Joey O.

🎄 It’s the 200th episode of the Advent Calendar House, but more importantly, it’s Christmas Eve! So we’re celebrating with a salute to the last remaining special we have left to talk about in the Rankin/Bass Christmas canon: 1974’s “The Year Without a Santa Claus.”  🎙️ It’s a packed party with Tim Babb, Michael DiGiovanni, Joey O., and Matt Spaulding as we spread Christmas cheer over Southtown and everywhere else — something we could’ve seen Mrs. Claus search for if she hadn’t immediately dropped the idea, but then we wouldn’t have met the true stars of the special: The Miser Bros.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The original story by Phyllis McGinley.  A read-along record narrated by Boris Karloff.  The DVD menu and only the DVD menu, if that interests you.  Snow Miser’s song in “Batman and Robin.”  Shirley Booth (Mrs. Claus) as “Hazel.”  Today’s TV Tropes: Dressed to Heal, Spinning Paper.  Bob McFadden (Elf Doctor) as “Cool McCool.”  “Panic In New York: Menagerie Breaks Loose,” and other prop newspaper headlines.  Are Santa’s Reindeer Female? (Old Farmer’s Almanac)  Survivor Series 1994: Clowns Are Us vs. the Royal Family.  Ron Marshall (Iggy’s dad) marks the first time I ended up on Muppet Wiki by surprise.  Charlie Chaplin’s hanging out in Southtown.  Heatmiser: the band.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Coca-Cola: “Candles (Buy the World a Coke)” (1977)  Coca-Cola: The World Needs More Santas (2023)  Matt’s book: “Santa in His Own Words.”  “A Bomb for Christmas 2: Past, Present, and Future” on the Can’t Wait for Christmas Podcast.  ****  “The Year Without a Santa Claus” © 1974 Rankin/Bass Productions, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.

🎄 “This just in: Santa Claus is dead… or he might as well be, because there’s an even fatter man who’s holding families at nice-point!”  ’Tis the Advent Calendar House’s 15th season, so this December’s dozen begins with a similarly titled episode of “The Simpsons” from 2003.  🎙️ Shane Keating from ToughPigs.com, Erin Evans, and Joey O. join the mission to stop being selfish and start being good.  📺 As of this recording, “’Tis the Fifteenth Season” (Season 15, Episode 7) is available on Disney+.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  This episode premiered the day after Saddam Hussein was caught.  Marge’s couch gag anime costume: Jun the Swan from “Gatchaman.”  “How Low Can DVD Players Go?” (New York Times, 2003)  Kathy from Personnel.  The Joe DiMaggio rookie card is real.  Today’s TV Trope: Art Shift — “Christmas with the California Prunes” and “The Year Santa Got Lost,” animated by the Chiodo Bros.  Animaniacs’ 50 State Capitals.  Of course I looked up the astrolabe’s coordinates.  Convoy, and the cover by Sifl & Olly.  Operation: The Simpsons Edition.  The first on-screen appearance of Nelson’s mom.  The end of “Treehouse of Horror IV.”  Stupid TV, Be More Funny: How the Golden Era of The Simpsons Changed Television — and America — Forever, by Alan Siegel.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Bart vs. the Space Mutants (1991)  Butterfinger - The Power Cut (1993)  A Bomb for Christmas 2: Past, Present, and Future on the Can’t Wait for Christmas Podcast.  ****  “The Simpsons” and “’Tis the Fifteenth Season” © 2003 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.

