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ABC Weekend Specials: The Incredible Detectives Rant
Reviewed: 08/29/2026
More Like The Just There Detectives.
Well everyone, I'm finally going to do something I am interested in doing. With Peppa Pig going AI and Hey Duggee pretty much done as a show after Roly dug a giant hole in the garden and got cancelled (no, not really; I'm still reviewing that show), I'm kind of bored. I've decided to do something that is more of a trainwreck and I have not seen a lot of reviews on: animated weekend specials of the 1970's, 1980's and 1990's. Welcome to the Rant Shack partners, it's time for you all to be held to account like the Disney Afternoon shows would be if copyright wasn't a bigger asshole than Rev. Ash(hole) Taylor. Anyhow, these weekend specials were basically OVA's being put on television because the quality level was television level dependent on a certain year or so. I don't think I need to explain any further than that. It is what it is: a job to keep viewers watching while the emergency continues. Otherwise, on their own, mostly just stuff. Maybe when I start seeing these with a critical eye, I might change my mind about this, but that means it might be worse. We'll see. Okay, so my rules for this will be that the specials will be animated, or animated combined with live action. Ironically, I have already ranted on one of those ABC Weekend Specials already: The Adventures Of Teddy Ruxpin. The special that used costumes combined with live action. It was just there to suck, and the animated series in Canada was much better, animation production problems aside. My next choice here will be a lot more of an ink & paint special as it is going to be my second Ruby-Spears production which came long before a certain blue dweeb made the airwaves. Mega Man, everyone. I might continue doing a couple of OAV specials on Mega Man released in Japan that got dubbed to English, but I make no promises there. Anyhow, the plot of "The Incredible Detectives", which was released on ABC in 1979, is as follows: A bunch of animals that are very loosely enthic stereotypes that talk, but are animals are solving a mystery to rescue a kid who got kidnapped by extremists who want secret missile plans. I'm all set to rip this episode asunder. How does it fare? Let's rant on shall we...?
The Incredible Detectives is written by Mark Evanier and the direction is done by Rudy Larriva. The original story is based on a novel written in 1972 by Don and John Caufield. I have not read the original novel and I have no plans to do so. It might be a decent tome, I don't know. Mark you should know as he was basically one of the bigger writers in the animation industry during the 1970's-1990's. Rudy was a regular among Warner Brothers, and is one of the production crew members for the infamous "Song Of The South" production that Disney no longer wants part of for obvious reasons. Most of Rudy's Warner Brothers productions were with Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner, while a few with Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales (speaking of problems with bigotry...). The animation production house is unknown.
Opening Moment #1: The opening features still pictures of all the scenes in the special with voice credits. I'm going to ignore the scenes in detail because there are only a few of them, only to say that I'm going to wait until they happen and see if they are one-to-one with the opening. Put a pin in them. The voice credits are as follows:
[1.] Madame Chen (The Youtube subtitles had it as Chin) is voiced by Marlene Argon, whom has done little of note outside of being Synergy in Jem! being her final credit in 1988, Maya in Thundarr The Barbarian, Lioness in The Super Globetrotters and Cheetah/Wicked Witch in Super Friends. Otherwise, it's mostly additional voices.
[2.] Hennesy is voiced by Frank Welker, no need to say more on him.
[3.] Davey Morrison is voiced by Albert Eisenmann; whom was a child actor at this point (the production was released in 1979), although he would become a property master when he became an adult in 1988 and the rest is history with Criminal Minds being his most recent credit. (A show I actually watch now. It's fine.) As for his acting credits, not much: Debuted as Sean Murphy in Police Woman in 1977 and Omega in The Fantastic Journey in the same year. His only animation voices are this special, Peter & The Magic Egg as Peter Paas and Godzilla as Pete.
[4.] Reggie is voiced by the late Laurie Main (passed away in 2012) whom has some Disney credits, mostly being the narrator for Winnie The Pooh between 1998-2003 as his final credits. Most of his work is cameos in television shows and productions, and was the voice of Watson in The Great Mouse Detective in 1986. The Angel who Pawned Her Harp in 1951 was his debut as Parker and had over 120 credits to his resume.
