Why was it such a misfit?

Recently, I found a tape that was just labeled "FLINTSTONES / COMMISH."

That was enough to take a good guess. I knew The Commish was the name of a crime drama that ran on ABC in 1993. That same year, the same network ran two Flintstones TV movies that followed up on the original series: I Yabba Dabba Do, where Pebbles married Bamm-Bamm, and Hollyrock-A-Bye Baby, where Pebbles gave birth to twins. I assumed one of those two movies were on this...but I got something totally different.

Up to now I thought Hollyrock-A-Bye Baby was as far as the original continuity ever got. But there was a follow-up to THAT, in the form of a Christmas special that December. Until around last week I never knew the special A Flintstone Family Christmas existed.

And why not? I always turned on these Flintstone revivals. How could this one completely slip by me? Didn't ABC promote it? ....Apparently they didn't. I have a TV Guide issue with a lengthy article covering "every" holiday special scheduled to air in 1993. It makes no mention of this one. The day it aired, there was no ad for it. There was a FULL PAGE devoted to The Wish That Changed Christmas, now on its third airing, and a half-page ad for the special after that where Natalie Cole and Kathie Lee Gifford sang Chrismas carols to each other at Walt Disney World. But there's nothing about what was on at 8:00. It's almost like...ABC wanted to bury it.

What didn't they like about A Flintstone Family Christmas? What made them hesistate to properly promote characters that were still a big draw in 1993? Let's dive into it and figure it out.

Fred Flintstone is almost finished decorating his dwelling for Christmas, with the help of Barney and an electric eel in a fishtank to power all the lights. The eel says 'SHOWTIME" and bites on a cord, completing a circuit and lighting up Fred's house....but then the eel sneezes, somehow blowing out the circuitry. There was this giant sign on Fred's roof that said "MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM THE FLINTSTONE FAMILY TO YOURS." Post-explosion, most of the letters blew out and now it just says "FATSO'S HOUSE."

Fred asks why everyone seems grumpier this year. Holding up a stone newspaper, Barney points out "It's probably the state of the world, Fred. The Savings and Loanstone collapse, another drive-by stoning last night..." Fred doesn't want to hear it and pounds Barney's paper, crumbling it into little rocks. Barney holds the pile and says "Now if I wanna read the news, I gotta play Scrabble first."

"Drive-by stoning" isn't the type of gag you typically expect to hear on The Flintstones and neither is the mugging scene that's about to happen. When some period pieces get older, they inevitably reflect the time they were made in more than the time they were meant to depict. The original series, for example, is supposed to take place in the Stone Age yet the culture is unmistakably 1960s-era. Similarly here, for the Prehistoric time period there is sure a lot of 1990s 'tude and edge. According to Wikipedia, this special's working title was The Flintstones: Christmas Misdemeanors.

Later that day Fred and Barney emerge from the Bedrock deli with a fresh turkeysaurus, when their path is blocked by a bell-ringing Santa. "Hey there, care to donate to a worthy cause?" the Santa says, in a high scratchy voice that sounds way more like Christine Cavanaugh than Jolly Ol' Saint Nick.

"What's the cause?" Fred asks.
"CAUSE I said!" the Santa barks, suddenly changing tone and holding up what might be the first loaded gun in Flintstones history (too lazy to check). "NOW GIMMEE EVERYTHING YOU GOT."
Fred nervously hands over his watch and wallet. "What do we do now, Fred?" wonders Barney.

"Unless that bird is bulletproof, let him have it!" Fred shouts, and Barney throws the raw turkeysaurus at his head. The meat connects -- and somehow rips the robber in half?? The top half runs away while the bottom is left hopping. Fred and Barney are too weirded out by that to stick around.

At the police station, Fred finds it easy to identify the mugger in a lineup, as he's the only one under four feet. Wilma, who's in the room, is instantly skeptical: "Fred, that's just a child."
"No, I'd recognize that face anywhere! Also he was a lot taller when he robbed us!"
A detective informs her "The kid runs this Santa sting, with a partner who plays the bottom half."
Fred is mad and doesn't care how young the robber is, he just wants the book thrown at him.

That's when Stella Stalactite of Bedrock Social Services dramatically enters the room. She explains that Stony is "a caveless kid from the wrong side of the tarpits" who has been in and out of the system since nearly his birth, when he was the notorious "Binky Bandit" who robbed from other babies. Since then he's been bounced out of countless foster homes..."no matter who we tried, no one could get through to him." At this point they show a row of people who have tried to preach to Stony, and...

You know those people who complain about how the Flintstones shouldn't be celebrating Christmas because the show is supposed to take place thousands of years before Christ's birth? This scene seems like a thumbing of the nose at those people. "Guess what? Not only do we not care, we're going to complicate it firther. Not only does Christianity exist in Bedrock, SO DOES EVERYTHING ELSE! Hah! Deal with THAT!"

