Scooby-Doo in Arabian Nights



Scooby-Doo in Arabian Nights, also simply known as Arabian Nights, is a 1994 animated telefilm produced by Hanna-Barbera, yet unrecognizable as one of their own productions. Despite the film often being billed as a Scooby Doo movie, the titular Great Dane and his human friend Shaggy scarcely appear in the movie!

The story consists of Scooby-Doo and Shaggy traveling to Arabia to be royal food tasters for a caliph. However, when they eat the caliph's entire lunch, they chicken out and hide in the royal harem, where Shaggy disguises himself as a young maiden and, to avoid certain doom, tells the caliph two very long stories. The first story features a knock-off of Disney's Aladdin, but with a gender reversal to the plot and featuring Yogi Bear and his sidekick Boo Boo as genies, and a remix of Sinbad the Sailor featuring Magilla Gorilla.

This show provides examples of:

 * Anatomy Anomaly: The majority of human characters in this movie have only four fingers (if you include the thumb). However, Shaggy and the Chef both have five-fingered hands, which makes for a rather distracting error. Even Aliyah-Din manages to switch between four and five fingers in some shots.
 * Blind Without Em: When the caliph breaks his glasses, and DOESN'T EVEN TRY TO GET THEM FIXED OR JUST GET A NEW PAIR OF GLASSES! He just remains blind for the rest of the film.
 * Captain Ersatz: Haman, the villain of the Aliyah-Din story, is obviously very similar to Jafar of Disney's Aladdin.
 * Crossover: Yogi Bear and Magilla Gorilla appearing in a Scooby Doo movie.
 * Depending On the Artist: This movie was drawn by a different team of animators from the standard Hanna-Barbera fare, thus resulting in off-model characters and crude designs.
 * Disney Princess: Aliyah-Din is a parody of this.
 * Elevator Gag: The cyclops in the Sinbad segment has an elevator in a cliff.
 * Full Body Disguise: Haman magically transforms himself so he looks like the prince in the story to take over the throne.
 * Hello Nurse: Aliyah-Din, once she becomes a princess.
 * Hey Its That Voice: Quite a few of them, most notably Eddie Deezen as the Caliph, Charlie Adler as the Evil Sea Captain, and Tony Jay as the Lord of the Amulet.
 * Insult Backfire: When Shaggy and Scooby apply for the royal food taster job, the guard calls them suckers. Shaggy's reaction? "Did you hear that, Scoob? Suckers for dessert!"
 * Lighter and Softer: More politically correct and "easy to understand" than the original "Arabian Nights" stories.
 * Limited Animation: The animation in this film, while trying to pass off as full WB-esque animation, is very crappy, even for 1994!
 * Love At First Sight: Subverted a bit by the prince in the Aliyah-Din segment. "How could the prince expect me to instantly fall in love? It's impossible!" *sees Aliyah-Din* "Except for you."
 * Mickey Mousing: The music score to the film, complete with a full orchestra. It keeps stopping and starting constantly as a result. It could be because an Animaniacs music composer scored the film.
 * Negative Continuity: The film doesn't fit into the canon with the other cartoons in the Scooby-Doo franchise.
 * No Fourth Wall: "Amazing how things happen right on cue in a cartoon, isn't it?" Magilla Gorilla says at one part.
 * Non Standard Character Design: Shaggy and Scooby had to be slightly modified to fit with the designs of the other characters in the cartoon. Needless to say, it still looks rather awkward.
 * Off Like a Shot: Done quite a bit during the opening scene when the guards are chasing Scooby-Doo and Shaggy.
 * Off Model: Just about every existing Hanna-Barbera character in the movie.
 * Overly Long Gag: Quite a bit of this is present throughout the movie. One bit in the Aladdin parody includes Yogi Bear constantly hoping Aliyah-Din or Haman will make a food-related wish. The attempts to steal a rhuk egg, precious gems and a golden toothbrush in the Sinbad segment also go on for quite long.
 * Running Gag: The evil captain's boat constantly sinking followed by the cruise ship that Magilla was supposed to board sailing by during the Sinbad segment.
 * Running On the Spot: No Hanna-Barbera cartoon would be complete without this gag, subverted a few times during the Sinbad segment.
 * Scooby Dooby Doors: A portion of the chase between Scooby-Doo and Shaggy with the royal guards features this, but it also seems vaguely similar to the Road Runner cartoons in this case (mainly with the sound effects).
 * Standard Snippet: "Here Comes the Bride" playing during almost any mention of a wedding.
 * Stock Sound Effects: The famous Hanna-Barbera sound FX are very rarely used in this movie; instead most of the old Looney Tunes sound effect are utilized.
 * Wheel O Feet: Whenever anyone is running really fast.
 * Written Sound Effect: Occurs once, during the Sinbad segment.