What's wild is that while I remember loving the second film as a kid, as an adult I think the first is just a fundamentally better movie. There's a lot of fun moments in the second, like sexy Velma or Shaggy and Scooby raiding a fridge of potions, but the plot really feels like an excuse to have a series of unconnected bits, whereas the first is like a real movie with characters having arcs.

Wow, they must have merged together in my mind, because I thought there was only one movie, but I definitely saw both in theaters.

There was even going to be a third movie, but between the second one underperforming and Freddie walking away citing issues with censorship of the first movie, which I believe was initially going to go for an R-rating, as well as the studio kinda underpaying everyone for the second, it got canned.

What is it with comedy movies going for the R rating? Same thing with Galaxy Quest. I dont get the reasoning.

I don't know about Galaxy Quest, but the early 2000s were big for the R-rated sex comedy, it's probably the defining genre for that time period in my mind. Wet Hot American Summer, Wedding Crashers, The 40 Year Old Virgin, Another Gay Movie, etc. Idk what exactly it was and I think a lot of the era aged pretty poorly tbh, but it was definitely the style of the time. You even kinda see it bleed into other genres of the era, like Freddie vs Jason is ostensibly a horror film but has a lot of shots that would not look out of place in a raunchy comedy.

There is no need , it is terrible.

it was definitely the style of the time.

Like tying an onion to your belt?

I mean that's why it's good