With his backwards baseball cap, sneering cynical attitude and wildly patterned cave clothes, Stony comes straight from the Yo Yogi school of "modernizing" Hanna-Barbera. He may be the most obscure character in Flintstones canon -- I'd certainly never heard of him before now, for all the effort he did to chase my demographic. Stony insists he's "not that bad" and points out that his "gun" was really just a twig. Wilma has nothing but sympathy for the boy. Fred does not.

"Fred, no child should have to spend Christmas in jail. Maybe WE should take him in."
"Oh sure! Then we can see if Charlie Mansonstone wants to come for New Years!"

The Flinstone patriarch puts his bare foot down. "HE IS NOT SETTING FOOT IN OUR HOUSE, AND THAT'S FINAL!"
The very next scene is Stony walking into their living room: "Great place, Mrs. Flinstone, lotta carpet!"
Oh yes, that gag. Every 90s show did it at some point.

The wives walk into the kitchen to make some "rock nog," which sounds unpleasant. Fred and Barn are left alone with the terror, who insists he can be useful -- he can rewire their cable box to get THAT channel. "Alone tonight, caveman? Turn us ON. Welcome to the All-Cavegirl Network." I guess this'd be shocking if Star Wars hadn't broken that barrier fifteen years prior.

"GIMMEE THAT!" Fred yells, yanking the remote. He changes the channel to a black and white movie. "Oh, this is my favorite! It's A Wonderful Stone-Age Life. We used to watch this all the time when Pebbles was growing up."

We see a Jimmy Stewart caricature telling a toddler that when a bell rings, an angel gets their wings. "Gimmee a break," Stony scowls while watching. "Christmas was never that way for ME." His mind goes to an alternate version of the scene where Jimmy hears a doorbell, opens it and sees Stony shivering there. "GET OUTTA HERE! WE DON'T WANNA THINK ABOUT PEOPLE LIKE YOU AT A NICE TIME LIKE THIS!" Then he slams the door.

"Christmas is just the same as any other day, but colder," Stony tells Fred. The caveman gets flustered again: "My grandkids will be here soon and YOU'RE not gonna put down Christmas in front of 'em!" Just as they're about to tear each other apart, Wilma re-enters the room and tells Fred it might be a good idea if he and Stony went to pick out a Christmas tree.

"BUT...BUT...." Fred starts. "I thought we were gonna wait until the rest of the family got here to do that!"
"Hey, Mr. Flintstone, I know where we can get a tree at a ROCK-bottom price. Say...twenty bucks!"
"Fred, we have to show that we TRUST HIM," Wilma growls.

"Oh, fine." Fred hands Stony the bill and Stony gleefully races off. Fred figures there will be no tree for that exchange.
Then he's surprised when, moments later, Stony comes back with a beautiful pine, pre-decorated and everything.

"Gosh, I don't know what to say..." Fred starts.
Barney says it for him when he comes in from the kitchen and exclaims "Hey, that's MY tree."

Later that day, Fred is trying on his costume to play Santa in the Bedrock holiday parade when he gets a call from Pebbles (TRIVIA: she's voiced by Megan Mulally). She and her family are stranded at the airport due to a snowstorm, and their connecting flight has been delayed. "Well, that's it, Wilma...our Christmas is ruined. I can't spend it with my children; instead I got....HIM."

"Hey, Mr. Flintstone, I wasn't trying to rip you off. You gave me twenty bucks, I got you a tree."
'YOU GOT ME MY NEIGHBOR'S TREE."
"So? I'll only charge you fifteen."
"Hey, he isn't all bad," says Barney. "He just got me the All-Cavegirl Network, hee hee."

Wilma offers this: "Maybe Stony doesn't understand what Christmas is all about, because he's never had a real one before."
They decide to let Stony participate in some of their holiday traditions around Bedrock, though there's a LOT of grumbling out of Fred in that decision.

There is then a montage of the day's activities. Fred, Wilma, Barney and Betty sing Chrismas carols while Stony walks around collecting "donations" in his cap (until Fred grabs him). Wilma goes door-to-door giving out her homemade ornaments. They all go skating together, but Stony isn't good at it and just slides around on his rear. Fred decides to teach him, but he can't resist showboatimg beyond his own abilities and HE takes a tumble.

Finally, the family gets their picture taken together, and Fred hoists Stony up on his shoulders before the photo snaps, suggesting he's warming up to the boy. This is awfully quick; Fred has spent every minute of the special up to that point cursing Stony's very existence.

Past installments of The Flintstones have shown "picture cameras" that are made by birds inside the cameras chiseling out carved images with their beaks. Apparently the Stone Age has invented film now. But not color film -- I don't think I could have believed that.

The final errand is to pick up a "real" tree. Fred can't find a tree he likes that's also within his budget. Stony has an idea, and by this point you know what his ideas involve. He hustles up a shell game near the parking lot where he easily cons some tough guy out of his money. That guy is so mad, he stomps over to Mr. Flintstone and knocks him out with his own tree.

Fred wakes up in the hospital and moans, "What a day...what next?" He gets his answer when Mr. Slate walks in and says Fred will now have to be replaced as Santa in the Bedrock holiday parade. "I hate to do it but...how would it look if Santa DIED in front of everyone?"

