Review : Scooby Doo 2

Scooby Doo 2 : Monsters Unleashed -  The Gang are back for the sequel. As well as some old adversaries from the Cartoon Series.

Hey Everybody.

So on Monday, I did my review of Scooby Doo The Movie, today I am reviewing the sequel. 'Monsters Unleashed'. A case in which involves Mystery Inc, saving Coolsville from an attack of past unmasked monsters brought to life by an evil masked figure trying to demolish the gangs reputation.

I'll be honest, I am sceptical about sequels because either the idea isn't good enough, or it sounds good but when viewing it it isn't as good as I thought it would be. Most sequels tend to be 'oh let's go on holiday' because the writers have done everything, in the case of Scooby Doo the idea of bringing back old monsters people memorised from the old show is a powerful one. It would engage children with it, it would excite audiences and most importantly raise a lot of money in the box office.

This sequel came to pass after the success of the first film, so obviously the first film was a success otherwise why was this sequel made. The first one did great in the box office and proved that live action Scooby Doo was successful. It is a shame however that Monsters Unleashed killed live action Scooby Doo, as there was a lot going for it when this film was released back in 2004.

The Idea behind it is this, When Mystery, Inc. are guests of honor at the grand opening of the Coolsville Museum of Criminology, a mysterious masked villain ( I know shock factor) shows up and cause trouble before stealing the costumes of the gang's most notorious and memorable villains: Black Knight Ghost, Pterodactyl Ghost and Tar Monster.

Reason suggest throughout the film that their nemesis and scientist Jonathan Jacobo has returned and is trying to recreate their deadliest foes. Velma develops a crush on the museum curator Patrick Wisely but the trouble with him is he acts so suspicious. It becomes clear to the Mystery Gang that they are hard pressed to succeed this time, since pesky TV reporter Heather Jasper-Howe insists they are buffoons.



From the basic outline, this film has the workings of a good film. The concept is there, but it is however presented in a let's be honest badly executed way and what you get is a film less than satisfactory. It focuses to much on a young audience and having humour primarily based on children. Older audience members can't engage with it. Fans of the cartoon show that had grown up watching Scooby Doo, hated it.

However I liked the backdrop behind all the stuff in the museum, I thought that was a neat backdrop to introducing the old monsters again, I think all the monsters are presented in a new fresh and dynamic way that reintroduces them to older audiences who know them, and to both younger audiences who don't know about them. So that was all good.

I thought the film, like the last one was exceptionally well directed by Raja Gosnell. The story is directed accordingly to telling the story, not giving too much away and not straining forwards. It goes at its own pace as you do whilst you watch it.

Here's a clip.

All the main four cast members, excluding Scooby because he's a CGI Dog. Gave off a great performance. It's not so canny or cringe worthy for me. They could of been worse, but they all seemed quite contained and well established from experiences of playing the characters from last time that they come back to do better. To be fair, they do do better. all four of them, so I say well done. It's not easy to take on a roll as famous as the mystery inc team and bring on a convincing performance to a very highly substantial and critical viewing audience. I say well done to all four of them.

The best thing about this film for me was the way it started, and the reintroduction to this set up. It's very easy to go into a sequel and know it's going to be bad from the start, but this starts off so well, you sort of want it to be good, and urges your enjoyment of it to go on.



The worst bit for me was the end, there's nothing more pointless as an upbeat pop song and disco that has nothing to do with the plot. It's put in there to convince the audience that they had a great time with this low par film. I won't say it was rubbish because that would be untrue.


Final scores on the board for this film? for me it has to be a 5.5/ 10. Sorry, not for me.

Thanks for watching this review.

NEXT : I will review The Hobbit 'The Desolation of Smaug' I will post that review on Sunday the 12th of January 2014.