Scooby Doo / Tropes N to Z

• Name Drop: In "The Frickert Fracas", Maude Frickert tells Fred he looks like Glen Campbell.
  • In The New Scooby-Doo Movies, a character almost always name-drops the celebrity guest(s) upon first meeting them. (e.g., "Look, it's Jerry Reed!")
    • Same goes for Scooby-Doo and Guess Who?, except all the gang name-drops the celebrity and what they're know for (e.g., "Award winning singer, and actor Cher?")
  • A name drop through tagline: In Scooby Doo Meets The Addams Family, Scooby's "I ate the whooooole thing!" referred to the tagline of an Alka-Seltzer commercial prominent at the time, which was "I can't believe I ate the whooooole thing!"
  • From "The Ghost of the Red Baron" (with the Three Stooges) after the gang sees the Baron in his bi-plane:
    Shaggy: I thought the Red Baron was a beagle.
    Daphne: That's Snoopy, dummy!
  • In the comic book story "The Gorgeous Ghost" (Gold Key #25, April 1974), the boys and Scooby comment on Daphne after she is shined up for a beauty contest:
    Fred: She's prettier than Elizabeth Taylor!
    Shaggy: She's prettier than Raquel Welch!
    Scooby: Even prettier than Lassie!
• Nerds Are Sexy: Velma has a pretty notable fanbase in certain circles. Being a Bespectacled Cutie hardly hurts.
• Never Say "Die": While some are less aware, this has changed throughout the franchise. In which case in the earliest season the gang are in real danger, but it is often not really spoken about directly. The only exceptions being when somebody had to die to set up the episode's villain. (as in the week's monster is the ghost of somebody)
  • Later incarnations that went for a Darker and Edgier atmosphere have on purpose tried to avert this a lot more as time goes on.
  • The trope was once parodied in an early episode of The Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo Show.
    Scrappy: We've reached a dead end, Shaggy!
    Shaggy: (Scared) Like I wish you hadn't said dead, Scrappy!
  • Even earlier on The New Scooby-Doo Movies episode "Guess Who's Knott Coming To Dinner," when Fred rings the doorbell of Moody Manor and it emits loud Big Ben chimes.
    Velma: Ring it again, Freddy. Maybe they didn't hear you.
    Shaggy: You've gotta be kidding. Like, that doorbell is loud enough to wake the dead! (gulps, then in a quiet whine) I wish I hadn't said that!
• Nice Guy: Shaggy may be cowardly and will likely run at anything remotely creepy, but he will always put his friends first, even before his pure love of eating; he really is a nice and friendly guy. He is also the least likely of the gang to grasp the Adaptational Jerkass Ball (and even when he does, he's nowhere near as bad as the others who are affected)
  • The whole gang is this, save for a few projects where one or more of them get the Adaptational Jerkass treatment (all of them in the the live action movie, Scooby and Velma in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, Fred in Be Cool, Scooby-Doo!, and Velma, Daphne and Fred in Velma); they are generally friendly and likable kids.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The series The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo starts with Scooby and Shaggy tricked into opening the Chest of Demons. As Vincent Van Ghoul states in the opening as to why they have to capture the demons and return them to the chest, "Because you let them out!!!"
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: What's New fairly frequently dropped in thinly veiled expies of well-known real-life celebrities and fictional characters, including a professional golfer named Cougar Forest and an Australian archaeologist named Melbourne O'Reilly.
  • Don't forget the anthropologist studying gorillas named Joan Goodfew.
• No Ending: To The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo.
• No Fourth Wall: In A Pup Named Scooby-Doo.
• No Guy Wants to Be Chased: In Scooby-Doo Meets the Boo Brothers, Sadie Mae Scroggins, an attractive but aggressive teenage girl, is smitten with Shaggy, who spends as much time running from her as the ghost.
  • This could be construed as a Stealth Pun: Shaggy is constantly "chased" by ghosts that never catch him, where he is caught many times by a boy-crazy girl.
• Not So Above It All: No matter how serious a threat or how kooky a ghost, or even how strait-laced a character may be, anyone and everyone can potentially get wrapped up in the weird antics and hilarious chase sequences. This is especially prominent with some perps, even the homicidal ones, who inexplicably end up doing insane and over-the-topic antics as part of a chase gag.
