Scooby-Doo was always one of those cartoons I occasionally watched when it came on TV, even when it lessened in quality thanks to the awful yapping of Scrappy-Doo, Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island was a fairly good revival feature, and this was another feature for Scooby and the gang. Basically, the Mystery, Inc. gang are driving through Roswell, New Mexico when they are caught in a dust storm, forcing Shaggy (Scott Innes) to make a wrong turn onto government property. The gang see a UFO fly over them, causing The Mystery Machine to crash, and the radiator is damaged. While Scooby-Doo (Scott Innes) and Shaggy stay with the van, Fred Jones (Frank Welker), Daphne Blake (Mary Kay Bergen), and Velma Dinkley (B.J. Ward) walk to the nearby town to look for help. Shaggy and Scooby argue about the last Scooby Snack left, which is eaten by a mythical animal called a jackalope. They chase the jackalope into a cave, where they see a low in the darkness, and they encounter two large green aliens. They flee the cave and run into the diner in a panic and tell all inside about the aliens. The waitress, Dottie (Jennifer Hale), says that many people claim to have seen aliens, she says she has only seen or heard strange things at night. The chef, Sergio (Neil Ross), says that a month ago, some local cattle vanished without a trace, and many moved out of town. A local man named Lester (Jeff Bennett) believes Scooby and Shaggy, claiming that he was abducted himself near Scorpion Ridge. He also claims to have pictures, but they turn out to be his own paintings. He tells the gang that there have been numerous reports of UFO sightings and disappearing livestock since the installation of three SALF (Search for Alien Life Forms) satellite dishes. Lester offers to let the gang stay the night, but with limited space, Shaggy and Scooby are forced to sleep on the roof. Later that night, they are abducted. Waking in an alien spaceship, the aliens try to interrogate and examine them, they try to escape, but they are cornered and pass out. They wake up in the middle of the desert and are found by a hippie Native American photographer named Crystal (Candi Milo), and her golden retriever, Amber. Shaggy and Scooby immediately fall in love with them, before meeting up with the rest of the gang at the diner. The gang go to see local mechanic Buck (Neil Ross) to see if they can get their van fixed, the mechanic is moody and rude, but says he will work on it when he can. While Shaggy and Scooby take Crystal and Amber to find the jackalope they saw, Fred, Daphne and Velma go to visit the SALF station. During the tour, Velma becomes suspicious of the SALF workers, Steve (Mark Hamill), Max (Kevin Michael Richardson) and Laura (Audrey Wasilewski), seeing dried mud on their shoes (they are in the desert, and they are inside a clean facility all day and night), and they previously bought oil that was the wrong kind for hydraulics. Meanwhile, while looking for the jackalope, Scooby, Shaggy, Crystal, and Amber are confronted by two government MPs, who force them to leave. However, Crystal reveals that she is government agent, with Amber a government trained canine, undercover investigating alien sightings in the area, but Scooby and Shaggy agree to help them. Lester picks up Fred, Daphne, and Velma from the SALF station, and drops them of at the canyon of Scorpion Ridge, where Velma believes there may be a river at the bottom of the gorge. Scooby and his party enter the cave where they previously saw a glow, and at the same time, Fred, Daphne, and Velma enter the same cave from another entrance. Both groups find mining equipment and a massive amount of gold, before being chased by aliens. Fred, Velma, and Daphne are captured, but Shaggy, Scooby, Crystal, and Amber escape. The aliens reveal themselves to be the SALF crew, who explain that they stumbled upon the gold mine while looking for a location for another satellite dish. As they were the only ones who knew about the gold, and the mine was located on government property, they decided to keep it for themselves and not report it. They disguised themselves as aliens and hired the two fake MPs to keep people away, bought a chopper and dressed it up as a UFO, and created a spaceship interior to fool people. The fake MPs corner Scooby, Shaggy, Crystal, and Amber, but they are scared away when Crystal and Amber reveal themselves to be real aliens. After the SALF workers and fake MPs are defeated and captured, Crystal and Amber explain themselves. They came to Earth investigating the signals from the SALF dishes, the UFO that ran the Mystery Machine off the road was their ship, and they are disguised as hippies as they watched television broadcasts from the 1960s. Soon, Crystal and Amber say a heartfelt goodbye as they board their ship back to their home planet, leaving Scooby and Shaggy heartbroken. The SALF workers and fake MPs are arrested, and the Mystery Machine is brought back fixed. Scooby and Shaggy are immediately back to their old selves when offered a box of Scooby Snacks, and they all drive away as the alien ship speeds across the sky one last time. Featuring "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!" by Jennifer Love Hewitt, and "How Groovy" by Scott Innes (as Shaggy) and "The Aliens Are Here" by The Hippos. This will please all fans of the original series, especially those who enjoy the antics of Scooby-Doo and Shaggy, the love story for them is nice, if a little schmaltzy. This is a good back to basics romp for Scooby and the gang, with good animation, a little slapstick and a fairly good story that is fun for all the family, besides the cheesy stuff, it is an enjoyable enough animated adventure. Scooby-Doo was number 8 on The 100 Greatest Kids' TV Shows, and he was number 49 on The 100 Greatest Cartoons. Worth watching!
