Merry Christmas Eve Eve
On this holy occasion, let me share with you the greatest Christmas record album (or "LP,"an archaic format that our ancestors used to use to listen to music) I ever found at the thrift store:
Six Million Dollar Man Christmas Adventures (1978, Peter Pan Industries)
As you can tell from this scanned portion of the album cover, a Christmas with Steve Austin is no sedate, eggnog-and-fruitcake affair. But what you can't tell is that Lee Majors had no part in this merchandising effort (sure, you might have guessed it from the obvious low quality of the graphics, but I didn't).
Anyway, there are four adventures. The first one, "The Toymaker," is about a brilliant physicist who gets fired for being a Nazi or something, and takes a job with a toy company. When he can't make his production quota, he invents a "molecular duplicator" to speed up the toy making process. But then his greedy boss conks him on the head, throws him in the gutter, and tries to sell the gadget to a Bela Lugosi impersonator who is allegedly a big spy from an important foreign power. Steve Austin sneaks into the toy plant and gets chased by dogs. But the day is saved when Bela wants to see if the gadget can duplicate something big, like a tank, and the tank explodes because the duplications are only stable if you use small molecules. Or something.
Here's some dialog from it:
Steve: "Someone is coming. I'd better hide. There. Behind that box." [later] "That's my cue to exit. I hope I can outrun those dogs. ... They're getting awfully close."
"The Kris Kringle Caper" is the adventure illustrated by the three Santas punching a guy in his gut. (I think Santa with kung-fu grip would make a great action figure).
Anyway, this one is about some bad guys who are are passing "fuel cells" from our secret SYR-9 missle ("Steve: SYR-9???") by having a supermarket Santa give them to a little girl, who then delivers them to those danged foreign spies. But Steve takes over as the store's Santa, and busts up the spy ring! But did he ever get that perfume that he was trying to buy at the beginning of the story? I guess we'll never know. "Christmas Lights" concerns a message which OSI intercepted from space. A sexy lady scientist (okay, she doesn't sound that sexy, but you just know that she is) says that the signal is coming from an exploded sun, and this nova may be the source of the light that was seen at the birth of Christ. She and Steve take a rocket to investigate the message. "Peace on Earth," was all it said.
No, it actually said, "Prepare for a new era." Sure, the people who sent us this inspirational message all died when their star went nova so that the wise men could have a star to guide them, but at least they were upbeat about it. (Not based on a short story by Arthur C. Clarke, as far as you can prove.)
But the best adventure of all is "Elves' Revolt." (No wisecracks about revolting elves, please.)
It begins when the head-elf approaches Santa about a cost-of-living raise for the elf workers. Santa says no.. The elf says, "But we have to earn a decent living." Santa says get back to work. The elf says he and his comrades will strike. Santa says he'll hire scab elves. And that's when the elf introduces Rumat, his strike enforcer ...
Back in Washington, Oscar Goldman recalls Steve from his Christmas vacation because the polar ice cap is melting.
Steve: "You can't be serious. The polar ice cap is melting?"
Anyway, if something isn't done in the next couple of days, the entire northern hemisphere will be covered in two feet of water. So, Oscar and Steve head to the North Pole to find the heat source responsible for the meltdown.
They parachute out of a jet, but are immediately captured by Rumat, and held prisoner in Santa's workshop. A fat, bearded man is also being held there. They don't believe that he is Santa.
Santa: "Has TV destroyed everything?"
But it seems that the guy not only knows their names, but that Steve is bionic.
Steve: "Oscar, there IS a Santa Claus."
Santa tells them about the striking elves, and about Rumat, "the gun-toting terrorist" whom the elves brought in as muscle. Rumat shows up then to gloat about his plan to melt the ice cap and rule the world. He also explains that he duped the "stupid elves," who will "soon be prisoners too."
Of course, the elf shop steward overheard all this, and pops out to tell Rumat that he has a super cool laser gun aimed at Rumat's stomach which will cut him in half unless Rumat surrenders. So, Rumat surrenders. The elf apologizes for having wanted a living wage ("Sorry, Santa, I should have trusted your judgment"). Santa forgives him, and Christmas is saved. (See, kids, management always knows best.)
Oscar and Steve want to buy one of the cool laser guns for OSI use. The elf confesses that it was just a toy. The End. ***** Kids, this is the kind of spiritual holiday we used to enjoy before the Secular Left killed Christmas. I hope you have learned a valuable lesson from it.
4:02:08 AM |
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