• Occult Detective: Though the occult almost always turns out to be someone in a Halloween costume.
• Oddball Doppelgänger: Scooby has one in his cousin Scooby-Dum◊, who is rather dimwitted.
• The Olympics: Scooby-Doo! Spooky Games.
  • And the "Scooby-Doobies" team in Laff-a-Lympics
• Omnidisciplinary Scientist: Velma seems to know everything, at least items convenient to the plot.
• On One Condition
• The Only Ones: Vincent Van Ghoul makes it clear that Scooby and Shaggy are the only ones who can get the 13 ghosts back into the chest of demons, because they're the ones who let them out.
• Only One Plausible Suspect: Used frequently in various versions of the franchise. Subverted once in What's New, Scooby-Doo? though, in the episode "It's All Greek to Scooby". The crook turns out to be some random person the gang has never met before. Velma naturally is rather displeased and keeps insisting her theory about who was the monster was at least plausible.
• Only Sane Man: Or girl, in this case—Velma in Music Of The Vampire. Although she does get a strange snark in when Daphne disappears and it is learned that the vampire seeks a bride with "beauty and is pure of heart."
  Velma: You know, I'm pure of heart. Does anyone ever think of kidnapping me?
• Our Cryptids Are More Mysterious: While individual monsters in the franchise are often made up from scratch, several classic cryptids such as the Loch Ness Monster and the Chupacabra have featured in the animated movies or more recent series.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: From The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo right down to the last ghost. While they are all referred to as ghosts, the series goes back and forth on whether they're actual demons or something else entirely. A couple of them even seem more like rival magic users to Van Ghoul rather than actual spirits.
  • The monster ghost in the Supernatural crossover episode "Scoobynatural" was real, but it was actually the spirit of a deceased little boy who was manipulated into doing bad things. Sam, Dean and Castiel help the boy and in turn, the boy helps maintain the Scooby status quo and get the guys back to their own live-action world.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: The first episode of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo has a town of werewolves who hide their true selves from outsiders, only to attack and transform them at night, acting more like a secret cult than the general idea of a werewolf.
• Outdated Outfit: The gang's original 1969 outfits usually get copied, but a few adaptations give them fashion makeovers.
  • This is lampshaded in one of the made-for-TV movies. Fred is seen getting dressed, and he puts on the orange tie he wore in his original outfit. He thinks about it for a few seconds, then says "Naaah," and takes it off.
  • Lampshaded in Scooby Doo and the Cyber Chase where the gang meet digital models of themselves from years earlier, who are still wearing the original outfits. For most of the segment, it's the only way to visually tell the two groups apart. Fred also gives himself a comment on the ascot.
  • The two made-for-TV live-action obviously deviates a a little from the gang's appearances — Fred has dark hair. This is subverted and lampshaded in Curse of the Lake Monster: Fred and Daphne pose as mannequins to lose the trail of the creature, and they are both done up as the original cartoon Fred and Daphne. After looking in a mirror, Fred thinks it's a good look. Daphne thinks he's being ridiculous.
• Out Sick: In the comic "Big Girls Don't Sneeze", Velma has a cold or the flu (even she doesn't know which) so the rest must continue to investigate without her.
• Pair the Spares: Shaggy and Velma in Mystery Inc.
• Papa Wolf:
  • Scooby cares for his nephew, Scrappy, and is very protective of him, keeping him from running straight for any ghoul they encounter on their travels and is willing to stand up to danger to keep him safe.
  • In an episode of What's New Scooby Doo? he faced a huge menacing cat creature that was attacking a litter of puppies. Having spent the whole night already rescuing the pups from a pair of kidnappers, Scooby was in no mood to put up with the monster's threats, and flat out tackled it. Don't threaten innocent puppies in front of Scooby Doo.
• Paranormal Investigation: except it usually ius a "Scooby-Doo" Hoax, though some of the later movies and TV shows have actual paranormal activity.
• Parental Abandonment: They either have no parents or just very hands-off parents who don't seem to care that their teenagers go all around the world, hunting down villains in Halloween costumes.
• Parental Bonus: Cher was a gold mine for these in her guest appearance on "The Scooby Doo Movies."
  Sonny: But this is our delayed honeymoon. You should be enjoying it.
  Cher: I am enjoying it or my name isn't Barbra Streisand.
