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This article is about the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! episode. For other uses, see Mystery Mask Mix-Up (disambiguation).

Mystery Mask Mix-Up is the second episode of the second season of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, and the nineteenth overall.

Premise[]

Daphne buys a decorative, and purportedly cursed, mask in Chinatown, and is subsequently kidnapped by a pair of ghastly ancient Chinese figures. The rest of the gang trail the kidnappers to the temple of the evil Zen Tuo, who is apparently haunting the temple and wants to do away with the gang.

Synopsis[]

In a seemingly abandoned temple in San Francisco's Chinatown, the Ghost of Zen Tuo materializes in a puff of smoke. He orders his minions to retrieve his mask, and not return without it.

Elsewhere in Chinatown, Fred, Daphne, Velma, Scooby, and Shaggy are watching the Chinese New Year parade. After the parade, the gang stops by at an antique store, where Daphne purchases a golden Chinese mask encrusted with jewels. The gang leaves and two hooded ghosts arrive at the antique store and ask for the mask. The store owner, frightened, tells the ghosts that a girl took it.

While walking down the streets, the gang runs into the hooded ghosts who attempt to take the mask. Scooby creates a smokescreen from a steam press and the gang flees. Mystery Inc. heads to an oriental art shop where a dealer, Mr. Fong, informs them that many centuries ago, the mask was stolen from the tomb of Zen Tuo, a Chinese warlord whose ghost returns to seek the mask. He warns them that they are in great danger.

While driving in the Mystery Machine, the hooded ghosts start following them in their car. A car chase ensues, leading the gang to crash into Fisherman's Wharf and land in a pile of fish. In the confusion, Daphne is kidnapped (bound and gagged in the back seat of the ghost's car) and the mask is taken and the hooded ghosts drive away. The kidnappers leave behind a paper that reads "The Temple in the Hills".

The gang heads to the temple and enter. Splitting up, Fred and Velma find a secret room. They enter, hear a noise, and look to see a bound and gagged Daphne. She struggles to speak through her gag. They remove it and she says it's a trap: the door closes and locks and they are all trapped inside.

Scooby and Shaggy run into Zen Tuo (now wearing the golden mask) and the hooded ghosts who chase them. They eventually are captured and placed in a room tied up on a pile of fireworks, a lit fuse making its way toward them. They manage to escape, and in the process, freed Daphne, Fred, and Velma from the room.

Daphne leads the gang to a secret room that she saw on her way in, full of pigeons in a coop. They find messages that read dates and times have been tied to their legs.

Freddy formulates a trap, where Zen Tuo comes in, he steps on a train powered by Roman candles, and the trap is set. But Scooby doesn't finish laying the track pieces out in time and the train runs into him. In spite of this, the villains are captured.

Zen Tuo is subsequently unmasked as Mr. Fong, and the hooded ghosts are his henchmen. Mr. Fong has been the leader of an international smuggling ring. Information about dates and times entered the country inside masks and then the info was sent to other gang members by the pigeons. When the police question how the gang had gotten the mask in the first place, Daphne explains that the mask was delivered to a curio shop by mistake, where she ended up buying it as a souvenir. The ghost act was to scare people away from the temple, their center of the operation.

With the case settled, Shaggy and Scooby are now concerned about their next meal; Velma offers a Scooby Snack, but she only has one for them both. She tosses it in the air for them to catch, but they fumble and fail to catch it, hitting the floor and being momentarily knocked out. In that moment, a mouse runs out its hole and takes the Scooby Snack for itself; eliciting laughs from everyone about them being outfoxed by a mouse.

Characters[]

Main characters:

Supporting characters:

Villains:

Other characters:

  • Bats (only appearance)(no lines)
  • Chinese crowd (only appearance)(no lines)
  • Cat (only appearance)(no lines)
  • Laundry shop man (only time heard)
  • Doorman (only appearance)(no lines)
  • Carrier pigeons (only appearance)(no lines)
  • Mouse (only appearance)

Locations[]

Objects[]

  • Laundry ticket
  • Fish
  • Scooby Snack
  • Trash cans
  • Gold mask
  • Shirt presser
  • Fire hydrant
  • Banana peel
  • Carpet
  • Chinese gong
  • Roman candle rockets
  • Shaggy's train set
  • String
  • Mousetrap
  • Match
  • Sandpaper
  • Fuse
  • Ghost of Zen Tuo's fireworks
  • Flower pot
  • Statues
  • Stick
  • Velma's glasses

Vehicles[]

Suspects[]

  • None

Culprits[]

Culprit Motive/Reason
Mr. Fong as Zen Tuo
Mr. Fong's henchmen as the Scare Pair
To steal a "valuable" gold mask which contained evidence that has the names and dates of their shipments for their smuggling operations.

Cast[]

Don Messick Scooby-Doo
Zombie 1
Curio shop owner
Inspector Lu
Casey Kasem Shaggy Rogers
Frank Welker Fred Jones
Zombie 2
Heather North Kenney Daphne Blake
Nicole Jaffe Velma Dinkley
Keye Luke A. Fong
Zen Tuo

Songs[]

Song Credits Performed by
"I Can Make You Happy" Written credits by Danny Janssen and Susan Steward George A. Robertson, Jr.