[5.] The remaining voices are voiced by Stan Freberg (of The Wuzzles fame), Michael Rye (of The Gummi Bears fame) and John Stephenson (of Hanna Barbara fame). Michael Rye, John Stephenson and Frank Welker voiced TaleSpin characters before.
We begin this one in a suburban community in Anytown, USA with birds chirping and a green leaf flying for no reason other than to tell the viewer that we animated an leaf because the animation is going to suck and be limited. The animated leaf seems to repeat the same animation sequence at least twice as we head to a house. Cut to behind the bushes as a boy with brown hair and glasses and then he comes out of the bushes and then they do the Scooby Doo chase sequence on a far shot with a crow, a simense cat and a brown bulldog. The brown English bulldog is Reggie, the crow is Hennesy and the cat is Madame Chen, and yes, they are stereotypes voiced by mostly white dudes. Sigh. The kid hides behind a tree as he pets Reggie and Reggie of course is an out of shape bulldog, but the kid sympathizes with the dog's lack of speed. The kid is wearing a white shirt with orange trim and jeans. His face looks like a male version of Velma from Scooby Doo, speaking of ripoffs. Madame Chen (even though the kid pronounces it as "Ch-in" instead of "Ch-en") cuddles the boy's leg and then gets the petting treatment. Hennesy perched on the boy's shoulder and the kid feeds him a peanut. Peanuts are fine as long as they are unsalted and unflavored. Again, just be considerate, okay?! We discover that the boy's name is Davey because his mother calls out his name and Davey walks over to the driveway to meet his dad, who looks like a Scooby-Doo Freddy Jones clone dressed up in suits with brown hair and glasses. His mother is blond hair and looks like Wilma's hairstyle from The Flintstones, wearing a brown coat and carrying a purse. Just your average dull family who smiles, I guess. Basically, the dad is going to work to test a missile and is likely going to be late and the mother is going to the museum with Davey. Davey walks off with mommy as we cut back to the three animals exchanging notes. It's amazing how child actor sound a lot more natural acting then the adults here. TaleSpin had this problem as well when Ed Gilbert would sound like he's reading his lines half of the time, while Sally Struthers and RJ Williams sounded like they had something to prove to the execs or something. This is no exception here. Despite Chen acting like a Chinese stereotype, it sounds like the voice actor reading their lines. Frank Welker is at least trying to act and Laurie is trying as well. It doesn't help that the material written in this episode is written by a television writer writing for a pay cheque.
Anyhow, the whole promos cut here are that Chen and Hennesy, the stereotypes are arguing over the white boy's affection and Reggie tells the truth about Davey. Sigh. Chen then has the detective hunch that Davey is in trouble. I know this because Chen shuts the whole thing down. We scene change to the museum, the most generic USA museum of all time with a trademark approved USA Flag mirrored with no stars. I could make a joke about this in 2026; but this special has no heat, so I won't. We head inside and it's amazing to me that Davey loves museums and wants to see the dinosaur exhibit willfully. He's George Pig's spirit animal now. The mother agrees as she goes left to see the Van Gogh exhibit, and to meet her at the information desk in half an hour. Outside of an unanimated guard and information attendant at the desk, the museum is devoid of people. I think the museums would have more people visit them today than in 1979, actually. Maybe I'm wrong. Then we get a jump cut as there is another guard dressed in brown on the top right next to the restrooms and a blue coated, brown curly hair, red beret guy on the payphone talking to someone and proclaims that Davey just went by him. Yeah, trouble. Davey goes into the dinosaur exhibit and it looks more impressive than the one in Peppa Pig actually, despite the washed out art style. Maybe George Pig should have visited this museum in the USA tour, who knows. Davey has his hands behind his back looking at the bones of a giant dinosaur and then the wannabe kidnapper shows up and gives the kid the evil look. It looks like a deranged Shaggy Rogers now that I think about it. Davey and the kid get the most subdued martial arts zoom ins of all time and we fade to black less than three minutes in. When we return it's AFTER HAPPY HOUR (after dark) and we are back outside the Davey residence as Davey's mother is worried in the most contrived voice possible. There is no way I can take her seriously being worried about her son, it sounds like someone reading their lines here. We head into the house with dad and mom on the couch showing off a human detective a photo of their son and explaining what happened. Yes, Davey Morrison has been kidnapped, you see. For really no reason whatsoever. Sharp pan to the right as we have the only friends Davey really has considering that Chen and Hennesy were fighting over whom had his affection ever, the highspot of this cartoon so far.
