Recent updates on Mindy Kaling's pending Velma for HBO Max & Chumptoon Network have revealed that Kaling has plans not just for Velma herself, but certain other members of Mystery, Inc..
Photo courtesy of Twitter/WB.
Kaling, as we've noted previously, is essaying the title role, with Velma now of Indian (South Asian) descent, as are her parents. But that ain't all.
Daphne, the leggy redhead, is being reimagined as a foundling this time, adopted by two female police officers. Mitch Watson tried a similar tack with Fred in Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated in 2010, having Fred adopted as an infant, only for his "birth parents" to return in season 2 to reclaim him.
Norville "Shaggy" Rogers is being flipped to African American. Now, this is a gig Kevin Hart should've looked at. And maybe he did, for all we know.
Velma is being posited as a prequel to the Scooby-Doo franchise, which has been a fixture on television, either on broadcast or cable networks, since its launch in 1969. In other words, you might not be able to escape the earlier series if they're readily available.
I get what Mindy is trying to do with a more culturally diverse cast, following a popular trend du jour in Hollywood, but the accessibility of all those DTV movies and various series, either on DVD or on cable or HBO Max, coupled with negative pre-release feedback on various message boards, and a pending CW special, is cause for concern.
My guess is that CN/HBO Max will hold Velma until after the "reunion" special on CW airs later this year. I may be wrong about that, but ya never know.
5 comments:
I'm not a huge Scooby Doo fan, but I don't think that it's a good idea to have a Scooby Doo inspired series featuring characters in the Scoobyverse but without Scooby himself. That just seems wrong to me. I could maybe understand reducing Scooby to a supporting role, but removing him entirely? It would be like having a Flintstones series without Fred.
The show's producers can't even use the excuse that their introducing Mystery, Inc. to a new audience, since Scooby Doo has been on the air in some way, shape or form and has therefore been in the public consciousness since "Scooby Doo, Where Are You?" debuted in 1969.
I made that latter point in the post. If Scooby'd been off the air, even the reruns, for any period of time, then you could justify it, but the videos are everywhere, even excerpts on YouTube.
More and more this is starting to sound like some unrelated pet project of Mindy Kaling's that WB decided to slap the Mystery Inc. characters' names on for the sake of brand recognition.
Personally, I'd prefer Mindy's VA roles as Taffyta Muttonfudge (the 2 Wreck-It Ralph films), Disgust (Inside Out), and Val Little (Monsters at Work, a series exclusive to Disney+ that is definitely worth checking out) over reinvented characters any day.
Ok, let's assume this actually does go on the air. How many seasons does this get?
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