Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost

Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost is the second in a series of direct-to-video animated films based upon Hanna-Barbera's Scooby-Doo Saturday morning cartoons. It was released on October 5, 1999, and it was produced by Warner Bros. Animation (although with a Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc. copyright). Like a number of direct-to-video Scooby-Doo animated films released in the late-1990s and early-2000s, Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost features real ghosts instead of simple bad guys in masks. The videos sold well and received generally positive reviews in the press.

Premise
The Mystery Inc. gang travel to a New England town called Oakhaven after being invited by horror writer Ben Ravencroft.

Synopsis
Ben Ravencroft, a famous horror writer of whom Velma is a big fan, assists the Mystery Inc. gang in solving a case at a museum. Afterwards, Ben invites the gang to his home town of Oakhaven. But when they arrive there, they find that the town has been built up by its mayor into a tourist attraction, complete with a replica of the town in the 17th century and a supposed ghost of a witch who haunts the town. The mayor and pharmacist Mr. McKnight explains that the ghost is of Sarah Ravencroft, a relative of Ben's, who was persecuted as a witch by the town in the 1600's. But Ben says that Sarah was actually a wiccan who used natural herbs to heal people, and even has a diary of all her patients that Ben wants to find to prove her innocence. Scooby and Shaggy find what appears to be a shoe buckle, and then go to a local diner for food, owned by the friendly Jack.

Ben, Fred, Daphne, Velma, and many visitors stay out late in order to see the witch, but do not. But Scooby and Shaggy are chased by the fireball-throwing witch, and run into Ben and the gang returning home. The gang finds some broken branches at the scene, as well as a local goth girl rock band named the "Hex Girls", comprised of Luna, Dusk, and Thorn. The gang then split up; Fred and Daphne follow the Hex Girls, Velma and Ben explore an old barn, and Scooby and Shaggy follow the Mayor. Fred and Daphne see Thorn doing some sort of ritual, and become convinced that the Hex Girls are actually witches. Velma and Ben find a cherry picking truck in the barn. Scooby and Shaggy see the Mayor talking to and giving things to many of the townspeople. They then run into the witch again, who chases them past to Mayor and into Velma and Ben. Velma then tells the Mayor that she has a plan to catch the witch.

The Gang, Ben, and the Hex Girls meet in the woods. The witch appears and gives chase, but is captured by Daphne and Fred. The witch is revealed to be McKnight, who is Thorn's father. Velma then locates the truck among the trees. She explains that the truck lifted the witch and made her appear to fly, and also deduces that many townspeople were in on the trick, including Jack and the Mayor. Ben scolds the people involved for exploiting Sarah's good name for their benefit. Back at Ben's house, the gang apologize to the Hex Girls, and Thorn explains the ritual was just to improve her vocals, and that she is actually 1/16th wiccan. The Mayor and McKnight then arrive, explaining that they had to use the witch to boost the towns economy because of lack of tourists. They then say that they did find the head marker for Sarah's grave, but still don't know where the grave is located. Velma then remembers that the buckle Scooby found is that same one one Sarah's diary in a painting Ben has.

The gang, Ben, The Hex Girls, McKnight, and the Mayor go to the spot where Scooby found the buckle. Scooby digs deeper, and discovers a chest. A excited Ben opens the chest to find not a diary, but a spell book. He then explains to a horrified Mystery Inc. that Sarah was indeed a witch, and that he created the case at the museum in order to meet the gang so they could find the book for him. Becoming insane with his new magical powers derived from the book, Ben captures McKnight, The Mayor, and the Hex Girls before resurrecting Sarah. But Sarah's ghost rejects Ben's idea of ruling the world together, and instead wants to destroy it. Horrified by this, Ben attempts to imprison Sarah back in to book, but she says only a wiccan can return her. Velma then gets an idea, and frees Thorn and asks her to read the spell, and sends Scooby and Shaggy to get the book. The gang tries to get the book many times, but Sarah keeps turning pumpkins, trees, and even a turkey into monsters to stop them. Eventually, the gang obtains the book, each throwing it to another person when they get captured, until it reaches Thorn. Thorn reads the spell, sending the witch and Ben, whom she grabbed hold of at the last second, back into the book. A burning branch falls on the book, disintegrating it. The gang then free the others, and the witch's monsters turn back to normal (except for the enormous turkey which the town can now use as a tourist attraction). Later that night the Hex Girls (and the gang) give a concert to the townspeople and the tourists.

