Scooby-Doo and Batman are two of the most popular franchises that we grew up with. While Scooby and the rest of the gang are known for their humorous yet thrilling adventures, Batman episodes have mostly been dark and gritty. What if the two shook hands for a crossover? Well, it so happens that the two franchises collaborated multiple times in the past. In this article, we shall brief you on all the major Scooby-Doo and Batman crossovers to date.
The Dynamic Scooby-Doo Affair – Where It All Started
Inspired by the name “Dynamic Duo”, a name given to Batman and Robin’s partnership, The Dynamic Scooby-Doo Affair (S05E02 of The New Scooby-Doo Movies) was the first time Mystery Inc. joined forces with Batman and Robin. Has the collaboration not piqued yours? Interest enough? Wouldn’t it have been nice if DC villains made guest appearances as well? Worry not because two iconic villains from the Batman fandom show up in the episode. More of that, once we delve into the plot.
The episode starts off on the outskirts of Gotham City, with the gang traveling to the Mystery Club Convention. Their car’s battery cable gets disconnected, and it breaks down. While they are busy figuring out how to fix the vehicle, an airplane delivers a crate to a couple of people sitting in a truck. As curious as ever, the gang follows the mysterious truck carrying the crate into a house. As they are busy inspecting the room where the crate is placed, Batman and Robin pull up.
The Dynamic Duo explains that they had caught sight of the airplane with its lights turned off, which led them to that house. As the team unboxes the crate, they take out a large doll of a clown stuffed with counterfeit money. Thus begins their adventure as the team soon discovers The Joker and the Penguin behind this unsavory business. Also, there’s a third culprit from whom the Joker and Penguin have been taking the counterfeit money. This leads the team back to the mysterious house as they play the cat-and-mouse game with the counterfeiter. With that, we conclude our first crossover between Scooby-Doo and Batman.
Scooby-Doo and Batman Crossovers – The Caped Crusader Caper
The Caped Crusader Caper(S01E15 from The New Scooby-Doo Movies) aired in 1972. With the growing popularity of The Dynamics Scooby-Doo Affair, the characters from the previous episode return for another round. This time around, the Mystery Inc. gang is at the campsite in the middle of the forest when Shaggy and Scooby crave a midnight snack. As the boys head out in search of more firewood for cooking, they come across the Joker and Penguin holding a professor hostage.
As they rush to inform the gang about this, they inadvertently reveal their position to Joker and Penguin. The boys run for their lives before stumbling upon the Dynamic Duo: Batman and Robin. Meanwhile, the 2 villains learn about the presence of campers in the forest and chalk out a plan to scare them away. The Dynamic Duo and Mystery Inc. join forces to devise a plan to free the professor and put the notorious villains behind bars.
This is another episode from The New Scooby-Doo Movies that features an excellent atmosphere, nail-biting tension, and a captivating story. The Caped Crusader Caper and The Dynamics Scooby-Doo Affair grew exceedingly popular among the fans, leading to future re-releases with both episodes in one DVD (Scooby-Doo Meets Batman).
Bat-Mite Presents: Batman’s Strangest Cases!
“Bat-Mite Presents: Batman’s Strangest Cases!”(S02E25) was written by Paul Dini. The episode is from the television series “Batman: The Brave and the Bold,” which introduces fans to the Bat-Mite, a 5th dimension imp and arguably Batman’s biggest fan. Bat-Mite gives a tour to all sorts of Batmans across the multiverse. The episode also features the Joker, Weird Al starring himself, and Penguin. Bat-Mite Presents Batman’s Strangest Cases! is not the first time Batman joins Scooby-Doo to solve mysteries. Hence, reference to crossovers from older episodes makes their way into “Bat-Mite Presents Batman’s Strangest Cases!”
Scooby-Doo and Batman Crossovers – Scooby-Doo! & Batman: The Brave and The Bold
Movie time! The Brave And The Bold, the only crossover movie of Batman and Scooby-Doo, shares the same name as the television series that screened “Bat-Mite Presents: Batman’s Strangest Cases!”. A multitude of well-known characters across the DC universe make their appearances in this movie. Some of these characters include Aquaman, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn, Riddler, Joker, Penguin, Question, Martian Manhunter, and Detective Chimp. The entire team of superheroes takes on a new enemy type called the Crimson Cloak. The fight is to no avail, as attacking the Crimson Cloak doesn’t seem to deal damage. So Batman opens the one case file that he couldn’t solve in the past and finds leads on the Crimson Cloak.
What A Night for A Dark Knight!
Up next on the “Scooby-Doo and Batman crossovers” menu, we have the episode named “What a Night, for a Dark Knight!”. The title reference to the first ever Scooby-Doo, “What a Night For a Knight,” simultaneously teases Batman (The Dark Knight). The episode(S01E13 from Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? series) features a plethora of well-known characters and voice actors. For starters, Kevin Conroy voiced Batman, while Mark Hamil voiced the Joker. Interestingly, Mark even guest-starred himself and referenced the Joker as he transitioned into his iconic Joker laugh.
