get it right. Eventually he learned how to do it without the screaming, thank goodness.
Mitch said that when they always wanted Velma to be the “cute Comic-Con girl who’s into underground music, with glasses, etc.”.
Matthew remarked that he is very proud to be playing Shaggy, who is such an iconic character.
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