Let's Watch This - "The Moo Family Holiday Hoedown" (1992)

Christmas is gettin' a-closer, but there's still plenty of time for me to post another review of an animated Christmas special. And this one has even more cow puns than Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of Moo Mesa.

You're probably wondering just who the Moo Family actually are. Well, they're the brain children of the folks at Calico Entertainment. How they came up with this, I don't know. Maybe somebody working there just one day drove by a farm and said, "Hey! Why don't we do a Christmas special starring a family of anthropomorphic cows?"

You probably recall that Calico Entertainment is also responsible for the infamous Bubsy cartoon pilot. And not only were both productions directed by the same guy, a Mr. Tom Burton, it also features many of the same voice actors. This might be considered a turn-off for some people, but you'll be happy to know (I'm guessing, anyway) that this special is much better than the Bubsy pilot. Does that mean that it's any good? Let's find out...

The special begins with the voice of Rob Paulsen exclaiming, "And now, Moo TV is proud to present, live from the beeeeeeee-yeauiful island of Cowaii, THE MOO FAMILY HOLIDAY HOEDOWN!" 'Cowaii'? They couldn't think of a more clever pun than that? I gotta admit, though, I wasn't expecting a special about farm animals to take place in Hawaii... uh, I mean COWaii... as opposed to, say, Kansas or something...

Why do their "hooves" have fingers? That's not how hooves work!

Okay, so I guess the Moo Family is a family of hillbilly cows who are also famous musicians. And this special will also feature "Santa Cow" (okay, that's a LITTLE better than "Cowaii", but still not particularly funny) and his ace sled jockey, Chuck Steaker. A cow with "steak" in his name? Kind of a dark joke, isn't it?

It's then revealed that the announcer is a chicken named Chick Bantam (who, as I've said before, is voiced by Rob Paulsen), our host for the evening. He introduces the Moo Family.

I'm surprised that at no point during this special does anybody say
"UDDERly" as opposed to "UTTERly".

The Moo Family does a not particularly good song (the Country Bears they aren't). Daddy Moo (Brian Cummings) is annoyed by his son T-Bone (Rob Paulsen again) playing the electric guitar, and eventually they notice that Baby Moo (B.J. Ward) has climbed to the top of the Christmas tree. I like how it's revealed after the tree falls on top of Daddy Moo that it's just a cardboard cutout - I gotta admit, I wasn't expecting that.

After the musical number, Chick dubs the Moo Family "steerific" and "cowlossal" (see what I mean about the cow puns? I hope you find 'em funny, because there are a lot of them) before getting out a crude-looking horse puppet he calls "Melvin the Mustang". "Say, Melvin, did you like that Christmas song?" he asks Melvin. "It makes me feel like singing a real MULEtide carol!" Melvin replies. Chick tells him to go ahead, but Melvin can't - he's feeling a little HORSE. Was this written by Fozzie Bear or something?

Backstage, Daddy Moo (who, by the way, sounds like a cross between Pete and Yosemite Sam) demands to know A) what T-Bone was doing out there with those amplifiers and B) why he has a "cowlick", as Momma Moo (Tress MacNeille doing her best Clarabelle Cow impression) points out. "It's the nineties, Pop! This is how all teenagers in cartoons from the nineties look!" T-Bone replies. "You're always bustin' my chops! Keep your horns on, don't have a human, man."

I kind of agree with Daddy Moo, to be honest... T-Bone DOES look pretty stupid with that "cowlick".

Isn't his hair technically a Mohawk... or, as the Moo Family might say,
a MOOhawk... as opposed to a cowlick?

After that, we cut back to Chick and Melvin's not particularly funny act (though we're probably not actually supposed to find it funny), and then Chick announces that it's time for the revelation of Santa's new turbo-sleigh. They'll be going live via "saddle-lite hookup" (wouldn't the pun "saddle-lite", while kind of clever, be more fitting in a cartoon about horses?) to the North Pole to join another member of the Moo Family, Patty Moo (B.J. Ward), for an interview with Santa Cow (Jim Cummings) and Chuck Steaker (Patrick Fraley). "It's not the technology that matters, Patty," Chuck boasts. "It's the sled jockey who makes them." Meanwhile, I'm just wondering where Santa's reindeer are. They weren't rendered obsolete when Chuck invented this new "turbo-sleigh", were they? Then again, it's entirely possible that this "Santa Cow" character isn't supposed to be the same guy as Santa Claus, but merely their cow equivalent. Who knows?

Apparently, most of the turbo-sleigh is strung together with bailing wire and spare tractor parts. And apparently Chuck is a massive idiot because he hasn't even tested it, so this will be its first time up. Santa Cow isn't too pleased to hear that. "THE FIRST TIME UP?! WHAT ARE YOU, NUTS?!" he shouts.

"My sled jockey is a pompous idiot! WHY AM I JUST REALIZING THAT NOW?!"

