A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is not really something that is acknowledged and certainly not something that is celebrated in Scotland, but I watch this TV special every year in the run up to Xmas just to get me in the mood. The cartoon begins with the usual gag where Lucy yanks the football away from Chuck. I guess he'll never learn to distrust women, eh.

But his main grief in this one is the fact that all of his friends invite themselves over to his place for Thanksgiving despite the fact he's going to his grandmother's for the celebration. Snoopy and Woodstock work together (and against each other) to prepare a slapdash dinner including toast, jelly beans and popcorn. Needless to say the rest of the Peanuts gang are far from impressed with the menu, though that doesn't stop Peppermint Patty putting the moves on Chuck.

All this talk of food has made me hungry.

Charlie Brown and Sally are going to their grandmother's for Thanksgiving. Peppermint Patty calls and invites herself and then Marcie and Franklin to Charlie Brown's for Thanksgiving. Linus suggests Charlie Brown have two Thanksgiving dinner with the help of Snoopy and Woodstock. Peppermint Patty is angered by the lack of traditional Thanksgiving food but Marcie convinces her to apologize. Charlie Brown's grandmother calls and invites everybody to her place.

Peppermint Patty's voice by Christopher DeFaria is really rough and raspy. It's a little bit jarring. Otherwise, this is a charming Charlie Brown holiday special and it holds up well. It has the innocence of the simple cartoon drawings. Also it's a single story without the usual detours. This just has the sense of the impending Holidays that appears every Fall. I do wonder if there is anything wrong with Woodstock eating turkey.

Yes, here we actually had a Charlie Brown holiday where Linus was not a complete buzz kill. A change of pace from the norm for him, but his one is a simple tale of a couple of Charlie Brown's friends inviting themselves over for a Thanksgiving day feast when Charlie Brown is intending to go to his grandmother's house so he and his pal Linus and Snoopy cook up a feast all on their own. This grand meal including plenty of toast and popcorn. I like this one, to me it is the funniest of the three most well known ones...Halloween and Christmas being the other two. This one is also about the poor holiday stuck between Halloween and Christmas and to me seems to be almost a forgotten holiday these days as the retail stores push Halloween and Christmas and seem to ignore Thanksgiving all together. This one really shows the friend or family member that likes to kind of invite themselves to dinners and things like that this time of year as the culprit in this case is the ever exuberant Peppermint Patty. Marcie comes along too. I know lots of people that kind of tag along events such as these mainly because they do not want to cook themselves so I guess this one sort of hits home, and for me is the funniest and best of the holiday trio.

I have always enjoyed these "Charlie Brown" specials as

I called them...It always tells me a holiday will be coming shortly when i watch this on television. there is a weird quality to these specials...they are children oriented, but they seem to have a lot of strong messages

behind them for anyone of any age....like Linus's speech

about Massasoit--a young one who loves his blanket and

sucks his thumb, and to be so smart is like an oxymoron, a mature child..I'm sure we can all relate to one of the

characters in a way!

I have watched A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving for many years and of all the Peanuts specials that I have watched and reviewed for this website, this is my favorite. The opening scene where Lucy pulls the football away from Charlie Brown always cracks me up. If you watch it on DVD or tape it off the TV, play back the football scene in slow motion to see Charlie Brown in mid air.

As for the rest of the cartoon, I thought Peppermint Patty was bossy and rude to Charlie Brown, inviting herself, Marcie and Franklin to Charlie Brown's for Thanksgiving dinner, monopolizing their phone conversations and even worse, complaining about the nontraditional cuisine. She was also flirtatious toward Charlie Brown. There were also outstanding sight gags involving Snoopy and Woodstock and the scene where they get the food ready for the feast that's set to "Linus and Lucy." It proves that cartoon scenes can work well without dialogue.

I also liked the scene near the end when the kids are in the car and they sing "Over the River and Through the Woods" en route to the Brown's Grandma's condo for a real Thanksgiving dinner. Before or after you go over the river and through the woods for your holiday feast, watch this cartoon. You'll even learn about the holiday in Linus' Thanksgiving prayer.