The detective then reveals that it's not a missing picture, but a note and reads that it's a ransom note stating that Davey will be returned unharmed if you need their demands. The mother realizes the demands right away: They want the plans for the missile the dad is working on. Wow, that is one great deducation there. So amazing that I wondered if she planned this kidnapping and is trying to DAVROS everyone. I betcha she's not involved in this and it was just to make up a logic break to make her seem important, even though the three animals are the stars of this special. Chen is like "I do you all so", but since pets are not allowed, they couldn't run in to save Davey. Hey, I have heard worse reasons for not following Davey to the museum right away. This is when I discover that the family's last name is Morrison and then we get the dumbest excuse of investigation incompetence I have seen (and that covers a lot of ground) to give incentive for the animal detectives to search for Davey: The human detective with black curly hair sneezes dramatically. Oh, TAG~! The gimmick is that the detective is allergic to animals and demands that the family put the animals outside. How convenient, eh?! Did we need to do that spot?! The answer is yes, because we have roughly 20 minutes or so to kill in terms of time. Even Reggie realizes that this detective is so dumb, a blantant excuse for the animal detectives to take over. Hannas gimmick is that he's a repeating parrot with Newton's double speak gimmick. I don't care. The mother shoos then away despite only one of the three looking like the shooing actually worked. The other two willfully left on their own, of course it's the crow because the crow is a stupid crow like Newton is a stupid centaur. The animals are outside and will be let in after dinner according to the mother as she bails. The animal detective don't care, they decide that these human adults suck like shit and they are going to do an intervention to save Davey. Reggie's claim that he is related to Scotland Yard bulldogs was the only amusing thing in their entire promos. Reggie's plan is to sniff the note and Hennesy's plan is to steal the note long enough to get Reggie to sniff it. Chen is basically Wraith from Mighty Ducks: The Animated Series. At least in that show, the heels are suppose to be stupid even though the show shouldn't have Wraith bury the heels before the plan even starts. The animal detectives are babyfaces and Reggie just got buried as one and it made Chen look like a jerk. Lovely!
Hennesy flies through a window as we head back to the living room as the detective is teasing the obvious problem with the mom's story since none of the guards saw Davey kidnapped and leaving. Neither did the audience, sir! We saw the tease and then we cut away. Anyhow, Hennesy swoops in and steals the note. The office protests his outrage saying it's material evidence! No, it's not. The material evidence is that you suck at your job! More so than the entire team who developed this special, actually! The officer chases after Hennesy as if the cop is a racist dictator and calling it a federal offense. Oh wait...Hennesay swoops out the window and drops the note to Reggie. Reggie sniffs the note and gets the scent out of it. The human detective grabs the note on the round and threatens to arrest them for tampering with evidence. He's so much of a bigot that he would be willing to arrest animals! Clear animal-ism! I made it up of course, but it's not my fault that "-ism" now means "bigot" instead of "learned behavior" like it was supposed to be. The detective storms off as the mother asks if he's all right. The detective says yes, and then proves to be a bigger liar than a NARC by walking right into a conveniently placed man-made pond and somehow the splash made was so big, the animals also get splooshed. SUZY SHEEP~?! The detective says it all and then we scene change to the front of the house as the detective is dry as a bone now. SUZY SHEEP~?! Thankfully, the detective covers up the logic break by thanking the mother for drying him off. I wouldn't have bothered, this guy would likely charge someone with assaulting a police officer if that really happened. Cut to the animal detectives as Reggie proclaims that they must solve the mystery themselves because this detective couldn't find a hippo in a birdbath. Okay, that was funny, the first funny joke of the special over five and a half minutes in. Reggie walks off as Hennesy and Chen are aruging on who is in charge. Like ten seconds after Reggie walks off, the only being with a clue. Keep in mind, he's a British bulldog; while Hannesy is a black crow and Chen is a simenese cat. Did Vince Russo watch this special and applied this to the Nitro Girls on WCW Nitro in 1999?! Furthermore, can you make the stereotypes look even more obvious, special?!
