Alright, it's time.

This one is pretty much THE Scooby-Doo film, the one that everyone remembers and remembers fondly at that. The first of the 90s Scooby films, this one was originally meant to be a standalone until its success warranted the production of Witch's Ghost, and as a result, the team behind this movie got a huge amount of creative freedom, something that definitely shows in the fact that this movie is staggeringly different from every piece of Scooby-Doo media up until this point.

I already talked about these four movies, but this one stands out the most for being an insane example of a movie with no studio interference and a creative team dedicated to taking Scooby-Doo and turning it into a full-blown kids horror film. This movie is actually pretty creepy, believe it for not, possessing the same gloomy semi-realistic artstyle later seen in Witch's Ghost but with far more frightening visuals, designs, and setpieces. Acting as a sequel to the original show, the gang is aged up a little bit, something that facilitates them being put into some more mature situations, as well as making them all (with the exception of Scooby and Shaggy obviously) much more grounded characters.

This right here, is the movie that saved the franchise... and then allowed it to go on for another two decades or so, progressively getting worse with each new installment. Such is life.

The movie opens up much the same as Witch's Ghost, a bunch of slow, atmospheric shots of a spooky building and then a chase scene between the gang and the monster, a big green ogre looking dude. Mystery Inc. is decked out in their classic outfits rather than the more "modern" outfits they get later on, and Fred, Daphne, and Velma all almost die. Shrek is unmasked (and presumably charged with attempted murder) though, revealed to be some real estate guy printing counterfeit money in the basement.

The movie then cuts to Daphne on a talk show, where the previous events were revealed to be a story she was telling about her time with the gang, which is now disbanded as they've all stopped with the mystery business. Daphne and Fred are TV reporters, Shaggy and Scooby are airport security, and Velma runs a bookstore. Daphne uses her slot on the talk show to talk about a new segment she wants to do: a real paranormal research show where they try to find genuine evidence of the supernatural. She expresses that despite the tedium of every monster turning out to be a masked guy, she misses the group and their adventures.

This gives Fred an idea, and he rounds up the gang in secret to surprise her on her birthday and join her on the trip. This doesn't serve as a problem for Shaggy and Scooby's job though, as they're fired for eating all the contraband food they've confiscated. Typical. The gang heads off to Louisiana to begin their adventure, and we get a fun montage of them traveling from place to place and encountering more and more typical masked monsters and fake ghosts. This little segment is amusing, and shots from it were used quite heavily in some of the commercials for this thing in much the same way the beginning of the first live-action Scooby Doo was, in order to conceal the true nature of this movie a bit. I'm a big fan.

Stopping in New Orleans, the gang laments the fact that they have yet to have a true supernatural encounter, when they are approached by a woman named Lena, who claims that she works as a chef on "Moonscar Island", which is haunted by the ghost of the infamous pirate who gave it his name; Morgan Moonscar. The gang doesn't believe her after everything they've been through, particularly Fred, though they go along with her anyway after Velma mentions that Moonscar Island has had several mysterious disappearances take place, taking a ferry operated by a jolly-yet-vaguely-ominous ferryman named Jacques. Along they way they also run into a nasty backwoods fisherman with a big mean pig who wants everyone to fuck off out of the bayou. This is our obligatory red herring, and he's not in the movie that much.

I do like his pig though.

The gang arrives, finding the island swarming with cats that apparently belong to the owner of the pepper plantation on the house, a woman named Simone. The cats are rather spooky, often showing up in the background to stare at the gang. Scooby chases them around, pissing off a guy named Beau, who is the plantation house's new gardener. The plantation house is the main setting for the vast majority of the movie, and is really nice to look at. This movie's got even more detail than the previous one, and this place is dripping with atmosphere for the most part.

In general this is a very "dark" movie. Not in a thematic sense necessarily (yet) but aesthetically speaking. Even scenes ostensibly set in the daytime have a bit of an eerie look to them, and the lights in most of the mansion never feel like they quite do enough. The gang explores the house, while Shaggy and Scooby fuck off to the kitchen to go eat some hot peppers. While they're pigging out on peppers they literally can't eat without screaming in pain, the words "GET OUT" etch themselves into the wall right before their eyes, causing them to scream in not-pain and go hide in the closet.

