Synopsis: After years of successfully solving mysteries, Mystery Inc. is given the honor of a museum display in their hometown of Coolsville. However, when the costumes of their former conquered bad guys come to life on their own, they are quickly vilified as the people of Coolsville come under attack.
Movie Review: Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed (2004)
by StevenHelmer
A review of the 2004 live action movie starring Sarah Michelle Gellar and Freddie Prinze, Jr.
Who's In It?
The movie stars Sarah Michelle Gellar, Matthew Lillard, Linda Cardellini, Seth Green and Freddie Prinze, Jr.
Review
My wife and I picked the original "Scooby Doo" movie for our movie night on Saturday and, since we both enjoyed it so much, I decided to watch the sequel with her on Sunday morning. It had been a while since we saw this particular film and I didn't remember much about it as a result. But, while it wasn't quite as good as the first movie, it did prove to be enjoyable.
There were a couple things I found I liked about this film. The first was the fact there were so many potential bad guys, including a few that seemed to be very obvious, including Velma's (Cardellini) new boyfriend (Green) and a pushy news reporter (Alicia Silverstone) that seems to be going out of her way to make the mystery solvers look bad. And, this doesn't even include the tavern full of ex-villains they've unmasked in the past.
Another thing I liked about this movie was the way everything seemed to be working against them. The entire town hates them. Shaggy (Lillard) and Scooby (voiced by Neil Fanning) are going through a bit of confidence crisis and they don't even have the ability to simply unmask the bad guys because they aren't people in disguise. This feeling of hopelessness made their mystery solving much more interesting simply because they weren't given the benefit of having all the latest crime-solving gadgets and time.
Some of the fight scenes were a bit intense, especially when Fred (Prinze) and Daphne (Gellar) were fighting two of the villains and were being knocked around really hard. This isn't too big of a deal but it's worth mentioning because it might be too much for some younger kids, including the final battle, which has some of the Mystery Inc. members being suffocated by a tar monster.
Final Opinion
The first movie was definitely better. But, this one was worth taking the time to watch too. It's a decent family-friendly movie that has a good mystery and is just fun to watch.
My Grade: B
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Updated: 02/15/2016, StevenHelmer
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Comments
StevenHelmer, Thank you for product lines, pretty pictures and practical information.
The library system here has Scooby Doo 2 among its Blu-ray and DVD collections. So I intend to catch up on Scooby Doo films soon, most likely after Lent.
What would have made the sequel up to par with the original?