All Episodes

🎄 The Advent Calendar House gets overrun by earworms strong enough to burrow into wood.  🎙️ Michael DiGiovanni and Michael May drop in to help carve into a 1980 Rankin/Bass special starring that beloved Christmas icon… Pinocchio.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Two songs, “Dancin’” and “The Very Best Friend I Ever Had,” were cut from and later restored to TV broadcasts.  “Starstuff,” a Philadelphia market, Saturday morning kids’ sci-fi TV series starring Todd Porter, the voice of Pinocchio.  The most disappointing gifts we’ve ever received, including what Santa gave me after I allegedly misspelled “Alpha Critters.”  How does Pinocchio’s nose detect lies, and does it grant him a mulligan here?  The strange flash-forward to the rest of Pinocchio’s better-known adventures, even though Rankin/Bass already made a Pinocchio TV series, its first ever stop-motion animation project.  ****  “Pinocchio’s Christmas” ©1980 Rankin/Bass Productions, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Season 3 of the Advent Calendar House kicks off with a new regular feature: Scrooge Sunday, celebrating the many adaptations of “A Christmas Carol.”  🎙 Lizzie Twachtman and Adam Pope drop in as we begin with Disney’s 1983 featurette marking the big-screen debut of Scrooge McDuck playing his namesake.  📺 You can watch “Mickey’s Christmas Carol” on Disney+.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Before Disney+, almost all of this film was hiding on Netflix at the end of “Mickey’s Magical Christmas: Snowed in at the House of Mouse.  Adam’s well-preserved VHS copy.  A 1974 Disneyland Records LP called “Dickens’ Christmas Carol,” Alan Young’s first recording as the voice of Scrooge.  Mickey Mouse’s very detailed, fanmade family tree.  Siskel and Ebert’s 2 Thumbs Down review.  Goofy as Marley’s ghost at Disneyland.  Mickey’s Christmas Carol animatronic window displays in the Magic Kingdom.  We identify every Disney background character at Fezziwig’s party and lament the absence of Pluto from this entire thing.  Quick shout-outs to Totally Minnie and “Disney’s DTV Romancin’” Valentine special.  Willie the Giant as the Ghost of Christmas Present carefully wandering through the tiny streets of London calls back to the ending of “Fun and Fancy Free,” Disney’s 1947 package film featuring “Mickey and the Beanstalk,” which is also on Disney+.  Your now-annual reminder that Pete has been a cat this entire time.  ****  Mickey’s Christmas Carol ©1983 Disney.  Opening Music: “Christmas Was Better in the ’80s,” by The Futureheads, ©2010 Nul Records.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎃 Put out the oars and surrender yourself to the mercy of the rivers of time as they take us back to Garfield’s terrifying 1985 Halloween special.🎙️ Jeff Somogyi joins us to celebrate the special that turned a generation into scaredy cats.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Jim Davis wanted Garfield’s Halloween Adventure to “at least scare 4-year-olds” (The A.V. Club, 2014)  Samples of the comic book adaptation, “Garfield in Disguise,” from Rotten Ink and Goodwill Hunting 4 Geeks, including even creepier drawings of the old man and pirate ghosts.  The first appearance of Binky the Clown!  The time a raccoon broke into Jeff’s attic and left a hornet’s nest inside a Nativity scene shepherd.  Speaking of attics, the Pink Panther advertising Owens Corning fiberglass insulation.  The Roy Ogle of “Roy Ogle’s roots” was a plant breeder at Clemson. They’re sweet potatoes.  The black cat pajamas may be a callback to the killer panther from 1984’s “Garfield in the Rough,” another good special to put on if you want to give your kids nightmares.  Was the ghost of Jon’s grandfather watching all the Christmas festivities in that special?  C. Lindsay Workman (Old Man) as Garfield’s grandfather in “Garfield on the Town” and God in “Garfield: His 9 Lives.”  The “double burn” glowing effect used on the ghosts reminds us of the “Night on Bald Mountain” sequence of Fantasia.  We had to ask: Did Garfield and Odie really survive the night, or is everything thereafter really Garfield Minus Garfield?  ****  📼 Commercials:  McDonald’s Halloween Pumpkin Pails (1986)  ****  “Garfield’s Halloween Adventure” ©1985 United Feature Syndicate, Inc./Anderson Digital.  Closing Music: “Witch’s Night Out,” performed by Razoreater, written by Peter Rochon.  Full show notes with links at adventcalendar.house.

