I was a bit surprised by today’s reprint of Peanuts. It’s from November 5, 1959.
Doesn’t it seem out of character for Charlie Brown to be making fun of somebody else, especially Linus?
Category: Cartooning
Post-Pumpkin Post
As a follow-up to my post on “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,” click here for a brief NPR feature about the cartoon.
Note: Lucy is shown holding what didn’t exist 40 years ago — TV Guide the size of a magazine, and not a digest.
Raspberry Heaven
There’s lots of Azumanga Daioh on YouTube™, but as a follow-up to a previous posting, here are the end credits, framed by the commercial break outro and intro. The “Raspberry Heaven” catch-phrase is very catchy.
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It took a couple of episodes to see past the underlying wackiness. Something I didn’t realize at first is the show deals with some very contemporary themes about growing up that in previous generations were simply not presented.
Feeling Pekared
If the space above is blank, blame YouTube™!
It took some years for me to warm up to ‘alternative’ comic-book writer Harvey Pekar. But my friend Morris Hyman is a big Pekar fan, so I gave him a copy of the DVD American Splendor, which is a very good movie.
An interview that Pekar did with Terry Gross on the NPR show Fresh Air has been re-run. It’s at this link.
A Charlie Brown Anti-Christmas
Click picture to see complete image
As I’ve said before, I’m an admirer of cartoonist Charles Schulz. I’ll never decide if my favorite Peanuts cartoon is A Charlie Brown Christmas or It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. But it’s Halloween, so I’ll say it’s The Great Pumpkin. Let’s listen to “Great Pumpkin Waltz,” by Vince Guaraldi, transferred from a wonderfully warm-sounding, but slightly-warped, LP.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/OCT06/pumpkinwaltz.mp3]Here’s a comment by Charles Schulz, as recalled by Lee Mendelson in It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown: The Making of a Television Classic.
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This raises an interesting discussion topic. A Charlie Brown Christmas plainly states who, other than Santa, there is to believe in. And it’s Linus who articulates that belief so poignantly in the show. But it’s also Linus who believes in the obviously non-existent Great Pumpkin.
The Great Pumpkin fabrication was intended by Schulz to be a Halloween counterpart to the Santa Claus character. The name of the Halloween counterpart to Jesus isn’t given in It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.
Here’s a screen shot from Friday night’s showing of It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. It’s strange to see the ABC-TV logo in the corner, because in my mind the show is indelibly associated with CBS. But at least they aired it. The show is, after all, 40 years old!
Also, take note of the “G” rating and the blurb promoting the Harry Potter movie. It wasn’t too many years ago that religious groups were in an uproar over Harry Potter. Perhaps they still are.
For me, and I mean this sincerely, Christmas is about Birth (or, if you prefer, Life) and Halloween is about Death. The symbolism is undeniable. I admire Schulz for dealing so deftly with the always-touchy subject of Faith in his Christmas and Halloween cartoons.
Seven Samurai 7
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Honorable son Eric’s latest Animé pick is Samurai 7, a series based on the legendary movie, The Seven Samurai. When I was in high school, the Boston PBS station showed it complete and commercial-free, and it was my friend and mentor Morris Hyman who made sure I didn’t miss it.
Eric and I watched the original movie together not too many months ago, and I was pleased to see that he was suitably impressed. George Lucas borrowed much from this movie when creating The Jedi Knights.
I’ve spliced together a couple of brief scenes from both presentations for comparison. Below is, obviously, the original. No robots!
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