Here's what happens next: Officer gets into his brown car, and as he gets into his car, the animals hop into the back seat while the officer sneezes again, because he's allergic to animals, you see. It's not suppose to be funny, I should note. Scene change as the car is driving east on a boring road with much better backgrounds than Peppa Pig ever had. The music in this is the best thing on this, although the sound editing does confuse me if the music is from the special, or it was intended to be on the radio the officer is playing. Head inside with the detective sneezing and driving. He needs professional wrestling, that might cure this. The animals are in the back just making sure to the audience that they are not dead. We scene change to outside a police garage parking lot with a six pointed star that comes dangerously close to a Star Of David. We head inside the station as a police officer with red hair in a blue uniform is at a wooden table reading something and greeting officers as I discover the dectective's name is Jim. Okay, that makes my work easier, then! The police car in the background, looking awful I might add leads me to believe that this took place at the entrance of the station since this was Level A, so there is a Level B somewhere, I think. The animals enter and the joke here is that the red haired officer is identifies them as either suspects or dead victims. Not funny and the reaction of the animals he rang off wasn't any better. The officer simply does nothing after that, killing whatever hope the joke was shooting for. I don't know if BS&P stepped in or something, but they shouldn't have here. Head into the hallway with the animals splitting up like they saw Scooby-Doo...oh wait. Apparently, Reggie wants another sniff of the note. Two problems: The note was wet in the pond incident, so the scent is gone and Reggie was also splooshed in the process, thus the scent is gone from him. The later part makes sense with what Reggie is saying; but the former kills the idea right there. Just find a way out of this hellhole and find the museum and start your search from there. Of course, the split up is just Reggie going and the other two staying of course. Head inside's Jim's office as Jim is at his desk while Reggie is practicing the fine art of not being seen, which is so stupid because Jim is allergic to animals anyway.
The phone rings on the wooden desk and Jim answers the phone, putting down the note. Jim is talking to the shop, and I'm guessing it's supposed to be where they process the evidence. Anyhow, Reggie sniffs the note; Jim grabs Reggie's note and the note is written out by teleport. SUZY SHEEP~?! If they were trying to do the "dog ate my homework" spot, it failed badly! Jim sneezes and then Reggie is so busted. Chen basically says what I am thinking, only I would add "stupid idiot" to that promo. Jim grabs Reggie like he's carrying a football, despite being 150 pounds soaking wet and Reggie looking like he's 200 pounds in a dry heave. This is so unintentionally hilarious and it's not a good sign for this special when this is the funniest spot of the episode and you are barely 1/3 in. This was so stupid it's funny. Jim is sneezing more and Jim threatens to kick him out or put him down, and you know what that last part means! In comes Hennesay to try to make the save high and Chen goes low. Jim drops Reggie, thankfully not on his head like Della does with Dewey, and is trying to fight the power of the crow. Jim sucks at that, too. This awful detective is getting more screen time than Davey at this point, leading me to believe Davey is just a prop at this point. Very dehumanzing character wise. The animal meet again as Reggie tells Hennesy to push the red button on the conveniently placed wall that says "alarm". Hennesy obeys and pecks the button. Alarm sounds ensue as I cannot buy Reggie trying to sneak out of a police station, nor the other animals. You know the police really suck here when only JIM can figure out that the intruders are talking animals. Well, the animal part anyway. The animals all flee as the officers try to lockdown the police station, only the black male cuts a promo. Chen is blaming Reggie like a jerk, AGAIN! Reggie is totally blown up at this point. Henesay directs traffic, the animals bail stage left as the police offices uniform change from blue to brown to make the scene look like there are more officers. It failed. The animals run out of the garage and the garage door is sealed just seconds after Reggie runs out of course. Jump cut to a hallway with Jim talking to a strongman police officer in a blue uniform and he might be the police chief for all I know and care.
