Live-action remakes of classic animated movies and series are controversial at the best of times. Just ask Disney. Animation fans have lampooned everything from the impassivity of the animals in the live-action Lion King to The Rock's ridiculous hair in the upcoming Moana remake.
Scooby-Doo Origins, an upcoming Netflix series based on the classic Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters, is taking the 'live-action' moniker more literally than Disney, but it looks set to be no less controversial. The streaming platform has released a teaser revealing that the titular canine hero won't be CGI. He's just a regular puppy.
The Scooby-Doo: Origins teaser (above) starts with a pooch's viewpoint taking us sniffing around some woods until we spot Shaggy Rogers. Later, we get a glimpse of Scooby-Doo as a puppy as Shaggy lifts him up.
Tanner Hagen looks perfect as shaggy, with his long face and pointy chin. But Scooby?An actual real-world dog? For someone who grew up with the iconic cartoons, it feels almost sacrilegious.
The difficulty with live-action remakes is that by nature they tend to aim for realism, even in examples where there's as much CGI animation going on as there is live action. And realistic-looking animals generally don't share the dramatic expressiveness of their stylised animated counterparts.
Scooby-Doo has had many interpretations. The upcoming anime Scooby-Doo looks great. But its charm is that it's goofy and surreal. The live-action movies of the early 2000s with Sarah Michelle Gellar and Matthew Lillard weren't exactly great films, but they respected this by making Scooby a heavily stylised CGI character. Leaning into the cartoons' camp absurdity, his exaggerated mannerisms drove the energy of the two movies.
Don't get me wrong, the dog that plays Scooby Doo in Netflix's series is adorably cute and may be a fantastic actor. At least, he's a Great Dane, and he's shown wearing Scooby's iconic teal collar But it's hard to imagine him delivering the exaggerated expressive performance that the role requires. If he can't do a wheel o' feet, impressions of ghosts and ghouls and exclaim "Ruh-roh!" and "Scooby-dooby-Doo" in a sufficiently melodramatic way at appropriate junctures, he might as well be Lassie.
That's where one big question remains. Netflix hasn't said whether or not Scooby will talk in the series.
There have been rumours that veteran voice actor Frank Welker, the only living member of the original cartoons from the '60s, will return to voice Scooby. Meanwhile, Paul Walter Hauser is included in the cast, but his role hasn't been announced, leading to speculation that he might be the voice of Scooby.
This is encouraging but also concerning. If the real dog is going to talk, does that mean they'll be using CGI to animate his mouth like in Babe, or, God forbid, Beverly Hills Chihuahua?
What is Scooby-Doo Origins?
Rant over. I've calmed down. What do we know about Scooby-Doo Origins anyway?
As the show's name suggests, the live-action series will tell the story of how Mystery Gang first met each other and their canine companion Scooby-Doo. It will begin at a summer camp, where Shaggy and Daphne Blake (Mckenna Grace) end up involved in a haunting mystery after finding a lost puppy that may have witnessed a supernatural murder.
A "pragmatic and scientific townie" Velma Dinkley (Abby Ryder Fortson) and "strange but ever-so-handsome" Fred Jones (Maxwell Jenkins), they set out to solve the case. The series is being produced by Warner Bros. Television with Berlanti Productions and Midnight Radio. Toby Haynes will direct the first episode.
Netflix is retaining some mystery around the series, which is fitting for Scooby-Doo. It's possible that we will see Scooby evolve and come to look more like the Scooby-Doo we know. That could be quite interesting. Maybe he'll eat a Scooby Snack that transforms him into the real Scooby-Doo, which would be appropriately psychedelic.
The series is actually starting to sound quite promising. I'll probably watch it. I'll be seething though.
Scooby-Doo Origins is slated for release on Netflix in 2027.