Once the others run in to check on what all the noise is about, they discover the writing and decide to film Daphne talking about the discovery. This is a frequent thing that happens in the film, every once in a while they'll set up the camera to do a bit of paranormal investigating, and considering Daphne and Fred's careers, and it helps keep the movie feeling a bit grounded.

While they film, they see another word etched into the wall underneath: "BEWARE". The room also grows eerily cold, and upon checking the footage, a ghostly pirate figure is seen carving up the wall with his sword. Despite this figure only being visible on camera, and the fact that the wall changed before their eyes, Fred still thinks its bullshit, blaming it on people faking a haunting to search for Morgan Moonscar's treasure, even though Velma gets magically levitated into the air a while later. What a dunce.

Shaggy and Scooby prepare a picnic and head outside to eat, but after more of the cats try to piss Scooby off, they run into the fisherman guy, who sends his pig to go beat their asses, leading to them ending up in the bayou and falling down a pit. This moment is where millions of kids across the world shat their pants in unison. As grown adults, this scene probably isn't doing all that much for you in terms of being frightening, but this scene is just FUCKED if you're a kid, especially at the young age most of us probably were when we saw it. I said Witch's Ghost had the Hex Girl scene as its memorable point, and this scene right here is probably the equivalent. No one forgets this part.

(The actual part starts like a minute into this clip, couldn't find a more concise one on youtube).

The duo escape, running into the gardener, who is acting shady. He's our red herring #2, but he's still a much nicer guy than the groundskeepers in this series usually are. Once the rest of the squad shows up, Fred declares that Shaggy and Scooby must have just seen one of the masked men he believes to be hunting for treasure, and the gang heads back to the mansion for dinner, with Shaggy and Scooby being kicked outside to go eat in the van because the cats don't like Scooby's presence. This part of the movie is actually why Shaggy's original voice actor stopped voicing him for these films: Shaggy eats some crawfish with Scooby, and the VA was vegetarian and refused to voice Shaggy if Shaggy wasn't also vegetarian. I'm not kidding, look it up.

After being swarmed by more spooky cats, Shaggy tries to drive the van out into the bayou for some peace and quiet, but the tires get stuck in some mud as zombies begin to rise and approach them. They flee on foot, and their screams echo across the bayou, being heard by the gang back at the mansion. They head off to search, Velma taking the gardener with her to keep an eye on him. Eventually they find the van, and Daphne judo throws a zombie and KOs him, which is a pretty impressive feat honestly. Shaggy gets his ass thrown too when he comes out of a bush and startles her, followed shortly after by Scooby, who does not get thrown as throwing a large dog is hard and also his approach is more tactful.

With the camera set up, Daphne and Fred try to unmask the zombie, only to realize... it's not wearing a mask. Going as far as to tear the damn thing's head off, Fred proclaims that it must be an animatronic as more zombies rise out of the marsh. Daphne tells him he's in denial and being an idiot, and the group runs away, with Fred dropping the camera in his hurry.

I said earlier that the scene in the pit was iconic, and it is, don't get me wrong. The movie never really hits that level of "genuine horror material" again, but what happens next is probably the best chase scene in the entire franchise, accompanied by a song that to this very day, kicks absolute ass. This is another scene that no one who watched this movie has ever forgotten, and probably a scene that many kids would outright rewind to watch again.

Anyway, now that they're split up, Shaggy and Scooby find a weird altar and voodoo dolls of the gang made with some of their possessions and hair that they use to unknowingly levitate their friends around and generally be dickwads, until they're chased out by a swarm of bats. In the meantime, Daphne, Fred, Velma, and Beau all head back to the manor after hearing another scream, only to find Lena by a secret passageway leading under the stairs, claiming that Simone was dragged away by Zombies. They follow her through the passage, but Velma grows suspicious as she discovers no drag marks in the dirt floor, only Simone's shoeprints.

As they proceed further, they find themselves controlled by those very same voodoo dolls and tied up by Simone. Beau the gardener reveals himself to be an undercover police detective investigating the disappearances, threatening to take action against her, but Simone laughs him off and reveals the truth about Moonscar Island, in a similar vein to the Ben Ravencroft twist in Witch's Ghost: Hundreds of years ago, Lena and Simone were part of a group of settlers on the island, a strange group of cat worshippers who lived quite happily until Morgan Moonscar attacked, slaughtering their entire village and feeding them to the gators. They prayed for vengeance from their god, and were granted monstrous catlike forms and immortality, which they used to tear Morgan Moonscar and his crew apart.

