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🎄 Ho-ho-ho, I’m hu-hu-hungry! Fill your soul with season’s greetings and another batch of cereal commercials from Christmas past.  🎙️ Uh-oh, here comes Joey O. to revisit a collection of seasonal ads for Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles, starring Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The main attraction: This Fruity Pebbles Christmas commercial, circa 1986, and a redubbed version with Jim Cummings as Santa from the early ’90s.  An older Fruity Pebbles Christmas commercial, dated 1980.  A Newer Cocoa Pebbles “Christmas Carol” commercial.  “I’m the Master Rapper and I’m here to say, I love Fruity Pebbles in a major way!”  The theory I’m going with: Fred and Barney know about Christmas because they live in a post-apocalyptic future.  The Rock’s Fruity Pebbles promo on John Cena, 2011.  WWE’s Christmas in Baghdad opening from 2003, featuring “Stone Cold” Steve Austin disguised as Santa Claus.  ****  Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles cereal commercials © Post Consumer Brands / Warner Bros.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s1 #1980s #commercials #hannabarbera #flintstones

🎄 Santa’s sleigh is grounded in the original video game crash.  The Advent Calendar House kicks off another Christmas countdown by rewinding back to 1982, when Santa found himself stranded in Pac-Man’s neighborhood.  🎙 Lindy and Alicia join us for a stroll through “Christmas Comes to Pacland,” where no one knows about Christmas, but somehow the Ghost Monsters know the words to “Jingle Bells.”  🚨 Warning: Santa spoilers from 11:25 to 13:30.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Santa is flying with 8 reindeer, including Rudolph. Who got the night off?  Why some reindeer actually have red noses.  This might be the first time a Christmas special shows Santa using a computer.  Russi Taylor’s Pac-Baby has the same voice she later used for Robin in “Muppet Babies.”  Absent from this special is the Ghost Monsters’ boss, Mezmaron.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Pac-Man Cereal (1984)  Chef Boyardee Pac-Man Pasta (1984)  A Bomb for Christmas, made for podcast Christmas movie by Tim Babb of the Can’t Wait for Christmas Podcast, co-starring Mike as “Captain Willis.”  ****  “Christmas Comes to Pacland” © 1982 Hanna-Barbera Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s5 #1980s #hannabarbera #videogames

🎄 It’s Christmas Eve in the Advent Calendar House as we walk through a ring of fire back to 1982 to dance with the Smurfs and watch goodness make the badness go away.  🎙 Thom Crowe from Tis the Podcast and Gerry Davila from Totally Rad Christmas join us for a heaping help of Greedy Smurf’s cauldron of pink pudding.  📺 You can watch “The Smurfs’ Christmas Special” for free on YouTube.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  My son thinks the king of Hyrule is Santa.  I just now learned about Watergate salad.  The Smurfs in theme parks.  Danny Goldman (Brainy Smurf) in “Young Frankenstein.”  Paul Winchell (Gargamel) invented an artificial heart.  The mysterious Stranger may or may not be the actual Devil.  Teaser for a new Smurfs animated series.  ****  📼 Commercial:  The Smurfs at Kings Dominion (1984)  ****  “The Smurfs” and “The Smurfs’ Christmas Special” © 1982 Hanna-Barbera Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s5 #1980s #hannabarbera

🎄 Santa falls off the roof, and a guy who acts like a caveman takes over his job.  🎙 Gerry Davila from Totally Rad Christmas and Sean Sotka from the Christmas Podcasts Podcast join us as we close out another countdown to Christmas in July with a sleigh ride back to the Stone-Age Year of Our Lord 1977.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Our episode on the Fruity Pebbles Christmas Commercial.  I found a Flintstones chronology on, of all places, Flickr.  The Internet Archive’s VHS Vault.  Domino Rally.    I want to know more about Santa’s reindeer turn signals.  “Daze Before Christmas” for Super Nintendo and Mega Drive (Genesis).  Virginia Gregg (Mrs. Claus) was the uncredited voice of Norman Bates’s mother in the first 3 Psycho movies.  Santa’s workshop should have gotten Flintstone Theming.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Fruity Pebbles: Rapping Barney (1988)  Voice Command Crusher RC Car (1993)  Behind the Bells.  ****  “A Flintstone Christmas” © 1977 Hanna-Barbera Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s6 #1970s #hannabarbera #flintstones