Fred is now in deep despair, and for the first time ever, Stony feels guilty. "It's all my fault...." he mopes, staring out the window. But then he spies Slate's limo below, and has an idea on how to "fix" things.

Slate enters his limo and orders the driver to take him to the Flintstone house, "I have to get that Santa suit back from him! The things I do for my rockholders..."
"YESSIR," says Cavanaugh's scratchy voice. Apparently Stony can drive.

One scene transition later Stony proudly presents Fred with the Santa suit. All he had to do was lock Slate in the bathroom and swipe it! Now Fred can still be Santa, right?
Fred doesn't like that at all. He instantly heals from his injuries and leaps out of bed, down the hall and all the way to his house, where Slate is yelling about being kidnapped. The police arrive, the media arrives too, and everyone thinks Fred did it.

After a commercial break, Fred and Stony are wearing stripes and being led into jail. Stony is familiar with the place and gives Fred some advice on survival, such as "never slow dance with someone named Bubba." Fred moans that this has turned into the worst day of his life. Stony replies that it could be worse..."you could be forced to play Maria in the prison musical."

Fred doesn't want to hear anything else out of Stony for the rest of the time they're cellbound, however long that is. "You don't even want some of Betty's marble cake?" Stony offers.
"Huh? How'd you think of bringing that?"
"When you've been on the streets as long as I have, you never know when your next meal is coming. I always pocket stuff for later." He agrees to share it with Fred.

Fred again feels he's been a bit too hard on Stony. "I only wanted to make things better," Stony says, "but what do you get the man who has everything? I thought getting the suit back would help, but..."
"Aw kid, you mean well, you're just...doing it the wrong way. You can't cut corners to get what you want, understand?"
"I'm starting to..."

At that moment both Mr. Slate and Stella Stalactite enter the cell. Mr. Slate dropped the charges because he can't find anyone else to play Santa....and Stella has seen and heard enough about what Stony has put Fred through. "I can see your placement with the Flintstones went like all the others." She drags him away from Fred, who wonders if he'll ever see the kid again.

As Fred prepares to ride in the sleigh float, Wilma walks up to him with positive news. "The weather has cleared up at the airport, so Pebbles can make her flight now. They'll all be here for Christmas after all."
"I know that should cheer me up, but..." Fred is depressed now. Sure, he'll have his biological daughter, but right now she's less important than the lawbreaking reprobate he just met and who ruined his whole life in just 24 hours.

Then Fred feels something stuck in his Santa hat. He reaches in and pulls out one of Wilma's homemade ornaments. Stony put it in there and wrote "To Fred" on it. At that moment, by classic television coincidence, his float passes by Stella's car where Stony is in the backseat. Only one thing to do! He cracks the sleigh reins and forces the pterodactyls dragging it to start flying (that's right, this is a fully functional flying sleigh).

He catches up to the car and holds out his hand. Stony grabs it and boards the sleigh. Stella notices what's going on and Fred shouts "SORRY STELLA, BUT STONY'S GOT A HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS!" They fly past the moon and shout "YABBA DABBA DOO!" together.

The final scene is the entire family, with Pebbles and Bamm Bamm, together singing carols while Stony discreetly teaches the twins how to play the shell game. Fred tells him there's a family tradition that "the youngest member of the family gets to hang the Christmas star." Stony thinks he means the twins, but Fred of course means him. Bamm-Bamm lifts Stony on his shoulders and he tops the tree, and the lightning bug inside the star illuminates its rear end. Everyone bathes in the vibrant bioluminescent beam.

Then they all start singing "WE ALL WANT SOME TARPIT PUDDING...." Do you really? Won't that kill you?

Why didn't it fit in?
There's another reason I never knew about A Flintstone Family Christmas. Airing opposite it on CBS was the Dr. Quinn episode based on A Christmas Carol where Quinn is taken to visit her past, present and future self. I remember watching that episode during an overnight stay at my grandmother's house. There was this bit in the Christmas Future segment where someone says "Let's call Grampa in here" and you see this shadow of an old man with a cane slowly moving down the hall. At that second, the ghost says "Okay, time to go" and transports Quinn back home. My aunt, who was also watching, flew into a rage. "HOW DARE THEY! SHOW HER HUSBAND, YOU COWARDS!" As if they were going to commit to endgame that hard, that early in the series.

But back to the subject at hand, the way A Flintstone Family Christmas ends suggests H-B was really hoping ABC would order some kind of revival series, with Stony as Cousin Oliver. That didn't happen -- like I pointed out, this thing was purposely buried at launch and probably didn't perform well in its only airing. It did get a VHS release in 1996 and a DVD release in 2011, and I'm told that today you can find an HD-remastered version buried in the Max menu somewhere, that is if Zaslav hasn't removed it already.

BONUS TRIVIA: Only two cartoon franchises have two separate Christmas specials that chronologically take place twenty years apart from each other: The Flintstones and How To Train Your Dragon.