She's A Good Skate, Charlie Brown (1980)

This is the third Peanuts special I've talked about which I first saw in the Peanuts Emmy Honored Collection DVD set, with the other two being Someday You'll Find Her, Charlie Brown and What Have We Learned, Charlie Brown?. Wanting to do another one that was set in the wintertime, this was an obvious choice, although I hadn't watched it since I first got that set back in 2017 and remembered crap all about it, save for it being about Peppermint Patty figure skating, with Snoopy acting as her temperamental coach. Re-watching it, I have to say that this one is pretty damn good, and has just about everything you'd want from a Peanuts cartoon: good animation, particularly in the skating scenes, well-designed, lovely backgrounds and environments, nice instances of humor, some really good music, and an ending that's actually rather touching. Also, like how What A Nightmare, Charlie Brown broke from the norm by focusing almost exclusively on Snoopy, She's A Good Skate is all about Peppermint Patty and Marcie, with Snoopy, as well as Woodstock, having notable supporting roles. Charlie Brown himself has very little screentime and only has a scant few lines, while the other Peanuts regulars who show up get even less than that, if anything at all.

Peppermint Patty is training for an upcoming figure skating competition, comprised of eight increasingly difficult tests. She's been getting up at 4:30 every morning to practice before school, with Snoopy acting as her stern, grouchy coach, and she's been doing it for so long that it's beginning to take its toll, as she's constantly falling asleep in class. One day, she and Marcie, who's been continually watching Patty practice, go over to the latter's house, and Patty spots a sewing machine. Even though Marcie explains that it belongs to her mother and she herself doesn't know how to sew, Patty tasks her with making her a skating dress for the competition. To make matters worse, when they go out and get the supplies, Patty asks for denim, despite being warned it may not stretch enough. And, as expected, when Marcie makes the dress, it's a complete disaster. Fortunately for Patty, Snoopy comes to the rescue and turns it into the exact type of lovely dress she was hoping for. The day of the competition arrives and, when it's Patty's turn, things quickly go south, as the cassette tape of the music she skates to gets completely ruined. Keeping her from being disqualified requires some quick thinking by both Snoopy and, more significantly, Woodstock, who's also been watching Patty practice and has become enamored with her music.

As with most of the Peanuts cartoons during this period, She's A Good Skate, Charlie Brown was directed by Phil Roman, making this the tenth one he had a hand in directing, either by himself or with Bill Melendez co-directing. By this point, the two of them had also co-directed the two feature films, Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown and Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and Don't Come Back!!), the latter of which was released three months after this special aired. Aside from its focusing on Peppermint Patty and Marcie (the former wouldn't really get another starring role until the 2022 Apple TV+ special, To Mom (and Dad), With Love), what also makes She's A Good Skate unique is that it was based on an ongoing storyline in the comic strip from back in 1974, something that itself was really unusual for this particular strip. As per usual, though, a number of changes were made in the adaptation, with various subplots getting dropped and the main story being altered. And finally, this is the first special where the adults have actual voices, something it has in common with Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (though, unlike in that movie, they don't appear onscreen).

While she has been known to be pretty unlikable in some of the past specials (There's No Time for Love, Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving being prime examples), that, thankfully, is not the case with Peppermint Patty (voiced by Patricia Patts) here. The only thing she does that's kind of crappy is when she tasks Marcie with making her a skating dress, even though Marcie flat-out tells her that she doesn't know how to sew. And while she doesn't apologize for admonishing Marcie for how badly the dress comes out, and then complains about it to Snoopy, accusing Marcie of ruining everything (even though Marcie, again, reminded her how she told her from the beginning that it would suck), it doesn't go any further than that. Other than that, she proves very easy to root for, as she practices as hard as she can for the upcoming skating competition, even getting up every day at 4:30 to do so before school. By the start of the cartoon, it's already beginning to catch up to her, as she keeps falling asleep in class (not that that's out of character for her), much to her teacher's annoyance. While it's not dwelt upon, given the pressure of the competition, which she explains consists of eight tests that get progressively harder, it's easy to understand why she's pushing herself. And she also proves to be anything but a pushover, as when a group of boys show up at the frozen lake to play hockey, threatening her if she doesn't leave immediately, she's not at all intimidated, and both she and Snoopy take care of them very easily. When the competition rolls around, things immediately seem to fall apart for Patty when the cassette tape of the song she skates to becomes a tangled mess. But, thanks to Woodstock's quick thinking and lovely whistling, she's able to skate beautifully and come out on top.

