The Scarab Lives!

"The Scarab Lives!" is the first episode of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo season one. It aired on September 22, 1979 on ABC. It was respectively written and produced by Mark Evanier, and directed by Ray Patterson, Carl Urbano, Oscar Dufau, George Gordon, Charles A. Nichols, Don Jurwich, and Alex Lovy.

The superhero comic book character of Blue Scarab has come to live to with a warning for his creator, Jerry Sloane, to stop drawing his comics. To ensure Jerry does what he's told, the Blue Scarab goes on a crime spree to tarnish his own reputation.

Memorable quotes
Shaggy: Like, how do we get ourselves into these things, Scoob? Scooby: If you ask me, uh, dumb luck, I guess.

Characters

 * style="background-color:#clear"| Blue Scarab
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Pat Fraley
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Radio announcer (voice only)
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Casey Kasem
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Jerry Sloane
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Jack Angel
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Shaggy Rogers
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Casey Kasem
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Scrappy-Doo
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Lennie Weinrib
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Scooby-Doo
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Don Messick
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Velma Dinkley
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Pat Stevens
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Daphne Blake
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Heather North
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Fred Jones
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Frank Welker
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Yogi Bear (drawing)
 * style="background-color:#ffff00"| N/A
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Mr. Hardy
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Floyd Hotchkiss
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Howard Gruber
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Pat Fraley
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Security guard
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#clear"| Yogi Bear (drawing)
 * style="background-color:#ffff00"| N/A
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Mr. Hardy
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Floyd Hotchkiss
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Howard Gruber
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Pat Fraley
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Security guard
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Pat Fraley
 * style="background-color:#d2d2ff"| Security guard
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable
 * style="background-color:#aaffaa"| Unavailable

Organizations

 * Mystery Incorporated

Locations

 * Earth
 * United States
 * Lake City
 * Jerry Sloane's residence
 * Malt shop
 * Press room
 * Romeo Jewelry
 * First Big Town Bank (mentioned)
 * Museum
 * Brazil (mentioned)
 * The Moon

Objects

 * Scarab Alarm (mentioned)
 * The Blue Scarab comic book
 * Ruby Crown

Vehicles

 * The Mystery Machine

Development
Scrappy was invented from an idea by Joseph Barbera, which was drawn by Iwao Takamoto, among others, as a "new element" to prevent ABC from canceling Scooby-Doo in favour of a new series from another studio. Several attempts had been made at Hanna-Barbera to write the episode which would introduce the new Scrappy character; one of those included a neice of Daphne's owning Scrappy. Mark Evanier, who had written the pilot episode of the aforementioned new series to take Scooby-Doo's place, was hired to take a stab at the episode which would introduce Scrappy. His agent considered Scrappy's first episode to be the pilot, taking several weeks longer than a regular episode, which is what the Business of Affairs guy at Hanna-Barbera considered to be, so a deal was reached that would pay Evanier a bit more if his script was approved and be the basis of which all other episodes would be based on. It's worth mentioning that this squabble caused Evanier to be fired for eighteen minutes until Barbera himself personally intervened.

When Barbera described Scrappy to Evanier, he never explicitly mentioned Henery Hawk from Looney Tunes, but did leave a strong impression on Evanier that that's who he wanted Scrappy to be modeled on. Evanier wrote a short piece with Scrappy imitating Henery Hawk's voice and swagger, which Barbera loved.

Evanier wrote the script which caused him to get several different notes both within Hanna-Barbera and at the network of ABC. Eventually he was able to satisfy both parties involved. As the script was being xeroxed (word for word from his own word processed writing), he discovered that a Hanna-Barbera executive had added his son's name, as he felt his son was owned the credit after all the work he had previously put in before Evanier's hiring. Evanier was able to get an apology from the executive and the son's name retracted. Although the irony being that Evanier isn't personally identified as the writer of this specific episode on-screen, nor is any other writer for the following episodes.

