In my ongoing mission to torture Beware of the Blog readers with insufferable nineteen seventies kitsch I have sunk to a new low. I would have sunk to this earlier but this did not hit the internet until this week. I thought it could get no worse than The Brady Kids - Wonder Woman crossover. I was wrong. Roy Clark, jonesing for even more stomach-churning hokum than Hee-Haw could offer, called up the chick from One Day at a Time to help host a roast and celebration of Fred Flintstone. Not the real Fred Flintstone but one in a giant foam outfit. Along for the ride, defying all stone-age continuity, are other Hanna-Barbera characters in oversized cloth forms : Jabberjaw, The Banana Splits, Snagglepuss, Hong Kong Phooey, The Hair Bear Bunch and on down the line. The laugh track seems to be enjoying itself immensely (although if you listen closely you might hear a bit of a retch track). This is truly the worst thing I have ever seen - and although I appreciate the absolute awfulness of it all - even I can't bring myself to watch ALL FIVE PARTS that are on YouTube. Oh - one minor detail I forgot about. It is, of course, ON ICE.
this is the type of stuff I love from Hanna Barbera, the type of stuff that convinces me that they were stoned out of their minds
Posted by: John McCabe | June 28, 2009 at 01:30 AM
And the Sylvers! How could you not mention the Sylvers!?
Posted by: Andy Lester | June 28, 2009 at 01:51 AM
My god, there is not an aforementioned because if there was she would send them all to hell on ice!
Posted by: Jrld | June 28, 2009 at 04:48 AM
And yet .. more entertaining than American Idol and Dancing w/ Stars crap combined forever.
Posted by: Kevin | June 28, 2009 at 05:39 AM
So scary,love it!
Posted by: Rob Lett | June 28, 2009 at 09:02 AM
With this passing for "standard" mid-1970s TV variety, any wonder the first years of SNL seemed like such a breath of fresh air????
Posted by: Andrew | June 28, 2009 at 10:48 AM
it started off strong, but I couldn't make it past the first jabberjaw thing.
Posted by: EH | June 28, 2009 at 01:59 PM
If you don't do drugs, you may find yourself enjoying this. Or making dreck just like it.
Posted by: SillyWilly | June 28, 2009 at 04:51 PM
Oh my. Say Ralph,how do you find these treasures??This silly exercise in entertainment is a thousand times better than some of the crap today.Although I wouldn't advise watching without some chemical help.LOVEITLOVEITLOVEIT!!!
And as always,thank you!
Posted by: texas scott | June 28, 2009 at 06:32 PM
sorry.Thanks,Kliph,not Ralph.
Posted by: texas scott | June 28, 2009 at 06:37 PM
Fred Flintstone makes me Ralph too!!
Posted by: bartelby | June 28, 2009 at 08:34 PM
This is great....man, I love this stuff.
Posted by: Gavin | June 29, 2009 at 01:19 AM
Somehow I missed this way back in the day, and it would have been something I would have watched, too. Everything seemed to be on ice in the 70's...
Posted by: Rick Garcia | June 29, 2009 at 01:24 AM
Snow, actually.
Posted by: K. | June 29, 2009 at 11:23 AM
I never thought that I'd ever see anything as deliriously
coked-up and campy as "Can't Stop The Music", but that is
right up there with it!
1000 times more fun to watch than anything on TV today,
just for sheer camp value...
Posted by: Dave | June 30, 2009 at 11:28 AM
I owned a video about ten years ago, I always held this masterpiece up as the worst thing you could rent actually rented it quite a few times.
Posted by: zombek | June 30, 2009 at 04:39 PM
I have an HR Puffnstuff (gratuitous drug reference alert) TV special on washed-out VHS somewhere with the same dull premise: the main character is missing for some reason, so that the entire narrative arc of the thing concerns all the other characters trying to locate someone.
As something to hang the story on, this kind of set-up can surely appeal only to the extremely young or the extremely stoned.
I think that one may have been on ice as well.
Anyway, I think the camp value, if any, of stuff like this is far outweighed by how frankly dreadfully bad it is.
Posted by: snarfyguy | June 30, 2009 at 05:08 PM
Didn't they have "specials" like this one to introduce the new Saturday morning line-up, like the Friday night before?
Posted by: bartlebyvqf | July 01, 2009 at 04:52 PM
On Ice?
.... not nearly as painful as the intro of Batmite & Scrappy-Doo
Posted by: Uncle Ash | July 02, 2009 at 07:49 AM
I'm a bit lost for words. That was amazing. Kind of reminded me of Waiting for Godot. And the creepy guitar solo in part four was my personal favourite moment. Wow, I'm glad to be alive to have seen that weirdness. Seriously, thanks for posting.
Posted by: Art | July 02, 2009 at 10:12 AM