You can’t think of certain holidays without thinking of Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang. What is Halloween without the Great Pumpkin? What is Christmas without the soundtrack of “Linus and Lucy” in the background? It’s no surprise, then, that there was such outrage when Apple TV+ acquired the exclusive rights to the Peanuts TV specials last year, thereby putting these titans of culture behind a paywall. (Apple later relented, making each of the classic Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas specials free to all for brief windows around their respective holidays periods.)
So yes, we all know who Charlie Brown is. But do we really, to borrow from everyone’s favorite Thor meme.
In order to truly understand this lovable baseball manager and son of a barber, we have to know the man who created him, Charles Schulz, which Apple TV+ does in their new documentary, Who Are You, Charlie Brown?
With use of a Peanuts short where Charlie is tasked with writing an essay about who she is, along with classic comic strips, testimonials, and Schulz’s own recordings, 70 years of Peanuts history and the life of its creator, gets condensed into 54 minutes. It would seem such an organizational structure would lead to disorganization, but it’s all handled quite seamlessly, with no one aspect taking over. Each act of the short opens up an act of the documentary: Schulz’s early life, World War II service, romance, marriage, and family, and his final years, bringing together creator and creation effectively to tell these dual stories.
Every successful writer lives by the adage, “write what you know,” and it may surprise some to find out just how much of Schulz and his life in each of his character. We’ve all known Charlie Brown as the two-dimensional allegory of its creator, but it may surprise viewers to know that he’s put a bit of himself into each of his characters. His sarcastic side? Lucy. His introspective, philosophical side? Linus. The perpetual dreamer? Snoopy. Real life bleeds into the page in almost scandalously intimate ways. Take the little red-haired girl that remained the object of Charlie Brown’s affections. She was a real little red-haired girl: her name was Donna, and she did date Schulz for a period of time. And when Schulz retells this particular anecdote, you can hear the heartbreak in his voice at the failed relationship and understand on an even deeper level that unrequited love Charlie Brown held for his own little red-haired girl.
As Schulz brought his life to the strip, he also had his finger on the pulse of contemporary society, finding ways to weave in simple truths and gently educate his readers in matters of equality and tolerance. Whether it’s the introduction of Franklin, the first Black character in the Peanuts world, or his friendship with tennis legend and activist Billie Jean King as the influence for Peppermint Patty, Schulz used his strips to educate as well as entertain. These moments, along with the characters’ contributions to society and pop culture, end up being glossed over, and that’s a disappointment. If this was broadcast television, I would be more forgiving. But with the freedoms of a streaming service, and the breadth and depth of archival material available thanks to Apple’s partnership with Peanuts Worldwide, I expected much more. Fortunately, there’s more than enough other material out there that takes that deeper dive, allowing this documentary to be the springboard for further exploration.
Also glossed over is anything too overly critical or negative. The reactions to Franklin’s introduction in 1968, where some papers threatened not to run the strip anymore if Franklin appeared in the same school as the rest of the kids are touched upon only briefly. And there’s no time given to criticism that the strip moved away from its exploration of deeper truths to a vehicle to show off Snoopy, much like what Steve Urkel did to Family Matters in the back half of its run. If one wants to consider a work of art and its impact over time (a piece of advice Linus gives to Charlie Brown in the next-t0-last act of the animated sequences), we have to consider the flaws alongside the high points.
Continued belowWhat I did find fascinating (and perhaps wanted more of in my dual roles as comic critic and longtime Peanuts fan) is the look inside his process and drawing routine, particularly the shaky line of the last two decades of the strip. This was the Charlie Brown style I remember from my formative years. To discover that it was borne out of his health issues in the early 1980s underscores just how much of his authentic self appeared on that page, and how he turned adversity that could have ended his career into an opportunity. It added to the vulnerability and empathy we the reader have for his characters, a reminder of just how authentic – – and in turn, how universal – – these characters have become.
The animated short that anchors this documentary, thankfully, does capture the nostalgia and all the high beats of what made those Charlie Brown movie and TV specials so beloved. Classic characters, moments, and conflicts are all there: Snoopy at his typewriter, Linus as the old wise soul in a young boy’s body, the inaudible trombone voice of the kids’ teacher. It’s also thankfully done in 2-D animation with plenty of Vince Guaraldi jazz riffs. While the 3-D style of 2015’s The Peanuts Movie was critically well-received, it only feels right that this documentary go back to the roots of the look of the characters.
We all know how the story of Charles Schulz ends: he passed away on February 12, 2000, the same day his final strip appeared in newspapers. Here is a man who died doing what he loved, right up until his final day. And we still feel that impact two decades later, where it isn’t Christmas without A Charlie Brown Christmas, where Snoopy and NASA still walk hand in hand, and where children from 8 to 88 find joy in a stuffed Snoopy toy or viewing of the Great Pumpkin.
Who Are You, Charlie Brown? certainly doesn’t reveal anything we didn’t know before about Schulz and Peanuts. But for those younger generations who may just be discovering Peanuts through Apple TV+’s The Snoopy Show, or those who only casually drop into the world when it’s holiday time, it provides a decent primer to Schulz. And for us longtime fans, it’s a cozy security blanket of love and praise for a creator who was such an integral part of growing up in the 20th century.