🎄 Join us for a short spin back to 1993 as I spend 48 minutes blah blah blah yackety schmacketing about Taz’s attempt to spread Christmas cheer.  🎙️ Sammy Hain and Joey O. join us for Summer in December during Christmas in July in a land that’s way under Down Under.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Tasmania was once home to the world’s tallest decorated Christmas tree.  John Astin (Bull Gator) in “Return of the Killer Tomatoes.”  How the origins of Taz’s creation involve Errol Flynn and the Los Angeles Zoo.  Hot Dr. Pepper.  Bing Crosby’s Minute Maid Orange Juice Commercials.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Tornado Taz Plush (1997)  Christmas Creeps.  ****  “Taz-Mania” and “No Time for Christmas” © 1993 Warner Bros. Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🌴 In Part 2 of our “Futurama” Xmas double-header, we meet the only thing worse than an evil robot Santa… two evil robot Santas.  🎙️ Michael DiGiovanni, Erin Evans, Joey O., and Donnie Storms return for 2001’s “A Tale of Two Santas.” ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “Box Car Blues” (1930).  Santa’s Death Fortress sure looks like Elsa’s ice palace.  Coolio’s final acting role before his death was a return as the voice of Kwanzaa-bot.  An ode to Musicmatch Jukebox and our turn-of-the-century mp3 albums we’re still holding onto.  My favorite joke in all of “Futurama.”  “I’m Spartacus!”  ****  📼 Commercials:  America Online Keyword: eBay (2001).  A Bomb for Christmas: A made-for-podcast Christmas movie featuring your old pal, me.  ****  “Futurama” and “A Tale of Two Santas ” © 2001 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🌴 The Advent Calendar House has awoken from what feels like a thousand-year slumber and a lame April Fool’s joke. As a peace offering, here’s the first of two back-to-back episodes celebrating Xmas as imagined by “Futurama.”  🎙️ It’s extra crowded in the cryogenic chamber as Michael DiGiovanni, Erin Evans, Joey O., and Donnie Storms drop in for 1999’s “Xmas Story,” in which we’re introduced to the annual tradition of gift-giving and shelter-taking from a killer robot Santa Claus that awaits our descendants in the year 3000.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “Fresh Hare” (1942).  Orange Cassidy sleeping through his own wrestling match.  “Why Chaucer Said ‘Ax’ Instead of ‘Ask,’ and Why Some Still Do” (NPR, 2013).  “Why is the number 1,729 hidden in Futurama episodes?” (BBC, 2013).  The classic dangling from a clock tower scenes from “Safety Last” and “Back to the Future.”  John Goodman’s other appearances as Santa.  Randy Johnson hits a bird with a fastball.  Corona Extra’s Christmas palm tree commercial.  The lyrics to “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town” are sinister enough by themselves.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Hess Truck 1999 Space Shuttle Toy.  Stick to Shorts: A Classic Cartoons Podcast.  ****  “Futurama” and “Xmas Story” © 1999 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s 2003, and nothing puts me in a festive mood quite like a bar fight.  🎙 Joey O. and James Riley join us for Christmas break with the Justice League — well, most of it. Wonder Woman’s off doing something else, and Batman… you know, smells.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Mike talks “Comfort and Joy” on Tis the Podcast.  Paul Dini’s notes on “Comfort and Joy,” including what where Wonder Woman and Batman were.  The Shrine of the Silver Monkey from “Legends of the Hidden Temple.”  The “Calvin and Hobbes” snowman gallery of horrors.  Santa gives Darkseid a lump of coal.  Clark and his parents’ cat, Streaky, are this universe’s Jon Arbuckle and Garfield.  One of the stuffed animals on Kara’s bed looks like Zook, one of Martian Manhunter’s comic book sidekicks.  “Sam, the Guy from Quincy” by the Arrogant Worms (re: Robert Ito as the Japanese toy company CEO).  The end of The Simpsons’ “Treehouse of Horror IV.”  Wild Swamp Thing appeared!  Ultra-Humanite is doing a Party Man.  