As you can tell by our episode's title, today Mystery Incorporated tackles the Chthulu mythos! Gotta love those weird ugly squid gods, and the fact that their writer chickened out when it came to describing them only adds to their charm. Everyone loves designing creatures that can "break" the mind of anyone who looks at it directly.
Scooby-Doo was neither the first nor the last children's show to tackle this topic, but MI is our first real representation of it for the franchise. Let's talk about it and the gang's first college tour.
Backstory: The gang are all driven to the Darrow University by their parents whose motives are far different from their children's. Meanwhile, the college is playing host to two popular writers who couldn't be any more different. Harlan Ellison is a no-nonsense tightwad whose work is more "respectable" than the cosmic horror tales written by H.P. Hatecraft - this universe's version of our H.P.
One of Ellison's fans disparages the works of Hatecraft, and is swiftly attacked and kidnapped by the main villain of those stories. The gang mostly stumbles into this mystery by accident, preoccupied by their early brushes with college life. Daphne becomes a communist, Fred is put through homoerotic hazing, and Shaggy points out that he's no longer voiced by a vegetarian in a very unsubtle way.
Velma is the one who actually came to meet Ellison at a book signing, and the gang soon cross each other's paths before finding Ellison being terrorized by green Squidward.
The gang still have their hang-ups, much more strained thanks to everyone's love troubles. They even get distracted from the mystery thanks to their previous college antics, until Char Gar Gothakon attacks Shag and Scoob directly. When the gang confronts Hatecraft, he first gives them the "whispers from another world that I translate into the best-selling written word" spiel. However, to dispel the beast he decides to reveal to an entire class of people the truth.
He made it all up, there is no dark force from an alternate dimension giving him material to write. This upsets his number one fan, but that pales in comparison to how badly Charizard Gengar Gothita takes the news. The Gangrene Illithid kidnaps his creator and takes him back to Hateman's house, which is also where the Ellison fan was being kept prisoner in.
Chary Gary becomes another attempted murderer, deciding that Hatecraft deserved an appointment with the ground after a trip to the roof. The gang distracts the monster long enough to save both Hatecraft, and Char Gar Gothakon, when they nearly fall off the roof. They finally muzzled his tentacles, a trick Fred learned from his college buddies, solving the mystery you already did several minutes ago.
Design: Char Gar Gothakon is a humanoid octopus-human hybrid wearing cultish robes, obviously based on Chthulu and Illithids from D&D. Octopus-faced monsters are just awesome, with the sea creature they're based on already being some of the coolest things on our planet. Did you know all of them are venomous, and some of the best hunter-killers in the sea? They're like wolves in that way, creatures we can both hype up as supernatural omens of death and real-life predators you don't mess with.
Char Gar Gothakon: The Beast with no name, is rather lanky despite how stocky its wearer is. It has diamond-shaped eyes with orange irises and yellow sclera and pupils. It has a globular smooth head and wriggling tentacles encompassing most of its lower face. It's body, especially its "forehead", is covered in skin patterns resembling green splotches like the markings of a frog. It also has small siphons, two on each side of its head, in place of ears. Another easy to miss detail are the gillman-like fins on its forearms.
Its outfit is rather flamboyant, resembling a priest's dressing with a turned-up high collar that's too large for its already giant head. Its shoulder pads are gigantic and connected to the rest of the outfit by the belt. It's belt and bicep bracelets are all gold.
It doesn't even wear a shirt, the middle piece of its outfit being mostly made-up of intersecting strips that expose its shoulders, ribs, and V-line.
Honestly, it's a pretty slutty costume. Besides it's vertical striped long skirt it also wears fingerless elbow-length gloves that also have gaps to expose MORE of its skin.
For powers, it uses a sonic screech that's powerful enough to Launch a grown man onto a car's hood. Its face tentacles can also stretch out, revealing a large circular maw full of sharp teeth underneath, to entangle a victim. The tentacles also stretch and contort in a way that shouldn't even be physically possible since they were taken from a real dead octopus.
Reveal: The true culprit turns out to be Hatecraft's own superfan and student assistant, Howard E. Roberts (named after Robert E. Howard). He decided to bring Hatecraft's monster to life to get back at the haters. However, when Hatecraft declared himself a fraud the superfan decided that the author needed to be destroyed. He made his sonic death blast technology with the help of his college courses by the way.
It is actually through deriding their fans that Ellison and Hatecraft find companionship with each other, leaving the gang to discover the archived documents stolen by Mr. E left in the Mystery Machine.
The plot thickens.
5/5, Western Media needs more Mindflayer rep. Nice Gregorian Chants by the way.
See, you can talk about Lovecraft without mentioning his cat being named after the N-Word.
The Mystery Incorporated gang was spending a day at Darrow University for future college prospects when Char Gar Gothakon, a mythological beast from one of H.P Hatecraft's books, appeared and began attacking people, specifically fans of rival writer Harlan Ellison. The beast ended up being a kid who was a huge fan devoted to the myths written by Hatecraft. Culprit: Howard E. Roberts Episode: The Shrieking Madness Originally aired: October 18, 2010 Series: Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated
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