  Sonny: But your name isn't Barbra Streisand.
  Cher: You catch on quick, big boy!
• Phrase Catcher: "And I would have gotten away with it too..."
• A Pirate 400 Years Too Late: Scooby Doo! Pirates Ahoy!
• Poorly Disguised Pilot: Scooby has crossed this line several times here.
  • The New Scooby-Doo Movies Addams Family episode did successfully lead to an Addams Family Cartoon.
  • Likewise, Batman and Robin on The New Scooby-Doo Movies led to the Superfriends.
  • One episode of The Scooby-Doo Show goes through a lot of trouble to introduce us to The Alex Super Experience and even features a new animal companion in a frog. This was either an aimed pilot or recycling of an unsold meddling kids show.
  • The last episode of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo backseats Fred, Daphne and Velma, and has Scooby and Shaggy be rescued by Scrappy and two of his childhood friends. Seems very much a spinoff that didn't take.
  • Scrappy-Doo and Yabba-Doo was given a whole segment for one season for this reason.
  • On The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo we also spend an episode introducing a variety of comic parody characters with spotlight on three different ones, very likely a candidate for a three short show.
• Powder Gag:
  • Scooby-Doo! (DC Comics): Exploited in "Flour Power" (issue #122). The Monster of the Week covers himself in flour and dresses as a bakery ghost. As he pursues them, they knock flour sacks, causing the entire room and themselves to be coated in white powder. The bakery ghost uses the diminished visibility to get rid of his costume and make it seem as if he just stumbled onto the mess.
  • Scooby Doo Readers: In Scooby-Doo! and the Haunted Diner, the storm causes a momentary blackout in the diner the gang is eating in. After stumbling in the dark, they find a terrifying monster made of dripping flour. As it turns out, it's the cook, who fell on sacks of flour when the light suddenly went out.
• Precision F-Strike: The crossover with Supernatural has Daphne concerned about either going to Heaven or Hell, Sam says "son of a bitch," and a bleeped-out F-word is uttered.
• Put on a Bus: Every member of the gang, save for Shaggy and Scooby, received this treatment eventually.
• Put on a Prison Bus: The early seasons of the TV cartoon almost always had the villain who perpetrated the "Scooby-Doo" Hoax being arrested by the police for the criminal operation the hoax was intended to cover up.
• Quaking with Fear: Scooby and Shaggy quake when afraid. Their shaking and shivering even gets referenced in the main theme.
• Real After All: Something of a tradition in the movies.
  • In general, if the monster is put forth as weird technology instead of some kind of supernatural being, it's real (as early as "Foul Play in Funland", but also seen with "houses of the future," walking action figures, and robots of all kinds).
  • Also, the coral monster in one episode of What's New turned out to be...a monster made of coral.
• Reckless Sidekick: Scrappy-Doo. Considering that all of the monsters of the week were old men in costumes, Scrappy might have been able to take them.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: The Gypsy Fortune Teller in the Where Are You! episode "A Gaggle of Galloping Ghosts".
• Red Herring: "I didn't do it!" Lampshaded in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, with a character named Red Herring, who is accused by Fred of ''every'' single crime in every episode, save the one time where Red was actually the monster and Fred couldn't accuse him because of a prior agreement made with the rest of the gang.
• Relationship Upgrade: Shaggy and Velma in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, disastrously. According to Word of God it was intended as a Last Het Romance, but most viewers just interpreted it as Velma being an Adaptational Jerkass.
• Replaced the Theme Tune: The later seasons did away with its iconic "Where Are You?" theme song in its entirety. Many fans assert that this change coincided with an overall drop in the show's quality as it preceded the introduction of The Original Scrappy by one season.
• Reveal Shot: From the special Scooby Doo, Where Are You Now!: The studio lights go out and an ungodly monstrous noise is heard. When the lights return, hostess Janel Parrish says she hears the sounds of castanets. Cut to Scooby chattering his teeth then pull back to show him playing a pair of castanets.
• Reverse Psychology
• Road-Sign Reversal
• Robot Maid: Or Robot Butler, in this case: Robi in Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!.
• Roger Rabbit Effect: On ABC's 1976 Saturday-morning preview special (aired the evening before the new season started), Scooby appeared with a live-action Jimmy Osmond. They both danced to the 1971 Osmonds song "Yo-Yo".
