- The Flintstones was pitched to the network as an animated version of Jackie Gleason’s The Honeymooners. Now the honeymoon never has to end with this 4-disc set of the 28 episodes of the entire (pre)historic first season, full of terrific extras and trivia that will make fans shout “Yabba dabba doo!”Running Time: 737 min. Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: CHILDREN Rating: NR Age: 014
The Flintstones was pitched to the network as an animated version of Jackie Gleason’s The Honeymooners. Now the honeymoon never has to end with this 4-disc set of the 28 episodes of the entire (pre)historic first season, full of terrific extras and trivia that will make fans shout “Yabba dabba doo!”Meet The Flintstones in this prehistoric Hanna-Barbera production. Primetime’s first animated series was also the longest running until The Simpsons came along. Not so coincidentally, the two shows aren’t all that different–even if the former emerged in the sixties, the latter in the eighties. Fred (Alan Reed), patriarch of the cave-dwelling clan, may be marginally more intelligent than the similarly blue collar Homer, but most storylines still revolve around his more dunderheaded moves. Fortunately, wife Wilma (Jean Vander Pyl) and Barney (Mel Blanc) and Betty Rubble (Bea Benaderet), their neighbors, are usually able to set things right. That was also true for Ralph Cramden of The Honeymooners, a direct influence (Reed even sounds like Jackie Gleason). But Ralph didn’t have a pet dinosaur and he did live in the Modern Age–if you can call the fifties “modern”–rather than the Stone Age.
This long-awaited DVD set includes all 28 episodes of the first season, including the lost Flagstones pilot. Notable segments include “Hot Lips Hannigan”–one of several riffs on beatnik culture–in which Fred, aka “The Velvet Smog,” sings and Barney beats the traps and “The Creature From the Tar Pits,” in which Fred fills in as Gary Granite’s stunt double in a Bedrock-set horror flick.
The Flintstones‘s first season introduced two timeless couples from another time. Its success led to a theatrical release, two live-action features, and countless specials and spin-offs. New viewers may be surprised to find that Dino doesn’t make his official entrance until episode 18 (“The Snorkasaurus Story”), that Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm aren’t in the first season at all, and that the famous theme won’t hit the airwaves until the third (replacing instrumental “Rise and Shine”). Those quirky quotes, however, were in effect from the start: “Wiiilmaaaaaaa!,” “Droll, very droll” and, especially, “Yabba-dabba-doo!!!” –Kathleen C. Fennessy
Buy “The Flintstones – The Complete First Season” For Only $19.90
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April 2, 2010
#1
Jackie Gleason threatened to sue Hanna-Barbera over this show, and well he should have. So what if it was the first prime-time animated show in history? That doesn’t change the fact that it’s an uninspired, second-rate rip-off of the Honeymooners. It succeeded then because it was a novelty. Now that we have the Simpsons, who needs the Flintstones? Certianly not me; Warner Bros. needs to offer up some more Looney Tunes or Batman DVD sets instead of this prehistoric dreck.
April 2, 2010
#2
In this review I’ve replaced a certain common four-letter vulgarity with [stuff], because, if I don’t, Amazon.com’s censor will do it for me. Suffice it to say it’s a common word starting with the letter C, something you see every day (ahem).
At the beginning of “My Favorite Year,” the writing staff for King Kaiser’s (Sid Caesar’s) comedy show is reviewing the swashbuckling films of Alan Swan (Eroll Flynn), who’s going to be the guest star that week. One of the writers (played by Bill Macy) is decidedly unimpressed. “They’re all [stuff].”
“You don’t like ‘Captain from Tortuga’”? protests Benjy Stone (Mel Brooks). “Captain from [Stuff]!” is Macy’s response.
The same could be said about the TV output of William Hannah and Joseph Barbera. [Stuff]. Utter, total, unmitigated [stuff].
Hannah and Barbera had a stellar career at MGM, where they produced a long series of “Tom and Jerry” cartoons, taking home the animated-short-subject Oscar for more than a decade. I don’t much care for “Tom and Jerry,” but you can’t deny these cartoons were beautifully drawn and animated. The first of the series, “Mr. Cat Steps Out,” is one of the best animated shorts ever made.
The Supreme Court anti-trust decision that divested the major studios of their theaters removed the principal outlet for new cartoons. This, combined with the rising cost of animation after WWII, meant that by the early ’50s, high-quality animated shorts were no longer economically viable.
Not wanting to starve, Hannah and Barbera turned to television, where they were among to the first to produce cartoons using limited animation (ie, only a few cels per second; drawing only the part of the character that moved; heavy use of movement cycles).
The first of these (IIRC), was “Ruff and Reddy,” an adventure series featuring a dog and a cat. It’s an obvious lift of Jay Ward’s “Crusader Rabbit,” and though it lacked the satirical thrust of the former, my memory is that it was occasionally amusing and sometimes charming. Everything after was [stuff]. Total [stuff].
Starting with “Huckleberry Hound,” Hannah and Barbera churned out a huge pile of witless, humorless [stuff]. I’d go as far as to say that it is the _biggest_ pile of artistic [stuff] in the entire history of Western civilization. (I’m not joking.)