Then I realize that it's the police chief because the chief is asking questions as Jim tells the truth and the police chief accuses him of setting off the alarm, just for a bunch of animals. Dood...There are worser reasons to set off the alarm than THIS! Animals can be a problem in a enclosed space, you know! Sure, Jim is a total moron with an allergy issue, but he has a point there. Besides, Jim didn't set off the alarm, it was the crow! Every police officer looks like total morons and they need to be defunded right now. Plus, none of this was funny! Officer Panda and Grey Squirrel has a lot of funny moments, and they also had their horrible moments. These officers had nothing but bad moments from the start. Jim looks into the hard camera ashamed and we scene change to a street corner with the animal detectives and Reggie panting. Somehow, Reggie got the scent of the note. What a Forsenic Files-equse miracle that was?! Chen blows it off instantly because Hennesy proclaims that they should start the investigation at the scene of the crime, which is the museum. Yes, this was all done to kill time, and little of it was funny nor amusing. Everyone is a moron, I write! The animals exit stage left as we scene change to a shot of the phone inside the Morrison residence, ringing. Dad answers the phone, it's the kidnapper on a payphone demanding the blueprints before midnight. He basically says that Davey is okay and he'll stay that way as long as the blueprints are his. Scene change to a cell that looks like an unfinished bathroon as Davey is yelling for help and banging on the walls. Davey gives up because it's locked and soundproof. I'm going to put a pin on this because I betcha this breaks logic later on. We then fade to black nine and a half minutes in and this might be the second commercial break since the video used appears to be from a VHS tape of the special released six years later. We return with a sky shot of the town with a lot more traffic at night than I expected in this kind of area. Zoom in and then scene change to the sidewalk with the animal detectives walking west. The animals exchange notes for a while as Chen is still blowing Reggie off for wasting time and Reggie blows her off because he was doing detective work to set up a lead. I'm on Reggie's side, as stupid as the logic of this episode is.
Hennesy points out that they have made it to the museum. Chen thinks that this is where they find real clues, but I think they will also find something else. We make it to the window and Chen orders Reggie to stay put this time because he sucks, you see. Reggie is taking none of this crap; but then proves Chen right because he cannot climb the window Hennesy went through cleanly to save his life nor his brain. You can tell Reggie is British because he says that "it's a bit high". You American swine are jealous because you want total control of all cultures and Peppa Pig makes you lose control of the British culture because Peppa Pig is a legit British show! Then the logic gets dumber as despite Reggie's paws being nowhere near the window in the far, on the sky closeup shot, Reggie is hanging on for dear life on the window sill. Chen solves that problem by brandishing her claws and poking Reggie in the ass off-screen and Reggie goes in through a window clearly open, which by the way was closed like thirty seconds earlier. What a trainwreck of an animation sequence there?! Yup, I'm watching a Ruby-Spears production now. They are in mid-season form here. Reggie makes a cricket reference and Chen is like "you got in you ungrateful arse?!". Hennesy flies around as Chen basically tells Reggie to stay out of way of her clue looking. Cut to Chen searching for clues and Hennesy asking what are they looking for?! The first question that should be asked regardless if it's science or not, actually. Jump cut to two officers making small talk. One of them has white hair and glasses and the other has black hair, a mustache and no hat. Reggie watches on from behind as the guise of this is that they have no leads and no one saw the boy leave. In other words, it was an inside job even though the villain clearly is not working for this museum. Maybe an art gallery somewhere else, but that's just speculation on my part. Apparently, these are two crooks even though I saw only one. Huh. Could the white haired officer be the accessory to this crime?! We probably never know because Reggie exposes himself and gets busted...AGAIN~! Scooby-Doo Chase Sequence The Ruby-Spears Special Edition ensues through to the back hallway. Jump cut to Chen looking around somewhere in the museum.