  • A 1982 promo for ABC has Scooby entreating a live-action bored little boy to join the parade of ABC stars proceeding down the street of the kid's neighborhood.
  • The 2021 special Scooby Doo, Where Are You Now! is pretty much this, with the gang intermingling with live action figures during their interview and the mystery.
• Romantic False Lead: In the first few direct to tv movies, such as Zombie Island and The Witches Ghost, there would always be at least one character that Fred or Daphne would have a crush on, solely so that the other wound up being jealous and inducing Ship Tease.
• Rube Goldberg Device: In Mystery Incorporated, Fred's skill/obsession is in rigging up traps, which are this type of device. The one we see him try in the first episode works perfectly. Except it falls a few feet to the side, landing squarely on the Scooby Gang.
• Samus Is a Girl: Any "monster" who is unmasked and revealed to be a woman qualifies. There are also some female monsters who are unmasked as men, making them gender inversions.
• Saw Star Wars 27 Times: In the crossover with Supernatural, Dean says he's seen the Scooby episode "A Night Of Fright Is No Delight" (where he and Sam have entered the cartoon world) a million times.
• Scarecrow Solution: Mystery, Inc. sometimes turns the tables on the hoaxers by doing a little supernatural faking of their own.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Scooby and Shaggy occasionally try to do this if they feel things are getting too scary. The others usually won't let them.
• "Scooby-Doo" Hoax: The Trope Namer. It's been the franchise's bread and butter since 1969, with few exceptions (The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, most notably).
  • The crossover with Supernatural turns the trope on its collective head. Sam, Dean and Castile can't allow Scooby and the gang to become embroiled with real ghosts. When the three guys capture the episode's monster ghost, they find it to be the spirit of a little boy manipulated to do evil things. They offer to help him to his final reward, and in turn, the boy impersonates lawyer Cosgood Creeps so the gang can unmask him and end the mystery as the Scooby-Doo Hoax it was supposed to be.
• Scooby-Dooby Doors: Trope Namer, as it's a frequently recurring gag.
• Scooby Stack: Trope Namer, as it's also a frequently recurring gag.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The chest of demons from The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo.
• Secret Room: These abound and are usually found accidentally by "Danger-Prone Daphne".
• Self-Deprecation:
  • In the movie Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Scooby and Shaggy are seen in a studio cafeteria threatening Matthew Lillard, who played Shaggy in the 2002 and 2004 live-action Scooby theatrical feature films (averted seven years later, when Lillard would assume Shaggy's voice on the cartoon).
    Shaggy: What kind of performance do you call that? You made me sound like a total space cadet, man!
    Matthew Lillard: I'm sorry you feel that way. I was just trying to be true to your character.
    Shaggy: If you, like, goof up on me in the sequel, I'ma coming after ya!
    Scooby: Reah. And Ri'll rive you a Scooby Snack! [growls viciously]
  • In "Curse of the Lake Monster" the jab about relationships in the end seems to be one directed towards Mystery Inc.
• Self-Referential Humor: The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo started it, and A Pup Named Scooby-Doo kicked it up a notch.
• The Series Has Left Reality: While the original series starts out pretty grounded in reality, some of the sequel series introduce real supernatural creatures in place of regular guys in masks and Scooby is able to communicate with humans on a sapient level instead of just being able to say a few words.
• '70s Hair: Considering it was made about that time, it's not all that shocking.
• Ship Tease: In the original show it seems to heavily lead this on Fred and Daphne. Shaggy and Velma to a lesser extent as in some cases it may also just be script left overs from when the two were conceived as brother and sister.
  • During the 1980s, however, this shifted to Shaggy and Daphne when Fred and Velma weren't around. The heaviest of this era being in The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo where at one point they share a really long hug.
  • Starting with Zombie Island this was returned back to Fred and Daphne and in the series of dtv movies it becomes a quick plot point, but is shelved back at the end of the episode.
• Shout-Out: here.
• The Show Goes Hollywood: Scooby Goes Hollywood.
• Signature Laugh: Scooby's "heHeHEHeHehe" chortle, often followed by, "Rooby Roo!"
• Signature Team Transport: The Mystery Machine, their vehicle of choice in nearly every incarnation.
• Signing-Off Catchphrase: "Scooby-Dooby-Doo!"