💝 Love and dynamite are in the air as I introduce 2 guests to an early pilot of what would eventually become “The Muppet Show,” guest-starring a pregnant Mia Farrow.  🎙️ Joey O. and Brian Arnold drop by as we fall head over heels for “The Muppets Valentine Show,” a 1974 TV special that misinformed me about where babies come from.  📺 You can find “The Muppets Valentine Show” on YouTube.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “The Muppets Valentine Show” on Muppet Wiki.  Jim Henson’s Red Book entry about getting this pilot green-lit by some guy at ABC named “Mike” Eisner.  We quickly touch on Crazy Harry’s original incarnation as “Crazy Donald” and then immediately drop it.  Miss Mousey.  George the Janitor is simultaneously UHF’s Stanley Spadowski and WWE’s Perry Saturn.  George and Mildred At the Dance.  Droop in the “Cosby Show” episode, “Cliff’s Nightmare.”  The first appearance of Kermit the Frog riding a bicycle.  “You gotta know what a crumpet is to understand cricket.”  “Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms” and the Looney Tunes musical bomb gag.  Brian’s blog post about “The Candy Apple News Company.”  ****  “The Muppets Valentine Show” © 1974 The Jim Henson Company.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s Christmas Eve, and we’re celebrating with the first Christmas special I ever remember watching, from 1978.  🎙️ Erin Evans and Joey O. help bring Advent to a close as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of “Christmas Eve on Sesame Street,” in which Big Bird worries Santa’s unfit for skinny chimneys, Mr. Hooper spends his Hanukkah saving Christmas, and we get a possible clue into how to get to Sesame Street.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  My taped copy of this is interrupted in the middle by a WHYY telethon with Philadelphia TV legend Ed Cunningham.  The Count’s amazing ice-skating cape.  The wibbly-wobbly physics of Oscar’s trash can.  Olivia married the Predator.  A cameo by Mr. Macintosh.  If you want to go read about Northern Calloway (David) and his off-screen troubles and tragic death, proceed with caution.  The adorable 2-year-old girl too little for her own vocabulary trying to explain that Santa pushes a magic button to go down chimneys is now in her 40s.  “Don’t Eat the Pictures: Sesame Street at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.”  An oral history of Mr. Snuffleupagus’s revelation as not imaginary.  Oscar holds a broom like it’s Not His Broom.  Ernie’s pajamas look like the background of the “Trololo” video.  Joey makes my Christmas by assuring me I didn’t imagine “The Candy Apple News Company.”  ****  🏌️‍♂️ After This Episode:  Listen to my guest appearance on the Two Bad Neighbors podcast discussing my favorite Christmas-adjacent episode of The Simpsons, “Marge Be Not Proud.”  Then go relax or take a nap or something. Hope you enjoy your Christmas!  ****  “Christmas Eve on Sesame Street” © 1978 Children’s Television Workshop.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Remember ALF? He’s back, in podcast form!  🎙️ Jeff Somogyi drops by as we salute ALF’s two-part Christmas special from 1987, the single most depressing special starring a wisecracking alien puppet of all time.  🚨 Content Warning: In this Christmas special, the goofy alien with the jokes meets a terminally ill child and a man contemplating suicide.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The heartbreaking true story behind “ALF’s Special Christmas.”  A study in human ignorance: Gordon Shumway has a name, which he’s told everyone, yet everyone still calls him HEY ALIEN!  A study in willful alien ignorance: ALF opens everyone else’s Christmas gifts and succeeds in convincing me it’s because he doesn’t know how any of this works.  Talking ALF: The Storytelling Alien.  “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”  ****  “ALF’s Special Christmas” © 1987 Alien Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 We unearthed a Christmas special so low-quality, it happens in a sewer.  🎙️ Shawn Robare from the Cult Film Club and Jonathan Zelenak from The Sewer Den drop in for a radically recollection of “We Wish You a Turtle Christmas,” a 1994 cash-grab video starring the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles… or at least some version of them.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  About the Sewer Den, Jonathan’s massive TMNT collection, and his blog post about this special.  The Coming Out of Their Shells Tour.  The Turtles’ smiles look like they’re from Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun” music video.  A 1975 anime version of “The Little Mermaid” had a not-at-all-coincidental resurgence around 1990.  Writer Tish Rabe also produced “Big Bird in China” and “3-2-1 Contact,” created The Cat in the Hat Learning Library after Dr. Seuss’s death, and has written over 160 children’s books.  Y’all want to watch 43 minutes of the Ninja Turtles on Oprah?  That time a warehouse that housed the Rock-afire Explosion actually exploded.  The only pizza place willing to appear in this special is Sbarro, which has come a long way since the Fat Boys’ “All You Can Eat.”  The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Pizza Cookbook is a real book you should own.  The cheapest gifts we’ve ever gotten our parents from our elementary school Christmas bazaar.  Fun game: Sneak the “Wrap Rap” on a playlist in the middle of New Kids on the Block’s Christmas album and see if anyone notices.  ****  “We Wish You a Turtle Christmas” © 1994 Christopher Films, Inc. / Mirage Studios.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Tune in as we celebrate the 30th anniversary of Pee-wee Herman’s Christmas special the only way we know how: With lots of screaming, lots of fruitcake, and lots more screaming.  🎙️ Erin Evans, Lindy Kempe, and Joey O. call into the Podcast Phone to embrace the wackiest holiday party of 1988.  📺 The “Pee-wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special” is available for free on YouTube.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Magic Johnson recorded his segment hours before playing in — and winning — a Lakers game. We don’t know the precise date, but one win was against the SuperSonics, possibly (but probably not) on Ice Cube’s “Good Day.”  One commercial break includes a bizarre Pringles commercial starring a young Brad Pitt.  “Pee-wee’s Big Holiday.”  When did fruitcake become a punchline? Christmas Past has something of an answer. Or is fruitcake a byproduct of the Joys of Jell-O era? The working script and storyboards for this special.  Who mailed Grace Jones to the Reagan White House?  Pee-wee in “Back to the Beach.”  The King of Cartoons’ cartoon: 1936’s “Christmas Comes But Once a Year.”  My feelings about snow mirror this one, particular Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, published 5 days after this special aired.  The awkward moment when we realize the Dinosaur Family has a pet dinosaur.  ****  “Pee-wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special” © 1988 Paul Reubens.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 In Part 2 of our Disney Christmas double feature, Mickey and the rest of the Fab Five — and Daisy, who’s somehow less important than the dog — enter the third-dimension.  🎙️ Drew Crowley and John Dedeke from The Hourchive return for “Mickey’s Twice Upon a Christmas,” the main mouse’s first 3D-animated special.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  If you haven’t been to a Disney theme park in the last year or two, Mickey has a different face now.  The hippo and crocodile from “Fantasia” have names.  Chuck McCann (Santa) was the Dreamfinder in the original Journey Into Imagination.  The grumpy dog who keeps showing up only to get beverages spilled on him is the Stan Lee of the Mickey Mouse universe, which I only mention because we recorded this the day after Stan died.  Between the Goofys and the Plutos of this universe, there are talking reindeer who can own pets.  