Now a thing of legend, in a segment called "Meet The Stars" there is an interview with the main cast of 2002s Scooby-Doo movie. Asked about the enduring legacy of the Scooby-Doo character and cartoon, Daphne actress Sarah Michelle Gellar said:

It offered so much more than any other cartoon. It was so ahead of its time. It had a story. They worked hard to figure it out. And it wasn't gender-specific. It wasn't a "boys' cartoon" or a "girls' cartoon," or any of those things.

Answering the same question posed to him, Freddie Prinze Jr. follows immediately with this:

It was a talking dog, you know what I mean? There wasn't anything cooler than that.

And honestly, they're both right. In two roundabout ways, the two actors (and future couple) sum up precisely why Scooby-Doo remains such a pop culture icon: because it has something for everyone. As this year marks the 20th anniversary of the first live-action Scooby-Doo movie, it has seen a very gradual resurgence of appreciation directed back towards it.

So how has a canine that should have died at least five times over since he was birthed in the 60s stayed so 'rarn relevant?

Scooby's Jump to Live-Action

Scooby Doo gang from the film
Warner Bros.

The movies themselves take the trope perfected by the animated movies released just years before (Zombie Island, Witch's Ghost, etc.), but make the villain at hand actually real. Gone were the creepy janitors and disgruntled former employees, and in were flesh and blood monsters.

What these live-action films did was keep the same zoinks and jinkeys of the classic 1960s Hanna-Barbera cartoon capers, but sprinkled in a sense of kid-friendly danger, supplemented by big budget sensibilities (Warner Bros. spent $84 million on this Scooby movie or $140 million in today's money), all handled with genuine love and care for the original source material.

Seeing these (surprisingly well realized) characters make the jump from 2D to 3D, played by distinct and pitch perfect depictions, gave the great dane a jolt of life to the then 30-year-old cartoon. Played completely straight, the actors in question believe in what they're making and have no time to spare for irksome 'wink wink nudge nudge' moments to camera.

Scooby-Doo Mystery Machine Leads Police on a High Speed Chase
Warner Bros.

Far from, say, The Flintstones, (another beloved Hanna-Barbara cartoon turned into a set of two live-action films), Scooby-Doo does not look cheap and tacky. Instead, it feels vibrant and as real as it can be, with some superb set designs and truly committed acting.

Case in point? Making the entirely loathed Scrappy Doo the real villain behind the whole thing — what a genius reveal. The fart gags still feel beneath the material, and there is a general veneer of kitsch tackiness that the films almost unavoidably can't shake, but there is more than enough in its electric energy for kids and their ticket-purchasing parents to enjoy across both of the flicks.

Nostalgia and Mary Jane

Shaggy and Scooby-Doo in Scoob!
Warner Bros. 

The kids that watched these and other films from the early 2000s the first time around have grown up and become nostalgic for what they remember (perhaps even appreciative of the stoner Shaggy they recognize on screen now that they can smoke themselves). Writer James Gunn has said that the original cut of their Scooby-Doo was (inexplicably) rated R, but was cut down to eventually end up PG. But, as expected with Gunn in his days before the squeaky-clean Guardians of the Galaxy, some racier elements remained despite the family-friendly approach of director Raja Gosnell (Shaggy is in love with a girl named "Mary Jane," for example).

Related: Scooby-Doo: Why the Live-Action Movies Are So Iconic to This Day

Charles Cameron of Screen Rant writes:

The Scooby-Doo Mary Jane joke has taken on a life of its own across the 20 years since Scooby-Doo first premiered domestically, gaining immense popularity in contemporary culture through memes, social media, and a continued re-assessment of Gosnell's Scooby-Doo movies in recent years. The brilliance of Scooby-Doo's Mary Jane joke lies not only in its simplicity, however, but due to the fact it is also bolstered by other scenes from the movie that are indicative of Gunn's original R-rated cut. Musical Youth's "Pass the Dutchie" playing as the camera pans in on a smoking Mystery Machine is a more on-the-nose example here, while Shaggy's constant paranoia, munchies, and nicknaming his dog Scooby "Dooby" Doo are all nods to his stoner persona in Gunn's original script.

With the first film over 20 years old, there is another level of appreciation now that these fans can look back and realize some of the more outwardly adult leanings; able to re-digest them and appreciate them with new (possibly bloodshot) eyes.

