Here Comes Peter Cottontail

🐰 It’s Easter in July, and those two things together are the least confusing thing about today’s episode. In 1971’s “Here Comes Peter Cottontail,” the first Rankin/Bass non-Christmas holiday special, it’s a race across the calendar to reclaim the title of Chief Easter Bunny from the evil January Q. Irontail, voiced by Vincent Price.  

You can watch it on Tubi, or this restored version on the YouTube channel “The Rankin Bass Archive.”  

****  

🎙 Guests:  

Michael May (MichaelMay.online, After Lunch, Bluesky)  

Sammy Hain (Sammy’s Easter Tails, Bluesky)  

****  

💬 Topics & Tangents:  

“The Easter Bunny That Overslept,” the book, and a read-along video.  

This special has the same opening as Disney’s “Aladdin.”  

Vincent Price hosting “Read, Write, and Draw” on The Disney Channel.  

Jim and Dwight are bad at party planning on “The Office.”  

Patton Oswalt on Easter eggs.  

Seymour S. Sassafras is probably a Time Lord.  

Today’s TV Trope: Loophole Abuse.  

The Halloween segment reuses music from “Mad Monster Party?”  

Is the title of Chief Easter Bunny always on the line like a 24/7 wrestling championship?  

Johnnie Fedora and Alice Bluebonnet.  

Yosemite Sam attempts to cook hasenpfeffer.  

The Easter Bunny in Hell in “Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.”  

This special got a sequel in 2005.  

****  

📼 Commercials:  

Cadbury Easter Creme Eggs (1978)  

FOLCs Forever: A Lois & Clark Rewatch Podcast.  

****  

“Here Comes Peter Cottontail” © 1971 Videocraft International Limited.  

Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  
Full show notes and social links at adventcalendar.house.