The Hidden Mickeys Podcast.  ****  “Mickey’s Twice Upon a Christmas” © 2004 Disney Enterprises, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Live from the Turducken Hunger Games comes Part 1 of a Disney Christmas double feature featuring Mickey Mouse and his pals.  🎙️ Drew Crowley and John Dedeke from The Hourchive help me attempt to make sense of time, space, and the Disney fowl food chain as we watch Disney’s 1999 direct to video Christmas special.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Donald Duck’s comically enormous, fanmade family tree.  Happy Duck to the Future Day!  The “Quack Pack” intro will tell you everything you need to know about “Quack Pack.”  Donald Jr., a tiny, semi-realistic duck introduced in “Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.”  The Fab Five supposedly live in the fictional U.S. state of Calisota, on the Pacific coast.  Pete has been a cat this entire time!  Pete smokes a cigar, something since reportedly banned from Disney movies, despite still showing up in Disney movies.  Recycled animation alert: Mickey’s wacky, tongue-waggling dance first appeared in 1942’s “Mickey’s Birthday Party.”  ****  “Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmas” © 1999 Disney Enterprises, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 By the power of Grayskull, the only holiday podcast with Battle Damage action is back to be nice, kind, and wonderful to 1985’s He-Man and She-Ra Christmas special, in which Skeletor’s heart grows three sizes.  🎙️ Brandon Medley and Chad Young are here to help me identify everyone at Eternia’s first ever Christmas party. And Brandon’s dog stops by because he heard us talking about the Beast Monster!  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  He-Man and She-Ra are between 18 and 21 years old and gave children unreasonable expectations of what they’d look like when they grow up.  Greyskull Wiki has an entire section of Queen Marlena’s entry dedicated to speculating about her religion.  The Monstroids exist because the makers of He-Man toys want you to believe giant robots that can transform are evil.   Skeletor and Hordak are basically Miracle Max and his wife from “The Princess Bride.”  This may have been the first time I’d ever seen someone yank off Santa’s beard.  ****  “He-Man/She-Ra: A Christmas Special” © 1985 Mattel, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Tonight in the Advent Calendar House, we’re doing the same thing we do every night… watchin’ a bunch of holiday specials!  🎙️ Joey O. and special guest Joey Letson from The Animanicast joins the mission to apply North Pole to Pinky and the Brain’s 1996 Christmas special, probably the closest the lab mouse duo ever got to actually taking over the world.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  This special won the 1996 Primetime Emmy award for outstanding animated program.  Joey O. interviewed Rob Paulsen and Maurice LaMarche.  The Animanicast interview with Maurice LaMarche.  “Powerhouse,” Warner Bros.’ go-to “assembly line” music.  io9 ranked this episode dead last among the Brain’s plans to take over the world.  ****  “A Pinky and the Brain Christmas” © 1996 Warner Bros.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Listen in as we gush over a 1977 Muppet Christmas special that probably doesn’t get the attention it deserves.  🎙️ Emily Rowley drops in to marvel at Kermit riding a bicycle, watch a drum roll out a door too many times to count, and rock out to the Riverbottom Nightmare Band. Pa would’ve loved this podcast.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Muppet Wiki has the lowdown of all 5 cuts of this.  The official outtake reel and the one with the drum roll.  Of Muppets and Men: The Making of The Muppet Show.  The Christmas Price Index.  The “ass sliding” scene from “Rad.”  Jerry Nelson and Louise Gold sing “When the River Meets the Sea” at Jim Henson’s memorial.  The Can’t Wait for Christmas podcast on Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas.  ****  “Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas” © 1977 The Jim Henson Company.