The story unfolds with the gang arriving at the Wayne Manor in search of Alfred, only to find him kidnapped by Man-Bat. Meanwhile, Batman, detecting the presence of outsiders in his house, takes them hostage. When the gang cross-questions Batman regarding how he ends up in Wayne Manor, he drops a smoke bomb and takes them back to the Mystery Van. Velma and the team try to find clues about the kidnapper in a lipstick store while Batman suspects the Man-Bat behind the kidnap. So he heads out to Arkham Asylum only to find him locked up in his cell, to his surprise. Suspecting a different Man-Bat as the kidnapper, Batman asks the gang to escape from the store as soon as possible. We soon find that this Man-Bat is actually the Joker disguised in Man-Bat’s clothes.
Scooby-Doo and Batman Crossovers – Scooby Doo! Team-Up
Besides television series and animated movies, Scooby-Doo and Batman made appearances together in a few DC comics as well. As evident as can be from the title of the comic, “Scooby-Doo! Team-Up” pleased fans with a crossover of Scooby-Doo with Batman (of course), along with a plethora of DC characters as well as characters from other cartoons. Running from 2013 to 2019, some of the notable collaborations with Mystery Inc. included Wonder Woman, Flash, Team Titan, Superman, Flintstones, Jetsons, and a lot more. As for Batman crossovers, there are 4 issues where Batman and Scooby-Doo were found sharing the spotlight.
Man-Bat and Robbin
Released in 2014, Man-Bat and Robbin’ is the #1 issue of the Scooby-Doo! Team-Up comic. The issue also acknowledged that the events of The Dynamic Scooby-Doo Affair and The Caped Crusader Caper are canon. This time around it’s the Dynamic Duo that seeks help from the Mystery Inc. gang to catch the Man-Bat.
Who’s Scared
Who’s Scared starts with Scooby-Doo dreaming about helping Batman teach Gotham City’s villains a lesson. Scooby wakes up and finds the gang meeting with the mystery analysts of Gotham City. The readers are also introduced to Ace the Bat-Hound, Batman’s superhero dog. Things take a left turn when a huge spider interrupts the meeting. What is even more interesting is neither Scooby nor Ace sees the giant spider. Hence, no matter how hard Batman and his team try to defeat the spider, they just can’t.
“But that doesn’t make sense!”, you might say. Well, it does because Ace and Scooby soon discover the mystery behind this unkillable spider. It seems that the Scarecrow is behind this mess. While both the dogs follow the goons to their hideout, Batman figures out a way to stop the hallucination and regroups with Robin and the gang. They track Ace’s position and head out to save the day.
Two Mites Make It Wrong
Two Mites Make It Wrong is a rather goofy episode where the plot is quite thin. In this third issue of the comic, the scene opens with Mystery Inc. helping the Dynamic Duo with a case once again. When they catch the culprits and unmask them, another layer adds underneath the current one. As the unmasking continues, the team discovers that Bat-Mite is behind this mischief. Unable to tolerate Bat-Mite’s tricks, Daphne brings Scooby-Mite into the picture to teach Bat-Mite a lesson and the two end up quarreling. The two Mites symbolize the die-hard fans of Scooby-Doo and Batman, quarreling over the dominance of their hero.
Crisis of Infinite Scoobies
In the final issue of the comic series, Bat-Mite and Scooby-Mite return, but this time, the plot is actually interesting. This issue celebrates the 50th anniversary of Scooby-Doo and the 80th anniversary of Batman.
As the gang and the Dynamic Duo are helping each other out in a mystery, they discover that the Batman is being hunted according to reports. It so happens that an evil Batman from an alternate universe (Batman Apocalypse) has taken over. Things escalate when more multiverse Batmans and Scooby-Doos join the fiesta. As Velma asks Bat-Mite and Scooby-Mite to reveal themselves, the duo spawns even weirder multiverse versions of the two heroes. How weird? Well, we have mollusk and robot versions of Batman and Scooby, gingerbread Scooby, Turnip-headed Batman, Live-action Daphne, Scooby-Apocalypse Daphne, punk Fred, Scrappy-Doo and a lot more.
Batman and Scooby-Doo Mysteries
Lastly, we have another DC comic in-store featuring a crossover between Batman and Scooby-Doo. The Batman and Scooby-Doo Mysteries made its first publication in April 2021 and is still ongoing at the time of writing this article. So far, 12 issues have been published, with the latest one dropped on March 8, 2022. The comic features iconic characters such as Joker, Robin, Nightwing, Talia al Ghul, Ace the Bat-Hound, Harley Quinn, and a lot more, along with the obvious Mystery Inc. and Batman.
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