Last year, Max released Velma, an animated adult "reimagining" of the Scooby Doo franchise that became one of the most hated series in the history of television. On Thursday, April 25, Max premiered a second season of Velma that is almost as bad as the first.
Produced by Mindy Kaling, Velma is riddled with unfunny hostility toward men, particularly white men as embodied in Velma's doofus version of Fred (Glenn Howerton). Fred is a dumb and infantilized character who is routinely mocked.
Season two's plot is about a serial killer targeting white middle-aged men. The killer chops off the victims' penises.
Season One ended with a horrifying scene in which Velma twerked over the corpse of Fred's mother after she was killed in an accident. Season two's violence is no less vulgar.
In this new season, Fred becomes attracted to Catholicism and larps as a fake priest. His newfound interest in Catholicism, which he uses to promote his "spooky stuff hunting business," becomes a launchpad for insulting the Catholic Church.
After Velma (Mindy Kaling) rigs a school lottery to get paired with Fred for an activity, her violation of school tradition somehow turns into dialogue on Catholics.
Fred: I know you rigged this, Velma. If there's one thing rich people know, it's cheating.
Velma: There are more important things than tradition.
Fred: No, there aren't. Look at the Catholics. We used to control the world. But then, Martin Luther was all like, 'Let's ignore traditions.' And now, we only control Boston and the Supreme Court.
Velma: Exactly. Tradition, religion, superstition. When you remove the fun hats and free wine, they're just about controlling people with fear.
The local church priest is a drunkard who is secretly part of a government conspiracy that created a super-villain. The priest becomes one of the men murdered and castrated by the villain.
The series also mocks the sacrament of confession. Fred sits in the confessional and pretends to be a priest, but instead falls in love with the old lady on the other side of the screen confessing her sins.
In contrast to the moronic "Catholic" characters, an occultist heroine named Amber (Sara Ramirez) befriends members of the mystery-solving group and proves to be smart and intuitive. Amber is "non-binary" and uses "they/them" pronouns. She is a proud "witch" who draws pentagrams and practices seances.
Like season one, the plot of Velma's second season is too convoluted to unpack and nearly impossible to either follow or care about. Dialogue tosses in casual references to anti-capitalism and random praise for left-wing heroes like Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayer and former First Lady Michelle Obama. There is little rhyme or reason to these woke insertions.
Velma has zero redeeming qualities even by the standards of contemporary television. Its audience score on Rotten Tomatoes as of April 30 is 11%.
Max had heavily promoted the first season of Velma, but this second season dropped with little fanfare. Considering how little the streaming service marketed the second season, a third installment seems unlikely. If so, good riddance. The series is unredeemable.
