Scooby-Doo: Wrestle Mania Mystery isn’t the strongest or best outing of the recent array of Scooby adventures but it’s an enjoyable flick with more than a few laughs even if it’s an 80-minute promotional featurette on the WWE.
Scooby-Doo: Wrestle Mania Mystery
(2014)
Genre(s): Animated, Comedy, Mystery, Crime
Warner Bros. | NR – 84 min. – $24.98 | March 25, 2014
 |
MOVIE INFO: Directed by: Brandon Vietti Writer(s): Michael Ryan (written by) Voice Cast: Frank Welker, Mindy Cohn, Grey DeLisle Griffin, Matthew Lillard, Charles S. Dutton, Mary McCormack, John Cena, Brodus Clay, Michael Cole, Kane, AJ Lee, The Miz, Triple H, Vince McMahonDISC INFO: Features: Featurette, Bonus Episode, DVD Copy, Digital Copy Number of Discs: 2Audio: English (DTS-HD MA 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 2.0), Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0) Video: 1080p/Widescreen 1.78 Subtitles: English SDH, French Disc Size: 17.6 GB Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Region(s): A, B, C |
THE MOVIE – 3.0/5
The Scooby Gang is back and tackling their greatest challenge yet: product placement.
Scooby-Doo: WrestleMania Mystery opens with a prologue to introduce audiences to our “supernatural” villain known only as The Bear after it attacks The Miz who happens to be jogging down the road in the middle of the night far away from the bright lights of WWE City. So The Miz, who seemed to be a good sport poking fun at himself, gets injured before we go into the flashy opening credits introducing us to the various wrestlers we will be meeting in this feature.
So, this go around the gang make way for WWE City after Shaggy (MATTHEW LILLARD) and Scooby (FRANK WELKER) defeat a WWE video game winning a trip to see Wrestlemania. They first have to convince Fred (WELKER), Velma (MINDY COHN) and Daphne (GREY DELISLE GRIFFIN) by reminding them of the dangers they went through to solve cases.
Along the dark, winding road towards WWE City, they almost run over a raccoon, slide all over the place and nearly go off a cliff. They manage to get out (off-screen) but receive help from a passing motorist consisting of a man named Cookie (CHARLES S. DUTTON), his nephew Ruben (COREY BURTON) and, of course, WWE Superstar Jon Cena who lends a hand lifting the van and placing it back on the road.
However, before they can get acquainted, Scooby chases after the raccoon who has stolen a box of his Scooby Snacks deep into the forest where they encounter a shotgun wielding cantankerous old man (BUMPER ROBINSON). For their troubles with the backwoods crank, Cena gives the gang VIP passes to WrestleMania, afterwards, they’re invited to attend and stay at the WWE Training Camp where, that night, are attacked by The Bear.
I think you get the routine, lots of hijinks, elaborate traps and a finale/reveal that’s not overly clever yet satisfying enough for a cartoon aimed at kids. Still, for a Scooby-Doo adventure, it’s not an entirely bad flick, enjoyable enough but hardly the strongest outing of the recent releases.
But this one is different in its cross-promotion with the WWE in not only advertising Wrestle Mania but highlight their current crop of superstar wrestlers who make voice appearances from John Cena to Triple H to Sin Cara (plus the silent Kane). The jokes they’re given aren’t funny though The Miz’s brief appearance is fantastic as mentioned in the opening.
Scooby-Doo: Wrestle Mania Mystery offers passable entertainment and although it’s not a great adventure/mystery or anything, I still laughed at more than a few jokes and the Scooby gang is always fun to watch even after all these years and coalescing nicely in terms of the voice talents (including Matthew Lillard who has served as the perfect replacement to Casey Kasem now going on 4 DTV movies and a television series).
SPECIAL FEATURES – 1.0/5
This release comes with a glossy and embossed slip cover. Inside are a standard DVD Copy and a Digital Copy download code.
Behind the Scenes with Scooby-Doo and the WWE Gang (7:34) is a short featurette with interviews and some footage of them in the recording booth. It’s all pretty standard stuff as the WWE guys are glowing about working on the movie. Nothing noteworthy but it is more than what we usually get from recent Scooby-Doo animated movies of late…
There’s also an episode (23:17) called ‘Wrestle Maniacs’ from “A Pup Named Scooby-Doo”.
Previews – Son of Batman, Tom and Jerry: The Lost Dragon, Justice League: War
VIDEO – 4.0/5
Scooby-Doo: Wrestlemania Mystery enters into the Blu-ray ring shown in 1080p high-definition and presented with a 1.78 widescreen aspect ratio. Like previous recent Scooby-Doo releases, this one looks fine though the animation isn’t anything special though it looks nice and bright. There’s also some moments of banding but nothing distracting or even unusual for a production like this.
AUDIO – 3.25/5
The 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio track included is curiously soft, where while the dialogue levels are clear and understandable, the action elements, such as when the Bear attacks, are lighter and hardly have any impact (the LFE channel rarely kicks in). For the type of movie this is, it’s not a big deal but still disappointing.
OVERALL – 2.5/5
Overall, Scooby-Doo: Wrestle Mania Mystery isn’t the strongest or best outing of the recent array of Scooby adventures but it’s an enjoyable flick with more than a few laughs even if it’s an 80-minute promotional featurette on the WWE. The Blu-ray released by Warner provides for an adequate video, serviceable audio and a limited number of bonus materials.
The Movieman
Published: 03/27/2014