• The Sixth Ranger: The Mystery Machine is for all practical purposes an additional supporting character in the entire franchise.
• Skeleton Key: In the book, Scooby-Doo! and the Skeleton Key, Scooby and the gang find an old-fashioned skeleton key - which the ghost of a pirate wants.
• Skintone Sclerae: Of the gang, averted with Daphne up through The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries.
• Sleep Cute: On the splash page of the Sears March of Comics premium story "Spooky Wooky" (1971), while the Mystery Machine is going through a road at night, Scooby is sleeping over the passenger side window and Velma is sleeping leaning on Scooby's neck.
• Soundtrack Dissonance
• Spanner in the Works: Shaggy and Scooby act as this in Zombie Island; Samone and Lena dismiss them, and they end up disrupting the ritual long enough for the others to turn the tables.
• Special Guest:
  • The central feature of The New Scooby-Doo Movies were luminaries who appeared in cartoon form on the show: Jonathan Winters, Don Knotts, Phyllis Diller, Sandy Duncan, Sonny & Cher, Jerry Reed, Davy Jones, Tim Conway, Cass Elliot, and Dick Van Dyke. The Addams Family appearances re-recruited John Astin and Carolyn Jones as the voices of Gomez and Morticia. And Pugsley Addams was voiced by a young lady by the name of — you may have heard of her — Jodie Foster.
  • What's New, Scooby-Doo? had guest appearances by hockey's Brett Hull, baseball's Mike Piazza, skateboarder Chris Krug, Steve Harwell of the group Smashmouth, and music group Simple Plan.
  • Episode 11 of Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated featured author Harlan Ellison.
    • Inversions: Scooby and the gang are the guest stars in episodes of Batman: The Brave and the Bold and the CW series Supernatural.
  • Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? will follow the pattern with numerous contemporary celebrities and notable fictional characters as guest stars.
• Special Thanks: Starting in Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost in 1999, "Special Thanks To Joe Ruby and Ken Spears" is included in the end credits of every Scooby-Doo film (animated and live-action), TV-series, and TV-special produced since.
• Speech-Impaired Animal: Lampshaded in Scooby Doo and the Alien Invaders; Crystal and Amber (Shaggy and Scooby's love interests in thr film) are revealed to be aliens at the end, and Amber the dog can talk.
  Shaggy: Like, dig that, Scoob! A talking dog!
  Scooby: Ryeah!
  Fred: (dryly, to Velma and Daphne) Yeah, imagine that.
  • The speech-impaired part is a Running Gag in Shaggy and Scooby Get A Clue, where Robi the robot continually referred to Scooby as "Rooby-Roo" and Scooby would try to correct him.
    Scooby: Rat's Rooby! Roo!
  • This brief but funny exchange from Decoy For A Dognapper:
    Scooby: Ri, Raggy.
    Shaggy: Ri, Rooby.
• Spinoff Babies: A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, although technically they're 10-year-olds rather than actual infants.
  • According to studio bios from the cast we know, Fred and Shaggy are 17, Daphne is 16 and Velma is 15. A Pup Named Scooby-Doo would chronologically have Fred and Shaggy at age 10, Daphne at 9, and Velma (who in this series sleeps in a jumper) at 8.
• Stalker with a Crush: In What's New, Scooby-Doo?, Velma has one in the form of an inventor nerd named Gibby Norton.
  • In "Bravo Dooby Doo," Velma flirts with Johnny Bravo.
  Velma: (winks to Johnny) I don't bite!
  Johnny: (points to Daphne) Yeah...but does she?
  • In Scooby-Doo: Camp Scare, a ranger investigating the destruction of Camp Little Moose flirts with Velma, who is squicked.
  • In the Supernatural crossover "Scoobynatural," Dean has the hots for Daphne, while Velma tries to cozy up to Sam (she eventually plants The Big Damn Kiss on Sam at the end of the animated portion of the episode).
• Stand-In Portrait: Frequently.
• Standardized Leader: Fred
• Stealth Hi/Bye:
  • This happens a lot in Scooby-Doo, especially when Scooby and Shaggy decide to cook or just fool around after splitting up. The monster/ghost makes an appearance handing them something or offering a suggestion before they see it and run for their lives.
