Review of Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost (1999) by Luke S — 30 Apr 2011

In this animated Scooby-Doo adventure the gang run in to famed horror writer Ben Ravencroft while in the middle of a museum mystery. Velma is a big fan, having read all his work, and she's not afraid to tell him so.

He invites them all to come to his hometown of Oakhaven, Massachusetts and have a look at the surroundings where his career first began. When they all show up in Oakhaven however, they find the town overrun with tourists.

The mayor informs them that the town recently constructed a village that recreated the look and feel of the town in it's pioneer days and in so doing disturbed the final resting place of Ben's ancestor, Sarah Ravencroft.

Hundreds of years ago she was condemned for being a witch, although Ben insists she was simply a wiccan and misunderstood. But when her ghost shows up soon after their arrival and scares the wits out of Scooby and Shaggy, Mystery, Inc.

knows there is much more than meets the eye going on in Oakhaven! Further complicating the matter is a suspicious trio of teenage goths who perform in a band called the Hex Girls. Ben encourages the gang to get to the bottom of things but in the process seems a little too adamant about them finding an ancient book that belonged to Sarah.

Just who is behind all this will come as quite a shock when the gang finally solves this caper! There was a lot I liked about this movie and then also some stuff I didn't like. First off I loved the story, I thought it was great.

It involved a subject of historical significance, with the persecution of women being witches and all, I always really like it when these stories contain something of mysterious historical relevance. And once again I also really liked how the villain in the end wasn't just another man in a mask, there was an element of the supernatural in this movie and it really worked for me.

The only thing I didn't like about it was the consistency in regard to the most current crop of animated Scooby movies that have been released. But I can't really blame them for this, the Witch's Ghost is an older film (1999) and happened well before all of the other films we've watched recently.

I enjoy how all of the recent Scooby-Doo movies feature the same animation and voice talent for the main characters, it really lends a sense of consistency and history to the franchise. But in this movie all but one of the voice actors were different from the current lineup, and the animation seemed just a tad bit different.

Scooby and Shaggy looked as they usually do but Fred, Daphne and Velma all looked just a bit different. And their skin was a little deeper colour too, almost like they were tanned or something. Not a big deal, this movie was still really good, just a few little observations that came to mind while I was watching it.