Nothing says Halloween tradition better than the classic animated Halloween-themed PEANUTS special, "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown"! So many of us have found memories gathering around the Television for the annual airing!I own "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" on DVD as part of the
Peanuts Holiday Collection DVD with the Thanksgiving and Christmas specials
If you share my sentiment, get ready because the 1966 Charles Schultz Peanuts Halloween classic is on TONIGHT, Wednesday, October 15, 2014, from 8:30-9:00 PM (Eastern/Pacific) on ABC.
I can't wait to once again join the PEANUTS gang as they celebrate Halloween while Linus hopes that he will finally be visited by The Great Pumpkin. And of course, poor Charlie Brown just can't seem to get his costume right or get any Tricks or Treats candy! Remember the classic dialogue?
Lucy: I got five pieces of candy! -
Kid: I got a quarter!
Kid: I got a chocolate bar! - Charlie Brown: I got a rock.
(Next house) Kid: I got a candy bar! - Kid: Boy, I got three cookies!
Lucy: Hey, I got a package of gum! - Charlie Brown: I got a rock!
That fateful bag of rocks is what drew me to the figure shown above when it was first released back in 2002. They added Charlie Brown's botched ghost costume and I was sold!
Remember my previous post about my friend and co-worker's monster-themed office?
Well if you'll notice, this Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown Memory Lane Figure
This was not the only Peanuts figure available back then. UFS made many characters from the Peanuts gang and put them on interlocking bases so you could add them together to create a scene in the ol' pumpkin patch like this:
These were sold in 3-packs called It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown 3 Pack: Sally Brown, Charlie Brown & Linus van Pelt
and It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown 3 Pack: Lucy van Pelt, Snoopy / Woodstock & Schroeder
They of course, were also available individually like my Charlie Brown figure with his bag of rocks and the above slightly obscure Frieda with Ghost Costume, Coonskin Hat and Interlocking Pumpkin Patch Display Base
My favorite one (after Charlie Brown) is Snoopy as The Red Baron with Woodstock, It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown Set.
After the initial couple of runs with these Peanuts figures, they dropped the pumpkin patch bases and offered them as individual figures, adding other characters to the figures line like the It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown Pig Pen Figure,
and the now hard to find It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown Peppermint Patty with Goblin mask
Eventually, each Peanuts character was re-issued wearing different Halloween costumes. There is still a wide variety of these figures still available on Amazon.
It's as if the gang got to got trick-or-treating other years that we weren't able to see. The good thing about that idea is that poor ol' Charlie Brown may have been able to create a Halloween costume that worked. Here are some possibilities as to what he may have dressed up as for other Halloween celebrations:
Check those out! The
Charlie Brown Vampire
If we stay with the idea that there were other Peanuts Halloween nights for Charlie Brown to better himself it also gets exciting for Linus! Maybe, he didn't spend every Halloween night of his childhood waiting for The Great Pumpkin. Or better yet, maybe The Great Pumpkin finally DID appear to him in the pumpkin patch! Either way, the following year Linus would finally get to dress up as his favorite Universal Monster - Frankenstein's Monster!
Peanuts characters are so fun!
Don't forget to celebrate Halloween with Charlie Brown, Lucy, Linus, Sally, Schroeder, Violet, Peppermint Patty, Pig-Pen, Frieda, Woodstock and Snoopy tonight at 8:30 on ABC. I'll be there!
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