Who’s Your Friend When Things Get Tough.

I know, I know. I should be packing/looking for an apartment.

I received probably the bestest e-mail from my brother Gordon (sadly, he has no blog to link to) telling me about one of my guilty pleasures.

I have one or two guilty pleasures.

Oh, whom am I kidding? If you look deep enough into this blog, you will learn all about my guilty pleasures.

But this is the most secretest, and shamefull of them all.

This is so bad, that when I forced my family to watch these DVDs, that after they quit singing the song to themselves, they promised to show any serious marriage material, to warn her off. So if you are my GF, and you find this entry, and you’ve seen these videos. Be warned 😉 (Family, feel free to comment about your love for these series.. Really, let me know)

So Internet, I’m letting you know as well.

What did Gordon write me that made me so happy? From Darkhorizons comes the following info:

“Marty Kroft was on the radio this morning talking about the DVD releases of “Land of the Lost”. The subject of the new movie version came up. He said that along with Will Ferrell, the movie will also have Kirsten Dunst and Jack Black. He also mentioned that they plan to use the lowest of the high tech digital effects when making the film so it will look similar to the tv series. He then talked about how they are going to be making an HR Pufnstuf movie with Jack Black staring in it as Witchiepoo.”

I almost PEED my pants!

Now, for those of you who are unfortunate enough to have never seen these two shows, I’ve prepared a little history lesson. Starting off with HR Pufnstuf.

First off, you can thank Sid & Marty Kroft for for supplying us with such quality edutainment. They created both of these shows, of which, I would be a much sadder man if I had not been exposed to.

To truly understand “HR Pufnstuf” one must read the theme song.

Once on a magic summers’ day, When everyone was out to play
A boy and his magic golden flute heard a voice from off the bay
“Come and play with me, Jimmy, come and play with me,
And I will take you on a trip far across the sea-ee-ee.”

But the boat belonged to a kooky old witch who had in mind the flute to snitch,
From her vroom-broom in the sky she watched her plans materialize.

She waved her wand
The beautiful boat was gone,
The sky grew dark,
The sea grew rough,
And the boat sailed on and on and on and on.

But Pufnstuf was watching too and knew exactly what to do
He saw the witch’s boat attack and as the boy was fighting back
He called his Rescue-Ranger crew as often they’d rehearsed
And off to save the boy they flew but who would get there first?

But now the boy had washed ashore
Puf arrived to save the day
Which made the witch so mad and sore
She shook her fist and screamed awaaaaaaaaaay!

H. R. Pufnstuf, Who’s your friend when things get rough
H. R. Pufnstuf, If you can’t do a little, Then you can’t do enough.

From the song, you are introduced to the wonderful characters in the show. First off is Jimmy (he’s the one in the yellow). This boy (along with his magical talking golden flute Freddie) were just skipping along, kicking rocks, when they see this cool boat.

In what may seem to some, as a lapse in judgment, Jimmy climbs aboard a boat that shows up at the beach. Did I mention that this boat has eyes, and talks to Jimmy? I know. I know, you aren’t suppose to talk to strangers but this is a talking BOAT! I mean, how cool is that?

So, he gets on the boat, and it turns Evill.. And you are then introduced to Whitchiepoo! She’s this witch, who wants Jimmy’s flute. She flies around on what looks to be a jet powered broomstick, and has this coolio buzzard that hangs with her. Why the heck she wants the flute, when she has that broomstick, I’ve never figured out. She also has a awesome crib in the swamp . She also has some of the coolest toys on the block . And the strangest bathtub I’ve ever set my eyes upon (according to the lyrics, she shakes her fist, which is always a plus in my book.)

Next comes the HERO! HR Pufnstuf himself! This is, well, some sort of dragon thing. . From what I’ve been able to tell, he just hangs at the beach, waiting for mad things to happen and then grabs his rescue ranger crew.

So, in the end, HR saves Jimmy (and Freddie the Flute). They then spend time trying to stay away from Witchiepoo and getting Jimmy back to the real world, where trees don’t talk, and you don’t have to deal with talking everything. (houses even as well)

This show generated it’s own movie (which is where I think I first saw it) as well as it’s own board game .

Here’s Jack Black and Witchiepoo right next to each other. Tell me what you think.

I for one, submit that this movie will ROCK!

Next up is “Land of the Lost”

Once again, to understand the mythos, the drama of this wonderful show, you really need to understand the opening lyrics.

Marshall, Will, and Holly on a routine expedition
Met the greatest earthquake ever known.
High on the rapids it struck their tiny raft,
And plunged them down a thousand feet below.
To the Land of the Lost. (3X)

What you miss is this rag-tag-team of explorers getting chased by some kind of dinosaur. A large, but slow dinosaur, who has me convinced, the only way dinosaurs kept fed, was that there were a lot of slower dinosaurs (Read, these dinosaurs would have to be dead, or like unto death to be devoured)

So, you basically have these three who deal with these lizards called Sleestaks. And they have their own little monkey boy . How these three survive without dinosaur chow, I don’t know. I just enjoy watching the cheesetastic adventures.

Having Black and Ferrell in this movie will rock, just look at the two of them!

I look forward to this as well!

Well, I must go, but I hope that I’ve convinced a few of you to go and watch these shows 😉

Next I’ll have to write about some more guilty pleasure tv watching, such as

Kimba

The Electric Company

Donnie And Marie

Anne of Green Gables (just checking to see if anyone else is even reading….)