A tangent about Oreo cookies, Martian Manhunter’s favorite food.  ****  📼 Commercial Break:Burger King: Justice League Kids’ Meal Toys (2003)  Oreos for Santa (1986)  Wizards: The Podcast Guide to Comics  ****  “Justice League” and “Comfort and Joy” © 2003 Warner Bros.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄It’s 1990… or 1962… and a quantum physicist forgot to powder his boss’s underwear.  🎙 Erin Evans and Joey O. join us for a Scrooge Sunday involving time travel of a different sort as we follow Dr. Sam Beckett on a mission to save a mission, and the soul of the man trying to tear it down.  🚨 Warning: This episode briefly discusses the death of actor Charles Rocket and the would-be death of his Scrooge-like character, Michael Blake.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Episode guide on Al’s Place.  A Christmas story from the Quantum Leap comic: “He Knows If You’ve Been Bad or Good.”  Charles Rocket drops an F-bomb on “Saturday Night Live.”  “Bringing in the Sheaves” on “The Simpsons” and “Batman” (1966).  Polish Christmas desserts piernik and makowiec.  Al’s Ghost of Christmas Future costume looks more like Jacob Marley mixed with the Ghost of Christmas Past from “Scrooged.”  Goldie Wilson III from “Back to the Future Part II.”  ****  📼 Commercials:  Squarbles (circa 1987)  Can’t Wait for Christmas Podcast.  ****  “Quantum Leap” and “A Little Miracle” © 1990 Universal City Studios, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

Let’s all go to the taco show!  The Advent Calendar House has awoken early from its long winter’s nap to take the Leap Year challenge as prescribed by Dr. Frasier Crane on one unseasonably warm February morning in 1996.  🎙 Erin Evans and Joey O. get dressed up in buttons and boys to look into the “Frasier” cast’s Christmas connections, explore the world of complicated opera solos and bad Western ballads, and call in to a PBS pledge drive to try and talk to Big Bird.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Kelsey Grammer in “Mr. St. Nick” and “The Twelve Days of Christmas Eve.”  Our adventures on the mid-1990s internet, when it was All About the Pentiums.  “Frasier” episodes ranked on Variety, Frasier Online, and Thrillist.  “When You Had Left Our Pirate Fold” from “The Pirates of Penzance,” in which Leap Day becomes a plot point.  Oleg Cassini and the worst title card gag.   KACL is a real radio station, but not in Seattle.  “Rigoletto” and the aria “Ella mi fu rapita / Parmi veder le lagrime.”  Kelsey Grammer sings “The Star-Spangled Banner” at the 1996 Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Philadelphia.   “Buttons and Bows,” as sung by Bob Hope in “The Paleface” and by Leap Day baby Dinah Shore.  Adam “Edge” Copeland talks “Money Plane” on Hey! (EW).  ****  📼 Commercials:  McDonald’s “Morning Break” Commercial starring Kelsey Grammer (1995)  Remember That Show?  ****  “Frasier” and “Look Before You Leap” © 1996 Paramount Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄It’s 1984, and Ebenezer Scrooge is threatening to raise his asking price for a warehouse full of corn.  This Christmas Eve episode not only drops on a Scrooge Sunday, but it’s also the Advent Calendar House’s 150th episode! 🎙 Erin Evans, Joey O., and Anthony Strand join us for a Dickens of a celebration with 1984’s TV movie adaptation of “A Christmas Carol” starring George S. Scott, along with the original “Equalizer” Edward Woodward as a sassy Ghost of Christmas Present, and we even spotted our favorite Alfred Pennyworth, Michael Gough, as a not-so-portly gentleman.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  David Warner in “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze.”  George S. Scott in “Angus” and “Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue.”  “God Bless Us Everyone,” this movie’s theme music by Nick Bicât.  Wikipedia and NO ONE ELSE names one Cratchit child “Michael,” played by Susannah York’s (Mrs. Cratchit) real-life son, Orlando Wells.  