Alex, Sam, And Clover From Totally Spies - Aluminum Foil Sculpture

Genuinely I think at this point the whole "Daphne was just useless in the original series" is misogyny. She and Fred did the exact same stuff, found the same amount of clues as each other (if anything daphne found more) and were both the "faces" of the gang. Basically the only thing Daphne didn't do that Fred did was drive the van.

And if you include the Scrappy era she did that too and also found more stuff cause she stuck with the gang

The "danger prone" bit is just as much Shaggy as her, and if anything I associate "falling into a trap door" with him over her (not to mention Fred does it IN THE TITLE SEQUENCE). And the whole Kidnapping thing is like. Barely there? It happens with the clown and I can't remember many more instances in WAY.

Anyways all of this to say we have no need for plotlines in Scooby-Doo films where Daphne "works to have a place in the gang" SHE HAS ONE SHE'S THEIR FRIEND AND SHE FINDS CLUES AND SHE CAN DO ANYTHING WITH LIMITED RESOURCES

scooby doo mystery incorporated is crazy bc can you imagine if you were raised adopted but you didnt know and your dad was super emotionally unavailable your entire life and then when you found out your dad wasnt your bio parent he immediately went to jail and your bio parents came into your life for the first time and after spending ~1 month bonding they ally with the evil german parrot who wants to kill you and wake up an evil entity and start actively working to help him kill you and wake up the evil entity. and then when the parrot succeeds in his plan the evil entity he was trying to awaken just immediately kills him and then it also eats your bio parents. and then almost immediately after it takes your adoptive dad out of jail and eats him too. and then you and your friends defeat the entity and you wake up in an alternate reality where the adoptive dad who you came to view as your real dad was just your football coach/principal and your evil insane parents were suddenly really nice and you can never get therapy for what you went through because reality reset and none of what happened actually happened in this universe. youve taken over a life that isnt yours and your memories of the past year or so are all fake they never happened. what the fuck.

And what if I say Jason is, if not the most, one of the most tragic characters in the pjo books and he was only hated because people expected Percy's narration in TLH

me and the other five lab rats fans pulling up to the function:

How do you explain to people that one of your current favourite ongoing manga is a shounen about fighting off interdimensional invaders and it's fully just committed itself to a tactical computer game e-sports arc for the last 3 years? And that it's still just as good?!?!

bridget showing up at auradon prep after like 40 years to stage a coup because she hasn't let anything go since she was in high school

tbh I think so many of people’s problems with how Ben and Mal’s relationship started could’ve been solved by the love potion just. failing.

for one reason or another the love potion doesn’t work but Mal has no reason to realize that until later on because Ben likes her even without it

would solve so many issues

You know, I've seen plenty of comments about "Descendants should have been a young adult TV series!" and... I dunno how I feel about that.

Are there concepts that could use exploring much better geared towards an older audience? Sure.

But would it be the same without silly costumes, brightly-colored hair, stupid (affectionate) songs and teenage drama? All of which I doubt would be allowed in a grimdark teenage action/fantasy series like a bunch of us keep wanting? I doubt that.

I think it being a DCOM is a genuine part of its charm, and if it had become something like Shadowhunters, Once Upon a Time or Fate or even just something that would run on Freeform, all the fun would have been drained out of it.