The Fat Albert Halloween Special

Fat Albert Halloween Special. Don't those words just make you DROOL? I think this was a prime-time special, so it's in two different categories on here. Halloween time has come for the Junkyard Gang, and everyone's all set to trick-or-treating. When the costume store kicks them out, the gang comes up with "home-made outfits." A few of them talk about the Old Lady Bickwell who lives in the house by the cemetery, where she's given to creeping around and acting all weird.

Now on DVD:

"She's no weirder than other old women," says Fat Albert.

"That's the problem," comes the reply. "All old people are weird!"

It becomes clear early on that they're not out for candy. "We're gonna have a great time tonight, scaring old dudes!' Says one.
Ah, the true meaning of Halloween.

The gang then proceeds to a spooky old graveyard, where they sneak around, causing trouble. After some preliminary hijinks, they head off to scare old Searchlight Johnson at the movie house, then old Mudfoot Brown, and then the old lady Bickwell. As you can probably guess, things don't go too well. Searchlight catches them up to no good in the theatre and throws them out. Mudfoot Brown steals most of their candy. But Old Lady Bickwell turns out to serve the best Halloween candy in town (as the crazy old ladies in these things always do).



When I started collecting Halloween specials, this one was very tough to get - it hadn't been aired in years, and had been out of print on video for a good decade. The only copy I'd ever seen was at a video store in Des Moines in the late 80s - and I didn't rent it. I finally found a copy on ebay - and it wasn't cheap even there. Nowadays, it's a lot easier. I've even seen it on youtube in its entirety - including commercials, which are half the fun - but it seems to get taken down a lot.




Note: my video of this features a voice-over from Bill Cosby explaining that the show was made in a different time, when trick or treating was safe. "Sadly," he says, "the times have changed." Well, whether it's really less safe now is debatable, but it can't have been too acceptable at any time for kids to go galivanting around a graveyard like this, and it was never a good idea to let kids wander the city streets bothing guys named Mudfoot or Searchlight. The only difference is that back in the olden days, they hadn't figured this out yet.

Then again, I can see that things have changed. I used to walk a good mile to school - when i was six or seven - without adult supervision. You don't see many kids doing that these days. I don't know if the streets are more dangerous now (I doubt it) or if we're just more paranoid now (certainly) or if it was just never a good idea in the first place (probably), or if it's more to do with the fact that towns today are built on the subdivision system, with no sidewalks, and no way for kids to walk to school (without question) but I'm not here to editorialize on this. I'd say that trick or treating is as safe now as it ever was - the question is how safe it ever was in the first place

I can't find this on youtube, but you CAN watch it at this place for now, and it's finally available on DVD - Order from amazon today!

AND here's a 1985 Halloween Safety short!