An episode of Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated was quietly an Avengers-style crossover for the Hanna-Barbera characters Scooby helped inspire — and it had a concept solid enough that it could be the next Scooby-Doo movie. “Mystery Solvers Club State Finals” was a largely throwaway episode presented largely as a dream sequence for a fever-ridden Scooby, whose illness prevents the Mystery Gang from taking part in the titular competition, but it left a huge impression.
In the dream, Scooby’s health quickly improves and allows for the Gang to attend the finals. There they meet four other groups of mystery-solving teenagers, along with their respective unique partners. Each group is based on one of the shows produced by Hanna-Barbera after Scooby-Doo‘s success, which all featured teens with different mascots. There was the talking shark Jabberjaw, the pompous Funky Phantom, the living automobile Speed Buggy and the prehistoric powerhouse Captain Caveman.
The episode took a turn when the mysterious Lord Infernicus arrived and kidnapped everyone but the mascots, leaving Scooby to rally the other four bizarre characters to solve the mystery and save their friends. The team-up struck a similar chord as 2021’s Scoob!, which rebooted the franchise with a new continuity. In that film, Scooby-Doo co-existed alongside other Hanna-Barbera fixtures, one of which was Captain Caveman. However, Scoob! was a more superhero-influenced project, with a large part of the plot focusing on Scooby’s temptation to join forces with the superhero Blue Falcon. It didn’t fit with the Scooby-Doo brand (like the Teen Titans promoting basketball).
“Mystery Solvers Club State Finals” was a more engaging attempt at the same concept a decade earlier. It found a way to bond the various characters inspired by Scooby together into a fun crossover in the style of the Avengers or NBC’s One Chicago franchise, while still remaining true to the original series and quietly pushing forward the emotional throughlines of Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated. It wasn’t the first time a Cartoon Network show parodied the Avengers, but it had much more meaning.
The variety of the group’s unique attributes allowed for multiple scenarios that gave each character a role in solving the mystery. The episode even featured a solid twist, with Lord Infernicus eventually revealed to be Funky Phantom — who’d grown tired of being perceived as a goofy sidekick and wanted to become a more respected leader. That plot was an interesting way to look at Scooby-Doo, with the throughline of the episode being Scooby’s doubts about being a genuine part of Mystery Inc. instead of just being a mascot for them. It explored Scooby’s actual role within the franchise that bears his name, and allowed him to do so while expanding into an entire universe of young mystery solvers fighting against human corruption and mystical threats alike.
Any future Scooby-Doo film should focus more on a mystery element and if it does cross over with other Hanna-Barbera characters, focus more heavily on the characters thematically tied to Scooby. It could even be a great chance to push Tracy Morgan’s version of Captain Caveman from Scoob! further into the spotlight. “Mystery Solvers Club State Finals” serves as an ideal template for the next entry in the franchise, especially as the brand tries to expand for a new generation and potentially into the DC multiverse.
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