Get your comfy “line standing shoes” polished and dust off that one man pup-tent! Pack a lunch and a soup can to pee in, because Charlie Brown the movie is coming to the big screen and there is gonna be a line-up for tickets the likes of which you won’t believe! This thing is will put the new Star Wars movie upcoming pre-sale to shame and I…I can’t do this.
The new Charlie Brown movie is all over the news right now and people are pumped. Not me. I was feeling pretty good the day I heard the news – maybe too good, in fact – and some deity somewhere in charge of my personal well-being decided I needed to be taken down a peg or two on the happiness ladder. Since nothing brings me down faster than a Charlie Brown Christmas Special it seems a full-length cinematic feature was called for to pop my happiness bubble.
Am I overplaying the sadness and despair of Charlie Brown special?
No; no friends. I am not:
It's just as depressing as I remembered.
My cousins and I watched it every year as children, trapped in my Grandmother’s small front room with a kitchen towel wedged in the door frame to prevent escape. I have no idea what possessed adults in charge of our well-being to inflict this torture on their offspring, other than maybe payback for horrific 36 hour labours and their stolen youth.
I hope he gets a “Hair Club” membership for Christmas
Even as a child I thought Charlie Brown television specials were likely the most depressing children’s programming to exist. To be fair, Charlie Brown Christmas first aired in 1965, and while this was long before the concept of self-esteem for children was part of the parenting “toolbox,” I still think someone at the originating network was a kid-hater. Five minutes into my YouTube revival and the Peanuts kids had already called each other “stupid,” “hopeless,” and “dumb.” I’m pretty confident “asshole” and “douche-bag” sit reluctantly on the cutting room floor, due only to FCC interference.
I've read several of the articles outlining the upcoming movie and it appears creator Charles Schultz’s son and grandson will have heavy involvement with the production, which sounds like a lot of work until you remember that Charlie Brown consists mostly of depressing tuba music and sad, parentless children navigating a barren, water-coloured landscape.
Hopefully the new movie will explain some unanswered questions about the Peanuts gang. For starters, why do so many children on the block have only four greasy hairs on their head? Was having the hair of a retired plumbing parts salesman normal for the children of this era? Is there an unseen biohazard dumping area off-screen? Should someone call cartoon Erin Brockovich?
While my kids will likely want to see the movie, I think I'll send them solo while I do participate in something decidedly less sad - maybe knitting hats for orphaned kittens.
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