Velma Dinkley (Velma TV series incarnation)

Velma Dinkley is the main protagonist of her spinoff series based on the Scooby Doo franchise, named after herself. She is voiced by a producer of the show, Mindy Kaling. Unfortunately, she suffered a terrible case of flanderization.

This article will only be focused on her characterization in her self-named series.

Why She's Gotta Get Clues To Find The Real Velma

 * 1) First and foremost, she is barely anything like her actual Scooby Doo counterpart (since this 2023 show of her first name was supposed to be the "prequel" of the Scooby Doo franchise), as she has more bad traits than the actual Velma, resulting in her being flanderized beyond recognition. Sound awfully familiar? In fact, she can very shockingly make Velma's Be Cool Scooby-Doo incarnation more likable in comparison.
 * 2) *If anything, she feels more like a self-insert caricature of her voice actor and producer Mindy Kaling cosplaying as the character rather than the actual Velma.
 * 3) Her character design and the way she is animated renders her to be completely unrecognizable, as she looks too much like Quinn Ergon from Final Space in terms of how her eyes and lips are drawn.
 * 4) She is super rude to people, mostly insulting them for the smallest things.
 * 5) She is a pretty bad friend to Norville, as she laughs when he tries to talk to her and tries to get him to get her stuff.
 * 6) Additionally she is shown to be a hypocrite, as she critiques sexism and fat-shaming, but is herself a slut-shamer who assumes all popular kids are dumb and shallow.
 * 7) She is extremely ungrateful, as she was pleased at the thought of her pregnant stepmom being arrested and was glad Fred was arrested, even though he previously saved her from a school riot (albeit getting her gender wrong).
 * 8) Awful First Impressions: In the first reveal trailer, she is seen sending a death threat to the employees of HBO Max because of how they butchered Judy Jetson's character, which was a bad start to introduce her character. The writers probably wanted her to be self-aware, but it fails horribly as discussed below.
 * 9) Additionally, she was just made to insult viewers who don't like the show, as in the second trailer and episode two she is seen saying "Adults who still watch cartoons" as an insult which basically screams to the world that animation is only for kids and that if adults and teenagers watch it, then they're immature.
 * 10) *Yes, cartoons have a level of complexity that is toned down for younger audiences to understand, but adults can enjoy a level of charm to it. We're at an age where many children's cartoons, including the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?, can be enjoyed by kids and adults alike. Likewise, many adult cartoons (both good and bad) have an unbearably large amount of violence, toilet humor, swearing, and jokes that are plain offensive to brag about how their shows aren't meant for children.
 * 11) *This also comes off very hypocritical of her, as she is saying this in an adult cartoon. In a way, this is a double standard and doesn't work as a joke.
 * 12) She also has poor detective skills, which results in her failing to find the murderer at the high school.
 * 13) *Additionally, most of the time she is making more jokes rather than investigating to find the murderer.
 * 14) She is also occasionally very gross as in there ending to “Matching Band Sleepover” she had the audacity to smile after losing one of her teeth with blood leaking out from her mouth. That is an eyesore to look at, despite the fact that this was the fault of a police officer because he knocked out Velma’s tooth with his car.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) Mindy Kaling does a great job voicing Velma for the most part.
 * 2) Her design is at least faithful and pretty decent despite being mentioned at WSNTGCTFTRV #2.
 * 3) *Speaking her design, in the episode "Velma Kai", her hair design is decent that her hair is from the original Scooby Doo.
 * 4) Luckily, she still does have some traits from her original counterpart, such as her catchphrase "Jinkies" being here.
 * 5) She finally got her comeuppance and ended up being arrested in episode "Marching Band Sleepover" due to her violating curfew and insulting the police while Sheriff Cogburn was driving.