Product: A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)
Rating: 5.0
The Perfect Christmas Special
With Christmas coming to Peanuts-land, Charlie Brown suffers from holiday angst. The commercialism of the season, a mailbox always lacking Christmas cards and his little sister's monetary demands to Santa make Chuck wonder if Christmas is really something to anticipate. Unable to get any good advice from a therapy session with Lucy, Charlie Brown seems destined to be miserable through the holidays. Of all the Charlie Browns in the world, he is indeed the Charlie Browniest.To cheer him up, the gang puts Charlie Brown in charge of a very weird Christmas pageant that features a Christmas Queen, Beethoven music, a few people dressed as nativity characters and a stage full of dancers doing the same dance steps over and over and over. But Orson Welles he is not, and Chuck fails as a director.His pals give him one last chance to redeem himself by putting him in charge of procuring a Christmas tree. It is at this moment that the show makes a drastic switch in tone and ambition. The opening acts are full of silly set-ups and easy jokes. But as Chuck and his faithful pal Linus set out toward the Christmas tree lot, the narrative slows and strives for poignancy.The perpetually needle-shedding little tree they obtain and Linus's eventual speech on the true meaning of Christmas have become iconic moments for the holiday season. Linus himself seems to guide the last half of the show, as the baby-faced blankie-wielding introvert swoops in and steals Charlie Brown's Christmas special from him. Linus sees the potential for greatness in the little tree, believing it only needs some love. Indeed, the eternal optimism and right-mindedness of Charlie Brown's best friend transforms the show from a gloomy diatribe against modern Christmas to a declaration on the potential for beauty and wonder to blossom everywhere during the Christmas season.