The turbo-sleigh is revealed, and we get some early nineties CGI. Chuck decides to "see what this heifer can do", but wouldn't ya know it, it ends up going haywire. Guess you should've, I don't know, TESTED IT, eh, Chuck?

Chick announces that everyone is doing their part to find Chuck - for example, T-Bone is searching for Chuck with his "ham radio". To help clarify the complexities of this situation, Chick introduces science expert Dr. Albert Holstein (also voiced by Jim Cummings doing his best Ludwig Von Drake impression). "First," Dr. Holstein explains, "We've gotta analyze this predickle-a-ment. This is how the whole mess got started. First, the one cow jumps over the moon! Zappo! He's over the moon! That's one cow!" I think I'm going to like this Dr. Holstein. Of course, much of that probably stems from the fact that he's voiced by Jim Cummings.

So anyhow, Dr. Holstein goes into a ramble about cows trying to fly, and apparently this causes gravity to get confused (like me), which causes a "mootation" in the time/space continuum. "And you know what THAT MEANS?" Dr. Holstein demands. "Well, I'm not so sure myself. But I think it means Christmas gets one day ahead of itself! So every year, Christmas will be TOMORROW!"

Any particular reason this special couldn't have been all about him? Seriously, this entire special could've just been about this guy rambling about cows attempting to fly and I would've been satisfied.

Maybe Disney should buy the rights to this special so they can make a TV
special co-hosted by Dr. Holestein and Ludwig Von Drake. I'd watch that.

Then T-Bone gets a "Hayday" call from Chuck. Dr. Holstein dubs this impossible because according to his "cowculations", Chuck is somewhere "over the horn of Africow". Or maybe he's somewhere "near the Moosissipi River". I'm starting to wonder if the writers got a big book called "One Thousand Jokes About Cows" or something and THAT'S what inspired them to make this special.

But then T-Bone spots Chuck flying out of the sky - and he's headed straight for the barn! He ends up crashing, but don't worry, he's fine - just a bit dazed. "Bulldacious landing, dude!" T-Bone compliments him. Momma Moo asks if he's sure that he's all right, to which Chuck responds, "Me? No problemoo." The turbo-sleigh, meanwhile, is totaled. Apparently, there's a problem with the "cattle-lytic converter". But that's nothing that Dr. Holstein can't fix. They still need a power source to get the machine off the ground, but T-Bone has an idea: they can use his "mega-powered" amplifiers! Chuck loves the idea, and Daddy Moo starts acting like just a few scenes ago he wasn't chewing out T-Bone for using those amplifiers.

So we then cut to them fixing the sleigh. Daddy Moo suggests that they bring in the "automoobile" for extra power. That "automoobile" wouldn't happen to be a CATTLE-ac, would it?









Hey, if the writers can make cow puns, then so can I. Momma Moo tells him that Grandpa Moo (Patrick Fraley) is one step ahead of him. The one problem with this is that Grandpa Moo drives about as well as Mr. Toad, and he ends up smashing the car into the sleigh. Don't worry, it apparently doesn't do much damage.

Baby Moo then spots her bottle on top of one of the amplifiers (how it got up there, I don't know) and climbs up to grab it. Uh oh, I smell SHENANIGANS!

"What do you say we stampede out of here?" Chuck suggests after hopping inside the turbo-sleigh. Dr. Holstein says that the gauge will have to reach "maximum cow-power" to get up into the air, so T-Bone has to "hoof it". Daddy Moo gives him a "helping hoof", and then Momma Moo points out that Baby Moo is about to fall off the giant tower of amplifiers. Daddy Moo runs to save her, but she ends up in Momma Moo's arms, while Daddy Moo is the victim of SHENANIGANS!

But it worked! In fact, the explosion from the amplifiers somehow "mootated" the turbo-sleigh and the Moo Family's "automoobile" into a single contraption with hover power (and a great paint job). This means that EVERYONE can go to the North Pole to visit Santa Cow! I'm pretty sure that's not how amplifiers work, but eh, if the characters are happy then who am I to complain?

I honestly can't think of a funny caption here... so instead, I'll just say hi.

At the North Pole, Chick announces that Santa Cow will be able to go on his Christmas tour as planned thanks to the Moo Family. Although I would like to point out that Grandma Moo (Tress MacNeille) did jack-squat to help save Christmas - in fact, she only had one line in the whole special. Come to think of it, Patty didn't do anything to help save Christmas either. But eh...

And so we end on another song and Santa Cow wishing us a merry Christmas and a happy "moo year".

So, what do I think of The Moo Family Holiday Hoedown? Honestly, I was pleasantly surprised. I mean, it's certainly no A Charlie Brown Christmas, but it's actually a lot less corny than I expected it to be. If nothing else, it had decent voice acting and I really liked Santa Cow and Dr. Holstein. I'd recommend giving it a watch, if you can stomach all of those cow puns.

Further Reading:
Platypus Comix's review of the special