Since 1969, Scooby-Doo has become an iconic part of American pop culture and paved the way for an entire era of Saturday morning cartoons. Like all the biggest franchises of the time, the detective show quickly infiltrated the comic book industry, where the gang’s adventures were translated into pencils and inks. Here, readers were given a whole new set of cases, monsters, and places for the gang to explore. While some of these stories remain true to the gang, others offer shocking changes to the gang’s origins and adventures.
Scooby-Doo has been in print almost continuously since the 1990s, and has been picked up by some of the biggest publishers in the business, including Marvel and DC. These comic book issues are must-have collections for loyal Mystery Incorporated fans, expanding their adventures far beyond their television appearances. From formulaic monster-of-the-week stories to gritty reimaginings, these series helped make Scooby and company as entertaining in print as they were on screen.
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Scooby-Doo of the Golden Key (1970–1975)
Alpine Harper, Phil De Lara, Cecil Beard, Jack Manning and Dan Shpeegle
Gold Key (later Western Publishing), the first comic book publisher to license Scooby-Doo, holds a special place in the history of the gang’s printed adventures. The series is a direct continuation of the original series, reflecting the dark, kid-friendly horror tone that made it so successful. Here the gang fights everything from pirates and masked crooks to witches and clowns.
Golden Key Scooby-Doo the series remains one of the gang’s most treasured series, and the fact that it was printed right after the end of the show’s first season provided 70s kids with some much-needed fan service. For people who want to enjoy the adventures of the gang as intended in the original series, this series makes a great companion piece to the original series.
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Charlton’s Scooby-Doo (1975–1976)
Joe Gill and Alfred Owen Williams
Scooby-Doo was handled by a variety of publishers, but one of the strangers was Charlton Comics, a publisher that struggled to find direction in the 1970s and ’80s. Despite some great characters like Blue Beetle and the Question, the company turned to licensed franchises like Hanna-Barbera to try to stay afloat. Scooby and his team wrote their own anthology of comics that, while containing some great ideas, ultimately relied on short stories without much depth.
Charlton Comics’ Scooby-Doo in fact, the series appeared just as the publisher was beginning to decline, so the company’s hold on the Hanna-Barbera license was short-lived. Although the series boasted excellent villain designs and a mastery of cartoon tone, its publisher’s problems ensured that it would not last long—thankfully, it moved to a comics center immediately afterward.
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Scooby-Doo Marvel (1977–1979)
Bill Zeigler, Dan Spiegl and Mark Evanier
Scooby-Doo has the rare honor of being one of the few comic book titles published by both Marvel and DC, the latter of which now owns the franchise. Under Marvel’s control, the gang went up against classic foes inspired by universal monsters, from Egyptian mummies to witches and ghosts. The series kicked off with a return to the iconic episode of the gang’s battle with the Technicolor Phantoms – with the gang’s most striking cover ever, by Dan Speegle.
Marvel’s take on Scooby-Doo was a combination of rehashed stories from the series and fresh mysteries, offering the perfect style for the series’ young readers. This series is not only treasured by fans of the franchise, but also features some of the gang’s most stunning comic book covers, including everything from Greek gods to universal monsters.
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DC Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? (1997-present)
Terrence Griep Jr., Ernie Colon, Matt Wayne, Joe Staton, Andrew Pepoy, Chris Duffy, Sholly Fish, Dario Brizuela and others
While many of the best Scooby-Doo comics change things up by adding new characters or darker tones, readers can always enjoy a standard episode styled after the series. Since 1997, DC Comics has regularly published a bi-monthly magazine. Scooby-Doo, where are you? series that follows the gang through an endless series of mysteries. With the majority of issues written by primary Scooby writer Sholly Fish, the series is incredibly consistent in quality and never runs out of fresh ideas for the gang.
Scooby-Doo, where are you? presented readers with a combination of creepy stories, film tributes and real-life stories. Great examples include the gang battling sea monsters, the ghosts of historical figures, and a reimagining of the ghouls from the original series. Readers are spoiled by this iconic series, which has nearly three hundred issues to go.
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Scooby-Doo Archie (1995–1997)
Michael Kirshenbaum, Lee Weeks, Alfredo Alcala and Gordon Morrison
When it comes to finding the perfect match between character and publisher, there are few licensed pairings as brilliant as Scooby-Doo’s migration to Archie Comics. Known for publishing children’s slice-of-life stories, specifically those set in the picturesque town of Riverdale, Mystery Incorporated was somewhat of a perfect fit. In fact, outside of Washington, no company handled the gang as well as Archie.
Archie Scooby-Doo combines the signature teen comedy formula with the mysterious adventures of the gang. As they try to enjoy vacations from amusement parks to ski resorts, monsters from their old series are catching up with them, delivering everything from ghostly horsemen to mossy sea creatures. While this was not the first comic book issue featuring the gang, it remains one of the most desirable and, aside from Scooby Apocalypse, the best illustrated series featuring the gang in their original formula.
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Scooby Apocalypse (2016–2019)
Keith Giffen, J.M. DeMattis, Jim Lee, Dale Eaglesham, Howard Porter, Ron Wagner, Tom Derenick and Rick Leonardi
DC is no stranger to extreme character re-imaginings and the parodies that went into creating Scooby Apocalypse. Here, the gang’s origin story is reimagined as a response to a hellish apocalypse caused by failed scientific experiments. Now that the world is full of monsters, the gang takes up arms and travels the wasteland in the Mystery Machine in search of a way to set things right. From the monstrous Scrappy to the zombie hordes, the series never failed to deliver.
Scooby Apocalypse takes a beloved children’s cartoon and turns it into one of the best mainstream horror comics of the 2000s. The series succeeded where Max Velma failed to provide fans with a complete change of pace for character development aimed at older readers while still respecting the essence of what makes the franchise great. The series even features an amazingly tight creative team, with DC veterans Keith Giffen, J.M. DeMatteis, Howard Porter, and Jim Lee working on the book.
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The Adventures of Batman and Scooby-Doo (2021–present)
Ivan Cohen, Sholly Fish, Dario Brizuela, Randy Elliott, Scott Geralds, Matthew Cody, Erich Ownes, Amanda Deibert and Puste
The shared history of Batman and Mystery Incorporated goes back to the 1970s, when the detectives first met during New Scooby-Doo films Series. Since then, DC has honored their past many times, from animated films and video games to comic books. The best of their teams can be found in Mysteries of Batman and Scooby-Doowhich follows the gang into Gotham City. There, they work alongside the Caped Crusader to solve a series of mysteries that typically involve his most iconic villains, from the Joker to Ra’s al Ghul.
Mysteries of Batman and Scooby-Doo combines the action of Batman the Animated Series with the creative hijinks of Mystery Incorporated. The series is the perfect entry point for young readers into the world of Batman comics, offering a non-stop array of instances that utilize the formulas of their respective franchises incredibly well.
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Team Scooby-Doo (2013–2019)
Sholly Fish and Dario Brizuela
Team Scooby-Doo follows a series of adventures by Mystery Incorporated with an entire cast of kid-friendly characters owned by Warner Brothers. This ranges from cartoon versions of DC heroes such as Batman, the Atom and Jonah Hex to Saturday morning icons such as Space Ghost and Hong Kong Phooey. Each issue, the gang meets a new friend and is tasked with solving a new mystery, usually involving various supervillains.
Team Scooby-Doo This is undoubtedly the best comic book series the gang has gotten since going to print, thanks to its long-form stories and quirky mysteries. This series offers readers the same appeal as titles like Brave and Boldleaving them guessing who the next guest star will be and the nature of their latest case.