The Nelvana Holiday Specials: Intergalactic Thanksgiving

Nelvana premiered this feature in 1979, however the title shown onscreen was not actually Intergalactic Thanksgiving, but Don't Eat the Planet: reflecting more on the actual plot of the special. I assume this special is more known Intergalactic Thanksgiving as to have it fit in with Nelvana's more holiday-themed specials of this time period. But let's talk about the plot itself.

As one can infer, this is another science-fiction themed special. However, instead of taking place on Earth with aliens landing: this special takes place in space itself and all the characters are technically aliens (albeit some of them are humans). Anyways, we begin as we see a wagon train of Space Farmers roaming the galaxy including our family of interest the Spademinders, which consists of serious parental figures Paw and Maw, teenage daughter Victoria and dog Cromwell. The Spademinders end up crashing their ship into the planet Laffalot, where everyone pranks each other and the funniest person is declared king. The Spademinders end up setting up their farm on the planet. Victoria ends up developing a relationship with the Prince, Not Funny Enough (I am not kidding that is actually his name), while the Spademinders hard-working and straight-laced nature makes them hilarious in the eyes of the citizens. We also find out that food is mined from the planet and the people on the planet are too obsessed with having fun to prank each other. As the King finds out that his citizens will displace him as King with the Spademinders, the king goes into a rage and confronts the serious folk. However during this, the two teenagers and Cromwell fall into the inside of the planet. There they find how the planet is being overmined and is falling apart and an army of four-armed bugs are attempting to build it back up (hence the Don't Eat the Planet title). The King is upset at the lost of his child and ends up crying which brings tears to the other citizens. Unknowing to them, the planet is actually really fertile and giant crops grow everywhere with the kids clinging to the roots. So to celebrate they have a large feast and everyone ends up with a happy ending.

I really don't care for this special very much. The animation is nice, much smother than A Cosmic Christmas. But the pacing is too quick, I really wish we had more development with the characters. Like how I wish the relationship between Victoria and Not Very Funny was looked at more and was a bigger focus for the story. I also feel like this special has very little to do with Thanksgiving, I could see some comparisons between this and the actual events like the Spademinders being the Pilgrims and the people of Laffalot being the Native Americans, but this special is more of an original story. Overall compared to A Cosmic Christmas and The Devil and Daniel Mouse, I found this special to be disappointing in comparison.

Next time we'll be looking the robot love story, Romie-0 and Julie-8.

The Nelvana Holiday Specials: The Devil and Daniel Mouse

So the next holiday Nelvana tackled was Halloween with the 1978 special: The Devil and Daniel Mouse. As evidenced by the title, this special is based off the story the Devil and Daniel Webster. However, there are very few similarities with the original and is mostly an original tale.
Our tale begins with our two heroes, Jan and Daniel singing in a dank barely attended club. The owner fires our two protagonists calling their music old-fashioned, while they wander out onto the streets with no money. Daniel runs off to gather some money for food while Jan dreams of how much she wants to be a rock star. She states how she would give anything to be a rock star (which is obviously not going to have anything bad happen). Soon a lizard comes forth from flames saying that he is a music producer named B.L. Zebubb (yup not suspicious at all) and that he wants to sign Jan on to his record label. Jan excitedly agrees until the producer makes her sign the contract with her blood, but she agrees anyways and thus she begins her journey to rockstardom with her weasel manager.

Daniel is revealed to have sold his guitar to get money for food, but when he returns Jan is gone. Jan's fame has began to rise, leaving Daniel to think that Jan has left him behind. However on the night of the biggest concert at the height of her fame, B.L. Zebubb reveals himself to be the devil and comes for Jan's soul. Jan however finds a technicality and is able to give herself more time to find help. However no one is willing to help Jan, except Daniel whom becomes her lawyer in a trial for Jan's soul.

