Hi everyone, and welcome to another edition of the Nightcrawler Experience!
This is the first in a hopefully two- part Halloween- related series for this blog this year, and is again done in partnership with St. John's United Methodist Church, this time for a family event tying in to their wonderful Pumpkin Patch fundraiser. Tonight, we will be looking at the well- loved old Halloween TV special, 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!'
(Credit for this image goes to the user Baldwin17 on the Halloween Specials Wiki at https://halloween.fandom.com/wiki/It%27s_the_Great_Pumpkin,_Charlie_Brown?file=It%2527s_the_Great_Pumpkin.png)
Obviously based on the classic Charles Schulz comic strip "Peanuts" with Charlie Brown and his friends, this 1966 special has the whole gang each preparing for Halloween in their own ways.
Good old Charlie Brown and his friends are anticipating trick or treating and a big Halloween party. His younger sister Sally is excited as this will apparently be her first year being able to go trick or treating.
Their dog Snoopy, who dresses up as a World War 1 flying ace for the occasion, becomes quite convinced he actually IS one and must stop the "Red Baron" and escape from behind enemy lines (Strange, I know).
Last but most prominently, Charlie Brown's best friend Linus camps out in a local pumpkin patch to await the expected arrival of "The Great Pumpkin," a figure who apparently comes out of a "Sincere" pumpkin patch every Halloween and brings presents to all children who believe in him. He eventually convinces Sally, who of course has always had a crush on him, to join him in this.
Nobody's night goes well. Charlie Brown for some unexplained reason gets rocks from every house he trick or treats at, and is humiliated at the party. Linus and Sally don't fare any better as the Great Pumpkin never comes, and Sally angrily yells at Linus for this.
Nevertheless, the next day, Linus's faith remains unshaken, as he vows he'll keep trying each Halloween until he sees the Great Pumpkin.
Now, it's time for a little honesty: I've always considered 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown' to be rather overrated. Even as a kid, I found it REALLY depressing, as so many characters' Halloweens are completely ruined; Charlie Brown gets nothing but rocks from everyone while trick- or- treating (Seriously, why does everyone hate Charlie Brown so much? Did he poison the town's water supply or something? Also, how could the people at the houses even tell it was him, considering that his ghost costume covered him all over, including covering his face?) and the party was a disaster for him, and Linus and Sally both waste their Halloweens waiting for the Great Pumpkin who never comes. Consider, in contrast, the Charlie Brown Christmas special: That, too, had Charlie Brown going through a lot of unpleasant things, but at least it all came together well in the end and his efforts were rewarded. In this, though, there's no such happy payoff.
Nevertheless, it does have some funny and charming moments, and while I'm not a huge fan of it, I can see why others are. The voice acting from the kids is good, and it establishes a nice Halloween- esque atmosphere. It nostalgia value is through the roof, too.
I was able to find a few good Scriptural lessons to be taken from 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.'
The first, in the devotional distributed at the screening, used 2 Timothy 3:16 and Romans 1:20 to help show that, unlike Linus's misplaced faith in the Great Pumpkin, we as Christians can rest assured that our faith in Jesus Christ is well- founded, well- proven and 100% true.
Once again, though, I'd say there's more to be found.
Another theological lesson I've found in it is on the surprising kindness and mercy that people can be capable of. An obviously quite prominent character in 'Peanuts' stories is Lucy Van Pelt, who is Linus's sister and Charlie Brown's most frequent tormentor. Needless to say, she is NOT a nice person, terrorizing Charlie Brown every chance she can get and regularly mocking Linus for his faith in the Great Pumpkin. Nevertheless, even someone as nasty as her can be capable of kindness and mercy, as shown in two ways: While out trick or treating, Lucy makes a point of requesting extra candy that she can give to Linus, and at the end of the night, while Linus is miserably sleeping in the pumpkin patch with the weather increasingly colder, Lucy gets up, leaves the house, gets her brother, and lovingly brings him home and puts him to bed. I wouldn't have thought she had it in her! Such kindness is especially powerful because she was pretty angry at Linus at the time, due to his devotion to the Great Pumpkin making her as his sister look bad.
This is very much a Scriptural concept. Ephesians 4:32 instructs believers to "Be kind and compassionate to each other, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you!' If even someone as normally unpleasant as Lucy can show such compassion and forgiveness, then why can't we? God forgave us and showed mercy to us through sending Jesus to die for us, the least we can do is forgive and show mercy to each other for the much smaller in comparison wrongs we may commit against each other.
I think a final lesson to be taken from 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown' is on developing a childlike innocence and faith. However, this concerns not the special itself, but rather a quite heartwarming story I've heard relating to the fans' reactions to it. It appears I'm not the only one who was saddened by the unfairness of Charlie Brown getting nothing but rocks for Halloween; Charles Schulz once said that, in the weeks following the special's premiere, he received a ton of fan- mail packages from children all over the country which included bags full of candy and instructions to give all of it to Charlie Brown! This great story reminds me of what was said about Jesus in Matthew 18:2-4: " 2 He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. 3 And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven." I'd say that story about how the children reacted to this special gives a good example of some of what it means to be like a child in the way Jesus described. Simple kindness, innocence, a humble faith, and a desire to set things right and help those we believe have been wronged.
Before this entry ends, I have one more funny addition to make relating to 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown,' if any of you are interested in it: One of my current favorite Youtube channels is known as Shanieology, and the best feature of it is when he does what are known as "Skeletor Reaction" videos, in which he appears in costume and in character as He- Man's archenemy Skeletor and reacts to various videos and shows (Sometimes He- Man- related, other times not) in this way. They are always very funny to watch, and he has done many of these reaction videos in which he reacts to the assorted 'Peanuts'- related TV specials. He did a reaction video to 'It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown' last year that makes for a genuinely hilarious analysis of it. Check it out:
With that, I bring this edition of the Nightcrawler Experience to a close. Keep an eye out for my next Halloween- related entry, I should have that up soon. Until then, take care, and may God bless you all!
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