The 13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo: The Complete Series on DVD!

This is a warning to all living mortals, that whom should ever open this chest of demons will release thirteen of the most terrifying ghosts upon the face of the earth.

The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo (due out on DVD yesterday) is a short-lived spin-off of the original series that carries all the same charm, but cuts out all the crap. More specifically, by crap I'm referring to two of the original gang's cast members (Velma and Freddy) who are noticeably absent from Scooby's real haunted adventures.

Now, I do believe that Velma does have her merits in the series and just about every other recreation of the show has her and Freddy in it, but breaking things down to brass tacks Velma and Freddy are really a bore. All Velma contributes to the series was her intelligence which, in the end, disproved nearly every possibly interesting outcome of their mysteries. "Oh, that's not a UFO silly, its just swamp gas and Christmas lights that 'ole Uncle Gus rigged up to a lawn mower." Basically, she was Scully with no Mulder to keep her in check. What a buzzkill. Freddy, on the other hand, didn't contribute anything. All he ever did was boss people around and try to hook up with Daphne 24/7. Horny, ascot-sporting b*stard.

So yeah, The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo took the best of the older shows (Daphne's sex appeal, Scooby and Shaggy's innate cool factor) and tossed in some replacement annoyances in the form of Scrappy and Asian "wunderkind" Flim-Flam. To make up for these missteps, however, the show also featured the lord of shadows himself, Mr. Vincent Price, as über-cool Vincent Van Ghoul, instantly negating the grating presence of Scrappy and Flim-Flam.

Another cool spin that the creators added to the show was that these ghosts and monsters were real. That's right, no more Farmer Johnson dressed in an overcoat and seaweed! Real ghosts and ghouls opened the door for more imaginative thrills and chills including dark magic, sacrifices, demonic possession and "ghost-busting." As silly as it might sounds, The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo was totally a magic-inspired riff on The Real Ghostbusters. But who cares, right? The Ghostbusters ever had Vicent Price baking them up.

The complete series of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo drops in stores today, so match sure to scoop up a copy. The transfer looks amazing (see clip above) and though there hasn't been any word on extras (a behind-the-scenes with Vincent would be great), it is one of the best Scooby-Doo series ever made and it does feature the immortal visage of Vincent Price. Boo-yah!

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