Scooby-Doo! in Where's My Mummy? (2005)

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Could be worse.the jokes about the over-the-top reality TV shows are sooooo worth the price of admission. Especially if you are like me and inclined to hate them for the forced drama and, well, the horrible taste of them all.It's nice to see Scooby mocking them.The Problem is Egypt. It wasn't exactly Egypt enough. It felt like just about anywhere else and Egypt is sort of a really big deal for a van full of American teens to visit.Instead it felt more like an establishing shot and the old west. Very lazy for Scooby Doo.The plus side is that the mystery is solid and the jokes landed, even if it did all feel a bit lack luster.

This is the best Scooby-Doo movie without a doubt. All others are quick to dismiss this as another scooby doo clone, but do not acknowledge this blasphemy. It is without a doubt the most enthralling and action packed movie ever conceived from the scooby doo franchise, perhaps every other movie as well. From the scorpion fights to the mysterious delves to the deep of the sphinx, there is never a dull moment in this animated epic. It has classic villains creepy bugs and critters, to a mysterious benefactor that slowly turns protagonists to stone. The ending is a surprise no one could have seen coming and proved to be a jaw-dropping moment. This movie represents the pinnacle of animated movies, there cannot be one greater than this. It is the will of Ascubus!

This might have a spoiler at the end.I saw this film on TV, and for the first part I wasn't that impressed. For one thing, I was recovering from that horrible "Aloha Scooby-Doo," and another was that I wasn't a fan of "What's New, Scooby-Doo?" to begin with (in my opinion, it was nothing like a classic Scooby-Doo series, it was basically "Rocko's Modern Life" with the Scooby gang!) It started out like a basic 70-minute "What's New, Scooby-Doo?" episode, but taking place in Egypt, and besides, the Scooby-Doo gang had already come across mummies before, so this was sort of a remake of "Scooby-Doo and a Mummy Too" from 1969 and "Mummy Scares Best" from 2003. And this film only focused on Scooby-Doo (who is my favorite character in the franchise) for only half the film, other times it was just Fred and Daphne, or Scooby and Shaggy would just be in the background. The "Ascoobis" subplot was mildly amusing, even though Scooby still isn't saying much (probably as a tribute to the late Don Messick's great Scooby-Doo voice). As for the sound effects, they only use the classic Hanna-Barbera sound effects on a minor basis, mainly for exaggerated comedy scenes involving Scooby and Shaggy. WB has been doing this since 1998, and it unfortunately also carried over to "What's New, Scooby-Doo?" as well. But the ending, however, made up for the mediocre plot and sub-average animation: they found out that VELMA was the ghost! That was a nice surprise, and was a very nice exception to a now-tiring formula. I recommend this if you want to see a Scooby-Doo cartoon that does a major exception to the usual formulaic plots

Okay, we understand that a Scooby-Doo mystery is not going to be in the same league as a Citizen Kane mystery. But Scooby has good movies and bad movies just like any other Mega-Star. I'm pleased to say that Where's My Mummy is in the former category.Velma is assisting an archaeological dig in Egypt (on the Sphinx no less) when she finds a mysterious necklace which could be the key to Cleopatra's lost treasure. I've never heard of such treasure, but for the sake of the movie, we'll pretend it exists. The rest of the Mystery Inc. gang turn up to visit her but the site is promptly taken over by Amelia von Butch (Christine Baranski), a gun-ho Lara Croft-type and her band of cohorts.Despite warnings of ancient curses she forces the Mystery Inc. gang and an obnoxious reality-TV host (Jeremy Piven) to enter the tomb with her to solve it's secrets and find the treasure. Immediately setting-off traps, Shaggy and Scooby are separated from the rest of the gang (not on purpose for a change) and get involved in their own mystery of a deranged Hotep (Ron Pearlman) and his followers who worship a strange God known as Scoobis and his servant Shagman.Both stories are kept lively and entertaining until they merge into one. There's not a moment of boredom and, as usual, a couple of cool original songs too. But sadly, no new version of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You at all. To compare it with similar films like Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider or even The Goonies would be pointless. Yes, we've seen this kind of thing before but animation is a medium that present more opportunities than live-action and there's loads of inventive set-pieces and imaginative locations that have become the standard of modern Scooby-Doo outings.And what do you know? It even manages to provide a rather surprising twist at the end. We know it's far-fetched and unbelievable as always, but it ties together pretty well, thus making the film a little bit better a little bit more.As long as their is imagination behind this franchise, Scooby-Doo could go on forever. He may deliver a few duds from time to time (Monster of Mexico was extremely crap after all) but he still a very important character in modern animation and will always come out on top if we believe in him.Or am I taking this too seriously?