The episode that Evanier had written was adapted from "Mark of the Scarab," a comic book story in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! #24, published by Gold Key Comics.

Filming
Evanier recalls several actors auditioning for Scrappy, who were all considered perfect at the time, but were rejected after the recording. Every time a new actor was chosen, the entire cast was brought in to record their lines together.


 * The first actor chosen was Mel Blanc, by Barbera, but by the next day, he told Evanier to forget about him due to being too costly.
 * The second was Frank Welker, who ad-libbed a few fanfare notes and his popular catchphrase of "Puppy power." Barbera was so impressed with this, he compared it on the same level as Alan Reed ad-libbing "Yabba-dabb-doo!" for Fred Flintstone. Evanier didn't agree with this, but still inserted it into the script as instructed.
 * The third was Don Messick, but ABC rejected his rendition after hearing it.
 * The fourth was Daws Butler.
 * The fifth was Marilyn Schreffler.
 * They then went briefly went back to Welker.

Evanier loses count after that, although he does remember how Paul Winchell and Dick Beals were considered, although he doesn't believe neither of them had recorded any lines. The time had come to "bite ye olde bullet" and make a deal with Blanc, although after a few days of haggling (which also included auditioning other actors), a deal could not be reached.

Evanier felt that Hanna-Barbera had even been desperate enough to ask him for suggestions, which were Howard Morris and Marshall Efron. Morris believed that he would not be able to get the role due to a falling out with Barbera, and while a tape of Efron Evanier had was well received, they eventually decided on the man who won and kept the role, Lennie Weinrib.

Aftermath
It was deemed by Standards and Practices that Scrappy was in fact a bad role model to kids for being "too independent." The rebellious and outspoken nature of his character needed to be toned down for ABC, so weeks after the episode was believed to have been finished, Evanier was requested back to the Hanna-Barbera studio to revise the character to be, well, slightly less scrappy than he was to begin with. Evanier ended up winning the fight to save Scrappy's being, although he ended up finding out afterwards that a couple of scenes had been rewritten to tone Scrappy down by an unknown writer, and the writers working on the other episodes had to match Scrappy's new character, accordingly. Based on previous experiences, Evanier theorized that Hanna-Barbera did this in the event that ABC would change their minds down the line and the current episodes they were working on wouldn't be rerun, losing them revenue.

Music
The music was composed by Hoyt Curtin, credited as musical director, with supervision from Paul DeKorte.

Release
Dates are in order of release:


 * United States: September 22, 1979 on ABC

Behind the scenes

 * It's more or less implied Lake City is where the gang lives now out of the convenience of the plot.
 * Velma says "Jinkies" once.
 * Shaggy says "Zoinks" thrice.
 * The opening theme provides an explanation as to how Scrappy joined Scooby, which involved the gang picking up Scrappy at a train station, with the implication that this was the first time that Scooby had met Scrappy. Although in "Scrappy's Birthday," it was retconned so that Scooby and Shaggy knew Scrappy since birth.

Errors

 * When Fred asks Jerry to see his publisher, Fred's collar is white.
 * When Shaggy and Scooby read the new Blue Scarab comic, all intricate detail is lost, being replaced with just lines and shapes.
 * When the gang leaves the Mystery Machine for the museum, the Mystery Machine has the bare minimum art applied, with the writing on the van having been removed.
 * When Scooby first shows off The Blue Scooby, Scrappy is absent. This might have been to keep it as a surprise, but even so, it's still an inconsistency.

Critical reception
According to what Mark Evanier had been told by others, this episode and the second one he wrote, "The Demon of the Dugout," had been animated better than the episodes he hadn't written.

Home availability

 * In the United States:
 * April 28, 2015: Warner Home Video releases Scooby-Doo! and Scrappy-Doo!: The Complete Season 1 on DVD.
 * August 13, 2019: Warner Home Video releases Best of Warner Bros. 50 Cartoon Collection: Scooby-Doo on DVD.