Hello lords and ladies.
Welcome back to Cartoon Hangout, your place for all things cartoon!
Episode 18, "Saga of the Swamp Beast," takes us to my home state of Louisiana for a mystery
involving a terrifying swamp monster.
Because what else would be the monster?
Things are complicated when Fred keeps being shown up by an alligator detective.
Poor Fred never seems to catch a break.
I knew this episode was probably going to be good when only a minute into the episode,
I was already laughing.
What was I laughing at?
Well, Daphne, of course.
The camera had barely panned over to reveal her vampire cosplay before I was pausing the
show to laugh.
The look on Fred's face says it all.
I don't know if I'd go so far as to say it's my favorite Daphneism thus far, but Daphne
does look good as one of the undead.
Plus it doesn't hurt that the amazing Grey DeLisle has the voice to pull off a more macabre
Daphne.
She did voice Azula from Avatar the Last Airbender after all.
Although I'm from Louisiana, I don't often take part in many traditionally Louisianian
traditions.
I do partake in some gumbo from time to time though.
Despite that I really loved that the setting of this episode was good ol' Louisiana.
I really wish more cartoons took place here.
There's a lot of lore and history to be taken advantage of.
Bunnicula knows what I'm talking about.
That show is set here, too.
But while this episode is set here in Louisiana, I don't know if it really took such great
advantage of the setting.
Yes, there's a swamp monster, delicious Louisiana food, and a gator who somehow is both a detective
and is a realestate agent, and even a Mardi Gras parade.
It felt like it could have been a bit more, but I do appreciate the gesture of the creators
setting the episode in my home state, because God knows not many shows do.
We get passed up for New York or California.
Bah!
As for the swamp monster, I couldn't find anything it was maybe based off of.
There are some monsters with similar designs, but they weren't swamp-based.
It's possible this is an original creation for the show, which surprises me considering
the Scooby-Doo franchise is really old and has visited Louisiana a couple of times before.
Yet they've never thought of doing a swamp monster?
The monster's design really seemed familiar, but I don't know why.
While this show is definitely a bit more comedic than past iterations, even I was surprised
when things like Velma rocketing off into the sky happened.
And this is coming from a show that regularly has Scooby and Shaggy doing some outlandish
things, such as running across water.
I'm pointing it out because it just had me laughing really hard for no particular reason
other than being surprised it was how Velma got away from the monster.
The rest of the episode follows as one would expect.
The gang do some sleuthing, a chase scene with incredible music ensues (what is the
this song by the way?), and they capture the monster.
The monster ended up being Dwayne aka the Gentleman Bandit.
This caught my attention mostly due to an earlier episode being referenced as his back-story.
Namely the first, as Dwayne had attended the Kingston University.
Scooby and Shaggy even mentioned Mitch from that episode, too.
The show's not continuity heavy like its predecessor, but I really like the small references here
and there from time to time.
It makes it feel like this is a living, breathing world and their adventures don't take place
in a vacuum every week like some iterations have treated it.
All in all I'd say this a decently entertaining episode.
To compare it to last week's, I'd say it's not quite as good, but you'll get plenty of
laughs from it and if you're a Louisianian like me, you'll love the various shout-outs
to the culture.
The Daphneism was really funny, as were the hijinks the gang got up to.
I especially loved Scooby and Shaggy partaking in the thinly veiled parody of the ghost reaper.
As for Fred, I didn't really find his competition with the gator all that amusing.
More annoying than anything.
I think I felt that way because we've already had Fred in competition with others who weren't
good at sleuthing and this time it wasn't even a person.
So that's my review of "Saga of the Swamp Beast."
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Thanks for watching, sorry this review is up so late, and take care!