James Gunn's Ascendance Post-Scooby

Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed
Warner Bros. Pictures

Behind both the Scooby-Doo movies was the aforementioned James Gunn as a writer. Now having reached celebrity status as a writer/director, to the point of climbing the ladder to be announced as DC Film's co-chair in October, Gunn's first legit big film came with Scoob and the gang.

As his star rose as an assured screenwriter on works like Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead and his own directorial efforts like the one-two punch of Slither and Super, by 2014, James Gunn would become a name brand director in his own right following the massive success of Guardians of the Galaxy, which

Employing a mixed cast of TV actors and some up-and-coming film actors, Gunn was essentially making a family-friendly horror film with his Scooby-Doo movies — something that he would use as an education on later movies like his fantastically gooey Slither in 2006.

And, once the Scooby-Doo films had proved that the formula worked, Gunn could repeat the format of the ensemble cast plus one completely CGI character in his later superhero outings (Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad both would utilize entirely motion-capture created anthropomorphic creatures to great effect alongside broad ensemble casts; in many ways, he's been making Scooby-Doo over and over again). But Scooby himself was where it all began for Gunn.

V is for Velma

Velma in catsuit in Scooby-Doo 2 played by Linda Cardellini
Warner Bros.

As the younger audience have grown up and looked back on these films, another element stands out — the universal sexual awakening that came with Linda Cardellini's introduction in red. Vacuum packed into a bright red catsuit in Scooby-Doo 2, as her Velma asks Seth Green's character "Who's your mommy?" the whole spectrum of audience members became horny teenage boys, ready-to-experiment gays, and/or saluting theys in appreciation of the dorky Velma's sudden glow-up.

Related: Velma and Other LGBTQ+ Cartoon Characters

For many, 2022's Halloween's costume of choice was distinctly Velma. With such an easy costume to pull together consisting of a jumper, skirt, and glasses, everyone wanted some Dinkley, and a scroll through TikTok in October assaulted many viewers with a barrage of Velma orange. And the numbers add up, with TikTok users in the US between the ages of 20 and 29 making up 22.4% of its North American membership, the second highest on the platform. Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed was released in 2004, meaning that most of those users would have seen the live action films and grown up on them, educating their humors and now trickling down into their favorite social media platforms.

This October also saw an animated Velma revealed to be canonically gay, as she becomes infatuated with a fellow female character called Coco. It was final confirmation for the LGBTQ+ community, always certain that the character was on their side.

Velma crush
Warner Bros.

The always very accessible Gunn revealed that he had also tried to incorporate the character's sexuality into his own films. In a (now deleted) tweet from July this year, Gunn wrote:

I tried! In 2001 Velma was explicitly gay in my initial script. The studio just kept watering it down & watering it down, becoming ambiguous (the version shot), then nothing (the released version), & finally having a boyfriend (the sequel).

Ruh-Roh!

Velma HBO Max
HBO Max

As the iconic Scooby-Doo IP trundles on, it's been a mixed bag for the decades-old series. While the characters remain universally recognizable, the features were becoming increasingly campy, as all manner of increasingly silly guest stars joined Scooby and the gang, including KISS, Batman, and John Cena.

2020's feature outing, the animated Scoob! made back less than a quarter of its budget at cinemas as fans didn't bother. Its sequel, Scoob 2: Holiday Haunt, despite being announced as completely finished and ready to go, has just been caught in the firing line of Warner Bros'. genocide of anything animated. This is on the back of last month's lay off of 82 Cartoon Network employees to fit in with the new merger with the Warner Bros. Animation arm.

And finally this year saw the first images of the almost antagonistic changes from Mindy Kaling's (The Office) recent spin-off Velma, scheduled to be released in 2023. What has been revealed doesn't appear to resemble the show at all and feels like out there alterations have been made almost for the sake of it. Faced with immediate backlash and controversy, Kaling herself brushed the reaction off; after all, getting mad at her for having a laugh at the Scooby-Doo franchise would be like fuming over Robot Chicken playing with toys and titles like He-Man.

With so many unremarkable outings, misses, and WB's active attempts to put the canine to sleep, it's easy to look back and remember when these forward-thinking Scooby movies for everyone (that also featured a talking dog) were on top of the pile.