Marcie (voiced by Casey Carlson) mainly acts as a bystander and observer to Peppermint Patty's skating practice, telling her that she admires her skills but can't skate herself because she has "weak ankles." She tries to help Patty whenever and however she can, like when she wakes her up in class, then has to push her head up off of her desk, as Patty says she can't move it herself, and later whacks her on the head with a book in order to fully wake her up. She also suggests Patty eat a couple of eggs for breakfast, saying, "You've never seen a chicken fall asleep in class, have you?" (she admits that was a bad attempt at a joke), and then, "Maybe you fall asleep in class because of uncorrected astigmatism," a notion that Patty immediately dismisses. And even though she tries to tell Patty that she can't sew, when Marcie gets roped into making a skating dress for her, she does the best she can, despite her lack of skill, and even if the idea gives her a really bad stomachache. Of course, the dress comes out bad, and Patty gives her grief over it, but Marcie calmly reminds that she said she couldn't sew, and the issue is dropped almost immediately. Naturally, Marcie is present at the competition, watching and cheering Patty on from the bleachers, along with Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy, and Schroeder.

Snoopy's (voiced by Bill Melendez) main role here is to act as Peppermint Patty's skating coach, and in this capacity, he proves to be rather gruff and hard to please. During the opening, after she completes a nicely done set, she asks him what he thinks and his response is to simply go, "Bleh," and walk away; Patty then comments, "There's no one harder to please than a skating coach." When she shows up at Charlie Brown's house at 4:30 to fetch her coach, Snoopy sleepily walks through the woods leading to the lake ahead of her, managing to avoid every single tree. However, he then walks out onto the center of the ice, not realizing what he's done until he's fully awake. Once he does, he panics and tries to run back, but slips and falls on his back. Throughout Patty's training, Snoopy doesn't do much beside growl out a bunch of critical gibberish and act grumpy, though he also helps her deal with the bullying hockey players who show up and threaten her to get off the ice. Where he really comes to the rescue is when Marcie bungles the job of making Patty's skating dress. He takes the botched dress, does some measurements on Patty, and uses the sewing machine and a pair of scissors to create the one she wanted. But he's less helpful when Patty complains about her hair, saying it's "mousey blah," as he gives her a big, red, curly wig that doesn't work at all. During the skating competition, Snoopy both operates the Zamboni to clear the ice and the tape deck for the individual skaters' music. But, when it's Patty's turn, the tape messes up and becomes a big, tangled mess in the player. Snoopy tries to fix it, getting into a fight with the player itself on the ice, but it seems as though Patty is heading towards disqualification...

...until Woodstock intervenes. Having joined Patty and Snoopy out on the ice, he heard the music that the former skated to, O mio babbino caro (Oh My Beloved Father), on the player and was really taken with it. Thus, when the tape messes up, he sees how desperate Patty is, prompting him to step up to the microphone and whistle a very lovely rendition of the song (instead of Bill Melendez, as per usual, Woodstock's whistling is provided by Jason Victor Serinus). It not only saves Snoopy's skin, as he breathes a sigh of relief after sitting back down, but also enables Patty to skate flawlessly and take home the gold. On the way home afterward, Snoopy continually grumbles whenever Patty asks him about her routine, but when she finally asks if he has anything nice to say, he kisses her on the cheek, much to her delight. Meanwhile, Woodstock, bringing up the rear, whistles the song again.

Save for when he answers his front door at 4:30 AM, half-asleep, Charlie Brown (voiced by Arrin Skelley) really only appears at the skating competition, cheering Patty on, along with Marcie, Linus (voiced by Daniel Anderson), Lucy (voiced by Laura Planting), and Schroeder. Out of the whole group, Charlie Brown gets the most lines, i.e. three: when he comments, "There are three things in life that people like to stare at: a flowing stream, a crackling fire, and a Zamboni clearing the ice," and another two where he laments that Patty seems to be on the verge of being disqualified from the competition. Linus and Lucy only get one line each, with Linus asking, when the tape screws up, if Patty will be disqualified, and Lucy confirming that she will without music, but Schroeder says absolutely nothing (that said, I'm sure one of the skaters doing her routine to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony met with his approval).

Some other miscellaneous characters include the kids who show up on the lake to try to force Peppermint Patty and Snoopy to get lost so they can play hockey, with two of them (both voiced by Tim Hall) not only demeaning her, repeatedly calling her "Beautiful" in an obviously degrading manner, but flat-out threatening her with violence. One asks, "You wouldn't like to get with a hockey stick, would ya, beautiful?", while the other tells her that she's vastly outnumbered. However, both she and Snoopy easily,

and literally, knock them on their asses. You also see several of the other girls who are participating in the skating competition, though the first two, a brunette named Sandy and a blonde named Mora, both end up falling on the ice in the middle of their routines. However, a redhead named Evelyn comes out and proves to be quite a talented skater in her own right (and yet, at the end, while Patty gets the gold medal, Mora gets the silver, while Evelyn is saddled with the bronze, which should not be the case at all). And like I said, even though you don't ever see them, 

the adult characters, in a rare occurrence, do have actual voices, such as Patty and Marcie's teacher, the fabric storekeeper (both voiced by Debbie Muller), and the competition announcer (voiced by Scott Beach).

