I was most anticipated for this crossover but at the same time a bit hesitant. Courage the Cowardly Dog is my favorite cartoon ever but without the involvement of its creator John R Dilworth seemed a bit disheartening. Not to mention the straight-to-video Scooby Doo films lately have had less effort than the stuff that used to come out back in the day. I am however satisfied to say this crossover mostly delivered.
While the story is honestly nothing that special, its the interactions between the two shows main characters that makes this worth watching. It's so fun to see everyone (minus Eustace) get along with each other especially Scooby and courage who feel like long-lost brothers. Add shaggy to the mix & you get a trio of scaredy cats running from everything in sight. It was just so great to see courage do the hallway doors gag with them. While most the movie is trying to solve a mystery like the Scooby-Doo formula it still mostly respects courage's as well. One thing that really worried me was that they were gonna debunk courage's more supernatural foes as ordinary baddies in masks like they've been doing but luckily they don't. The supernatural element is still very much there & the mystery gang are oblivious to it. Not to mention when the mystery is uncovered at the end and you find out whose behind it it put a big smile on my face. Although there's no freaky scary moments which is what courage is remembered for there are maybe a couple moments that can be pretty terrifying for younger kids. The voice cast for both sides are excellent. Frank Welker, Grey Griffin, and Matthew Lillard still do their roles as well as always. Velma's current voice actor Kate Micucci however im not a fan of. Just sounds like a female Steve Urkel. Marty Grabstein returns as courage & hasnt lost his touch after all this time. Thea White voices Muriel one final time before her death & shes also still great. I swear Muriel Bagg rivals Winnie the Pooh as the nicest cartoon character ever. Eustace is now voiced by Jeff Bergman due to the previous two voice actors passing away long ago & while its abit different he gets the job done voicing the grumpy greedy old fart.
As for negatives the movie feels a bit too padded out. Supposedly it was originally going to be just an episode of Scooby-Doo and Guess Who which probably wouldve been a better idea. There's one sequence in the movie where they go to a mansion and it just feels like its there just to show off a bunch of Courage fan service. Another negative is they try to give a reason for all the strange encounters courage had in his show and it's pretty unnecessary and honestly doesn't make too much sense. Also Eustace raps............yep you heard that right Eustace Bagg raps!
Though not perfect my expectations for this movie was better than I expected. Both shows get represented equally and it's just so fun watching their scenarios mixed together. 2021 gave me 2 crossovers I thought I'd never see in my life, the other being Spider-Man No Way Home.
