The 90's was a tremendous time for traditional animation. The Disney Renaissance was in full-swing, but it's also worth noting that it was an especially strong era for Warner Bros Animation as well. With television offerings like Animaniacs and Batman The Animated Series and films like The Iron Giant and Mask of the Phantasm, the studio had a lot to offer cartoon fanatics back in the day. For me, one of WB's most memorable productions was Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island, a direct-to-video film that premiered on Cartoon Network on Halloween night, 1998. Considering it's been years since I've watched my copy (naturally, recorded off the TV onto a blank VHS tape), I figured it was high-time I revisited the film that many credit with reviving this classic franchise from the clutches of Saturday morning stagnation.
As the story begins, the Mystery Inc. gang has given up the ghost and disbanded; Velma (B.J. Ward) runs her own book store, Shaggy and Scooby (Billy West and Scott Innes) are employed as bumbling customs agents, and Fred and Daphne (Frank Welker and Mary Kay Bergman) work together on a successful television show. As the production is about to embark on a road trip to investigate hauntings across the country, Fred is inspired to get the gang back together for old times' sake. The crew eventually find themselves in New Orleans, investigating a reportedly haunted plantation house on Moonscar Island, the former hideaway of a legendary pirate. Tales of mysterious disappearances and vengeful ghosts pique the gang's curiosity, but things take a turn when actual zombies begin to rise from the bayou; as the film's tagline says, "this time, the monsters are real!"
It's really a brilliant subversion of expectations; throughout the entire first half of the movie, the gang's skepticism is played through the roof. They question every remotely spooky thing they see, immediately searching for a projector or rubber mask. The idea of making the threat of a Scooby-Doo story genuinely supernatural is a stroke of genius; by packing the first two acts full of standard slapstick antics, it sets the stage for a major tonal shift once the zombies are revealed to be real. The first three-quarters of this movie are lighthearted and slow-moving, exactly what one would expect out of a Scooby-Doo film. There's lots of gags about Scooby chasing after cats and eating big sandwiches, almost to the point that it becomes tiring. However, this is all merely set dressing for the main event that is the climax.
I won't spoil the ending here, but it goes to some genuinely dark places. The movie starts and ends as classic Scooby-Doo, but the last twenty minutes in-between is essentially an animated horror film. The opening scene is an upbeat chase through a spooky castle as the gang is pursued by a swamp monster, while everything past the halfway point involves the honest-to-god rotting corpses of Confederate soldiers and pirates clawing their way out of the soil to limp after our protagonists. There are even some zombie tourists in there, implying that the Mystery Inc. gang aren't the first folks to stumble upon Moonscar Island and run afoul of the living dead. It honestly justifies the entire film all on its own; as corny as the tone was for the majority of the runtime, it all works in favor of subverting the audience's expectations and making that tonal shift hit that much harder.
I also can't praise the film's presentation enough; the animation was done by Japanese studio, Mook Animation (responsible for animating such works as SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron and Tiny Toon Adventures). Every scene taking place at night is full of heavy shadows that almost give things a stylized, hyper-realistic feel, as if we're watching a moving blacklight poster. I know the era of ink and paint is long gone (and that the upcoming S.C.O.O.B. will be computer animated), but I've always felt that this style was an ideal fit for Scooby and the gang, and would kill to see it used again in some capacity. Hanna-Barbera was not a studio known for its animation, so it's nice to see a property so ripe for spooky atmosphere done justice in terms of visuals. The 90's kid in me would also be remiss if I didn't mention the soundtrack, featuring original songs by Skycycle. Put simply, they shred. If you've never had It's Terror Time Again stuck in your head, then you've never seen this movie.
Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island is a fresh, original, well-animated entry in a franchise that is seldom known for being any of those things. It could be argued that the vast majority of entries into the Scooby series follows the "fake monster unmasked by meddling kids" formula; there are a few exceptions, of course (such as the more recent Mystery Inc. series), and Zombie Island is fortunately one of them. It's very much a film aimed at children, but the lighthearted beginning and middle work in service of a dark, exciting, and at times genuinely scary end. It's just over an hour long, so if you're a meddling kid with some free time on your hands, you really don't have any excuse not to check this out.
No comments:
Post a Comment