10 Things You Didn't Know About Scooby Doo
The monster nudie films, for a start.
When CBS broadcast What A Night For A Knight, the debut episode of Scooby Doo! Where Are You?, on 13 September 1969, it premiered to a topsy turvy world. Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy had been assassinated, the Manson family were still at large and if you hadn’t yet figured out times were changing, then a controversial new film called Midnight Cowboy, the first X-rated movie to win Best Picture, would change your mind.
In contrast, the members of Mystery Incorporated seemed to have stepped out of a different decade. Fred Jones, the group’s self-appointed hero/leader, would’ve been more familiar to teenaged viewers as the square-jawed protagonist who battled Blobs, mad scientists and rubber-suited monsters at the Drive-in every Saturday night.
His supposed girlfriend, Daphne Blake, had the token damsel-in-distress role while her considerably less attractive (and feminine looking) classmate Velma Dinkley, a near-sighted bookworm, could lecture for hours on such topics as runic symbols, palaeontology, Viking history etc. Rounding out the gang, and providing comic relief, were Norville “Shaggy” Rogers, a cowardly beatnik, and Scooby Doo, a talking Great Dane.
Even after 12 different series, 2 big budget feature films, plus a slew of straight-to-DVD titles as well as specials, spin-offs and spoofs, the show has barely departed from the blueprint laid down 5 decades ago. Shaggy’s bell-bottoms, the Mystery Machine, and the climactic unmasking are still present and correct, proving that some formulas never grow old.
10. The Show Was Originally Called Mysteries Five
Owing a debt to Enid Blyton’s Famous Five books, Mysteries Five was about 4 teenagers named Geoff, Kelly, Linda and WW, who roamed the country with their sheepdog, Too Much. CBS executive Fred Silverman disliked the idea, and wanted to revitalize his Saturday morning line-up with a series that would repeat the ratings success of The Archie Show as well as placate parent-led pressure groups that considered kids’ television too violent.
Between them, Silverman, writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears, plus animator Iwao Takamoto came up with Who’s S-S-Scared, which was basically Scooby Doo by another name. CBS President Frank Stanton rejected Who’s S-S-Scared? for being too scary for its intended audience, so Silverman changed the title and toned down the material, which was apparently enough to obtain the necessary green light.
In other words, Scooby Doo! Where Are You? came into existence because it was safe, formulaic and unlikely to tax an 8-year-old overmuch.