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The Backstage Rage

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The Backstage Rage is the ninth episode of the first season of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!

Premise[]

The gang investigate an abandoned theater where they face a spooky phantom and his puppets, all connected to a counterfeiting operation.

Synopsis[]

Scooby and Shaggy are walking home from a pizzeria when a car rolls by and hits a bump, causing a violin case to fall out of the back window. Shaggy picks up the case and discovers it is full of money. Shaggy goes to call the gang, leaving Scooby to guard the violin case. The same car drives over near Scooby, and suddenly a poodle, whining and limping, attracts Scooby's attention. Scooby puts down the violin case and heads over to the poodle. Two hands are seen picking up the violin case. The poodle giggles and Scooby turns his head to hide his giggles, and the poodle is lifted up and the car drives off. Scooby is confused and also sees that the case has been stolen. When the gang gathers, Scooby explains the whole situation.

The gang search the area and find a puppet controller with "Pietro's Puppets" written on it. Under the circumstances, the gang deduce this was the work of counterfeiters. So, Mystery Inc. head to Strand Theater, an old theater where Pietro's Puppets is located. They talk with the doorman who they fool by signing Scooby up for an audition. But Shaggy finds a discarded counterfeit bill, and with the evidence, the gang leave. In the van, however, Velma concludes it was a real dollar. The gang return and sneak past the sleeping doorman. The gang split up and a phantom in a black cape begins to stalk the gang, trying to drop sandbags, and set props onto them.

The gang see the phantom and follow it into a room filled with empty violin cases under the stage. All the cases are empty. They are lured back on stage by the sound of an organ playing and as they get onto the stage, they see the phantom playing the organ. In a second, the phantom disappears. All of a sudden, the gang sees Viking and Pirate figures letting out battle cries while raising their swords and the girl poodle shows up and Scooby disables the dog from its strings and they see that it is a puppet.

In the dog's stuffing, rests a money-printing case for a 20 dollar bill. They confront the doorman, but they find out that he is just a life-size puppet! The gang returns to the room underneath the stage and find a secret room. Inside they find a printing press and piles of freshly printed 20 dollar bills. The phantom finds them and gives them the chase. Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy and Scooby go back onto the stage and the Pirate and Viking appear again, but Velma realizes they are just puppets. Scooby spots the phantom working the puppets from a catwalk and corners him on a rope. Freddy pulls another rope, causing the villain to fall into a trap, and the phantom is unmasked as Mr. Pietro. With Pietro now in a cop car, the gang explain to the officer that he pretended to be the doorman to throw himself off suspicion and was scaring everybody away from the theater so his counterfeit operation would not be discovered. Shaggy adds that the real hero was Scooby, just when he can't find him. They spot him at the stage door entrance, wearing a magician's hat and cape. Velma responds by calling him a ham, to which Scooby replies with "Scooby Dooby Doo!"

Characters[]

Main characters:

Supporting characters:

  • None

Villains:

Other characters:

Locations[]

Objects[]

Vehicles[]

Suspects[]

Suspect Motive/Reason
Pietro Strange manner.

Culprits[]

Culprit Motive/Reason
Pietro as the puppet master Wanted to scare people away from his counterfeiting operation.

Cast[]

Don Messick Scooby-Doo
Police officer
Casey Kasem Shaggy Rogers
Frank Welker Fred Jones
Johnny
Girl dog puppet
Stefanianna Christopherson Daphne Blake
Nicole Jaffe Velma Dinkley
Vic Perrin Pietro
Puppet master
John Stephenson Viking puppet
Pirate puppet

Full credits[]

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

Notes/Trivia[]

  • The Mystery Machine returns after a two-episode absence.
  • This is the third episode not to have an unmasking.
  • This is the first episode in which the villain is caught by the gang without any planning or forethought; the villain is caught through instinctive actions from Scooby and Shaggy.
  • This episode was one of four Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! episodes, (the other three being A Clue for Scooby Doo, Hassle in the Castle, and Jeepers, It's the Creeper), that were selected for the home video release Scooby-Doo's Greatest Mysteries by being voted "Most Popular" by the fans.
  • This is the first episode to have Daphne and Velma paired up together while the gang split up.
  • This is one of a few episodes where Shaggy and Scooby are not comedic and actually act serious with the gang.
  • This is the first episode, of which the villain is unmasked off screen.