The chase continues as they do the "Reggie bumps into stone column containing a bust of a head, and the police has to catch it on his knees to prevent it from crumbling into millions of pieces" spot. Reggie then runs into the art gallery, so this might be an inside job after all. Reggie stops like a complete moron because he's out of shape and blown up...AGAIN~! His endurance is so poor that the black haired officer grabs him. Chen is hiding behind a vase blowing him off saying that they should have left Reggie outside, and then the white hair officer invokes the POINTY FINGER OF DEATH on Chen, so he has a bloodlust for them cats. How ironic, even Roly would have been appalled. Then we get a even stupider moment: Somehow, there are three officers in this museum because Chen gets captured by an orange haired officer, with a face pose that is unintentionally hilarious, I almost laughed. Hennesy watches on, the smartest animal in the entire room. The officer dump Chen and Reggie into the sports storage closet as they call animal control to step in and deal with them. Or animal shelter, doesn't matter. We head inside the locked closet as Chen of course is blaming Reggie for being a moron. Reggie then proclaims that the guard that caught him (the black haired officer mind you) has the same scent as the kidnapper. This is all after Chen blew off Reggie for smelling someone's aftershave. Hennesay is perched on the jail window sill basically making Chen and Reggie look like geeks because he can fly and not get caught. Hennesy is going to save Davey and Reggie tells him that the black haired guard is the mastermind. If that is the case, than the security guards are all in on it, including the white haired officer, whom all but gave away the secret by puralizing "crook". That's four suspects at the most, and the orange haired officer might be the original kidnapper. Considering that Reggie was in the art gallery at the time of his capture, this makes more sense than it should. Hennesy agrees to bail to search for Davey as Reggie and Chen just give up hope. In comes a red haired officer with an carry on animal cage, it's animal control. Considering that Reggie and Chen gulped on cue, my guess is that they will be put down. And by put down, I mean killed. Considering the implications, it's impossible for me to take this seriously given the BS&P'ing of this special. Okay, here is the next set of moments: Cut to outside the museum. The brown haired security guard gets into his green car.
I'm guessing the white haired officer is talking to the brown haired officer here, as he addressed the brown haired officer as Lou. Okay, then. Lou is returning to work the midnight shift and knowing how American children's cartoons work, likely his last shift. Hennesy drops onto the back bumper of the car and the car drives away. Scene change to a warehouse somewhere in town and then cut to a room via a window peeper shot of three people exchanging notes on the situation. One of them is the legit kidnapper from earlier, Lou and the most generic mobster thug you ever saw wearing blue fedora hat and a brown sweater. I'm guessing the white haired officer is the look out, so my theory of four suspect holds water. We know at least three of them are legit crooks here. Basically, once the police leave, they return to some secret room somewhere in the museum, they get the blueprints and everyone gets paid. I'm guessing the brown suited, blue fedora hat wearing thug is our vice mastermind here. So, it's possible that at least one more suspect is left. Hennesy overhears this and then flies away back to the museum and perches himself on the window still. He cuts a promo with such glee that he forgets to check the room to make sure someone could hear him and of course, Reggie and Chen are gone. Everyone's a geek, I write~! Hennesy does make me laugh by flopping down between the iron bars to end the segment almost fourteen minutes in. We return into the sky with Hennesy searching for his geek buddies and he stops perched on a flagpole. Somehow, Hennesy mistakes car noises for Reggie and Hennesy flies after a conveniently placed car driving into the city. Wait, what?! Okay, we then cut to a green van driven to the west by the red haired officer, which is indeed Animal Shelter. In other words, Reggie and Chen will likely not be killed after all. At least in theory. Cut to inside with Chen and Reggie sitting in the back which is emptier than most regular trucks, so the standards of this animal shelter are so bad, it might be a scam. Chen is dizzy for no reason as Hennesy does the fly in to make the save. They exchange notes as Chen asks how are they getting out of this cage, which might as well be the drunk tank. Hennesy flies away as Reggie questions this and Chen basically tells him to give Hennesy a chance because he can fly. Ooookkkkaaayyyy.