However, this blessing came with a curse: Every year on the harvest moon, they had to drain the life force from human beings in order to continue the eternal life they were granted. Every year for the past two centuries, they would lure people to the island to feed on them, tossing their corpses into the bayou. Each year, their victims too would rise from the dead in hopes of scaring people away and warning them, preventing them from falling victim to the same fate. As Shaggy and Scooby learn as they reach the dock in hopes of taking the ferry out, Jacques the ferryman is in on their ruse as well, transporting tourists to the island in exchange for that same immortality. He transforms and chases the duo, who end up crashing down into the room where the gang is held.

A brief battle ensues where the gang is actually aided by the zombies somewhat, until the gang manage to use some of the hair from their monster forms to repurpose the voodoo dolls into dolls that can control the cat monsters. They manage to delay long enough for the harvest moon to pass, and the cat monsters wither up and turn to dust, deprived of the life force that they needed to survive. The zombies too, crumble away, their souls finally allowed to pass on to the next life. The sun rises over Moonscar Island, and the gang departs on the ferry, their belief in new mysteries out there rekindled.

I probably wasted my time describing this one, because this is the one everyone's seen. I'm not even sure I've done it proper justice. This is the first movie on this list so far, and probably the only in the franchise, that I would call a legitimately good movie on top of being a good Scooby-Doo film. From start to finish, this movie takes the entire franchise formula and flips it on its head for the first time ever. It's also actually fairly scary for once, the zombies having genuinely pretty creepy designs on the whole, as well as the movie generally having a great, spooky atmosphere.

Even without the garrison, I'd probably watch this movie around Halloween. I always do. This film and the live-action movies are probably the most risks the series has ever taken in one of their movies (outside of the Mystery Incorporated TV show), and I feel like this movie, the other direct-to-VHS films, and the live-action ones really do show that this franchise has legitimate potential to do interesting things, and watching this mostly just made me angry at what its turned into nowadays. Celebrity crossover, shill pieces, nostalgia baiting, it's all so tiring.

This is easily the best animated movie in the entire series, though I suppose I can see how someone would argue for Witch's Ghost. It pains me to move on from this one, deep into the realms of mediocrity again like Monster of Mexico and Curse of the Speed Demon, but I enjoyed having a brief respite in which I could watch something as soulful as this movie. This one, being the franchise peak, easily gets a....

10/10

Ranking:
#1 - Scooby Doo on Zombie Island - 10/10
#2 - Scooby Doo and the Witch's Ghost - 9/10
#3 - Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed - 8/10
#4 - Scooby Doo: Abracadabra-Doo - 7.5/10
#5 - Scooby Doo: Stage Fright - 5.5/10
#6 - Scooby-Doo and the Monster of Mexico - 4.5/10
#7 - Scoob! - 4/10
#8 - Scooby Doo and WWE: Curse of the Speed Demon - 3/10
#9 - Daphne & Velma - 1/10

ok so, the only thing i remembered from this movie other than that i liked it, for the longest fuckin time was the airport cheese scene, SOMEHOW that's what stuck with me. my childhood era memory is legendarily awful, especially this time period

i didnt even remember the pit sequence

but then i loaded up the terror time chase bit and holy fuck ok i DO remember this, the song came back to me all at once even. jesus

i should watch this again. goddamn

On another forum back in the day, I knew a guy who hated Video Games because they were too hard for him, but loved movies. He'd always have this one as one of the greats.

I've definitely seen it but I don't really remember too much about it. I think the problem with the scooby doo franchise is there's just so many stinkers its very easy to dismiss it all in your head.

I vividly remember this one, quality movie

This post was last modified: Oct 24, 2021 at 10:54 PM by Toucan.

In 5th grade I got banned from my end-of-the-year field trip to Water World for getting caught making fun of Pee-wee Herman's theater fapping incident and I had to stay at school and watch movies instead.

This was one of the movies I watched.

Pure masterpiece. I remember it being advertised as the first time the monsters were real and pointing out previous times they were real, such as The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo.

But 13 Ghosts was garbage. Zombie Island was the thing that got me into being kinda a Scooby-Doo geek. I've now consumed nearly every piece or Scooby-Doo media but I think FWD has me outclassed by far.

Great review!

This is one of the earliest things I remember watching on TV. I must've been 4 years old. Really cool how they managed to make something creepy/exciting that didn't actually give me nightmares at that age