Director: Paul McEvoy
Distributor: Warner Home Video
Duration: 75 minutes
Scooby-Doo! Moon Monster Madness (DVD) – Movie Review
By now, Scooby-Doo and the mystery gang has seen just about every spot in the whole wide world. They’ve traveled around, using their peculiar skills to solve the strangest mysteries and puzzles, earning fame and respect from just about everybody. There is just one last frontier that they must overcome, an unknown place that isn’t mapped, Space.
In Scooby-Doo: Moon Monster Madness, our team of five gets invited to take a trip to the moon, which they gladly accept. Scooby-Doo, Fred Jones (both voiced by Frank Welker), Velma Dinkley (Mindy Cohn), Daphne Blake (Grey DeLisle) and Shaggy Rogers (Matthew Lillard) will join the extravagant billionaire Sly Baron (Malcom McDowell), astronaut Shannon Lucas and alien hunter Ridley (both voiced by Jennifer Hale), Zip Elvin (Mark Hamill), Colt Steelcase (Jeff Bennett), television reporter Clark Sparkman (Eric Bauza) and football superstar Univous “U-Boat” Botango (Kevin Michael Richardson).
They all board the massive spaceship Sly Star One and head off for the moon. However, it wouldn’t be a Scooby-Doo movie if the whole journey went without a hitch. Shaggy and Scooby are the first to notice something weird crawling outside the spacecraft and try to calm their nerves by eating copious amounts of food. It does seem that the alien Shaggy and Scooby spotted wasn’t a figment of their imagination and it soon becomes apparent that there is indeed a strange creature mucking about when the spacecraft loses its air supply. In an emergency landing, our heroes arrive on the moon, where Sly Baron has built a secret lunar base. Will our heroes survive on the base, now that an alien is attacking them?
Scooby-Doo: Moon Monster Madness is a very basic Scooby-Doo story. While the previous couple of movies added in some new variation that dared to experiment with the expectations of a Scooby-Doo story, this one returns to the very familiar story lines. So without any twists, the film is made or broken by its jokes and references to others movies. The jokes part falls a bit flat, with only two or three jokes that really hit the mark. The reference to others films are pretty good and constant, giving some nice winks to Alien, Predator and other sci-fi classics. These references make the movie watchable by the parents, who can play the reference game, while the kids are no doubt captured by the eventful storyline.
By now, the main voice actors are pretty familiar with their characters and this is a good thing. The natural sounding way of acting that Frank Welker, Mindy Cohn, Grey DeLisle and Matthew Lillard have been employing is pretty good, together with the group dynamic that has been integrated into the cast which lifts the whole movie up the a higher level. The newcomers all do an excellent job as well, but Jennifer Hale is sometimes a bit over the top in her performance. Malcom McDowell is one of those actors that can just show up and still give a good performances and his voice is always a treat to listen to.
The animation itself varies a lot in this one. There are a couple scenes that are drawn and animated beautifully, such as the scene where we first lay eyes on the lunar base. It is very impressive and wonderfully drawn, but it also shows that director Paul McEvoy chose where to put his budget. While the epic introduction scenes look great, you can clearly see a lot of reuse during the action fragments, which will most likely be overlooked by a younger audience, but will bug older ones. However, all in all McEvoy made the corrects choices: by reusing some animations during the fast paced action scenes he can free up some budget to animate the spacecraft and the lunar base in more stunning manner, he creates a wonderful setting.
Conclusion
After a series of very good movies, this new Scooby-Doo falls a bit flat by comparison. It goes back to the well-known formula, which lacks some creativity and removes any element of surprise. The reference to space classics are fun to watch and the kids will probably enjoy it as well, but it doesn’t reach the quality that the last couple of Scooby-Doo films had.
Scooby-Doo! Moon Monster Madness (DVD) - Movie Review,
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