A Review of "Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island"

Good God. Was this movie even made for kids? It's marketed as a kid's movie, it looks like a kid's movie, but... is it REALLY a kid's movie? What even is Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island? For those of you living under a rock, Scooby-Doo needs no introduction. Yes that's right, even for you you close-minded buffoon. Scooby-Doo involves a group of hippies and their talking dog going around solving mysteries, and not even being recognized by the towns they solve mysteries for. You'd think Mystery Inc. would get some kind of recognition for that. At least that's the part the movie got right. The cameo by Pamela Anderson, not so much. Anyway, I'm getting off-track here. Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island was Scooby's very first foray into animated motion pictures. By then, he'd only have about five different television series' with four more on the way, so he was alive and well, needless to say. So in a never-ending onslaught of Scooby-Dooness, what makes Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island stand out amongst the rest? Well quite simply put: It's horrifying!

As a kid, Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island is a twisted flick. It's got zombies, sure, but not like cartoony animated zombies like Scooby-Doo is used to, but horrific, groaning, creepy looking zombies. Their groans and movements haunt children's nightmares and I'm certain, with how needlessly PC America has become today, that parents will ban this movie from the Television airwaves should it ever come on again. Aside from the zombies, in case that horror wasn't traumatizing enough for your youngsters, there are Satanic cat people who eat people in there too! Crazy, am I right?! Who would've thought putting this in a fucking Scooby-Doo movie would de-terrify it. Simply put, it doesn't!

The film opens with the Mystery, Inc. gang solving the case of the Moat Monster. Becoming bored with solving mysteries, the gang goes their separate ways. You know, like visiting exotic locations and unmasking crooks would ever seem boring. Daphne Blake and Fred Jones start running a successful television series called Coast to Coast with Daphne Blake. What happens on this "successful" television series is beyond me. Velma Dinkley becomes the proprietor of a mystery bookstore (*cough* Ghostbusters II *cough*). Shaggy Rogers and his dog Scooby-Doo are fired from their job at an airport after eating all of the confiscated foods. Shouldn't both Shaggy and Scooby be diabetics by this point? D'ah shit, who cares. For Daphne's birthday, Fred decides to get the gang back together for a road trip while Daphne is filming her show. After encountering a lot of fake monsters, the gang finally arrives in New Orleans, where they'll discover the real monster: Hurricane Katrina! Just kidding, but they are soon invited by a young woman named Lena Dupree to visit her employer's home on Moonscar Island, which is allegedly haunted by the ghost of the pirate Morgan Moonscar. Just thought of visiting a place called "Moonscar Island" is a turn off enough already. So you know...fuck that noise. Though the gang is skeptical, they go with Lena, to whom Fred has taken a fancy. That horny bastard.

On the island, the gang meets Lena's employer Simone Lenoir, as well as the ferryman Jacques, and Simone's gardener Beau, to whom Daphne takes a fancy. That horny slut. They also meet Snakebite Scruggs, an ill-natured fisherman, and his hunting pig, Mojo. Snakebite Scruggs is voiced by Mark Hamill. Why did you need to know that? Why not? It's Mark Hamill! The gang sets out to prove that the "ghost" of the island is a fake. Shaggy and Scooby are chased by Mojo and end up falling into a big hole, where they encounter the zombie of Morgan Moonscar, in probably one of the first horror scenes in the movie. By the time the rest of gang comes to investigate, Moonscar is gone. So you know...zombies are here now. Plus the movie just went from child-friendly "Fuck, what is happening right now?" pretty damn quick. After the zombie sighting, Simone invites the gang to her house to stay for the night. Wouldn't you want to stay the night on an island inhabited by zombies? I know I wouldn't. As the gang is dressing up for dinner, Shaggy sees the ghost of a Confederate colonel in the mirror; Simone explains that the island was a temporary headquarters for a Confederate regiment during the American Civil War. Due to Simone's cats, Shaggy and Scooby eat in the Mystery Machine, but find the food spicy and get some water from the lake, where an army of zombies emerge. Shaggy's bad driving gets the Mystery Machine stuck in the mud, forcing him and Scooby to flee on foot.