Michael Carter (Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come) as Bib Fortuna in “Return of the Jedi.”  “It’s Corn,” and My favorite “Futurama” joke.  Scrooge’s grave, allegedly a real, reinscribed headstone, at St. Chad’s Church in Shrewsbury.  Twelve Hundred Ghosts - A Christmas Carol in Supercut.  ****  📼 Commercials:  IBM Sponsored Commercial Break from the original airing of “A Christmas Carol.”  George C. Scott “Read More About It” PSA.  The Christmas Podcast Network All-Star Comedy Christmas Show!  ****  “A Christmas Carol” © 1984 Travenol Laboratories Limited.  In memory of Jason Gross (1976–2023).  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  “Christmas in Your Heart” (from “A Garfield Christmas Special”) performed by Todd from Vista Blue/Second Saturday.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 After spending 3 months locked in a water tower, the Advent Calendar House has escaped in time for Christmas Podcast Day, a fake holiday originally made up for a hashtag back when social media was slightly less stupid.  It’s not Scrooge Sunday, but the theme for this year’s Christmas Podcast Day is “A Christmas Carol,” so I’m playing a long, but also cheating a little by covering both segments of a 1993 Christmas episode of “Animaniacs.”  🎙 Erin Evans and Joey O. join us for a totally insane-y Christmas Podcast Day-ny!  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The Animanicast.  Animaniacs Wiki entry for this episode.  Sherri Stoner (Slappy Squirrel) was the live action reference model for Disney princesses Ariel and Belle.  “A Christmas Plotz: The Hip-Hop Musical.”  Jess Harnell (Wakko) sang the Taz-Mania theme.  Jess Harnell’s band, Rock Sugar.  Forest Lawn Memorial Park.  Today’s TV Tropes: Sensational Staircase Sequence and Scooby Stack.  Baby Jesus is in a thatched-roof cottage.  Kathryn Page’s gag credits.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Animaniacs McDonald’s Happy Meal Toys (1994)  Snow in Southtown.  ****  “Animaniacs,” “A Christmas Plotz,” and “Little Drummer Warners” © 1993 Warner Bros.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  “Christmas Podcast Day” song by Tim Babb from the Can’t Wait for Christmas Podcast. Parody of “Weasel Stomping Day” by “Weird Al” Yankovic.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s the Advent Calendar House’s 10th season, and to celebrate, every episode is revisiting familiar faces and places already covered on the podcast.  Previously, we spent Christmas with the Joker in “Batman: The Animated Series.” This time, we’re returning to the 1997 premiere of the redesigned, rebranded “New Batman Adventures.”  🎙️ Andre Bennett and Joey O. join us on a festive tour of Gotham City through the Joker’s hideously redrawn eyes.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The Batman Adventures Holiday Special original comic.  “Welcome to Our OOL.”  Dark Night: A True Batman Story, by Paul Dini.  Arleen Sorkin on “America’s Funniest People,” a her appearance as a jester on “Days of Our Lives” that inspired her casting as Harley Quinn.  Kevin Conroy on being recognized while volunteering after 9/11.  “Finding Batman,” by Kevin Conroy, from DC’s Pride 2022.  Paul Dini’s original cel from Harley and Poison Ivy’s shopping spree.  Tim Drake’s animated debut, and a shocking Muppet tangent.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Batman and Alfred Diet Coke Commercial (1989)  Festive Foreign Film Fans.  ****  “The New Batman Adventures” and “Holiday Knights” © 1997 Warner Bros.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s 1990, and a little girl’s Christmas wish is about to get shot out of the sky.  🎙 Joey O. join us for the podcast’s first voyage into the Disney Afternoon as Baloo the cargo pilot bear attempts to save his boss’s daughter’s belief in Santa.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Joey’s Christmas TV lineup that he wrote on a piece of paper around 1991 and found again 30 years later.  The TaleSpin/Quantum Leap joke.  