It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown – DVD Review

Nostalgia at its best…

Anyone under the age of forty no doubt has fond memories of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the rest of the Peanuts gang. You instantly go back to your childhood when you see any of the 50 or so Peanuts specials on TV. Beginning with the Christmas special, Charles M. Schulz started a tradition of dropping his lovable characters into the world of all of the major holidays. A more recent tradition is releasing “deluxe” editions of all the Peanuts holiday specials starting with the Valentine’s Day special last month. With Easter coming around the corner, it’s only natural that they released a “deluxe” edition of It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown next.

There are three different storylines going on in It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown. Peppermint Patty (voiced by Linda Ercoli) attempts to dye some Easter eggs, and teach Marcie (Jimmy Ahrens) how do so at the same time, which is not as easy as it sounds. Elsewhere, Snoopy tries to secure a dry home for Woodstock (both voiced by Bill Melendez). Meanwhile, Linus (Stephen Shea) believes the “Easter Beagle” will come and bring eggs and candy and peace to all the children in the world. Somehow he even convinces Sally Brown of that as well.

This Easter special was actually the 13th made-for-TV Peanuts special that was produced. That is a good and a bad thing for this special. The good is that all the things that have worked in the past works again here, like the great relationship between Snoopy and Woodstock. But at the same time certain storylines have that “seen it before” aspect to them like the whole Easter Beagle/Linus storyline. In fact, this storyline seems to be completely copied from It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Once again Linus believes in something that hardly anyone else believes in and somehow Snoopy is involved. In addition, the running gag with Peppermint Patty, Marcie, and the coloring of the eggs starts to get old towards the end of the special.

All of those negatives can’t discount all the positives, though. There are many cute and memorable moments here, especially with Snoopy. In fact, it might surprise you that Snoopy is much more of a focus in this special than Charlie Brown. It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown may not be the best Peanut special, and certainly not the most original, but it’s still pretty good. In addition, this is as good as this special is going to get. You just can’t help but smile as you watch another classic Peanuts special, despite its flaws.

The video is given in 1.33:1 fullscreen color. You shouldn’t expect a widescreen version of this animated feature since it is over 30 years old. However, the video has been digitally remastered so this is without a doubt the best this feature is going to look. It’s really about as good as you would expect and a vast improvement over the original release.

The audio included is available in either English Mono sound, Spanish Mono sound, or Portuguese Mono sound. There are subtitles available in English, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Portuguese, and Thai as well. The music and dialogue come out loud and clear, so no major problems either. Still not the greatest musical score for a Peanuts special.

It’s Arbor Day, Charlie Brown Bonus Feature –
This is another full-length holiday special that was on the previous release of this disc. Despite the holiday not being that great of one, the overall story in this special is really great. The baseball season is in full swing, which go hand-in-hand in planting trees. There are actually better jokes in this special than the Easter special. Again, not the greatest holiday special but still on par, if not better than the Easter special. Really underrated.

“In Full Bloom: Peanuts at Easter” Featurette –
This is all new featurette that runs 15 minutes long. Various crew members, historians, family members, and even other cartoonists who were just fans of Charles Schulz’s work talk about this Charlie Brown Easter special. It’s very interesting to hear a variety of people talk about the comic strip and animated special for this holiday.

This Easter special is fun enough that any kid will love it. That goes for grown-up kids who grew up watching all of these specials. The bonus feature is really underrated as well, so overall the content is fairly good. If you are wondering about whether or not this “deluxe” edition is worth a purchase if you already have the original release, that would be a yes. The video is greatly improved and the insight given in the new documentary about the Easter special is all worth a second purchase.

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Warner Home Video presents It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown. Directed by Phil Roman. Featuring the voices of Jimmy Ahrens, Todd Barbee, Linda Ercoli, Melanie Kohn, Bill Melendez, Lynn Mortensen, and Stephen Shea. Written by Charles M. Schulz. Running time: 25 minutes. Not Rated. Released on DVD: February 19, 2008. Available at Amazon.com