🎄 It’s 1985, but we’re rocketing into the future, when apparently urgent veterinary care no longer exists.  🎙 Jack Ford from the Total Christmas Podcast joins us for a glimpse into the space-age year of 2062 to find out if 3 robotic ghosts of Christmas can convince Mr. Spacely to change his stingy ways, while the clock is ticking for the Jetsons’ dog, Astro, on his deathbed.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  George Jetson apparently was/will be born at the end of July 2022.  George O’Hanlon (George Jetson) as Joe McDoakes in a series of instructional parody short films from the 1940s and ’50s.  The Jetsons’ “laser tree.”  “Bongo Feet and Zip,” the classic Hanna-Barbara running sound effect, is heard 9 times in this episode.  This episode marks the last appearance speaking appearance of the Jetsons’ pet alien, Orbitty.  Astro’s supposed fever is normal for dogs.  How the Flintstones movie teenage Spacely and his future wife watch changes the theory that both shows take place in the same time period.  The robotic Ghost of Christmas Past, Present (literally a talking wrapped Christmas present), and “Yet to Be.”  I had to look up whether Spacely even had a pet to warrant having a personal veterinarian. Meet Zero.  ****  📼 Commercials:  George Jetson’s Air Pollution PSA, National Clean Air Coalition (1990)  Cool Kids Club, a nostalgia-fueled trip back to the ’80s and ’90s.  ****  “The Jetsons” and “A Jetson Christmas Carol” © 1985 Hanna-Barbara Productions, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s8 #1980s #scroogesunday #hannabarbera

🎄 It’s 1979, and no one wants to go to Pat Boone’s lame Christmas party, but everyone’s here to dunk on him.  🎙 Guy Hutchinson extends an invitation to discover this bizarre but wholesome special featuring the Hudson Brothers, the stars of “The Ropers” as themselves but also still as the Ropers, and a criminally brief appearance by Yogi Bear and his Hanna-Barbera friends.  📺 You can watch the “Pat Boone and Family Christmas Special” on Tubi.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Pat Boone’s album of heavy metal covers from 1997.  TV Guide’s ad for the special, prominently featuring Yogi Bear and friends.  “The Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show,” as seen in a “Family Guy” cutaway gag.  “The Seventh Python,” Brett Hudson’s 2008 documentary about frequent Monty Python collaborator Neil Innes.  “Largo al Factotum,” the “Figaro” song from “The Barber of Seville.”  Dinah Shore’s giant belt buckle.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Master Charge Christmas Commercial (1979)  Season’s Eatings.  ****  “Pat Boone and Family Christmas Special” © 1979 Cooga Mooga Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s9 #1970s #hannabarbera

🎄 Previously on the Advent Calendar House, we witnessed goodness make the badness go away in “The Smurfs’ Christmas Special.”  This time, we’re taking a one giant puppy open sleigh ride back to 1987 to spend another Christmas with the Smurfs.  🎙️ Lindy Kempe and Donnie Storms join us to help the Smurfs save Christmas for a poor human toymaker and his gravely ill wife, while Brainy and Hefty get lost in medieval Crime Alley.  📺 You can watch “’Tis the Season to be Smurfy” for free on YouTube, or an upscaled version including the opening credits.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “Look at the adjective…”  The crazy backstories of the Smurfs’ Puppy and Sassette.  The Great Cookie Thief.  New and improved Joker products!  Painter Smurf paints like “Duck Amuck.”  ****  📼 Commercials:  Smurf-Berry Crunch Cereal (1983)  Bad Princess Movies.  ****  “’Tis the Season to be Smurfy” © 1987 Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s10 #1980s #hannabarbera

