Zoinks! Netflix is meddling with a new live-action Scooby-Doo

Start stacking your sandwiches and packing your Scooby Snacks because Scooby-Doo is taking the Toon Town Express to Live-action Avenue. Per Variety, Netflix is working on a live-action Scooby-Doo series described as a “one-hour drama” about a high-guy dog owner who talks to his near-verbal giant canine. Judging by the name Greg Berlanti, executive producer on the pilot, this version of Scooby-Doo will be something akin to Riverdale, The Chilling Adventures Of Sabrina, and Wednesday, taking a family-friendly franchise from yesteryear and turning it into a late-night soap opera for teens and teens at heart. Josh Appelbaum and Scott Rosenberg are writing and executive producing, coming from Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop and the uber-expensive Prime Video series Citadel.

Is it too early to speculate about this show? Heavens, no. So, let’s turn our attention to one Mr. Scooby-Doo. If this is indeed going to be a teen drama in the vein of Riverdale, which eschewed much of what Double Digest readers knew of Archie, we can probably assume Scooby-Doo, the talking, sandwich-eating dog with the strength to carry a full-grown teenager in his arms, won’t be part of the cast. We’re even further encouraged by the complete lack of Scoob on Max’s Velma animated series, which also reframed Scooby-Doo for an older audience. Jughead traded his crown for a beanie and Scooby-Doo plotting. Will Netflix sacrifice Scooby-Doo for Scooby-Doo plotting, too?

As long as we’re making predictions for the future, we’re curious how long it will take before Change.org petitions calling for the return of the cast from 2002's Scooby-Doo, Matthew Lillard, Linda Cardellini, Freddie Prinze Jr, and Sarah Michelle Gellar. We don’t expect the Mystery, Inc. class of 2002 to play their characters, but we wouldn’t be surprised if they turned up in other places. Lillard, in particular, has never been far from a script that reads
“Zoinks!” The actor has been voicing Shaggy on television since 2009,
with his latest turn coming on a recent episode of the contemporary Yogi
Bear cartoon Jellystone.