Peanuts, for those who may have been living in a bubble since 1950, is a comic strip created by Charles Schulz that features a cast of children, a beagle named Snoopy, and a bird named Woodstock. The stories tend to revolve around Snoopy's owner, the "round-headed kid" named Charlie Brown, and the conflict between his eternal hope and regularly being disappointed with reality. While Schulz was a practicing Christian, and many passages of scripture found their way into the strip, his intent was simply to "draw funny pictures every day," as his son Craig Schulz puts it in the "In Full Bloom: Peanuts at Easter" featurette.
In 1965, A Charlie Brown Christmas aired on CBS. It was the first of many popular prime-time TV specials based on the Peanuts characters, including 1966's It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, which is later referenced in It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown. The latter first aired on CBS in 1974, and has been rebroadcast annually since then, with the exception of 2007, when it was inexplicably not shown by ABC, who currently holds the rights to it. In 1975, it was nominated for the Outstanding Children's Special Emmy.
It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown begins on the Saturday before Easter Sunday. Sally is complaining to her big brother, Charlie Brown, that she won't have nice shoes for Easter when Lucy and Linus arrive on the scene. They are going to the store to buy Easter things and invite Charlie Brown and Sally to go with them, although Linus says it won't matter because the Easter Beagle will bring them everything on Easter morning.
At the store, which is advertising huge sales on Christmas items (a commentary on the commercialization of holidays that was as true in 1974 as it is today), they meet up with Peppermint Patty and Marcie, who are there to buy a dozen eggs to decorate. Once again, Linus reminds everyone that the Easter Beagle will provide all the Easter eggs, but no one believes him.
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