  • It also happened to Velma when she was in a college lab testing a mummy's bandages to find out if they were really ancient and the mummy handed her a test tube with the right chemical in it. (In retrospect, it's also kind of a clue that the mummy is one of the professors.)
• The Stoner: Shaggy. Okay, so the show never actively says he's The Stoner but he's stick thin, scruffy, always hungry, will eat dog snacks, thinks his dog can talk (the others could be humoring him or are probably as wasted as he is), and he's always freaking out.
• Stoners Are Funny: Shaggy again.
  • According to the show's creators, the idea that Shaggy smoked pot never even entered their heads in the creation of the character. But since it was brought up, a lot of the movies have a tendency to joke about it. And fans believe it.
• Story Arc: Scooby Doo: Mystery Incorporated has one of these, with the mysterious Mister E sending them clues about their latest mystery and challenging them to solve the disappearance of a previous band of mystery-solving teens years ago.
• Story-Breaker Team-Up: The various team ups with characters from other shows.
• Strictly Formula: There are very, very few cases where it is not a guy in a mask. Pointed out in Zombie Island.
• The Summation
• Surprise Slide Staircase: Appears in the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! episode "Never Ape An Ape Man".
• Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Scrappy has the strength to carry Shaggy and Scooby with one hand and bust through brick walls. Since, given the setting, that's pretty much a Story-Breaker Power, as there is no reason why he can't quickly drag the monster back to the gang. So, they have Shaggy and Scooby drag him away before he gets the chance, have him grab the wrong guy, or, worst of all, have him midcharge just stand around punching space, because...reasons. Yeah.
• Syndication Title: The 1976-78 episodes were syndicated as The Scooby-Doo Show, using the theme from The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour but with changed lyrics (i.e.: "They make a super pair with a super show to share" was changed to "Come on, get involved till the mystery is solved") and graphics.
• Take That!: In the special Scooby Doo, Where Are You Now, the gang groans when Scrappy-Doo is brought up.
  Daphne: More like Scrappy Don't!
• Take the Wheel: In Monsters Unleashed, when the gang is being chased by the pterodactyl monster, Freddy asks Shaggy to take the wheel of the Mystery Machine while he tries to shoot the monster down. A little while later, Shaggy gets called to the back of the van so he can help Velma, and he leaves the driving to Scooby. To Scooby. Granted, he's pretty intelligent as far as animals go, but he's still not that far up the scale...
• Talking Animal: The franchise as a whole lampshades the trope by featuring Scooby (and a number of other animal characters such as Scrappy Doo) talk openly, but no one finds this unusual - even though a primary concept of the entire franchise is that the supernatural (usually) doesn't exist.
• Tangled Family Tree: Each series/spinoff seems to insist on introducing (and, with few exceptions, never showing again) more and more relatives of the gang... cousins, uncles, aunts, grandparents, parents (Fred's and Shaggy's parents in Mystery Inc. are different than was previously presented), and in some spinoffs, even siblings. At this point, the Rogers, Dinkley, Blake, Jones and Doo family trees' must rival the (Mc)Duck family tree in complexity...
• Tasty Gold
• Taxman Takes the Winnings:
  • This turned out to be the motive behind one of the Monster of the Week schemes. The perpetrators had discovered a sunken treasure, and were trying to smuggle it out without declaring it, because if they did Uncle Sam would come in and take more than half of it.
  • Happens another way with a villain hunting for a lost-for-100-years federal gold shipment, and when it's found and the guy caught, he declares that it rightfully belongs to him because his great-grandfather was the teamster who died transporting it. Velma declares him wrong because the gold's still government property.
  • This was most likely comic book story "The Galleon Ghost" (Gold Key #2, June, 1970). The "ghosts" were actually gypsies who feared that the IRS would take it all, but Fred assured them that they would still be well off after Uncle Sam's take.
• 10-Minute Retirement: Happens twice. In the prime time special Scooby Goes Hollywood, he quits his Saturday morning show to pursue a career in nighttime TV. In the 13 Ghosts episode "It's a Wonderful Scoob", he becomes so traumatized by the episode's Big Bad that he goes back home to his parents. In the first instance, Fred, Daphne and Velma lead a rally for Scooby to return to his cartoon show. In the second, Vincent Van Ghoul shows Scooby the future world without him stopping the villain Time Slime.