Disney’s “The Jungle Book,” the animated one, is somehow Germany’s biggest box office draw ever.  “Tales of the Gold Monkey,” a single-season TV show that inspired “TaleSpin.”  “What a Dummy,” an even shorter single-season TV show featuring Janna Michaels (Molly) and a living ventriloquist’s dummy.  Joey’s Interview with Pat Fraley (Wildcat), again!   Today’s TV Trope: String-on-Finger Reminder.  Cape Suzette and Louie’s Place on the Disney Wiki.  Flunkey, the Einstein-haired monkey from “The Jungle Book” whose “TaleSpin” counterpart appears to be Santa Louie’s “elf,” Waldo.  ****  📼 Commercials:  McDonald’s TaleSpin Happy Meal Toys (1990)  Snow in Southtown.  ****  “TaleSpin” and “Jolly Molly Christmas” © 1990 The Walt Disney Company.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s 1997, and we couldn’t decide which holiday to end the season with, so we’re celebrating them all.  🎙 Joey O. joins us on a journey 20 miles below the surface of the Earth to the very “Pee-wee’s Playhouse”-like split-level cave of “Weird Al” Yankovic as he learns to listen to his friends and family.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Weirdle, the “Weird Al”-themed offshoot of Heardle, the music-themed offshoot of Wordle.  “The Weird Accordion to Al,” by Nathan Rabin.  Joey interviews Ben Kweller about his appearance with Radish on “The Weird Al Show.”  Al’s got a thing for the number 27, which makes its way into this episode.  Stan Freberg’s “Christmas Dragnet,” which I know from a compilation CD from Philadelphia radio station WOGL.  Ed Marques (Varna) as the Surf Guru on ZDTV’s “Internet Tonight.”  I had no idea “I Lost on Jeopardy!” was a full parody of an actual song.  “Weird Al,” Paul Reubens, and Danny Elfman sing “Kidnap the Sandy Claws.”  National Hamster Day exists. It’s May 10.  Funny or Die’s original fake trailer for “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.”  “Weird Al” Yankovic: There’s No Going Home, part of The Disney Channel’s Going Home concert/documentary series.  ****  📼 Commercials:  1990 Encyclopedia Britannica commercial starring Donavan Freberg (Baby Boolie).  ****  “The Weird Al Show” and “The Obligatory Holiday Episode” © 1997.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 It’s 1983, and Young Republican Alex P. Keaton is sick and tired of hearing “Merry Christmas.” It was a different time.  🎙 Molly Patton and Joey O. join us as we airlift our dirty laundry back to before “Back to the Future” for a Scrooge Sunday edition of “Family Ties,” in which Michael J. Fox is taken 30 years into the future to fix his family.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Michael Gross (Steven) on making the Christmas movie “Noelle.”  Chris Hebert (Young Alex) in “Fuzzbucket.”  Justine Bateman as Mallory as the Ghost of Christmas Future is the Best Dressed Ghost of Christmas Future.  Justine Bateman as Lady Zara, Superman’s long-lost betrothed wife-to-be on “Lois and Clark.”  Michael Gross and Meredith Baxter (Elyse) as Santa and Mrs. Claus in the 2015 Lifetime Original Movie, “Becoming Santa.”  The time I went shopping on Christmas Day in the year 2000 and ended up finding the loneliest Hollywood Video employee.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Atari Christmas Commercial (1983)  The Christmas Alphabet Podcast.  ****  “Family Ties” and “A Keaton Christmas Carol” © 1983 Paramount Pictures Corp.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎅 It’s the 100th episode of the Advent Calendar House, and what better day than Christmas Eve to return to the World of Rankin/Bass?  🎙 Erin Evans, Michael DiGiovanni, Michael May, Brandon Medley, and Joey O. join us as we put one foot in front of the other back to 1970 to revisit a Christmas classic that dares to answer children’s questions about Santa Claus while illegally opening his mail.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Both IMDb and Wikipedia had the premiere date wrong because of a typo in an old book. Rich Goldschmidt’s “The Making of Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town and The Daydreamer” gets it right.  