Rankin on Bass

4.8 (13)
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Welcome to Rankin on Bass, an offhanded joke that became a short-lived podcast where we discuss the stopmotion and animated works of Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass. Your hosts: Chris Stachiw of The Kulturecast podcast, Richard Hatem of DC's Titans, and Mike White of The Projection Booth podcast. Artwork by Abbie Stabby - https://www.instagram.com/abbiestabby Music by The Great Octopus - http://thegreatoctopus.bandcamp.com

12/31/2023

Farewell from Rankin on Bass

Live from the Island of Misfit Toys we record our last episode of Rankin on Bass where Mike, Chris, and Richard recount the bizarre trip they've been on for the last three years going from animagic to animated to live action fare that ranged from the sublime to the bizarre. Thank you to everyone who took this trip with us.

56 min
12/15/2023

Episode 38: Pinocchio's Christmas and The New Adventures of Pinocchio

We conclude our discussion of Rankin & Bass works properly with a double dose of animagic for the holidays - Pinocchio's Christmas in which the little wooden boy learns the magic of the season and some of R&B's earliest work, the New Adventures of Pinocchio.

47 min
12/08/2023

Episode 36: The Stingiest Man in Town and The First Christmas

Richard Hatem, Chris Stachiw, and Mike White are back in Christmas-town and looking at two more holiday specials from Rankin & Bass; The Stingiest Man in Town -- a re-telling of A Christmas Carol starring the voice of Walter Matthau -- and The First Christmas: The Story of the First Christmas Snow which features Angela Lansbury and a poor blind shepherd.

52 min
11/25/2023

Episode 37: Santa, Baby! and The Comic Strip

It's Santa, Baby an animated special from 2001 starring Gregory Hines as a frustrated songwriter and Patti Labelle as the patridge from the pear tree(!). We also discuss "Comic Strip" - a two hour block of cartoons featuring The Mini-Monsters, Street Frogs, Karate Kat and TigerSharks. This would be the last animated TV series produced by Rankin & Bass. You can watch Santa, Baby via Amazon: https://amzn.to/3R7I2MW

1h 3m
10/27/2023

Episode 35: The Coneheads (1983)

It's time to consume mass quantities of Coneheads with this 1983 pilot produced by Rankin & Bass for a Coneheads half-hour animated television show. Richard Hatem, Mike White, and Chris Stachiw discuss the strange choices made when trying to bring the Coneheads into America's living room on a weekly basis.

57 min
09/21/2023

Episode 34: That Girl in Wonderland (1973)

Marlo Thomas returns as "That Girl" in a very "not cannon" episode. Here she's in a Rankin & Bass cartoon where she seems to be having delusions about being inside several familiar fairy tales.

49 min
08/19/2023

Episode 33: Willie Mays and The Say Hey Kid (1972)

One of the more rare Rankin & Bass specials we've covered, Willie Mays and the Say-Hey Kid was the sixth episode of the first season of The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie. It's a bizarre story of Willie Mays being saddled with an orphaned child and her guardian angel, KC.

47 min
07/28/2023

Episode 32: The Red Baron (1972)

One of the episodes of The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie, The Red Baron (1972) is a canine interpretation of the story of Baron Manfred von Richthofen who, for whatever reason, was having a real resurgence in the late '60s/early '70s (lest we forget the General Mills Baron von Redberry cereal). We get off-target very easily and very quickly in this one. Forgive us, but this one was a real dog!

43 min

See All (39)

4.8

out of 5

13 Ratings

I heart this podcast 🧑🏼‍🎄

10/24/2022

Andrea Canales

The chemistry between Mike, Chris & Richard is infectious. As are the laughs and jokes on this podcast, I hope it keeps going for a long, long, time!!
Chris, Richard, and Mike Deliver Again

03/26/2022

RoguesDa

Veteran podcasters cover the entire Rankin & Bass catalogue. They are knowledgeable and entertaining. I can enjoy the shows on the specials I watched countless times or on the clunkers I never watched and never will. A must listen for folks who grew in 70s and 80s when animation was rarely on at night.
Heavy Hit of Nostalgia

11/28/2020

mwbegley

As a child of the '70s the Rankin Bass Holiday Specials were something I looked forward to every year. You had to make sure you were in front of the TV when they were on so you could soak in all the magic of the stop-motion animation, sing along with the wonderful songs, and then hold onto those memories until the next year! Those were special, yet frustrating times. These days we have access to them on DVD/Blu-Ray, and NOW a limited-series podcast to break down each(?) special and I'm here for all of it!

Welcome to Rankin on Bass, an offhanded joke that became a short-lived podcast where we discuss the stopmotion and animated works of Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass. Your hosts: Chris Stachiw of The Kulturecast podcast, Richard Hatem of DC's Titans, and Mike White of The Projection Booth podcast. Artwork by Abbie Stabby - https://www.instagram.com/abbiestabby Music by The Great Octopus - http://thegreatoctopus.bandcamp.com