As I said when we looked at What A Nightmare, Charlie Brown, the use of snow in the Peanuts cartoons always makes for some very picturesque visuals, which this one establishes from the outset. It opens on a lovely scene akin to that of A Charlie Brown Christmas: the snow-covered woods outside the neighborhood, with the camera panning over to the frozen lake, where Peppermint Patty is practicing her routine, in the midst of a light snowfall. This beautiful imagery continues throughout the special, with Patty and Marcie walking home from school

through the snowy neighborhood, passing by snowdrifts and even a random snowman, while the sky in the background has that lovely purple, wintertime sunset color to it. During this sequence, it briefly switches to a shot with a totally red sun high in the sky, while Patty and Marcie appear as virtual silhouettes on the ground below. Some similarly lovely visuals come when Patty wakes up at 4:30 the following morning, walks to Charlie Brown's house, and then she and the half-asleep Snoopy walk to the 

lake. As they do, there's a shot of the horizon with a hint of the coming sunrise, while the characters and the trees are, again, in silhouette. While some of the interior scenes, like when you see Patty and Marcie in class at the beginning, and when they deal with how the skating dress came out, have that sparse detail in the backgrounds and environments that you expect from Peanuts, others, like the one room in Marcie's house when Patty spots the sewing machine and the

fabric store, have a lot more than you typically get. Needless to say, the most notable interior is the stadium housing the ice rink where the skating competition is held during the climax, which they clearly put quite a bit of work and detail into drawing.

Animation-wise, this one is very notable in that it makes use of rotoscoping for the skating scenes, with Charles Schulz's own daughter, Jill (credited here as Amy), being the model for Peppermint Patty. When you watch it, you can see this major upgrade, as Patty's movements are not only very smooth but also realistic, as she pulls off a number of true-to-life skating moves, including spins, jumps, and various poses. And even though the first two of them suffer embarrassing wipe-outs, the animation on the other skaters in the competition is really good too, with

special mention going to Evelyn, who, again, proves to be quite a match for Patty's already considerable skills. (Some still frames from the skating footage used in the rotoscoping can be seen during the ending credits.) The rest of the animation is also quite good and on brand with how well it had gotten with these specials by this point, with some standouts including Woodstock being absolutely taken with the cassette tape of O mio babbino caro, as well as when he whistles it during the competition; Patty and Snoopy

dealing with the bullying hockey players by shoving them over; Snoopy turning Marcie's disastrous attempt at a skating dress into what Patty was hoping for; him driving the Zamboni before the competition; the judges repeatedly skating out onto the ice in order to score the individual performances; and Snoopy fighting with the continuously unraveling cassette tape during the climax.

The special is not short on comedy, which is often the case when Peppermint Patty and Marcie are involved. Right after the opening credits, we have the typical scenario of Patty snoozing away in the middle of class, and Marcie waking her up. But in this instance, it's compounded when Patty says, "I can't lift my head, Marcie. Give me a little push." Marcie proceeds to do so, causing Patty's head to fling forward, bopping her nose on her own desk. As she rubs it, she tells the teacher, "Don't call on me for a while, ma'am. I'm here, but my nose is in the recovery room." As per

usual, she doesn't do too well in school. The teacher asks if she knows the answer to this problem, "How many gallons of cream containing 25% butter fat, and milk containing 3 1/2% butter fat, must be mixed to obtain 50 gallons of cream containing 12 1/2% butter fat?, and Patty, after reading it aloud and staring at the worksheet in disbelief, asks, "Ma'am, would you settle for twenty push-ups?" The teacher doesn't respond and Patty, almost immediately, falls back asleep. The teacher wakes her up and Patty, after

apologizing, notes, "I dreamt I had just been given a scholarship to Vassar." She's told to stay awake and, as she slumps back in her chair, laments, "Well, back to reality." Despite asking Marcie to wake her up if she dozes off again, she does nothing when Patty immediately falls back asleep, leaning her head back onto Marcie's desk. The teacher, again, has to shout at her to make her wake up, and Patty leans forward, bumping her nose on her own desk again, but this time, remains half asleep. However, when the teacher 

tells her to stay awake, Marcie whacks her on the head with a book! Patty promptly yells, "I'm awake! I'm awake!", but when the teacher asks if she's aware of what's happening, she answers, "No, ma'am, I don't know what's going on... but I'm awake!"