Songs

 * Main article: Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost (soundtrack)

Villains

 * Sarah Ravencroft
 * Ben Ravencroft
 * Witch's Ghost/Mr. McKnight (redeemed)

Locations

 * Unnamed city or town
 * Museum of Natural History
 * Unnamed city or town
 * Oakhaven, Massachusetts
 * Miller's Creek
 * Puritan village
 * Oakhaven Restaurant
 * Ben's mansion
 * Music stage
 * Barn 1
 * Hardware store
 * Molly Parken's Bed and Breakfast
 * McKnight home
 * Shed
 * Barn 2
 * Ben's apartment (flashback)

Continuity

 * Ben finds out about Mystery Inc. from seeing them in the paper after solving the Moat Monster case which happened in a flashback in the previous film.
 * Daphne wears the same purple suit she wore in the previous film.
 * This is the second film to make reference to a possible romantic relationship between Daphne and Fred. Fred says that he and Daphne should follow the Hex Girls, and Velma wonders why they're always pairing off. Later when they're alone, Daphne asks Fred why they always pair off and he hesitantly begins to answer, but is distracted by the Hex Girls approaching. This a nod to the original series, where they would often pair off together most often than not. A romantic relationship between the two had already been alluded to in the gang's guest appearance in the Johnny Bravo episode, Bravo Dooby-Doo.

Notes/trivia

 * This marks Scott Innes's debut as the voice of Shaggy, taking over from Billy West from the previous film. This is the second time one cast member has voiced both Scooby and another member of the group; the first was Don Messick who voiced both Scooby and Scrappy-Doo.
 * Billy Ray Cyrus sings the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? theme song in the museum chase scene.
 * Ben Ravencroft's name seems to be a play on H.P. Lovecraft, a horror writer. His character could be a reference to modern horror author Stephen King, who lives in New England.
 * This is the first time in (canon) standard continuity that Velma has been attracted to someone. Unlike when she made it clear to Beau Neville in the previous film that she was only interested in detective novels and not detectives, this was a little more obvious in how much she loved Ben's work and them traveling together alone to Oakhaven in his car (while the others were in the Mystery Machine). She also felt very betrayed by him, coupled by Daphne comforting her by putting her hands on her shoulders.
 * The middle-aged man wearing a plaid shirt and overalls also has a cameo as a customer at Sergio's Diner in the next film.
 * Some of the tourists in this film are far more anime-looking than the others. When turns evil and hovers into the air he also is designed to be more anime-esque.
 * This is the first appearance of the Hex Girls; they return in Scooby-Doo! And The Legend Of The Vampire and the What's New, Scooby-Doo? episode, The Vampire Strikes Back. Their appearance and personalities have been greatly toned down to be less frightening.
 * Sarah's spell-book may or may not have inspired the Tome of Doom from the video game, Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem.
 * Interestingly, Tim Curry's character in Scooby-Doo! And The Goblin King has an opposite arc. Ben starts off as someone who appears to be an ally to the gang, but is then revealed to be one of the movie's two "big bads" at the beginning of the third act. At the beginning of the other movie it appears that the Goblin King is going to be the "big bad", but in the third act it's revealed that he's not so bad after all (although that's a matter of perspective).
 * The scene at the end with the gang playing along with the Hex Girls is a nod to what the original idea for a Scooby-Doo series was before it was changed. Originally, the show was going to be about a group of teens who are in a band with their dog that travel around performing while solving mysteries. The instruments the gang plays are the same ones they were going to play in the show which even included Scooby on the bongos.

Miscellanous

 * Ben's apartment is likely in Europe as that's where he said he spent his time when he's not in Oakhaven.

Animation mistakes and/or technical glitches

 * Griswald and the guard holding him aren't visible when Perkins blames for Ben interfering, and also when Perkins is taken past the gang.
 * Presumably it's intentional, but the guards' nametags are empty.
 * From a distance, Velma and Ben while in the latter's car have little detail given. Velma's mouth is missing, as is Ben's jacket.
 * When the Mystery Machine parks in Oakhaven, the right window is empty.
 * There seems to be possible confusion over the gender of the female African American tourist's partner. From afar the partner looks to be a male with a ponytail, but close-up shots have the partner looking more feminine wearing lipstick and has breasts.
 * When the plaid-shirted middle-aged tourist takes a picture of Shaggy in the pillory, the blue stripe on the right side of his baseball cap switches to the left.
 * The butter churner's face is randomly off-model every time she's seen from a distance.
 * The gray hair around the male African American tourist's head changes with each turn he makes as the talks.
 * The black holes in the chest should've really already revealed some of the spell-book.
 * Velma's face is off-model when Daphne asks Ben why go through the elaborate plan of getting their help. This also happens after Velma answers for her that they wouldn't have if they knew the truth.