• There Are No Adults:
  • They either don't have parents or their parents just don't care that their teens travel around the world solving mysteries with a talking dog.
  • While not directly approached in the original, Daphne's first relative is a famous director, hinted at her wealth. Later down the line the family trees have been extended so far it seems likely the Scooby Gang are all from affluent families. Only once do they seem to need money, and by the end of the episode (which is only a few nights later, it's no longer a concern).
  • Mystery Incorporated subverts this, with their parents appearing frequently to try to get them to stop solving mysteries, because in this world that's what rebellious teens do apparently. Except for Velma's mother who provides them with information on whatever monster concept the crook of the week is using and her father who only appears three times.
• Third-Person Person: In the DC Comics story "Nutcracker Not-So-Sweet", the ballet dancer Rudolfo Kaspenov constantly refers to himself in the third person out of vanity.
• 13 Is Unlucky: The 13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo
• Toilet Humor: Shaggy in Legend of the Phantosaur when the biker picks him up:
  Shaggy: And there goes the bladder!
  • In the special Scooby Doo, Where Are You Now!, Shaggy and Scooby are dressed as Bingo and Drooper from The Banana Splits posing as bait to lure the Snow Ghost into one of Fred's traps. Velma tells Shaggy not to pee in the costume.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Scooby is not the least bit contrite when in "The Headless Horseman Of Hagglethorn Hall" (SD Movies ep with Davey Jones), he hides from a ghost in the gang's picnic basket and proceeds to eat everything in it.
• Toon Physics: Used mostly in the earlier shows, Scooby and Shaggy could leave stuff suspended in midair, hang from ceilings from jackhammers, etc.
• Totally Radical: Found in the Live Action movie. It's also sadly found in the made-for-TV movies.
• Town with a Dark Secret: The town of werewolves in the first episode of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo.
• Trademark Favorite Food:
  • Scooby-Doo and Shaggy really love their Scooby Snacks.
  • Shaggy's "Super Shaggy Sandwich".
• Tunnel King: Scooby in some episodes
• Twist Ending: From the show's earliest days in "A Clue For Scooby-Doo," everyone was so sure that the ghost of Captain Cutler was beach hermit Ebeneezer Shark since he had a diving suit similar to Cutler's. But Shaggy immediately recognized him as Cutler himself, from a picture on Widow Cutler's wall.
• Undercover When Alone: The fake monsters and ghosts remain in character even when nobody, except the audience, is around to see them. There is no reason whatsoever for them to just dress up and act like they're real other than to introduce the Monster of the Week to the viewer, which has no value to them in-universe.
• Unexpected Inheritance: In "A Night of Fright Is No Delight" on Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! the plot centered around a Scooby getting the chance at inheriting an unexpected inheritance worth millions - which turned out to be millions in Confederate currency, which was worthless (clearly they never thought of selling all that Civil War memorabilia to museums or other collectors).
• Unintentional Backup Plan: Common. Often the original trap that is set will not work, but Shaggy and Scooby's incompetence causes it to fail, but yields similar results.
• Unspoken Plan Guarantee: In the older shows, Fred would often explain or demonstrate his ghost traps in detail before springing them - naturally they would typically fail, but also occasionally worked perfectly if he didn't explain it beforehand. In later series the plans failing bit itself became more iconic than the set-up, so the traps would backfire regardless of whether he explains them or not.
• Vague Age: The Mystery Gang. They're only described as "Meddling Kids," but considering how much time they spend on the road, they almost certainly have to be in their 20s, or late teens at the youngest.
  • Their ages have been given, for the original series at least. Velma is 15, Daphne is 16, and the boys are 17. The original premise was to have them be a teen rock group on tour, which makes the lack of parents and time on the road more explainable.
• Verbal Tic: Like, Shaggy, obviously. Also of note, Professor Flakey in 1972's "The Caped Crusader Caper", one of two crossovers with Batman and Robin. Flakey's dialogue consists almost exclusively of spoonerisms and this memorable malapropism:
  Flakey: I always liked Shaggy because he's dumb to kind animals!
• Video Wills: The phonograph record in "A Night of Fright Is No Delight".
• Walking the Earth: Or driving it, anyway.