🎄 Previously on the Advent Calendar House, we watched a cavemen take over Santa’s job after he fell off the roof in “A Flintstone Christmas.”  This time, our reunion tour of previously podcasted-about characters makes its final stop of the season in Bedrock, where Fred Flintstone is letting the lead role of “Ebonezer” Scrooge go to his head.  🎙️ “Ant-stony” Strand and “Mi-coal” May join us as we watch Wilma do the workload of I lost count of how many victims of the highly contagious Bedrock Bug. We also make the strongest case yet that this Modern Stone-Age Family does, indeed, know about who made lame beggars walk and blind men see.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  “A Flintstone Family Christmas,” from a year before, was the last appearance of adult Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm.  “The Flintstones & WWE: Stone-Age Smackdown!”  The latest we’ve waited to shop for our spouses.  A grown-up Philo Quartz from “The Flintstone Kids” appears here and then never again.  The Piltdown Man hoax.  How big is the stage, and how are the actors playing ghosts appearing translucent?  They added a “love scene” with Belle, and Maggie Magma is way too excited about it.  Brian Cummings (Ernie/The Ghost of Christmas Present) did a weird Kermit the Frog voice in a promo for “Mr. Willowby’s Christmas Tree.”  Other Dickens characters have headstones in the graveyard.  IMDb credits Rip Taylor as the voice of a Venus flytrap tuba in the orchestra pit.  (These show notes originally included a link to vote on which version of “A Christmas Carol” we’d cover for Christmas Eve! Here’s what won.)  ****  📼 Commercials:  Cocoa Pebbles “Christmas Carol” commercial (1998)  “Dinner & a Movie” makes standing rib roast with “Rockshire” pudding (1996)  ****  “A Flintstones Christmas Carol” © 1994 Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s10 #1990s #scroogesunday #hannabarbera #flintstones

🎄It’s 1980, and my spoiled nephew just got beaten in a ski-jumping contest by a bear who’s never seen winter before.  🎙 Bill Hanstock join us we fail upward through middle to upper hotel management featuring a simultaneously very mature and very immature conversation about cartoon bears discovering mistletoe. What could be the Jellystone Winter Lodge’s final Christmas carnival manages to wake up Yogi Bear, who hibernates directly underneath it but somehow never knew about it before now.  📖 Check out Bill’s book, “We Promised You a Great Main Event: An Unauthorized WWE History.”  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  This special opens with a typo: The sign reads “Yellystone Park.”  Daws Butler’s Snagglepuss voice was a Bert Lahr impression that was so spot on, Lahr threatened to sue when Snagglepuss started endorsing Kellogg’s cereal.  Hanna-Barbera’s Christmas Sing-A-Long album, featuring songs from this special.  Yogi was in “Casper’s First Christmas” in 1979, so this isn’t really Yogi’s First Christmas.  Fruity Pebbles Christmas Commercial episode (2017)  The Wonkamobile.  ClickHole: “Which One of My Garbage Sons Are You?” Clickhole, 2014.  Eddie the Eagle.  Mickey Mouse’s shirtless (and hatless) Steamboat Willie winter look at Disneyland.  “Mean, Sour, Crafty, and Cruel” in “Oliver and the Artful Dodger” and “Smurfs.”  The Zone of Death in the part of Yellowstone National Park that’s in Idaho.  “Christmas Is Here” in “A Flintstone Christmas.”  ****  📼 Commercials:  Cocoa Krispies Snagglepuss “Heavens to Murgatroyd” Commercial, circa 1963.  Bad Princess Movies.  ****  “Yogi’s First Christmas” © 1980 Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s11 #1980s #hannabarbera

🎄 We wrap up Christmas in July with an old-fashioned scary ghost story.  🎙️ Adam Pope and Donnie Storms join the trip aboard the Mystery Machine back to 1984 for Scooby-Doo’s very first Christmas special, in which the gang tries to save an orphanage with the power of pageantry, and stop the mysterious Ghost of Christmas Never.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries opening was riding the “Thriller” wave.  Beetlejuice’s Graveyard Revue.  Mr. Wizard and the Talking Head Illusion.  Our experience with Christmas pageants, including some unfortunate elementary school play featuring the song, “Santa Claus, Santa Claus, you are much too fat.”  The elf costumes look like Tingle.  The Mystery Sleigh!  Go-Gurt + Scooby-Doo = Ro-Gurt!  Today’s TV Trope: Read the Fine Print.  The Scooby-Doo Character Reference Guide.  “The PTA has disbanded!”  The Little Rascals (1994) boys crash the ballet.  Mr. Burns collapses on a sundial after being shot.  Scooby Apocalypse.  Adam’s stitched Scooby-Doo portrait.  ****  📼 Commercials:  The Kodak Disc (1984)  Remember That Show?  ****  “The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries” and “The Nutcracker Scoob” © 1984 Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s14 #1980s #hannabarbera

