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Animation writer and executive Joe Ruby, who created cartoon series including “Scooby-Doo” along with his partner Ken Spears, died of natural causes Wednesday in Westlake Village, Calif. He was 87.

To me Scooby-Doo is one of those shows I grew up watching and now my own children are watching a different version of, and I think that is rare in today's cartoon world.

Scooby-Doo was the show that taught me to not be afraid of monsters and the dark as a kid, everything has an explanation in the end (like Old Man Jenkins!).

I'm sure even if you didn't like Scooby-Doo, Joe Ruby probably touched something you did. Ruby was a lifelong animator and...

started out as an inbetweener at Walt Disney Productions. After serving in the Navy and working in television editing, he met Spears while working at Hanna-Barbera Productions.

Among the series produced by Ruby-Spears Productions were “Mister T,” “Alvin and the Chipmunks,” “Superman,” “Thundarr the Barbarian,” “Fangface” and “The Plastic Man Comedy-Adventure Hour.”

Ruby went on to serve as executive producer on animated versions of live-action shows and movies including “Punky Brewster,” the “Rambo” series and “Police Academy: The Animated Series.”

A lifelong comic book fan and artist and writer, he worked with artist Jack Kirby on numerous characters and stories that they hoped to put into production.

RIP Joe and thank you for all your contributions to making mine and I'm sure many others Saturday mornings something to remember.

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  • 1
    He did Thundarr the Barbarian, too? One of my all time faves! Lords of Light!
    – Helbent IV
    Aug 28, 2020 at 18:30
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    @HelbentIV His full list of credits is quite impressive imdb.com/name/nm0748445
    – Skooba
    Aug 28, 2020 at 18:45
  • This is off-topic. I don't think Scooby Doo is Science Fiction or Fantasy. All those ghosts turn out to be fake.
    – user931
    Aug 29, 2020 at 9:05
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    @UmbrellaCorporation That is a really bad take. Scooby and the gang do run into real monsters especially in later iterations. In addition Mr. Ruby, was involved in dozens of other shows that would also fall into the SFF category.
    – Skooba
    Aug 29, 2020 at 12:06
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    They actually do see a real apparition in the first season of the original series: scoobydoo.fandom.com/wiki/A_Night_of_Fright_is_No_Delight @UmbrellaCorporation - not to mention that Scooby basically speaks broken English and is understandable by all the characters and is essentially anthropomorphic
    – NKCampbell
    Sep 3, 2020 at 17:20

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Scooby and Shaggy hugging and crying

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    Ruh-Roh Raggy!!
    – Skooba
    Aug 28, 2020 at 18:52

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