Fred and Daphne later head out and find the Mystery Machine, but no sign of Shaggy and Scooby. They argue about each other's supposed love interests and come across Shaggy and Scooby. They manage to capture a zombie, which is revealed to be real when Fred pulls its head off thinking it is a mask. Let me reiterate. Fred...from Scooby-Doo...rips a zombie's head off. They play this off as nothing, but this is a zombie. Which means this was a real human head at one point, and Fred just ripped it off. As the zombies swarm around them, the gang splits in panic. One generic (yet badass) heavy metal song later, Shaggy and Scooby discover wax dolls that look like Fred, Velma, Daphne and Beau, and they play with them, causing their friends to undertake a series of involuntary actions for a short time until they leave after disturbing a nest of bats. Thank God for this, terrifying is slowly returning to comedically cheesey once again. Later, they return to Simone's house and discover a secret passage under the staircase. They find Lena, who tells them that the zombies dragged Simone away. Ominous. They find a secret chamber for voodoo rituals, where Velma finds footprints of Simone's heels and interrogates Lena about the story. Simone then appears, and she and Lena use voodoo dolls to trap the gang in the chamber before revealing themselves to be evil cat creatures... and horrifying once again. When Velma recognizes this, she accuses Simone of stealing Morgan Moonscar's treasure. Angered by the mentioning of Moonscar, Simone explains that centuries ago, they were part of a group of settlers who were devoted to a cat god. When Moonscar and his pirates chased the settlers into a bayou filled with alligators that later ate them, the vengeful Simone and Lena asked their cat god to curse Moonscar. Their wish was granted and they killed Moonscar and his crew, but the curse caused them to become cat creatures permanently, provided that they keep draining life forces every harvest moon to preserve their immortality. WHAT DOES ANY OF THIS HAVE TO DO WITH SCOOBY-DOO?! This is scary voodoo shit! Not men in masks. This is too scary! I'm stopping the VCR to watch Toy Story and feel better about myself! Turns out that Jacques joined them later on, agreeing to bring them more victims in exchange for immortality. Jacques turns into an even scarier cat creature, ripped and ferocious. Thus the repentant zombies' intent was to warn the gang to leave to escape their fate. So...the horrifying zombies, whose groans haunt our very nightmares when the lights are off and we're home alone...were the good guys after all. Well played, Scooby-Doo. Well played.

Finding Shaggy and Scooby, Jacques transforms into a cat creature and chases them to drain their lives. Thanks to the zombies, Shaggy and Scooby escape and accidentally tumble into the cave, interrupting the draining ceremony and distracting the cat creatures. Velma quickly unties herself and creates voodoo dolls of Simone and Lena to interrupt their ritual. Where did Velma learn how to do this? How did she? Who knows, but when Lena and Simone start slapping each other around, it's not scary anymore. When they are finally cornered, the cat creatures' curse expires, causing them to age hundreds of years and disintegrate, freeing and avenging the zombies' souls and allowing them to rest in peace. Reminds me of the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when the guy drinks the wrong grail. Fucking brutal. Beau is revealed to be an undercover police officer sent to investigate the disappearances on the island. Betcha he didn't think he'd see fucking cat creatures. Daphne offers Beau a chance to guest-star on her show and discuss the adventure. The next morning, everyone leaves the island via ferry to head back to town.

So yeah, Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island is a pretty fucked up children's movie. It's got the usual Scooby-Doo stuff, like capers, monsters, and comedic stoner antics, but it's also got carnivorous cat people, curses, groaning undead and night-time bayou chases, all serenaded with late 90s heavy metal music. So...it's all over the place. A lot of it is still pretty cartoony and enjoyable for kids everywhere, but other parts of it are either really creepy or just flat-out unsettling. So, in a way, it's the perfect Scooby-Doo movie. Every one after this one got more cartoony and dropped the adult horror themes so that it could play safer to kids, but this one had some balls and still stands out as probably the best Scooby-Doo movie ever made. Hell, even the 2002 live-action movie was more cartoony than this, and that was the fucking live-action movie. Have some balls, Hollywood. If I don't get an R-Rated Scooby-Doo movie where monsters disembowel people, Shaggy and Scooby get high while Fred swears like a sailor and busts caps in people's asses, I'm going to be sorely disappointed by the end of my lifespan.