Former pro-wrestler Special Delivery Jones (no relation).  Burgermeister Meisterburger is a dead ringer for Mauser from “Police Academy 2.”  Hey, IMDb, I highly doubt the Greg Thomas voicing young Kris Kringle grew up to play the saxophone in Parliament Funkadelic.  For a while, Topper was renamed Waddles.  Kris’s weird face he makes after being caught by the Winter Warlock’s angry trees.  Save the Earth from Godzilla vs. the Smog Monster.  Weddings on Christmas Day used to be popular.  The first known recording of the song “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town” and our favorite versions.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Folgers Coffee: Peter Comes Home for Christmas (1982)  ****  “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town” © 1970 Rankin/Bass Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Happy Back to the Future Day! Set your time circuits to 1845 by way of 1991 for a special Christmas in July episode of the “Back to the Future” Saturday morning cartoon featuring hologram clothes, the hoverboard equivalent to texting while driving, and Bill Nye the Science Guy.🎙 Joey O., along with Joseph Wade from Christmas Creeps and The O/S/T Party, are our partners in time for a “Dickens of a Christmas,” featuring Dan Castellaneta as the voice of the animated Doc, Thomas F. Wilson as Ebiffnezer Tannen, and Christmas movie all-star Mary Steenburger as Clara.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Mary Steenburger playing “Informer” on the accordion in “Last Man on Earth.”  Series art director James S. Baker storyboards his own blog.  The Back to the Future pinball game and its random movie quotes.  Futurepedia on how Doc’s clothing converter camera works.  Weird things we did as kids to show our parents we were responsible.  Some toys in Fedgewick’s shop shouldn’t be there yet in 1845.  Did “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” exist in 1845? Possibly, but not the version we know.  Doc’s wad of cash vs. England’s bank notes circa 1845.  Wilkins’s dog looks like 1980s T-shirt icon Rude Dog.  My Back to the Future-themed Good Friday and Easter Sunday tweets.  The closest thing we could find to a Kaiju Christmas movie is 1962’s “Gorath.”  ****  📼 Commercials:  Back to the Future: The Ride at Universal Studios Florida (1996)  Hi-C Ecto Cooler Commercial (1989), starring David Kaufmann, the voice of Marty.  ****  “Back to the Future,” the Animated Series, and “Dickens of a Christmas” © 1991 Universal Cartoon Studios / Amblin Television.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 10 years after “The Simpsons” debuted, Matt Groening presented another Christmas special about another Santa’s little helper.  🎙 Erin Evans and Joey O. joins us on a 2-dimensional flight back to 1999 to revisit “Olive, the Other Reindeer,” a misheard but not forgotten doggie treat.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The Making of “Olive, the Other Reindeer.”  “PaRappa the Rapper.”  “Mr. Lunch Takes a Plane Ride,” the first book by “Olive” creators Vivian Walsh and J. Otto Seibold.  “The Goonies II.”  Jay Mohr in “Camp Wilder.”  Famous mondegreens and the stupidest lyric I’ve ever misheard.  Dan Castellaneta’s Postman voice sounds like his Robot Devil.  “You’re no Jack Kennedy.”  Bullwinkle tried to kidnap my baby.  R U Talkin’ R.E.M. Re: Me?, formerly U Talkin’ U2 to Me? and currently U Talkin’ Talking Heads 2 My Talking Head?  Michael Stipe on “The Adventures of Pete & Pete.”  The pope gets a Phillies hat.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Amazon.com Christmas Countdown Commercial (1999)  Santa by the Minute.  The Christmas Podcasts Podcast.  ****  “Olive, the Other Reindeer” © 1999 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Filmation’s space western gets a dickens of a backstory.  🎙 Joey O. and Sammy Hain saddle up for a Scrooge Sunday edition of the Advent Calendar House looking back at a 1987 Christmas episode of “BraveStarr.”  