Full credits[]

The following credits are how they are seen on-screen (or as close as possible).


Notes/Trivia[]

  • The following snippets from this episode can be seen in the second season's opening and closing sequences:
    1. Scooby and Shaggy after they have crashed into the trash cans after losing their balance.
    2. The gang running away from the hooded ghosts after first seeing them.
    3. The mask, albeit in a cartoon drawing on a plain blue background with an extreme zoom-in.
  • Scooby and Velma both understand Chinese--Scooby's heard speaking it (when he's arguing with the owner of a drycleaner) and Velma claims that she can read in Chinese (and presumably speak it as well).
  • H&B Tuna Co. is a reference to Hanna-Barbera.
  • Whilst not yet retconned, Daphne's wealth is implied in this episode, being able to buy an ornate golden mask inlaid with jewels as an impulse purchase. On the other hand, having been delivered by mistake to a curio shop, it may not have been that expensive.
  • Zen Tuo is the second villain to attempt to kill members of the Gang, after the Snow Ghost in That's Snow Ghost. In both cases, the villains use explosives in an attempt to kill them.
  • Joe Ruby and Ken Spears cite this as one of their favorite episodes.
  • Shaggy breaks the fourth wall when he says to the audience "How do you like that? Man's best friend is a mouse."
  • In the Spanish version of the episode, there is an instrumental version of the song "I Can Make You Happy".
  • While it is not explicitly stated where this episode takes place, it is most likely set in San Francisco, which has a large Chinese neighborhood (Chinatown) and population. Additionally, there are Buddhist temples in San Francisco and the chase scene ends with the Mystery Machine crashing in what appears to be San Francisco's famous Fisherman's Wharf.

Miscellaneous[]

Adaptations[]

  • There was an adaptation from Little Golden Books called Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mask Mix-Up.
  • Golden Books published an adaptation collected in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Adventures in 2000.
  • Dalmatian Press also published two different books with the same name; one with a colour and coin reveal and another colour and read-along, with stickers.
  • The Ghost of Zen Tuo is a past villain as stated in the live-action theatrical film Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, where the costume was put on display at the Coolsonian Criminology Museum. However, the Scare Pair zombies were not on display.

Animation mistakes and/or technical glitches[]

  • When one of the zombies demanded the mask, he and his partner's tunic folds (the y-shapes in front) were faced the wrong way.
  • When first confronted by the zombies, the only female silhouette shown is Daphne's, which mouths "Yow!" However, it is Velma's voice that proclaims this most profoundly.
  • When Scooby gestures for the zombies' car to stop there is a metal strip on the bottom of the car near the doors which is the same colour as the 2 bumpers however when it leaves the metal colour changes back to the normal black colour.
  • When Scooby opens the zombies' car and gasps, they have yellow pupils in the black eye sockets of their masks.
  • During the chase scene right after the Fisherman's Wharf sign appears, Scooby is shown in the Mystery Machine. Two seconds later he is back on top of the zombies' car.
  • When Scooby was digging for Shaggy in the fish, his arm turned the color of Shaggy's shirt, twice.
  • When Zen Tuo was crossing the first line Shaggy drew it and showed another line already drawn behind him.
  • After being unmasked, the Zen Tuo costume turned black, even though it was white for the rest of the episode.
  • When the fish squirted water at Scooby, its eyes were closed, even though fish don't really have eyelids. Although the usage in animation gives it a more facial expression to the character.

Inconsistencies/continuity errors and/or goofs/oddities[]

  • For comical effect, the Mystery Machine slips on a banana at the end of the chase scene. (In fact, it's the reason it ends.)
  • When the zombies come to get the mask from the salesman, he says it was "just purchased by a young girl". Considering this very generic description, it is amazing how quickly they realised Daphne had the mask. Furthermore, it would have been perfectly easy enough for Daphne to deny all knowledge of it, having never met them before.
  • Why would the zombies be carrying around a piece of paper with "The Temple in the Hills" written on it, considering they are already aware of where the hideout is?
  • All Zen Tuo and the zombies wanted was the mask- why kidnap Daphne? That's just an invitation to be followed.
    • They probably couldn't allow any witnesses, or decided that it would be quicker to grab the one holding the mask than risk a delay in a struggle.
  • Having been worn throughout the episode, why does the mask still contain messages within its mouth at the end?
  • If the mask was delivered by accident to somewhere else, how did the zombies know where to find it? They must have connections within the postal service.
  • It's unknown how the mouse knows Scooby's catchphrase.

In other languages[]

Language Name Meaning
Greek Η Μυστηριώδης Μάσκα The Mysterious Mask
Hungarian Kínai kalandok Adventure in China

Home media[]

Quotes[]

Daphne: I think it's groovy, I'll take it.
Shaggy: Looks like Daphne wants to scare up a couple of new boyfriends.


Shaggy: I wonder what's behind that curtain Scoob?
Scooby-Doo: A shower?
Shaggy: No, it's not a shower.


Shaggy: Don't you know it's illegal to shoot off fireworks and wreck a storeroom?
Ghost of Zen Tuo: We will build a new storeroom.
Shaggy: Like, who's going to build a new us?

External links[]


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Nowhere to Hyde Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!
Season 2
Scooby's Night with a Frozen Fright
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