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🎄 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.  #s2 #1970s #rankinbass #nativity

🎄 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.  #s2 #1970s #disney #nativity

🎄 Young Conan the Barbarian meets baby Jesus on this episode of the official holiday podcast for people who hate all humans — which, in 2020, is most of us.  🎙️ Brandon Medley and Michael May join the dance to the beat of our own drum back to 1968 and back into the Rankin/Bass universe for their stop-motion follow-up to “Rudolph.”  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  This was Romeo Muller’s favorite Christmas special he wrote for Rankin/Bass. Also, that link on Rankin/Bass’s website is from 2003 and looks like it hasn’t been touched since 2003.  Paul Frees voices of 8 different characters in this special, if you count animal noises.  The song, originally called “Carol of the Drum,” was written more recently than I’d thought — in 1941 — and first recorded in 1951 by the Trapp Family Singers.  Aaron’s origin story is the same as Conan the Barbarian’s.  Here’s an isolated recording of “One Star in the Night,” without the narration.  Burl Ives wouldn’t have felt out of place narrating this special, since he’d go on to narrate one about another caravan.  The special also mixes up its kings, at least as they’re traditionally named.  Our definitive versions of the song.  Young Brandon insists on adding the Little Drummer Boy to a church Nativity pageant.  ****  📼 Commercials:  Kentucky Fried Chicken: Christmas Carol (1989)  NetfliXmas.  Feliz Christmas, Merry Navidad.  ****  “The Little Drummer Boy” © 1968 Rankin/Bass Productions.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s5 #1960s #rankinbass #nativity

🎄 Previously on the Advent Calendar House, we went on an apocryphal adventure with the story of The Little Drummer Boy.  This time, Rankin/Bass drums up an unnecessary sequel from 1976, its busiest year for holiday specials.  🎙️ Brandon Medley joins us on a side quest to retrieve the stolen silver bells from a troop of greedy Roman soldiers in the “Rogue One” of Christmas stories.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Allen Swift (Melchior) as Twinkie the Kid.  Simeon the bellmaker is very loosely based on the Biblical Simeon, but his Song of Simeon is left out.  Ray Owens (Simeon) as the voice of Superbook, and Jesus in “The Flying House.”  Zero Mostel (Brutus) on “The Muppet Show.”  “Money Money Money” (not the song from “Mamma Mia!”)  How bad is Brutus compared to the other Rankin/Bass Christmas villains?  “Do You Hear What I Hear?” was written during the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Our favorite recordings of “Do You Hear What I Hear?” by Copeland, the Mike Sammes Singers for Disneyland Records, and one by Spiraling that invokes The Who’s “Baba O’Riley.”  ****  📼 Commercials:  Kodak XL Movie Camera: “One Christmas” (1976)  Holly Jolly X’masu, your podcast destination for Japanese Christmas music. ****  “The Little Drummer Boy, Book II” © 1976 Rankin/Bass Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  #s10 #1970s #rankinbass #nativity

🎄 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.  #s10 #1990s #scroogesunday #warnerbros #nativity

🎄It’s 1983, and the Worst Kids in the World are taking over the church Nativity play, smoking in the ladies’ room, and helping themselves to the sacramental grape juice.  🎙 Scott Leopold from Holly Jolly X’masu and Bob Baker from Festive Foreign Film Fans join us as we meet the Herdmans in a classic Christmas story turned TV movie starring Loretta Swit from “M*A*S*H” and a young Fairuza Balk in her on-screen debut.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Today’s TV Tropes: It’s the Best Whatever, Ever and Title Drop.  Author Barbara Robinson wrote 2 sequels: “The Best School Year Ever” (1994) and “The Best Halloween Ever” (2004).  Fairuza Balk (Beth) in “The Waterboy.”  Loretta Swit (Grace) interview: “Meanest kids in town make the best pageant,” AP via The Free Lance-Star, 1983.  Jason Michas (Leroy) as Johnny Arcade in “The Power Team” animated segment from Season 1 of “Video Power.”  Antony Holland (Reverend Hopkins) as Dr. Light — er, “Wright” — in “Captain N: The Game Master.”  Ocean Hellman (Alice) in “Danger Bay,” which keeps coming up this season.  ****  📼 Commercial:  Duracell “No Longer Under the Christmas Tree” Commercial (1983)  Festive Foreign Film Fans.  ****  “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” © 1983 Comworld Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Full show notes and social links at adventcalendar.house.  #s11 #1980s #nativity

🎄 Fresh from 1996 comes a Christmas tale that’ll make you cry, but only because it’s being told by an onion.  🎙️ Anthony Strand hops along for the ride as we buzz back to the VeggieTales’ first Christmas special, in which the only children’s toy that comes with a working circular saw embarks on a quest to find the true reason for the season.  📺 You can watch the official version of “The Toy That Saved Christmas” for free on YouTube, or the original 1996 version on the Internet Archive.  ****  💬 Topics & Tangents:  Differences between the original and the reanimated version from 1997.  “Happy Birthday, Baby Jesus.”  “Most folks call ’em green onions, but they’re really scallions.”  This Mr. Nezzer is not the previously seen Nebby K. Nezzer, but his brother, Wally P. Nezzer, who’s not as cleverly named.  The original vs. the new, improved Bunny Song.  The shelves of Buzzsaw Louies predate the shelves of Buzz Lightyears in “Toy Story 2.”  Ken Cavanagh (Buzzsaw Louie) may have authored this Medium post from 2020: “Leave Jesus Out of It. Viruses don’t care what you believe.”  “The Dead Sea Squirrels,” by Mike Nawrocki.  Today’s TV Trope: Blatant Burglar.  Doctors in the hallway in “Muppets From Space.”  What do you call a group of penguins?  Two More Eggs: CGI Palz.  ****  📼 Commercials:  VeggieTales: “The Incredible Singing Christmas Tree” album (2005)  The Incredible, Edible Egg: Wisecracks (1991)  Mouse Trap (1990)  The Studio Demands It!  ****  “VeggieTales” and “The Toy That Saved Christmas” © 1996 Big Idea Productions.  Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  Find us at adventcalendar.house.  Hosted by The Retro Network.  #s15 #1990s #nativity