Then we get, no joke; the best part of the special! Low praise, but I loved this! Here's Hennesy's plan: Hennesy flies into an alley filled with cats sleeping. Hennesy wakes them up and taunts them as the cats are not amused. You cannot catch a catnip mouse in a phone booth is just absurd and was howling with laughter. It's so stupid, yet I was laughing my ass off here, so it was worth it. This made it worth watching this otherwise dumb special. Hennesy flees while taunting the cats as we head to the animal shelter. The officer opens the back of the van, here comes the army of cats running stage right. Guard is amazed as he runs away stage right and closes the door. Hennesy flies in and opens the opposite door and the babyfaces all escape. Okay, this would have been better if the door that was originally open stayed open since that makes more sense, but Hennesy opening the opposite door was much funnier in hindsight. Reggie of course flops on his belly because he's out of shape and needs more leg day sessions. Hennesy then makes the storyline make sense: Davey is actually in the museum in a secret room and the heels are coming for him to make the exchange of him for the blueprints. Which means it is very close to midnight. Of course, this show cannot pretend that this is a Scooby-Doo rip off as they do the running start sequence 1:1 with Scooby-Doo's running in the late 1960's edition of that show, roughly ten years later. Ruby-Spears everyone, B-level Hanna Barbara at best, Z-Grade Hanna Barbara at worst, still leagues better than Chargeman Ken, and better than The Mighty Hercules though. Hennesy flies away as we head to the museum as Chen proclaims that she'll find the secret room, and then recoils and says "we". At this point, Reggie did his job and so has Hennesy. In other words, her being selfish wouldn't be a bad thing since she needs to do her job anyway. I would have said "That's okay, you can find the secret room. I'm totally blown up!". I mention that because Reggie is blown up for the third time in this special alone. He needs a fitness regimement more than Daddy Pig ever did. Hennesy's stare here tells the entire story. Reggie trying to sell the idea that they helped each other is so dumb at this point. The animals all run in to find the secret room. We split up again, this time Reggie and Hennesy are together as Reggie becomes the most out of shape Scooby ever. Reggie finds a lot of scents and then finds Davey's scent. Reggie follows the scent and they make it to a conveniently placed wall and they found the secret room and somehow, this wall has a conveniently placed red skeleton key lock on the top of the wall where Hennesy is. How did no one notice this?!
Everyone is in on the scam, they are all traitors now! Sadly, Hennesy's beak sucks as a lockpick and Kit Cloudkicker feels bad. Chen's intution tells her so, which is basically "I saw the keyhole in a freaking wall!" as Reggie deduces that Lou is the one who might have the key and Hennesy proclaims that it's time to be cunning. We head to the entrance that is locked as Lou shows up and puts his officer hat on the coat rack and has the most erased newspaper in his hands. He sits down at the desk and of course, the newspaper has stuff on it when he reads it. SUZY SHEEP~?! Hennesy finds Lou and we notice that the WCW KEY OF DOOM is on a rack hooked on it. The dumbest place to put a key because it's in clear sight of Hennesy. All Hennesy has to do is slip the key off with his talon and fly away without Lou noticing. 2:1 odds this fails and we get a chase because we still have at least four minutes left in this special! Okay, what happens next is maybe the second best part of the special, again all due to Hennesy: Hennesy flies over the piano and plays the most hideously hilarious tune with his talons. Lou hears it and goes to check the piano. Somehow, he cannot spot Hennesy because Hennesy flies in and steals the keys. Hennesy is trying so hard to salvage a thumbs in the middle for this special, I swear to PZ Myers. Lou makes it to the piano and scratches his head and we scene change to the animal chain ladder spot in order for Hennesy to insert the key to open the secret room. I don't know why they had to do that, except to show teamwork, I guess. Hennesy could have done it himself and it wouldn't be a logic break either. Credit to the creators though: They managed to keep the logic of the room being soundproof throughout this story. We get the reunion with Davey and the Just There Detectives, well two of them. Hennesy earned his crew cut at least. Davey has lost track of time, thinking he was here a full month even though in storyline, it was only like 12 hours. I would have changed this to a solid week, that would have been more believable. Now, he's hyperboling Roddy Piper on how much money he makes on an episode of Monday Nitro. This goes on for far too long, as Davey is showing teeth because he comes the thug and his kidnapper as they say it all. Then the thug grabs Davey and Reggie commits the first legit violent act on the show by biting the thug on the leg. This seems like a Ruby-Spears motif since Rush did the same thing in Mega Man. Chen tackles the French Tickler Kidnapper, who refuse to tickle anyone.
