Scooby-Doo (2002)

With its snarky, eye-popping production design and disparate cast of popular young thespians, this live-action take on the Saturday-morning staple seemed like it had half a chance of pleasing Baby Boomers and Generation X. Instead, though, it's a children's flick, suitable only for Generation Z and almost completely lacking in Brady Bunch Movie-style winking. Scooby Doo does contain a few laugh-out-loud moments and lots of in-jokes about marijuana, but the film has been carefully engineered so as not to offend or confuse the kiddies. (Pointed references to Velma's sexual orientation ended up on the cutting room floor, along with lots of other subversive hijinks if the Internet movie spies are to be believed.) The result is a movie that looks good and stays relatively true to its source material without ever seeming edgy or even engaging. Perhaps a cartoon whose very appeal has always been its extreme lameness couldn't really afford to be enclosed in yet another set of quotation marks. But given the pedestrian CG and by-the-numbers spookiness on display, it seems the filmmakers couldn't come up with anything compelling to replace the missing irony. Scooby-Doo himself is an computer-generated monstrosity who mixes poorly with the human actors. Of those performers, their watchability varies highly: The delightful Matthew Lillard mimics Casey Kasem perfectly but also invests Shaggy with something approaching human feeling. Linda Cardellini and Sarah Michelle Gellar both subvert feminine stereotypes and provoke chuckles, though within very strict parameters. The less said about Freddie Prinze, Jr., the better, though his blond dye job is far worse than his acting. The real blame for this supremely adequate outing lies at the feet of the corporate gatekeepers who decided to play it safe. Very young children will probably enjoy it, but for anyone older than 10, it's a slight trifle at best. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide