Scooby Doo in the techno-apocalypse. Wacky Racers, designed by someone who worked on Mad Max: Fury Road. All the Hanna-Barbera action heroes — Johnny Quest, Space Ghost, Birdman, The Herculoids, Frankenstein Jr., The Impossibles, The Galaxy Trio and Mightor — in one crossover series.
These are the ideas that DC Comics and Hanna-Barbera have unleashed upon the unsuspecting world this morning, with a new line of comics that promise to update classic Hanna-Barbera shows for a modern audience, according to Entertainment Weekly. DC will publish Scooby Apocalypse, Future Quest, Wacky Raceland and The Flintstones, featuring the talents of such comics luminaries as DC Co-Publisher Jim Lee, Amanda Conner and Evan "Doc" Shaner — not to mention Mark Sexton, the lead storyboard artist on Mad Max: Fury Road, who has contributed design ideas to Wacky Raceland.
"If these characters were created and interpreted today, how would they exist?" is the way that DC Co-Publisher Dan DiDio characterized the company's starting point for creating the new line to Entertainment Weekly. "You're gonna have an epic adventure in the future stories with Johnny Quest and Space Ghost. You're going to have a scary, dangerous world in Wacky Raceland that is just as strange and dynamic as you hope it would be. I think Scooby Doo is going to excite people and challenge people, and I think that we're going to use Flintstones to really bring out that voice and social commentary that they might've brought out in the '60s and raise it back for today."
It sounds like an idea that's... just crazy enough to work? How do DiDio and Lee expect these radical reinterpretation to be received?
"Outrage!" Lee joked, and he's not wrong. As much as I'm here for a gun toting Daphne, I'm really not sure what to do with a hipster beard on Shaggy, much less putting cybernetic eyebrows on Scooby Doo. But those are the breaks when you're tweaking something as old and as timeless as Scooby Doo or the Flintstones.
There's still a lot that's unknown about the new comics, but DiDio remains optimistic.
"When we discuss the plot of these books, the smile that comes over people's faces is infectious. And even without reading any of the stories, they're already excited at what we're trying to accomplish. As a longtime fan of this material...this is my childhood dream come true. And when you see what's going to happen with Scooby and Wacky Races, even if you were cynical about how we approached these things, you're going to love everything once you see the finished product."
You can check out more art from the new series, including that Mad Max-inspired Wacky Racers take, at Entertainment Weekly.
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