📺 You can watch “Tex’s Terrible Night” on YouTube.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The Fisher-Price Western Town I used as a backdrop for the much larger Bravestarr action figure.  Joey’s interview with Pat Fraley (Marshal BraveStarr).  This episode uses flashback scenes from the movie “BraveStarr: The Legend,” which explains why the animation quality isn’t consistent.  Young Tex Hex looks like a purple Faker from “He-Man.”  Stampede, the show’s even bigger bad, grants Tex Hex the power of transformation, because Filmation really wanted to teach kids that things that transform are evil.  The “present-day” husband of Tex’s former love, Ursula, looks like Fred Ward.  The time BraveStarr found a kid dead of a drug overdose.  ****  📼 Commercial:  Marshal BraveStarr, Tex Hex, and Neutralaser Toy Commercial (1986)  Christmas Time in the City.  ****  “BraveStarr” and “Tex’s Terrible Night” ©1987 Filmation Associates.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 S-s-season’s greetings-s-s! You better watch out, because today we’re kindly rewinding back to a 1985 Christmas episode of “G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero,”🎙️ Joey O. parachutes in for “Cobra CLAWs Are Coming to Town,” featuring the incredible shrinking Cobra troops and a giant parrot.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  We don’t even get 4 minutes into this before bringing up the U.S.S. Flagg.  Then we get caught up in the Crossfire.  A brief history of the G.I. Joe toy line, from “America’s Movable Fighting Man” to the Adventure Team, to “A Real American Hero.”  “The Toys That Made Us” on Netflix.  The “opening monologue that explains the show” has nothing on Voltron’s.  Neil Ross (Shipwreck, Dusty, and Buzzer in this episode) has an audio camero in “Weird Al” Yankovic’s “I Can’t Watch This.”  Joey’s interviews with Pat Fraley (Wild Weasel), Gregg Berger (Firefly), Michael Bell (Duke, Blowtorch, Major Bludd), and Rob Paulsen (Tripwire, his earliest known voice credit).  “The Viper is Coming” is both our favorite G.I. Joe episode and my dad’s favorite dad joke.  “King Koopa’s Kool Kartoons,” starring Chris Latta (Cobra Commander).  We try and find Keystone City, which may or may not be somewhere in eastern Pennsylvania.  The titular Cobra CLAW (Covert Light Aerial Weapon), an odd name for a Cobra vehicle, because snakes don’t have claws.  Fenslerfilm’s G.I. Joe PSAs.  ****  📼 Commercials:  William “The Refrigerator” Perry G.I. Joe Action Figure (1987)  Weird Christmas.****  “G.I. Joe” and “Cobra CLAWs Are Coming to Town” © 1985 Hasbro, Inc.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.

🎄 Join us as we slowly slink sideways back to 1983 to celebrate the time someone literally threw an idea at the wall to see if it would stick.  🎙️ Joey O. returns to talk “Deck the Halls with Wacky Walls,” an animated Christmas special about Wacky WallWalkers. But first, we need to talk about the man behind the WallWalkers, Dr. Fad!  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “The Dr. Fad Show.”  Eight ’80s Xmas Specials You Might’ve Forgotten (Dinosaur Dracula, 2015)  X-Entertainment’s preserved 2003 tribute to the Wacky WallWalker.  This isn’t the right Apple Jacks commercial, but I can’t not mention young Julia Stiles scoffing that it doesn’t taste like apples.  Writer Mark Evanier’s blog.  The WallWalkers’ home planet looks like an M.C. Escher painting.  Darryl’s friend, Kenzo, is named after one of Dr. Fad’s sons. His other son married comedian Ali Wong.  The most expensive things we’ve asked for from our parents for Christmas, which pale in comparison to a $1,000 toy car — which, of course, we then look up its adjustment for inflation.  Waxing nostalgic about popcorn garland on Christmas trees.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Corn Pops Cereal with free Wacky WallWalker inside (1984)  ****  “Deck the Halls with Wacky Walls” © 1983 NBC Productions.  “The Dr. Fad Show” © 1988 Tradex Corp.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.