The latest “woke” reboot of an iconic classic cartoon character is being savaged by critics who are appalled over the spinoff featuring a character from the beloved kid’s series “Scooby Doo” about the canine sleuth and his teenaged pals, giving HBO Max’s “Velma” a resounding two thumbs down for its “pointless nudity” and “gratuitous violence and gore.”
While the prequel doesn’t feature Scooby, it does swap the races of three of the main characters with the chubby, bespectacled title character getting an overhaul as a darker completed Indian, Daphne depicted as Asian and Shaggy now being black with only Freddy remaining of the four characters who were originally white.
But it’s the show’s graphic content that is definitely not suitable for younger audiences that has drawn the ire of fans.
In the series which further explores the titular character’s lesbianism, long speculated about by left-wingers, there is sex, violence and gore aplenty with one reviewer, The Wrap’s Gwen Ihnat saying that it “sounded like a great idea” to “lean into the long-held speculation about [Velma’s] sexuality,” but expressing dismay over the “adult” content that is already proving to be a big turnoff to audiences.
“You have to wonder, in the development of ‘Velma,’ where did everything go so horribly wrong?” Ihnat asked, complaining about “the pointless nudity, the gratuitous violence and gore” with the first episode beginning with the brutal murder of a high school girl who then has “her brain cut out of her oozing corpse.”
https://youtu.be/GSm_Y3yS7bA
(Video: YouTube/HBO Max)
The show which just premiered this week is already being dragged on Rotten Tomatoes where it currently has a 53 percent critics rating along with a dismal 7 percent audience score, with one reviewer asking, “There’s no scobby doo… what is the point of this?”
(Image: Screengrab/Rotten Tomatoes)
“Yikes. Sexualizing kids, bad writing, and worse jokes. This is all bad,” wrote another reviewer with still another opining, “Absolute dog water. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse than she hulk. I’m starting to loose faith in comedy as a whole after watching this.”
“I actually gave this show the benefit of the doubt. As I was watching it dawned on me, the only creativity left in these Hollywood types is to change the race of some of the protagonists and add in some seriously unfunny childish humor,” another reviewer said.
“Hey let’s take people’s childhood and fill it with violence, profanities, drugs and sexual references, they’ll love it!” said another reviewer who expressed disgust with the perversion of a childhood favorite of generations of Americans.
It wasn’t much better on Twitter where the spinoff was slammed with one user, Catholic priest Father Miller, drawing attention to a scene from the “Velma” trailer showing two males locked in a homosexual embrace and swapping tongue in a high school hallway.
a scene from the new "velma" trailer pic.twitter.com/aY5NwAXubR
— Fr Miller – The Nerdfather (@FrMiller) January 12, 2023
More reactions.
TRUE DIVERSITY is about creating and standing by original content as opposed to using cheap “parlor tricks” like race-changes. VELMA is about cheap race-changes as opposed to creating something original, with original/new diverse characters that stand on their own.
— MhadleyImprintBooks (@MhadleyBooks) January 12, 2023
So far, Velma is as embarrassingly bad as we all predicted it would be. It has nothing humorous, original or inciteful to offer, and the only time it surprised me was when it was occasionally even worse than I'd predicted.
Don't even bother hate-watching it. It's not worth it. pic.twitter.com/NrkPhXLqxR
— Cynical Reviews (@Cynical_CJ) January 12, 2023
Velma Was NOT African-American or Gay….Boycott the Woke Nonsense!!! https://t.co/FD3clwyJPe
— The Quad Father (@quadsfather) January 13, 2023
Bottom line, it’s not the mystery gang. It feels hollow, and it’s another show about high schoolers (Velma is FIFTEEN here) doing drug and getting in sexual situations because it’s an “adult” show https://t.co/fL38ne92CI
— Sparkle 🍉 Disventure Camp Era (@Sparklepool102) January 11, 2023
Season one of “Velma” is available for streaming on HBO Max and features 10 episodes.
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