What will this year bring Peanuts fans. The new animated special will be accompanied by a book adaptation. There will, of course, be two new volumes of The Complete Peanuts, covering 1979 through 1982. And beyond that? Honestly, I don’t know.

Usually by now I’d have some clue on some things coming, bookwise. But all I know about this year are things which I thought were coming, but won’t be. The jungle is quiet. Maybe I’m just a bit more out of the loop than usual, but perhaps the recent switch of ownership of Peanuts has slowed matters a bit, as potential licensees have to deal with changes at the licensor. (Oh, okay, one very minor note: there should be a version of Schulz’s Youth available for the Nook ebook reader in the next few days. I will let you know when it’s available. But that’s not a new book, just a new format – about as vital a piece of news as the Hallmark-branded variant of the Peanuts Philosophers set I saw yesterday.)

As for the animated special, we now know it will be a direct-to-DVD release, and we have an official description:

“Linus is pushed to his limits when he learns grandma is coming to visit and plans on ridding him of his childish security blanket. As grandma’s arrival looms closer the Peanuts gang tries to help Linus learn to cope without his fuzzy crutch. Lucy is particular eager to cure Linus’ dependency using her own psychiatric techniques, and while Charlie Brown tries to help he just doesn’t have the heart to see Linus suffer. All the while Snoopy is constantly agitating matters because he wants the blanket for himself. In the end, insightful Linus points out that everyone has their own type of ‘security blanket’ and in life a little security is a valuable thing”.

The DVD will come with three featurettes on the creation of the special, plus one deleted scene.

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