The MSRP on “Peanuts: 1960s Collection” seems a tad exorbitant – six 30-minute TV specials plus a featurette on the music of composer Vince Guaraldi, needlessly spread over two DVDs, does not seem like it should carry a $30 price tag – but there is no denying the quality of the contents. There is a raw beauty in these early shorts; television was a new medium for Charles Schultz, and he made sure his stories, true to form, spoke from the heart and entertained the kids in the process. (He always maintained that his comic strip was never meant for children.) The one-two punch of “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” are worth the price of the set alone, but what a pleasant sight to see the long-lost baseball episode “Charlie Brown’s All-Stars” (where Schultz teaches kids the importance of loyalty) and “He’s Your Dog, Charlie Brown,” where Snoopy gets his first lead role, as it were. The Guaraldi featurette turns out to be one of the set’s highlights – he is the one that suggested the muted trumpet sound whenever the teachers spoke – but they missed a golden opportunity to include the Robert Smigel cartoon of Jesus welling with pride and doing the Franklin dance after watching “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” Still, we’re splitting hairs, and besides, you already decided to buy this the second you saw the title, didn’t you? At least, those of you born before 1975, that is.