Our one glimpse of Charlie Brown before the climax is when Patty wakes him up at 4:30 to tell him she's come to wake up her skating coach, then has the audacity to tell him to go back to sleep. She "wakes" Snoopy up by literally pulling down from atop his doghouse by his ear and dropping him into his coat and putting his hat on. As the two of them walk to the frozen lake, Patty, noting how he's asleep yet walking, feels he'll run into the trees but, amazingly, he manages to avoid every single one. But once they get to the lake, Snoopy's sleepiness gets the best of him

when he walks out onto the ice, stands there as he finally wakes up, and then, realizing where he is, panics and tries to run back, but slips and falls on his back, with his hat flying up and landing on the end of his big snout. Also, like I said, when those hockey players show up and threaten her to get off the ice, Patty is not at all intimidated. She tells the first one, "Get lost, neckhead. I was here first," and when the second threatens to hit her with his stick, she gets in his face and asks, "How would you like to be force-

fed a pair of goalie pads?" And while Snoopy, at first, doesn't seem so confident when she tells them that the two of them can take all of them on, they easily trounce them by shoving them and causing them to collapse on the ice like dominoes. Speaking of Snoopy, when Patty falls on her back while practicing, he shows her how it's done and skates, i.e. slides on his feet, flawlessly around her.

When Patty tasks Marcie with making her a skating dress, despite being warned that she doesn't know how to sew, you know the end result is not going to be pretty, and it isn't. Although Patty is initially overjoyed upon receiving it, when she puts it on, it turns out to be more like a blue poncho than a dress, as it doesn't even have sleeves. Marcie suggests, "Maybe it'll look better after I get the sequins sewed on, sir," and after admonishing her about how badly it came out, only for Marcie to remind her that she told her she couldn't sew to save her life, Patty laments, "I 

think I'm going to cry. I can feel the tears forming in my stomach." She then goes to Snoopy and pours her heart out about to him, saying, "When a skater is feeling low, she should be able to cry on a pro's shoulder. I can't even do that! You don't have any shoulders!" That's when Snoopy takes her back to Marcie's house and manages to turn it into the dress that she wants. But, as much as she likes it, Patty now complains about her hair, saying it's "mousey blah," and Snoopy brings out a present containing a big, 

red, curly wig that, when she wears it, makes her look like Little Orphan Annie (an in-joke, as Patricia Patts was actually Annie in a theater production at that time). Not satisfied, she puts it on Snoopy's head and then walks out with Marcie, leaving Snoopy there dumbfounded with this thing on his head, which covers his eyes.

But, despite all of the expected laughs and hi-jinks, there's a real beauty and grace to this particular special, which is best summed up in the climax. While the skating animation throughout is top notch, the competition finale, where Patty, dressed in that lovely dress, skates flawlessly to Woodstock's genuinely beautiful whistling of O mio babbino caro, is one of the most heartwarming and lovely scenes you'll ever see, not only in the entire Peanuts franchise but in animation, period. In addition to the awesome animation, the only thing you hear on the 

soundtrack is literally Woodstock's whistling and some soft music playing in the background, and when it's all put together, it's so awe-inspiring that everyone in the audience, including the other members of the Peanuts gang, can't help but just sit there in silent reverence. In fact, it's so lovely that Snoopy is moved to tears, and it's small wonder why Patty ends up winning the gold medal.

As you've already pegged, music plays an especially important part in this cartoon. Besides the aforementioned O mio babbino caro by Giacomo Puccini and Beethoven's 5th Symphony, there are other pieces of classical music featured, such as Dance of the Mirlitons from The Nutcracker, which plays when Sandy makes her ill-fated skating attempt, and Richard Wagner's Lohengrin: Prelude to Act III, which Evelyn skates to. As for the actual score, by Ed Bogas and Judy Munsen, they come up with a nice, quiet little song called I Thought I Saw A Shooting Star, sung by Becky Reardon, which opens the special and then becomes an instrumental leitmotif for Peppermint Patty throughout it. Like they would do throughout their long tenure scoring these cartoons, they would prove their own feel to the music but keep it in the Peanuts style. My personal favorite pieces they came up with here are the horn theme that plays when Snoopy walks through the woods, half asleep, and the piece you hear when Patty and Snoopy are faced with the bullies, as it has kind of an old-fashioned, gangster-style feel to it. And when Snoopy creates Patty's skating dress, it's scored with a quick, string theme that kind of sounds like a classical piece of music all its own.

She's A Good Skate, Charlie Brown is quite a delightful Peanuts special in just about every regard. It's an interesting change of pace to have one focused on Peppermint Patty and Marcie, and it also helps that the former is likable this time around; not only is the cartoon well-designed, with some very lovely visuals, but it boasts some very good animation, with the skating sequences being a really standout; it has plenty of funny moments but also a finale that's genuinely heartwarming and touching; and the music score is full of both bits of classical music and some very memorable original music. Honestly, other than a minor technical gripe I didn't mention, in that the characters' voices sound a little soft, which may force you to turn up the volume, this is one Peanuts cartoon that I can find no fault with, as it makes for a very pleasant way to kill half an hour.