🎄 Found under a pile of too many toys, enough for 442 boys, is a little-known gem of a Christmas special from 1993.  🎙️ Chad Young from the Horror Movie BBQ, Jeff Loftin from the Lost Christmas Podcast, and Sean Sotka from ChristmasPodcasts.com join us for the story of Jeremy Creek, a kid so greedy, Santa mistook his list for an entire town’s. Featuring the voices of Dick Van Dyke, Hal Smith, and the kid from “Kindergarten Cop” who gave us an anatomy lesson.  📺 You can find “The Town Santa Forgot” on the Internet Archive.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  The original poem: “Jeremy Creek” (Indianapolis Star, 1985)  Jeremy Creek (no relation) from the “Smallville” pilot.    Miko Hughes (Jeremy) in People magazine (2024): “Kindergarten Cop Child Actor Recalls Working with Arnold Schwarzenegger — and the Origin of That Iconic Line.”  Today’s TV Trope: Signs of Disrepair.  One of Hal Smith’s final voice acting roles during his lifetime. (He had a posthumous credit in “Zelda’s Adventure.”)  Larry Walters has a flying lawn chair and a BB gun.  ****  📼 Commercials:  NBC Commercial Break during the original 1993 airing of this special, including “The Muppet Christmas Carol” on VHS, and Wendy’s Big Bacon Classic.  ****  “The Town Santa Forgot” © 1993 Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.  #s15 #1990s #hannabarbera

🎄 Well, them podcast boys have run into another Scrooge Sunday, and this time, the ghosts from “A Christmas Carol” are haunting Boss Hogg in the Dukes of Hazzard’s Saturday morning cartoon counterpart.  🎙️ Michael DiGiovanni and new guest Ken Kessler from The Sounds of Christmas join the ride through Christmas past, present, and future as the Dukes take a holiday from their race around the world in an episode that made us wish they’d get back to racing.  📺 You can find “A Dickens of a Christmas” on the Internet Archive.  ****  (00:00) - Intro  (02:23) - Personal and Series History  (10:03) - Act 1: Big Jake Marley’s Ghost  (23:27) - Retro Commercial Break  (25:29) - Act 2: Christmas Past and Present  (37:19) - Act 3: Christmas Future and The End of It  (48:35) - Final Thoughts  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  John Schneider and Tom Wopat made a Christmas album.  Sorrell Booke (Boss Hogg) as Santa on “Full House.”  Christmas in Russia is on January 7th.  Is this story’s Belle substitute the only time we ever meet Uncle Jesse’s late (or, in this case, future) wife?  ****  📼 Commercials:  “The Dukes” Saturday Morning Promo (1983)  Kentucky Fried Chicken Christmas Commercial (circa 1987)  Snow in Southtown  ****  “The Dukes” and “A Dickens of a Christmas” © 1983 Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc.  “The Dukes of Hazzard” © 1983 Warner Bros., Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.  #s16 #1980s #scroogesunday #hannabarbera

🐰 This Easter in July, we’ve hopped back to 1994 on a rather stressful and dangerous trip through Jellystone Park.  🎙️ Sammy Hain and Gerry Davila join us for a visit to the Easter Bunny, the Magical Easter Chicken, and the world’s least eco-friendly plastic factory, all of which somehow call Jellystone Park home.  📺 You can find “Yogi the Easter Bear” on the Internet Archive.  ****  (00:00) - Intro  (02:23) - Guest and Special Histories  (05:50) - Act 1  (46:15) - Retro Commercial Break  (47:50) - Act 2  (59:22) - Act 3  (01:18:36) - Final Thoughts  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  There’s a whole franchise of Jellystone Park campgrounds.  Don’t feed bears chocolate!  Today’s TV Tropes: “Oh, Crap!” Smile and Bat Scare.  The International Ranger Federation was founded way more recently than I expected.  Sesame Street News Flash: Holiday Mix-Up.  The creepy Easter Bunny from “Teen Titans Go!”  “The Simpsons,” Duff, Duff Light, and Duff Dry.  “Saturday Night Live,” Colon Blow.  Easter Sammy’s Spring Breakers T-shirt, designed by Jayme!  ****  📼 Commercials:  Cadbury Bunny Tryouts (1994)  Totally Rad Christmas  ****  “Yogi the Easter Bear” © 1994 Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.  #s16 #1990s #easter #hannabarbera