“The Flintstones” was the first prime-time animated series. That’s its only legitimate distinction, as there’s nothing else _worth_ saying about such a total mediocrity. The characters are lifted from “The Honeymooners,” and the plots are the same tired sitcom rehashes that were ancient when the series premiered.
The idea that a series set in the Stone Age might be used to meaningfully comment on contemporary life doesn’t seem to have crossed the writers’ minds. Their idea of “satire” was such things as a Hollyrock actor named Cary Granite. Wow! Isn’t that just side-splittingly hilarious? I can’t stop laughing! How clever! How creative! How [stuff]y.
“The Flinstones” is contemporary with “Rocky and Bullwinkle” and “The Dick van Dyke Show.” Even by current standards, both are considered models of wit and solid comedy writing. “The Flintstones” isn’t within even a couple of parsecs.
If you want to see what “The Flinstones” _could_ have been, take a look at “Dinosaurs.” (It’s surprising Disney hasn’t issued the better episodes on DVD. “When Food Goes Bad” is a classic.) Ditto — cubed — for “The Jetsons” and “Futurama.”
If I were Bill Gates, I’d buy the rights to all of Hannah and Barbera’s TV “creations,” then publicly _burn_ every surviving negative, print, videotape, cel, and piece of artwork. They deserve no less.
PS: What can you say about a theme song that invites the viewer to have “a gay old time”? If there’s one thing “The Flintstones” _isn’t_, it’s gay. In any sense of the word — except its most-recent usage — “lame.” How can movie people, living in Hollywood, _not_ know that “gay” had another meaning?
April 2, 2010
#3
As a child, The Flintstones delighted millions of viewers, including myself, during a lengthy television run and subsequent syndication. Times may have been simpler back then (though I suspect only television and its portrayal of life was, in all actuality, simpler back then), but whatever charm and enchantment this program had during its heydey has dissipated with time. If anything, The Flintstones embraces every deplorable aspect of what would eventually become known as abusive and dysfunctional marriages.
The show still has its moments with its amusing talking gadgets and somewhat clever plays on words (Hollyrock, Rock Vegas, Ann Margrock, etc.), but in the 21st century, characters based on tired stereotypes who are engaged in duplicitous and distrustful relationships carry little to no charm. Fred Flintstone, without qualm, throws away Barney Rubble’s friendship in almost every episode, displaying about as much commitment and loyalty to his friends as a grade-schooler jockying for a position in the school yard power structure. Fred and Barney routinely lie to their wives, so often that Wilma has already become jaded and suspicious by the first episode. Wilma and Betty’s love for their perpetually-scheming husbands is most apparent when “the girls” are showered with material items. We’re reminded in every other episode that Wilma wants a fur coat, and in one particular episode, she’s pretty much had it with Fred until she thinks he’s bought her a diamond ring. Suddenly, she loves her man despite all his faults!
I realize this is just a show, and perhaps — in the immortal words of the MST3K theme song — I should really just relax. However, when I watch the Flintstones today, I don’t find Wilma and Fred trying to outsmart and deceive each other funny; I find it sad. Fred’s shabby treatment of his next door neighbor would prompt most people today to advise Barney to find some better friends.
To its credit, the Flintstones did pave the way for many prime time animated series and for several programs featuring characters in less than perfect marriages and family lives. The more successful of these subsequent shows seem to have found a way to exploit dysfunctional relationships with a sense of humor and irony that caused their characters to evolve and transcend the stagnancy in which the Flintstones remained throughout most of the series. While it may have been funny at the time, would anyone really want Fred and Wilma Flintstone as neighbors today?
April 2, 2010
#4
As I child, I loved this show. Yet again, as a child, I swallowed everything the church fed me as well. But when I grew up, I decided to view this show again, and was shocked at the content.
This cartoon promotes the Christian science Creationism, which declares that the Earth is 6000 years old and humans lived with dinosaurs. And lo and behold, there is Dino, living with the cavemen. It makes me sick to think that once upon a time, all our children were watching this smut. And believe me, all the Creationist preachers probably watched this show daily in the 1960′s.
If you want your children to believe this lie, go on ahead and purchase this. But I know my kids are never going to have a gay old time in Bedrock.
April 2, 2010
#5
Of course we’ve all seen the show, I have not seen the DVD, but plan to buy it. Based on my PAST veiwing I rate it HIGHLY! YABBA DABBA DOO(zey).
Now, to Mr.Sommerwrerck. The dude who calls this toon [stuff].
The show was made when—pay attention y’all–THE SIMPSON etc. WOULD NOT HAVE MADE IT!!! Class, NOT CRASS, was in..Donnie and Marie and Lawrence SWelk and Dean Martin..they had varietythe no talent PEVLIS ELVIS PRESLEY did not, and for a reason. Jay Ward got in trouble with parts of his show. HISW was HORRIBLY animated. Chuck Jones the ‘STONES weren’t but were never inbtened to be. SMURFS WAS a horrible show, right up with TINY TOONS, diabetetes time.bt don’t ever scond guess Hanna Barbera.
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