Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.0
Overall		4.0

Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie Review

Another easy gold medal for Warner Archive.

Reviewed by Randy Miller III March 21, 2026

Capitalizing on 1976 Olympics fever and ABC's ongoing sports series Battle of the Network Stars, Hanna-Barbera's exceptionally fun Laff-A-Lympics ran for two seasons in 1977-78 and enjoyed enduring popularity in the years to come. The format was simple: three teams of H-B all-stars squared off in wacky events around the globe with unpredictable results, occasional cheating, and two affable hosts in Snagglepuss and Mildew Wolf. Thanks to the studio's knack for variety-show entertainment and a similarly all-star roster of voice talent, Laff-A-Lympics wins a nostalgia gold medal for those of a certain age group... myself included, as I used to watch this one over at Grandma's. Awww.

In all honesty, that one-sentence summary covers the show entirely, but I've got a word limit to reach. Laff-A-Lympics (or, as it was better known as part of its Saturday morning block, Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics) is all about mostly friendly competition, with three teams, all with revolving competitors, going for the gold in each 30-minute episode. "The Scooby Doobies" include you-know-who along with Shaggy, Scooby-Dum, The Blue Falcon and Dynomutt, Hong Kong Phooey, Captain Caveman and The Teen Angels, Speed Buggy, and more. "The Yogi Yahooeys" are led by another obvious captain along with Boo-Boo, Cindy, Yakky, Huckleberry Hound, Pixie and Dixie, Quick Draw McGraw, Hokey Wolf, Mr. Jinks, Augie Doggy and his dad, Wally Gator, and the oversized Grape Ape, to name a few.

Last but not least are "The Really Rottens", a meddling group of villains including Mumbly and The Dead Baron (not Dick Dastardly, but close enough), Dinky and Dirty Dalton, Mr. and Mrs. Creepley, Orful Octopus, Magic Rabbit, Daisy Mayhem, and others. Don't recognize most of the baddies? Many were original characters created for the show and didn't appear elsewhere. But they introduce a dynamic that gives Laff-A- Lympics most of its fun unpredictability: the crucial cheating factor, with basically every event involving some sort of underhanded trickery that's caught by dutiful co-host Snagglepuss before or during each event's score tally or end-of-episode medal ceremony.

Every episode includes between four and six events and, like the worldwide locations where each one occurs, they range from grounded (downhill skiing and ice skating in the Swiss Alps, the Tour de France bicycle race) to absurd (a Loch Ness photograph contest, igloo building at the North Pole), with most of these sports or "sports" leaning towards the latter. Like the show itself, it's all in good fun and the characters -- and their voices, performed by Daws Butler, Don Messick, Frank Welker, Scatman Crothers, Casey Kasem, Mel Blanc, and others -- greatly add to the fun factor, as many of them play very well off of each other. although Hanna-Barbera's Wacky Races offered its own brand of fun a decade earlier (which was likewise inspired by then-recent entertainment such as The Great Race and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World), Laff-A-Lympics stands atop the podium for its wider variety and better execution.

Warner Archive's terrific new Blu-ray collection of Laff-A-Lympics (which goes by the longer name above) is the first complete* set of this series, as each of these two 12-episode seasons was released separately on DVD back in 2010. Thankfully, these three discs aren't overstuffed with episodes -- a mistake often made by their parent company -- as there's a comfortable eight adventures on each one. I watched all of them over the course of a few evenings, but die-hard fans up for a marathon are certainly encouraged to start their engines for a rally-style marathon.

* - The opening credits for Laff-A-Lympics' second season appear during all 24 episodes, since an acceptable source material for the first- season credits could not be located. See below for more details.

Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Like most vintage Hanna-Barbera cartoons, all 24 episodes of Laff-A-Lympics were disassembled for syndication long ago, meaning that Warner Archive's new Blu-ray presentation is more a reconstruction than a remastering. Word has it that the original negatives of the episodic segments were scanned in 4K by WB earlier this decade, and the same goes for the opening credits which are actually all from the show's second season. (The first-season credits, seen here, now only exist as video masters produced during the 1980s.) This gives most of Laff-A-Lympics a decently crisp and clean appearance, one that catapults beyond earlier iterations including DVD and broadcast versions, but the level of grain associated with typical remastering jobs done solely by Warner Archive is not as visible here.

Regardless of any occasional softness and a prevailing texture that's more smooth than grainy, this is a very capable presentation under the circumstances as these cartoons look very clean and colorful indeed. Only the closing credits, as seen in screenshot #28, are noticeably lower in quality... but in this specific case, it was either a second-gen element or nothing so, again, Warner Archive has made the most of an imperfect situation. All things considered, I'm very pleased with what they've achieved here and I imagine that most die-hard fans of Laff-A-Lympics will be as well.

Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Presented in era-appropriate DTS-HD 2.0 Master Audio mono, Laff-A-Lympics features Warner Archive's usual "even split" approach to its one-channel source for a wider but authentic listening experience. As expected this isn't exactly a demanding show despite its energetic pace, with a nice balance achieve between the dialogue, action, and music, all of which is well-prioritized without fighting for attention. No obvious damage or other source-related defects were heard along the way, outside of the lesser elements of the end credits sounding a bit thinner than everything else.

Optional English (SDH) subtitles are included during all 24 episodes only, not the bonus feature below.

Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This three-disc set ships in a hinged keepcase with fun character-themed cover art and hubs for each disc. There's only one bonus feature, which also appeared on WB's partial DVD collection of this series more than a decade ago.

• Scooby Doo: Spooky Games (23:18, seen in screenshot #30) - This short 2012 made-for-TV adventure follows Shaggy and the gang after he's invited to compete as a runner in England's World Invitational Games. Complications include a cute pole vaulter for Daphne and Velma to fawn over, the actual competition itself, and a potentially haunted statue, which makes Spooky Games much closer to a classic Where Are You! episode than the main feature's pure competition-based gags, but it's a decent diversion that fits in well enough.

Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Hanna-Barbera's fun and free-wheeling Laff-A-Lympics is one of the studio's better "variety show" efforts, with a flexible premise that gathers together some of the studio's most memorable characters (as well as a bunch of new ones) for loads of sports-themed entertainment. There's an entire generation with fond memories of this show and I happily count myself among as part of that group, so Warner Archive's welcome new complete series collection should be a very solid seller. This is a terrific effort by the boutique label with respectable A/V merits and an extremely low price tag, which makes Laff-A-Lympics an absolute no-brainer for kids of all ages. Highly Recommended.