Miscellaneous[]

In other languages[]

Language Name Meaning
Japanese 怪人黒マント The Black Phantom
Latin America Spanish El Teatro de los Billetes Falsos The False Bill's Theater

Cultural references[]

  • The puppet master evokes Erik from The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux.
    • He even closely resembles Erik's appearance in Universal's 1943 feature film adaptation of "The Phantom of the Opera" where he was played by Claude Rains.
  • Velma talks about Mata Hari, an archetype of the femme fatale.
  • The musical notes opening a secret passage is reminiscent of the 1940s Bob Hope film The Ghost Breakers. This film was cited by Ruby-Spears as an inspiration for the creation of the show.

Adaptations[]

Animation mistakes and/or technical glitches[]

  • The pepperoni is more decorative when the pizza is first taken out of the box and then looks regularly placed when Shaggy has it balanced on his finger.
  • At one point, the mysterious sedan looks as if it is driving on the sidewalk.
  • When Scooby mimes playing the violin, his sclera are missing.
  • There are several mistakes with the violin case:
    • Shaggy's arms while holding it are reversed in different shots.
    • Although when the sedan hits the bumps on the road and the violin case comes flying out it doesn't fall anywhere near a storm drain, it's next to one when Shaggy picks it up, at which time it's also facing the opposite direction.
  • Nobody was driving the mysterious sedan when the puppeteer pulls up the girl dog puppet.
  • When Shaggy says that a star is about to be born, Daphne's dress turns into a lighter purple.
  • When the gang first split up, the scenery wall that the phantom pushes onto Shaggy, and blames on Scooby, is gone a few moments later.
  • When Velma removes the engraving plate from the dog puppet, it is still there. It's possible that there was more than one plate inside.
  • When they go to wake up the doorman (and before they discover he is a puppet) his eyes are wide open.
  • When Freddy looks inside that harp-shaped room and says, "Wow, we hit the jackpot", it becomes a normal rectangular-shaped room. Perhaps only the doorway was harp shaped.
  • When the gang catch the puppeteer, he falls into a bass drum that looks like it was already broken. It's probable that Shaggy broke it beforehand.

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

  • It is unexplained how Pietro could continue to manipulate the girl dog puppet and also go over to get the counterfeit money. Perhaps he had a remote control.
  • A puppet dog, a violin case, packs of brand-new bills equal counterfeiters? How's that supposed to make any sense?
  • Shaggy and Scooby are noticeably less cowardly than usual in this episode - they don't protest about returning to the theatre, splitting up and looking for clues or express a desire to leave, and Scooby even chases after the villain at the end without incentive, much like he does the Ape Man in Never Ape an Ape Man.
  • Why would Pietro keep the lock to his door open? Unless if he actually wants intruders to come and expose his wrongdoings, he should have kept the door locked at all times. Maybe he was just trying to trick the gang into getting locked in, just like he did with the puppet of himself sleeping.
  • During the 'clues closet' scene, it's not known how Pietro was able to levitate himself up and down, as he was being held by strings. Perhaps it was just a puppet of the puppet master.
  • It's unknown how Pietro was able to disappear into the darkness after playing the theater organ. Perhaps there was a secret passage underneath the bench he was sitting on.
  • There was no way that Pietro was able to get back on the stage during the tunnel chase scene because the door they went through became bolted lock and there was no other way out. Perhaps there was another door, and the gang didn't notice it because they were being chased by the puppet master. In fact the only other way out besides the aforementioned ‘other door’ was via the ladder to the trapdoor in the stage!
  • Why did Pietro let go of his foot of the trapdoor that the gang was trying to get out of? Surely if the gang had just uncovered his wrongdoing, he would make at least some effort to try to trap the gang. Then again Fred already figured out that one guy isn't too heavy, so he got Daphne and Velma to help him out.
  • It is unknown if Scooby ate the Scooby Snack that Daphne offered him by throwing it in the prompter's box. If he would have eaten it, he would have been really fast in finding it and eating it because he was never shown to eat it on screen.

Home media[]

Quotes[]

Velma: He's gone!
Daphne: It must've been our imagination.
Shaggy: Well, that was the first time I ever heard mine.

External links[]


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