The following contains spoilers for Velma Season 1, Episode 5, "Marching Band Sleepover," and Episode 6, "The Sins of the Fathers and Some of the Mothers," now streaming on HBO Max.
As HBO Max's Velma proceeds, Mindy Kaling's titular character is juggling many issues. She's trying to iron out her kiss with Daphne, as well as if she really likes Fred. Not to mention, Velma's complicating her strained relationship with Shaggy by constantly asking him to help her investigate her missing mother, Diya Dinkley, even though she knows it annoys his new beau, Gigi.
Admittedly, it's reinterpreted the usually solid, mentally-sound Scooby-Doo character as someone more grounded and relatable, yet flawed. This change is compounded by the very human arc of Velma seeing ghosts as part of her hallucinations, manifesting her trauma as she feels guilty over her mother's disappearance years back. However, as Velma distracts herself with the new Crystal Cove case of young women being murdered, Diya's true fate might have been revealed, fingering her as someone crucial to the case.
Velma Unearths Key Evidence on Diya
Velma's been piecing together clues, insistent something happened to Diya. It leads her to Fred's mansion, which Shaggy's grandmother, Edna, once owned. Velma reconciles this with evidence from her principal and Shaggy's mother, Blythe, about Edna's basement being used as a lab for experiments. Apparently, the military -- through the sinister general, Meeting -- hired Edna to replace the brains of teens, making them more compliant and less inclined to protesting America's wars in the 1970s -- that is, until she snapped and got locked away.
It turns out, Diya, who loved sleuthing, found Edna's files and went into the catacombs, where Velma thinks she got taken. However, as Velma tries to solve the mystery, nothing insinuates Diya was snatched or killed -- it instead feels like Diya ditched the Dinkleys and became the killer herself. Of course, this would be controversial as fans wouldn't like hearing she abandoned Velma, but it would resonate as something Diya thinks could make her whole again -- an arc sure to draw even more eyes to Velma.
Velma's Diya Could Have Found a Dark Purpose
Diya deciding to hide away would make sense as she wasn't happy at home. Velma was a tough kid to raise, always hitting her mother, while Velma's father, Aman, didn't really fuss, believing the mother left as they had an unhappy marriage. In fact, he's still neglectful to his new wife, Sophie, and her newborn, opting to drown himself in work, so it's easy to understand why Diya would think the household was toxic.
That doesn't mean her potential behavior's condoned, as it created an unhealthy life for Velma, but Diya may now be trying to fix it. Seeing as Diya was an outsider too, she could have taken up the baton from Edna, killing bullies and experimenting on their brains. Notably, Diya appears to be removing mean girls from Velma's school, suggesting it's a social justice crusade. This would give her purpose, allowing the disillusioned mother to think she's helping her daughter;
The smoking gun may have come in a "Jinkies" note Velma and her dad eventually find in the lair, in Diya's handwriting. Along with mysterious footprints, it could be Diya's luring Velma in to see if she can crack the case. It would fit their detective games and mental tests when Velma was a kid, hinting Diya may see Velma as someone willing to join her cause and correct the town's superficial nature. Ultimately, with Daphne's birth mother, Carroll, being taken by the mysterious killer, this gives Daphne, as well as the top detective in Shaggy, reason to join the hunt. They may not realize Velma's mother could have entrapped them all in a sinister chess match to see who is worthy of reshaping the next era of Crystal Cove.
Velma debuts new episodes every Thursday on HBO Max.