Addendum [11/18]: Per Deadline, PBS will be airing A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving and A Charlie Brown Christmas ad-free on both PBS and PBS Kids on at 6:30 PM CT on November 22nd and December 13th respectively.
Original article: Since the premiere of A Charlie Brown Christmas in 1965, Charles Schulz’s Peanuts characters have starred in over 45 different animations spanning from 1965 to 2019 with the release of Snoopy in Space on Apple TV+ last November.
The Peanuts holiday specials have been a mainstay of cable television for 54 years, especially towards the last three months of the year with classics like It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving dominating airwaves during the lead up to Halloween and Thanksgiving respectively.
This year, however, things have changed.
On Oct. 19, 2020, Apple sent out a press release stating their partnerships with Peanuts Worldwide and Lee Mendelson Film Productions and WildBrain had been expanded and would bring Peanuts content both new and old to Apple TV+ exclusively. This effectively ended the nearly sixty year run of Peanuts on cable television networks as well as many a household tradition and caused widespread backlash. However, Apple also announced that each of the three specials listed prior (Great Pumpkin, Thanksgiving, and Christmas) would all be viewable without an Apple TV+ subscription for a limited time. Needless to say, this didn’t result in less backlash.
So why did this all happen?
Let’s begin with one of the biggest players in this ordeal: the American Broadcasting Company (ABC). ABC has held the broadcasting rights to Peanuts content since 2001 after taking them from CBS, who had held them since the initial broadcast of A Charlie Brown Christmas. They renewed this deal in 2013, which meant they could continue to broadcast these specials well into 2019, but would leave the broadcasting rights up in the air following its expiration date. Once it expired, the rights for Peanuts were up in the air until they were bought by WildBrain.
Formerly known as DHX Media, WildBrain is a Canadian media company best known for licensing children’s properties such as Caillou and Teletubbies. In 2017, they acquired the entertainment division of American-based branding company Iconix Brand Group to the tune of nearly $350 million and gained all of their entertainment properties, including Peanuts. It gave them an 80% stake in the Peanuts brand with the remaining 20% remaining with Charles Schulz’s surviving family. The following year, Apple, in turn, struck a deal with DHX Media to produce new content based upon the Peanuts characters.
Nothing came of this initially until the announcement and release of Snoopy in Space exclusively to Apple’s Apple TV+ platform in November 2019. The show was received positively by critics and was even nominated for a Daytime Emmy award for Outstanding Short Format Children’s Program.
All of this leads us back to current events. With WildBrain having a majority hold of the Peanuts brand and ABC’s contract having expired, the stage was set for them to gain the exclusive streaming rights. Despite the backlash, it doesn’t seem like these classic specials will be returning to cable television any time soon. Reportedly, DVDs and Blu-Rays of the specials are also selling out at a rather rapid rate, so best of luck to those unwilling to pay for Apple TV+ just to see the Great Pumpkin rise once more.
Photo Credit / WNYCStudios.org
