Advent Calendar House

We blur the lines of reality, time, and space and practice peace on Earth and good will to men, women, chickens, bears, and Dizzy Gillespie in the 1979 TV special, John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together.  ****  

In 1987, the California Raisins missed their bus, then made a sleigh out of garbage and flew it into space in the greatest holiday special out of all holiday specials hosted by clay dinosaurs.  WARNING: This episode inexplicably contains a major spoiler for the 2014 movie How to Train Your Dragon 2.  ****  

Let’s have a good, old-fashioned Christmas down on the farm in 1987’s A Garfield Christmas Special, featuring the voices of Squiggy and Ursula.  ****  

Rankin/Bass goes off the rails in its last-ever stop motion animated Christmas special, 1985’s The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus, based on the 1902 book by Wizard of Oz author L. Frank Baum, which explains a lot.  ****  

Hanukkah is here, so here’s a 1995 special starring sock puppets hanging out with Mr. Miyagi, the dad from Growing Pains, and the mayor of Gotham City.  ****  

Turn back the clock till it goes kerplunk — or kerplooey — to make some time for Rankin/Bass’s 1974 retelling of ’Twas the Night Before Christmas from the perspective of the mouse and his know-it-all nerdy son.  ****  

Get ready to blast off for Space Church as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Star Wars Holiday Special, the farthest point from the bright center of our favorite galaxy far, far away.  ****  

It’s time once again to count down to Christmas Eve, starting with 3 versions of Dr. Seuss’s classic Christmas tale from 1966, 2000, and 2018.  ****  

It’s time to dust off the cobwebs and get the Advent Calendar House ready for Season 2, featuring a new episode every day from December 1 through Christmas Eve, 2018.  In between commercial teasers for all 24 episodes coming in Season 2 — though not necessarily in order — the members of the all-new Christmas Podcast Network share stories of Christmas music traditions.  ****  

The Advent Calendar House presents a dazzling display of magical mischief as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of Witch’s Night Out, an often remembered, then forgotten, then re-remembered Halloween classic from 1978.  You can watch Witch’s Night Out at Shout! Factory TV.  ****  

We’re back for a surprise summertime episode on the 1986 animated movie, The Adventures of the American Rabbit, a star-spangled box-office bomb starring the voices of Donatello, Baby Piggy, and King Triton.  ****  

We’re back! This surprise bonus episode covers the 1976 Rankin/Bass special, The First Easter Rabbit, which despite its name and main theme, still relies heavily on Christmas.  ****  

In our Christmas Eve season finale, the Advent Calendar House is haunted by 3 spirited guests as we each draft our own casts of A Christmas Carol from a pool of characters from Christmas past.  ****  

Join us as we spend 17 times the length of a 30-second lottery commercial talking about the spot that had a whole commonwealth singing “FIVE CASH FIVES!”  ****  

In the Advent Calendar House’s first Hanukkah episode, we follow the Rugrats on their mission to stop the “Meanie of Chanukah” and make him take a nap, counting all the Yiddish words and misspoken “babyisms” along the way.  ****  

Ho-ho-ho, I’m hu-hu-hungry! Fill your soul with season’s greetings as we revisit a collection of Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles cereal commercials of Christmas past.  ****  

Trudge back to 1974 as we dig up a rare gem, The Gift of Winter, which introduces a colorful cast of characters better known from its Halloween sequel, Witch’s Night Out!  You can watch The Gift of Winter online on Shout! Factory TV.  ****  

Nobody can’t say no to this 30-second portrayal of Scrooge in a Christmastime commercial for Honey Nut Cheerios. Officially titled “Ebenezer Scrooge Discovers Honey Nut Cheerios,” this commercial ran from around 1987 through at least the end of the 20th century.  ****  

To mark the 30th anniversary of the shredded wheat and cranberry sauce of TV specials, we take a head count of every unexpected guest Fozzie Bear’s mother graciously welcomed into her home on Christmas Eve, 1987. It’s a lot.  ****  

Happy birthday! Join us as we begin our salute to all holiday specials, but mostly the Christmas ones by attempting to answer questions no one asked about the 1969 Rankin/Bass TV special, Frosty the Snowman.  ****