This is the first of the four lesser-known Peanuts specials
of the decade, but it’s also one that presents what would become one of the
biggest conventions of the specials. We
all know that Charlie Brown’s shtick is that he can never find victory in
certain activities of life, and most of the failures come from
his attempts to win a baseball game.
This special really hammers this in with mentions of his team’s
notorious streak of 999 straight losses and a big collection of big fails that
come from the team during the first game of the season. Those scenes of failed pitches, dropped
balls, and clueless players make for some really funny gags but at the same
time, it’s easy to feel the frustration that no one on Charlie Brown’s team
seems capable of winning. You might think that the reason the team can’t win is because Charlie
Brown sucks, but the fact is, through watching the game scenes in this special,
all the kids suck. They don’t seem to
pay attention to the game, spend their time commentating on the pitcher and
expect Charlie Brown to catch all the fly balls. With that in mind, it kind of leads you to
wonder if it’s really appropriate that the kids direct all the blame on Charlie
Brown. Now, the meanness of the kids,
especially of Lucy and the other girls of the team, does help give these
specials some edge and it makes sense considering how much of an outsider
Charlie Brown is to them since he fails a lot, but sometimes they go a little
too far with their treatment of him.
It’s fine and tolerable at the start of the special when everyone is so
frustrated with their constant losses that they end up quitting the team, even
if they only acknowledge Charlie Brown’s faults and not their own, but I will
say that their meanness does start to go too far when they bully him and ignore
him even when they’re not playing baseball.
That said, this special does demonstrate the great appeal of Charlie
Brown’s character. Even with all the
animosity he faces, he still considers all the members of the team to be his
friends, so much so that he greatly accepts an offer that will get his team in
a real league and a set of team uniforms to boot, and only turns the offer down
when he learns that playing in a league means he has to get rid of the girls
and Snoopy. It also shows how determined
he is to make things go his way despite always facing failure by being
hard-pressed to keep his team together and win a game so that they’ll forget
about being in a league and never find out he turned the offer down. At first, the game he has the team play
serves as quite a high point for the special, featuring all the kids actually
playing their best. Heck, even Charlie
Brown himself gets a hit. However,
there’s shown to be a downside to Charlie Brown’s determination as his trying
to be a hero causes the team to lose the game.
He ends up facing some more meanness from the team, but it’s far more
acceptable here than earlier because if he just waited at third base for
another hit, the team most likely wouldn’t have lost. What follows though is a good-hearted moment
that somewhat makes up for what we witnessed from the team. The girls and Snoopy learn that Charlie Brown
turned down the league deal to keep them on the team, and even get told off by
Linus and Schroeder for being such jerks.
It’s just so rewarding to see characters actually get called out for
their mean behavior every so often, especially when it leads to the girls
making Charlie Brown his own uniform to show that despite what they say to him,
he really is their friend. This special
really shows off the appeal of the baseball-focused stories of Peanuts. There’s a lot of humor in the ways Charlie
Brown’s team end up losing, examples of how strong of a character Charlie Brown
is despite his failings, and fun interactions between characters which also
make for some nice moments. This
particular special can get a little too mean at times, but it’s easy to look
past it and get in on some big league entertainment from this little league
team.
Recommended
Ranking
1) A Charlie Brown Christmas
2) Charlie Brown’s All-Stars
Be sure to stay tuned for the review of another popular Peanuts special of the 1960s, "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown."
No comments:
Post a Comment