To say that ‘Velma’ is not being well received is a very, very understatement. The animated spin-off of ‘Scooby Doo’ centered on Velma Dinkley premiered on January 12 on HBO Max and only two episodes have been enough for the public to issue its verdict. The series, produced by Mindy Kaling, who also voices the main character in English, is generating brutal negative reviews, to the point of becoming one of the worst rated series on the Internet.
The series is a modern, irreverent re-read that is geared towards adult audiences and tells an alternate origin story of Velma, the mastermind behind Mystery Inc. who finds herself immersed in the mystery of her mother’s disappearance while trying to solve a series of murders of teenage girls. And here is where the controversy comes, the character has been reinvented as a woman of Indian origin and openly queer, while Daphe is Asian (and also queer) and Shaggy is black; changes that have annoyed a certain sector of the audience, who have not hesitated to express their displeasure on social networks.
Criticism from the public, who have not received the humor of the series well either and consider the reinvention of the Scooby Gang to be disrespectful to the original classic, have led ‘Velma’ to fall to the lowest on Rotten Tomatoes, with only a 6% audience rating (compared to a very lukewarm 56% from critics). More significant is the case of IMDb, where the series has surpassed a record previously held by what is considered one of the worst movies ever: ‘Dragonball Evolution’, as ComicBook.com points out. The ‘Dragonball’ live-action is one of IMDb’s worst-scoring films, a 2.5/10 as an average of 76,000 ratings, but ‘Velma’ has managed to fall even lower, with a 1.3 and 25,000 ratings.