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Hang on to your creepy mistletoe hat as we hit the Bayside Mall for a 2-part “Saved by the Bell” Christmas special from 1991.  🎙️ Chad Young and Tommy Coombs drop in to watch Zack get way too shook upon learning the latest girl of his dreams is homeless.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Chad’s write-up on “Home for Christmas” from 2013.  That time WWE’s Daniel Bryan got fired for choking out an announcer.  Puppy Surprise, the dog that’s pregnant.  Dustin Diamond’s terrible heel turn on “Celebrity Fit Club.”  Homer Simpson beat Screech to the “What’s the number for 911?” joke by a year in “Bart vs. Thanksgiving.”  Who waits until Christmas Eve to buy a tree?  The Evolution of the Zack Morris phone.  Funny or Die: The Time Zack Morris Gave Himself A Homeless Girl For Christmas.  ****  “Saved by the Bell” and “Home for Christmas” © 1991 National Broadcasting Company, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Coming to you from Gotham City, it’s the podcast nobody wanted to see, but everyone will hear.  🎙️ Jay from the Purple Stuff Podcast and Joey O. drop in to spend Christmas with the Joker on a 1992 episode of “Batman: The Animated Series.”  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The crowdsourced origins of Jingle Bells, Batman Smells.  More discussion on “Christmas with the Joker” on Batman: The Animated Podcast and The Arkham Sessions.  Gotham City is in New Jersey.  Mark Hamill’s original performance as Ferris Boyle in “Heart of Ice.”  “Comic Book: The Movie.”  Mark Hamill’s longtime obsession with David Letterman.  Charles Manson apparently spent this Christmas at Arkham Asylum before spending a later Christmas in Nebraska on “South Park.”  Joker’s “Laffy” hand puppet reminds us of Señor Wences. His upside-down mouth puppet is even weirder.  Betty Blooper looks like Toot from “Drawn Together.”  Of course the Joker is hiding out at the Laffco Toy Factory. Look at it!  ****  “Batman: The Animated Series” and “Christmas with the Joker” © 1992 Warner Bros.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Part 2 of our Christmas donkey double feature presents a completely different origin story of the donkey who carried Mary to Bethlehem.  🎙️ Lindy Kempe and Brandon Medley return to talk “The Small One,” Don Bluth’s last Disney project, released in front of the 1978 re-release of “Pinocchio.”  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The original book, “The Small One: A Story for Those Who Like Christmas and Small Donkeys.”  “Dragon’s Lair.”  The Land Before Time toys from Pizza Hut.  Mouse in Transition: When Everyone Left Disney (Cartoon Brew, 2014)  Don Bluth visited Walt Disney Animation Studios 40 years later.  Assistant director Richard Rich went on to direct all 8 Swan Princess movies. (I’m sorry if you just learned there are 8 Swan Princess movies.)  One piece of silver, adjusted for inflation.  Edits for home video include the Merchants’ song, and the Star of Bethlehem getting extra rays of light to look less cross-shaped. To avoid too much foreshadowing, I guess.  Gordon Jump, the voice of Joseph, was on a very special episode of “Diff’rent Strokes.” Yeah. Sorry.  ****  “The Small One” © 1978 Walt Disney Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Extend your ears as we revisit a lesser-known Rankin/Bass special from 1977 that unravels a new side quest to the Nativity story.  🎙️ Lindy Kempe and Brandon Medley droop in to salute “Nestor the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey,” the first of a Christmas donkey double feature.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Roger Miller performing “Do Wacka Do” in 1966 with another guitarist, “Stubbs,” who’s wearing a Batman T-shirt.  Roger Miller’s “Whistle Stop” in Disney’s “Robin Hood” is secretly the Hamster Dance.  Tilly’s ascension back to heaven is strikingly similar to Poochie’s exit from “The Itchy and Scratchy Show.”  Mary has the Glow from “The Last Dragon.”  Annalee Santa dolls.  ****  “Nestor the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey” © 1977 Rankin/Bass Productions, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 We dug down like dogs to the bottom of the VHS bargain bin and found “Jingle Bell Rap,” an overlooked special from 1991 that had all the potential to become a Christmas classic, but none of the airtime.  🎙️ Chad Young drops in to introduce me to this special from Perennial Pictures, a studio that managed to spend the entire 1990s producing a whole slew of holiday specials I never knew about till now.  📺 You can watch “Jingle Bell Rap” in Tubi.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “Jingle Bell Rap” on Perennial Pictures.  Fruity Pebbles’ “Master Rapper” commercial.  Shout-out to the Cult Film Club and “Plot in 60 Seconds.”  Rollover’s dad looks like angry Homer Simpson.  Ralph Wiggum’s heart breaks in slow motion.  New Kids on the Block perform “Funky Funky Xmas” on “The Arsenio Hall Show.”  ****  “Jingle Bell Rap” © 1991 Perennial Pictures.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Lace up your ice skates for a look at 3 classic holiday commercials starring 3 different iterations of McDonald’s clown in charge: “Happy Holidays” (the ice skating one), “Star Wish,” and “Runaway.”  🎙 Joey O. swoops in just in time to convince me not to leave home and run away to McDonaldland, which is honestly tempting.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Grape jelly is good on Sausage McMuffins. Try it.  McDonald’s Wiki, which exists, runs down all 7 versions of the ice skating commercial. Yes, there are 7, and they’re all on YouTube:  1982: the original, with King Moody as Ronald and the “You Deserve a Break Today” jingle variant.  1983: with the “McDonald’s and You” jingle variant.  1984: with the “It’s a Good Time for the Great Taste” jingle variant.  1986: with Squire Fridell as Ronald, the version I remember most.  1988: with Fridell and the original jingle.  1990: with Fridell and the “Food, Folks and Fun” jingle variant.  1991: with Jack Doepke as Ronald, bad lighting, and “The Wish that Changed Christmas.”  King Booker.  Squire Fridell as Ronald McDonald in “Mac and Me” and Paul Rudd’s ongoing prank on Conan O’Brien.  Grimace’s last appearance as of this recording was at Dodger Stadium, though as we know, nothing can kill the Grimace.  The “World’s Largest Entertainment McDonald’s” in Orlando, home to an animatronic Mac Tonight that hangs from the ceiling.  ****  “Happy Holidays,” “Star Wish,” and “Runaway” © McDonald’s.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s mime time at the Most Magical Place on Earth in 1978’s “Christmas at Walt Disney World.”  🎙️ Drew Crowley and John Dedeke from The Hourchive drop in to watch Shields and Yarnell as the most 1978 couple imaginable, Pablo Cruise and their indifference to help a screaming woman escape from pirates, Phyllis Diller in the world’s poofiest princess dress, the Doritos guy as a wildly off-model Geppetto, Dee from “What’s Happening?” as an ungrateful passenger in a magical pumpkin coach, and Broadway’s original Annie singing Christmas carols with surprisingly reverent Disney villains.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Map of what Walt Disney World looked like in 1978.  Vault Disney.  How “My Favorite Things” became a Christmas song.  The opening music, “The Great Gate of Kiev” from Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition,” or as I know it best, Jerry “The King” Lawler’s theme music.  Shields and Yarnell on “American Bandstand” (1976)  Drew eating a gigantic spoonful of mashed potatoes at the Liberty Tree Tavern.  Photos from the long-abandoned Discovery Island in 2009.  Disney’s short-lived plans of reopening Discovery Island as an attraction based on Myst.  One-day admission to the Magic Kingdom plus a book of attraction tickets in 1978 cost $13, according to this Ticket Price Guide.  “Ernest Goes to Splash Mountain.”  Winnie-the-Pooh wearing a honey pot on his head.  Giant, smoking cigars in a theme park parade for children.  The (1970s) “Mouseketeers at Walt Disney World.”  “Kraft Salutes Walt Disney World’s 10th Anniversary” (1981)  The Hourchive on Walt Disney World: Part 1 and Part 2.  ****  “Christmas at Walt Disney World” © 1978 Walt Disney Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.