Davey manages to break free and runs away like an Hanna Barbara character, at least they were smart enough not to make him run 1:1 with Velma's running sequence, just to bury themselves even further. The kidnapper follows Davey, the babyface animals follow the crooks, as Chen claims that she's good at finding shortcuts. The two thugs stop to check their bearings as the kidnapper proclaims that the museum is locked tight, so he cannot escape. Hennesy then cosplays a police officer and the heels sell it like the police are here. That was funny. The kidnapper is blowing off the mastermind of this operation because he was going to give the kidnapper up to get a lighter sentence. They chase the bird (I think), Reggie dumps a bucket of water, with the most realistic flood ever I have ever seen, the heels hydroplane and crash into a suit of armour, because that is the only thing BS&P would allow because we cannot allow vandalism on this show, even though the bucket of water being spilled would cause more damage to the floors of this museum! I CLUB BS&P! The thug has the helmet on, protesting this outrage as the French Kidnapper blows him off. Davey is in the dinosaur exhibit and he is cornered by the heels. The animals are behind the bone dinosaur's tail. Here is the finish of this special: The animal gnaw on the tail, somehow, this causes the dinosaur skeleton to collapse and the ribcage lands on the heels and captures them. Davey walks off to call the police and Chen proclaims that they love working together. Okay, here's the obvious problem with this: WHERE THE HELL IS LOU?! Lou is an accessory to this whole thing and we haven't seen him since Hennesy played the piano! We return to the house as Jim arrives to inform the family that everyone confessed, including Lou! Okay, that makes sense, but damn; I would have liked to see Lou get his more than the other thugs for his betrayal of duty. Not only that, Reggie gets a T-bone steak as a reward because the dinosaurs were not damaged, even though they have to be put back together again! Yeah, they were rewarded for nearly destroying a precious exhibit. Granted, it was to catch a bunch of crooks who wanted missile plans, and who knows what happens after that. But for goodness sakes, this is damaging people's properties with inpunity. Government owned property I might add! This is so stupid! I will admit: Jim handing out the rewards and badges of honor while sneezing was funny. Jim is a trooper after all! Davey pets his animals badly and proclaims them his best friends in the whole world to end the episode at 21:01. Outside of a couple of funny Hennesy moments and the ending, this special was a mess and was mostly boring, dull and heatless. I have no interest in seeing this being turned into a series, none whatsoever. ** (40%). One more thing: The answer to the pin at the beginning is this: All the stills are original scenes not even in the show.
THE REVIEW LINE
Well; I finally finished my second ABC Weekend Special and it was literally just there with nothing really offensive outside of a few stereotypes and nothing really great for the most part. Hennesy turned out to be the best character of the special, mostly due to two spots: The cat alley taunting spot and the piano playing spot in the museum, even though it took over ten minutes before the special started to barely stand out. Reggie was just an out of shape bulldog, Chen was a jerk and not much more. The whole teamwork thing was not good enough to work for me and the villains were bland and even the French Kidnapper was nothing outside of his clothes. Davey was basically a prop throughout this whole thing for the storyline and the story was boring. Logic breaks didn't help either. The second best character was Jim The Sneezing Detective and it was all due to the ending that needed vandalism in a public place to win out in the end. Overall, this was a distraction and waste of 21 minutes. Which I'm fine with because I do want to see more because I'm a sadist and these productions do amuse me in how desperate they are in making me want to care about them. The Incredible Detectives is a miss, though. I haven't decided which one I will do next, but there is lots of choices here. P.J. Funnybunny and Miss Switch are regulars on these ABC Weekend Specials, or so I am told and I cannot wait for more. So....
Thumbs down for this episode and I'll see you all next time.