The hatred for Scrappy-Doo

[Just_Asking_Questions]

I’m too old for Scrappy. I was there Sept 13, 1969 at the original debut of Scooby-Doo Where Are You?. I was a just shy of 8, the prime audience. Even then, it was what it was. Somewhat stupid, mostly entertaining. The alien ghost still haunts me (so to speak!) I was grown up and long gone by the time Scrappy came along.

I thought the show started its decline when the celebrity years and the hour long episodes of The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries. Do kids really need or care that Phyllis Diller is helping them? Sandy Duncan? Don Knotts? Sonny and Cher? The Harlem freaking Globetrotters?

eta Wes Crusher gets a bum rap. It was the sweater. And Picard’s attitude. He was excellent in some episodes, like The Bonding.

The Game, however, should have all copies burned, and the ashes scattered.

[FlikTheBlue]

Count me in as a Scrappy Doo hater. I was born in 1977, so most of my Scooby Doo experience was reruns that were shown after school on weekdays. Even so, he still felt like an annoying outsider.

A big part of it, IMHO, is Scrappy’s in universe treatment compared to some of the other characters mentioned. Wesley Crusher, Cousin Oliver, etc., were annoying not just to the viewer, but also to the other characters on their shows. Scrappy, on the other hand, was fawned over by the rest of the gang, often pushing Scooby to the side. That’s what makes him more hateable than Wesley or Cousin Oliver.

[griffin1977]

I’m with the OP. Of course Scrappy Doo is a terrible character lazily written into a show at the behest of the suits. But when I watched the show I was too young to grasp any of that, he was just a funny puppy character who would get the better of the bad guys. What’s not to like?

[Maserschmidt]

It took 19 posts, but you got in with the answer before I did.

[Elmer_J.Fudd]

@Just_Asking_Questions

Do kids really need or care that Phyllis Diller is helping them? Sandy Duncan? Don Knotts? Sonny and Cher? The Harlem freaking Globetrotters?

I think we kinda did. It made the show seem more adult to kids who were just being introduced to these entertainers. I’m not saying the celebrity episodes were good, but they were popular and created a new fan base for artists who really needed one.

[Quimby]

There is a phenomenon where when someone grows up with a media and gets to the upper level of who that show is aimed at or beyond they get resentful at the things that are added to attract kids that are younger than them (but are their age when they themselves latched on) and thus hate them.

See also Wesley Crusher and Ewoks. (It didn’t help that Wesley was written poorly early on and kind of deserved the ire but Ewoks are awesome, don’t @ me).

[Andy_L]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

There’s a certain age, like 15 or 16, when the trappings of childhood become fraught. The things you loved as a kid, you still secretly love, but you’re ashamed to love them, because it makes you feel childish. Instead of rejecting those things, you performatively reject childish things that came after your time.

That’s basically the answer for me. The show started when I was five - I remember watching it, and it was (to 5-year-old eyes) pretty advanced stuff, and I was hooked. But the show didn’t age with me, and just as I was outgrowing it, they introduced a new character, not to appeal to me, but to appeal to 5-year-olds - how horrible!

@John_DiFool

As a (former) gifted kid I was one of the few that liked Wesley, tho admittedly his early appearances did go over the line in terms of his prodigy-ness. When he settled in as a regular character he became much more likable.

Yeah. Wesley in the first season could glance at a brainscan and see something that a qualified doctor missed, and was a jerk about it. Later on, when he saved the day in a more reasonable way (he didn’t get hooked on the video game because he’d rather hang out with a pretty girl - much more relatable), he was a reasonable character.

[hogarth]

@Odesio

He wasn’t a character I particularly cared for but he wasn’t one that grated on me either. I do think the cartoons produced before Scrappy were superior. But then I’m a big fan of the early period of Scooby Doo where all the supernatural nonsense have rational explanations.

I agree with all of this, although I remember kind of liking “The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo”.

[Q.Q.Switcheroo]

@Quimby

There is a phenomenon where when someone grows up with a media and gets to the upper level of who that show is aimed at or beyond they get resentful at the things that are added to attract kids that are younger than them (but are their age when they themselves latched on) and thus hate them.

See also Wesley Crusher and Ewoks.

And Elmo’s early-21st-century takeover of Sesame Street.

[What_Exit]

Was that when Vincent Price was added to the show?

I was the wrong age for that, but that was good.

[CastletonSnob1]

I’m old enough to remember Barney hate. There were even sites listing ways to kill Barney, and the “Barney Fun Page”.

[hogarth]

@What_Exit

Was that when Vincent Price was added to the show?

I was the wrong age for that, but that was good.

Yes, Vincent Price was in it (not to mention Arte “Laugh-In” Johnson and Howard “Ernest T. Bass” Morris). I was also a little too old for it, but I liked the “quest” concept.

[Moriarty]

@pkbites

I hates me a Scrappy-Doo!

Avatar checks out!

…

Scrappy was annoying. So was Captain Caveman.

[jnglmassiv]

@JohnnyEcks

the answer to life’s greatest questions

It’s remarkable how often I recommend rastafying this or that by 15, 20%.

[Andy_L]

Likewise.

And I still can’t wait to get to the fireworks factory

[Czarcasm]

The hatred for Scrappy-Doo is easily explained: Before he came along Scooby Doo was a very intelligent dog, so intelligent he could almost speak English! After Scrappy-Doo, he became a dipshit dog that couldn’t even speak properly compared to that annoying little dipshit. The very dynamic of the show changed, and people recognized who was to blame.

[RivkahChaya]

@Elmer_J.Fudd

What a lot of people don’t realize is that Scrappy Doo was the reaction to plummeting ratings and his appearance in 1979 actually garnered new viewers. People who grew up with the show weren’t watching Saturday morning cartoons anymore and the show had to appeal to younger audiences. And it worked.

I was the exact right age for hate, because I was the second wave Scooby audience. I was born in 1967, and started watching cartoons around 1971.

Scooby was my favorite.

He was my favorite in 1971, and remained my favorite. I still love him. I didn’t care for the celebrity episodes as much as the originals, but was still excited to have new Scooby-doo, and did not hate them.

In 1979, I still watched cartoons, albeit, not as fervently. We didn’t leave for shul until 9:45, and didn’t go every single Saturday; cartoons started at 5am. Scooby came on around 8. I got home from shul just about the time my Saturday papers were dropped off to be delivered. Unless certain relatives were visiting, we were never shomer shabbes.

I was just the right age for intense Scrappy hate.

@FlikTheBlue

Wesley Crusher, Cousin Oliver, etc., were annoying not just to the viewer, but also to the other characters on their shows. Scrappy, on the other hand, was fawned over by the rest of the gang, often pushing Scooby to the side.

This was it for me. I cherished Scooby, and I hated seeing Scrappy getting attention Scooby deserved! It pretty much became Scrappy’s show. Scooby was barely there.

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

There’s a certain age, like 15 or 16, when the trappings of childhood become fraught.

I wasn’t like that, and I wonder if that might be truer for boys than for girls. I remember Vault Disney releasing movies every so often when I was a teen, and going to them with my friends-- they’d be movies we had not seen before.

[Dr_Paprika]

It’s been many years since I thought about Scrappy. My opinion is pretty neutral. I like him less than any other character on the show. But you have too much time in your hands if your opinion ventures south of antipathy.

[themapleleaf]

I loved Scrappy-Doo. I remember him as a “kid appeal character” – Scooby was, after all, his uncle.

[Leaper]

For me, it’s because so many of the purely comedy episodes, with no mystery, had him in it, so it’s damage by association. I’m fine with the episodes or series that had actual mysteries in them even if he was in them.