Inconstitencies/continuity errors and/or goofs/oddities

 * Shaggy calls the curator "Professor" while Velma calls him "Doctor".
 * Ben seems uncomfortable hearing about his own stories from Velma. Even if this was apart of his act, he still wrote them all.
 * The tourists are so friendly it's a little unclear who's supposed to be with who. For instance:
 * The male African American tourist was holding the arm of a blonde mother's young son.
 * The middle-aged man wearing a plaid shirt and overalls even looked like he had a family when watching Scooby with the butter churn, a young girl had her arms wrapped around his legs.
 * In the last shot of some of the tourists watching Shaggy in the pillory, the blonde mother disappears. Possibly because she's already moved onto watching the butter churner, even if it is a tad bit fast.
 * At one point, the male African American tourist and a few other tourists are laughing at Scooby with the butter churn, but quickly disappear.
 * The young woman in the pillory is presumably the girlfriend of the young man wearing the shirt jacket (since he's with the woman in the pillory), but her hair is in a ponytail, she's not wearing her jacket, but she's now wearing hoop earrings.
 * Inside the Oakhaven Restaurant, there's a life-size thermometer on the wall next to the entrance.
 * The customers in the booth next to Scooby and Shaggy are already looking over at them when they just sit down, making them look a little rude. Maybe they read the same newspaper as Ben or it their scene was mixed up with their later reactions to the duo's monstrous appetite and table manners?
 * While Wicca is a nature-oriented religion that did not appear until the 20th Century, nature-oriented spiritual healers could very well have existed in the 1600s. Additionally, being a religion, Wicca is not passed down through bloodlines (that would be like someone saying they have "Catholic blood" or being "1/16th Catholic").
 * The man who's about to vomit from seeing Scooby smiling at him while his face is covered in cranberry sauce, suddenly replaces the group that had already been occupying the booth before him (who had also been reacting to the how much (and how) they were eating). It could be argued that the group before him quickly left, if it weren't for the fact that that when he rushed out he put a check on the counter.
 * Velma is correct in stating that the modern-day word for witch comes from the word wicca. However wicca is a masculine Old English word that means sorcerer, meaning that wicca and witch are technically synonyms.
 * It seems odd that Ben would discover the gang's Moat Monster case from a newspaper report, a case that's supposed to be a few years old. Even including the fact that Daphne had brought it up in her TV interview it still wouldn't make the papers because it was just from her memories; however they have got their cases in the paper before so it's possibly the flashback of was actually years ago and he was just finding the right moment to find Mystery Inc., although it's implied to not be that long ago.
 * That could be a reasonable explanation if it weren't for the issue of their clothes. Daphne and Fred both wear the new outfits introduced in the previous film when they should be wearing their original ones, making it appear as if that case had been retconned as one of the newest cases.
 * This could all be due to the fact that at the end of the previous film when the gang and Detective Neville would back up each other's stories that werewolves and zombies, etc. were real. From an in-universe point of view it could be assumed that no one believed them, but from the writer's perspective (considering both films have the same principal crew) it would be a continuity trap. The point of the last film was to bring them "back together", not make them famous or even professional. In fact, Daphne's whole role of a TV journalist/presenter is dropped which was presumably the whole point of even giving her the more professional wardrobe to begin with.
 * While Wicca is a nature-oriented religion that did not appear until the 20th Century, nature-oriented spiritual healers could very well have existed in the 1600s. Additionally, being a religion, Wicca is not passed down through bloodlines (that would be like someone saying they have "Catholic blood" or being "1/16th Catholic").
 * Hopefully the gang actually informed Dr. Dean of his currupted security guards.
 * Ben didn't need to be so elaborate since the gang were none the wiser until it was too late anyway.
 * It's unknown why Sarah would have a banishment spell in her own spell-book.
 * Sarah seems to be a tangible ghost as she can touch objects and people, she can get wet, and a bucket can get stuck on her head.
 * None of the people watching the Hex Girls perform "Earth, Wind, Fire, and Air" are the tourists from the beginning of the film. It's possibly the ones who are watching it are citizens.
 * With the exception of Scooby's bongos, the rest of the gang's instruments aren't heard. Possibly they were drowned out by the Hex Girls' own music.

Home media

 * Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost VHS.
 * Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost DVD.

Quotes
"(Shaggy sees three girls coming toward them) Girls. Yeah, rirls. (both make themselves look handsome by pulling their full stomachs as being buff, and Shaggy makes his hair a different style as a romantic look) Like, hi girls. Hi. (Shaggy and Scooby look frightened as they see their vampire-like fangs, then yell and run as the Hex Girls can be heard laughing)"

- Shaggy & Scooby and Thorn, Dusk, and Luna

"(Shaggy throws a bucket of water on Sarah Ravencroft) What was that? Like, you're not melting, it worked in The Wizard of Oz."

- Sarah Ravencroft and Shaggy