This special is very musical, probably the most musical of all the specials. The music is a very important aspect of the story, and very in the time period that the movie premiered . However this has the disadvantage of dating the special, as opposed to the more timeless aspects of the other specials. The music is still really good however and features my favorite music of all the specials and has a really nice moral of not taking the easy way out and how loving and caring about others will defeat any evil. I really enjoy this special a lot and consider this to be one of the stronger specials.

The next special we'll be looking at is another space themed one. The next one is Don't Eat The Planet, often known better by it's subtitle: An Intergalactic Thanksgiving.

The Nelvana Holiday Specials: A Cosmic Christmas

Nelvana is a Canadian animation company founded in 1971, whom have made several famous cartoons such as Strawberry Shortcake, Care Bears, and the Magic School Bus. Nelvana first works were animated short subjects combining live action with animation. But between 1977 to the 1980's, Nelvana produced 6 animated holiday specials. Many of these specials have more unusual themes and often feature elements of science fiction: which was popular at the time. I am now starting a series of blog posts looking over each of these specials and analyzing them in the order that they were released.

The first animated special Nelvana released was A Cosmic Christmas on December 4, 1977. The special starts with a boy named Peter wandering around town with his pet goose Lucy on Christmas Eve. The town is in a frenzy, buying presents and generally losing their cool. The townspeople are so distracted by their Christmas frenzy that no one but Peter notices a UFO land near the outskirts of town. And when Peter tries to tell the people around him, the townspeople ignore him and the local bullies harass Peter. So Peter and Lucy go off to find the UFO and discover three aliens. These aliens, whom bear a resemblance to the wise men of the biblical story, found a strange star that appeared in the sky for one night about 2000 years ago and were sent to find the source of that star. Peter infers that they saw the Star of Bethlehem and that the aliens are trying to find the meaning of Christmas. So Peter takes the three aliens into town to tell the meaning of Christmas. However the townspeople's selfishness and anger goes against Peter's message of love and peace which confuses the aliens. Peter then takes the three aliens to his home, where the aliens get a better idea of what the holidays are about due to the old-fashioned Christmas memories of Peter's Grandma.
**SPOILER WARNING: IF YOU DO NOT WANT THE ENDING SPOILED SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH**
The bullies seen earlier in the special are revealed to be homeless and are starving. The leader gets the idea to steal Lucy so that they can eat the goose. During the previous scene the leader takes Lucy and Peter chases after them. The leader falls through some thin ice and when Peter attempts to save the bully he also falls in. The townspeople had been gathered to confront the UFO the aliens came in and notice the two boys in the ice. The townspeople start to form a chain to reach the boys, but need a few more people. They beckon the aliens whom are standing at a distance to help. But the aliens are conflicted because they can only observe the action, they are not allowed to directly participate in the affairs of this planet. However the leader alien says that they need to learn the meaning of Christmas and they help the surprised townspeople save the boys. The townspeople are angry at the bullies for taking the goose and want to punish them. The aliens are confused why the bullies stole the goose in the first place and Peter's grandma explains that the bullies were probably hungry and Peter invites them to have dinner with them. As a party occurs at Peter's house and everyone learning the true meaning of Christmas the aliens leave forming lights as they depart.
**SPOLIERS END**


This being the very first special Nelvana produced, the animation is a little rougher than the later specials Nelvana produced. The character designs however, are very interesting, and this is the only special Nelvana produced that the majority of the characters are human. The plot is very interesting and has a good moral that goes into the true meaning of Christmas. Obviously the religion aspect of the special is very dominant, which may upset non-Christians. But, Christmas is about the birth of Jesus and one very famous Christmas special features another similar moral to A Cosmic Christmas: A Charlie Brown Christmas. Truthfully, both specials mention the religion aspect briefly enough to not preach but still feature it enough to not make it seem like an afterthought. This is a very smart special, and has decent enough animation. I highly recommend people to watch this Christmas special.


So one special down, 5 more to go. The next special I'm going to write about is The Devil and Daniel Mouse. See you then!