• The Walls Are Closing In: In "A Night of Fright Is No Delight", the gang discovered a locked trap door and a nearby organ that appears to control it. Scooby offers to play the organ to see whether they can open the trap door, but when that happens, the gang realizes the walls are closing in on them. As the gang tries to hold the walls back, Scooby desperately plays the instrument more, and then frantically dances on the keys to try to get it to stop the walls, and succeeds by sheer luck.
  
  The message on the sheet music read, "Feed the organ and watch the floor," and Velma deduced that it meant the musical notes F-E-E-D, which she plays and a panel in the floor opens. As to which keys Scooby pushed to stop the walls, that is anybody's guess.
• Watch Where You're Going!: A recurring gag. Usually, it’s Shaggy and Scooby running from the monster crashing into the rest of the gang coming the other way, or the gang crashing into the monster which results in the monster getting exposed.
  • Happens in The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, with Shaggy and Scooby on one side and Flim-Flam and Scrappy on the other.
  • Also happens with the main Mystery Inc. team in Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase. Velma and her Video Game counterpart do this again later.
  • The Scooby-Doo Show episode “The No-Faced Zombie Chase Case” had Velma, Fred and Daphne crash into the Lieutenant, Shaggy and Scooby all together. Cut to the No-Faced Zombie shaking its head and sighing as if exasperated by what it just saw.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Miss Mirimoto at the end of Scooby-Doo and the Samurai Sword.
  • Scooby-Doo: Music of the Vampire: Shaggy and Scooby are told by swamp hermit Tulie that his prototype for hovering shoes was stolen by the vampire. When the gang catches the vampire, this is never brought back up. Likewise, we never see Jasper Poubelle and his vampire-hunting posse at the conclusion.
  • The crossover with Supernatural takes place during the Scooby episode "A Night Of Fright Is No Delight," where Scooby and four relatives of an eccentric southern Colonel are heirs to a fortune. Cousin Simple is found stabbed to death. The other heirs—Nephew Norville, Cousin Slicker and Sweet Cousin Maldehyde— are never accounted for after the will reading.
• Who Is Driving?: Zig-zagged twice in the episode "Foul Play In Funland." First, Velma and Scooby are in a runaway bumper car which Velma can't control after losing her glasses (and she even taps her foot on the floorboard searching for a brake, which bumper cars don't have). Then, the gang is helping Mr. Jenkins find his recalcitrant robot in a jeep, which Velma's driving. And after the ride in the bumper car, where is Scooby sitting in the jeep Velma is driving? Shotgun!
  • Velma does show some mad skills with the Mystery Machine in Scooby Doo: Music Of The Vampire.
• Who's Laughing Now?: In the 2002 movie:
  Daphne: (having just overpowered Zarkos) Now who's the damsel in distress?
  Zarkos: Me?
  Daphne: Straight up!
• Who Would Want to Watch Us?: In Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, the newly redrawn cast mock their original appearances in a video game based on them. (Cyber!Shaggy, however, is wearing his red shirt from a couple of the movies.)
• Witch Doctor: The Tiki-Witch Doctor.
• Wild Wilderness: Well there are several locations from swamps to forests to islands to...well you get the point. They have to many adventures to really point this out to often but this trope swings in and out often.
• Wolfman
• Would You Do It For A Scooby Snack?: Normally with Shaggy and Scooby, but when Velma is offered a Scooby Snack in "A Terrifying Round With A Menacing Metallic Clown" to act as bait to catch the monster clown with Scooby, she refuses saying "I may be scared, but I'm not desperate." But she changes her mind when Daphne offers her a CD-ROM of the Encyclopedia ("King Tut, you're back in my life again!").
• Wraparound Background
• Writing Indentation Clue: One episode has Fred, Velma and Daphne come across someone's diary whilst looking for clues. They find that the ink of the text has faded, but the pressure of the pen has worn through to the next page. So one of them grabs a coal and shades the paper to see what was written.
• Younger Than They Look: They're supposed to be teenagers (hence meddling kids) , but look and sound like they're at least in their mid-twenties (Hell, Velma looked like she was about thirty in the original series). Possibly lampshaded in the Valentine's Day special of What's New, Scooby-Doo? where a flashback shows a much more teenage-looking Shaggy breaking up with his then-girlfriend. It's a little subjective, but the beginning of Zombie Island heavily implies the characters are now college-aged and subsequent animated versions of the franchise usually seem to tacitly follow suit even if the continuity is often vague.

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