Everyone knows the very first Peanuts animated special, 1965’s classic A Charlie Brown Christmas. Everyone knows the third Peanuts animated special, 1966’s classic It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.

But the second Peanuts animated special, 1966’s Charlie Brown’s All Stars? Not so much. Largely forgotten, the sports-themed show gets its day in the sun via this DVD release.

Once again, Charlie Brown’s (Peter Robbins) baseball team suffers one loss after another. Tired of the failure, the players decide to skip the summer’s season.

In the midst of this, Charlie Brown receives an offer for formal league sponsorship, with real uniforms and all! However, this comes with a caveat: Charlie Brown needs to fire all the girls and animals from the team. This places Charlie Brown in a dilemma.

As the follow-up to the classic Charlie Brown Christmas, All-Stars has big shoes to fill. I’m happy to report that it does pretty well for itself. Of course, it lacks the warm emotionality of its predecessor, but it offers a fun experience.

All Stars also includes a bit of a progressive agenda via the league’s refusal to accept anybody other than boys. The show doesn’t pursue this theme to a large degree, but it adds an interesting thematic bent to the proceedings.

Like many Peanuts shows, fans will recognize some of the gags from the daily strips. Not too many of these examples occur, though, as the program provides mostly new material. Even the redundant jokes still entertain. Though not quite as good as its predecessor, All-Stars is a funny winner.

Charlie Brown’s All Stars appears in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 on this single-sided, single-layered DVD; due to those dimensions, the image has not been enhanced for 16X9 televisions. Overall, the show looked good.

Sharpness was solid. The shows always offered good definition and delineation, without any notable signs of softness. Moiré effects and jagged edges did not present concerns, and I noticed no edge enhancement. Print flaws remained absent in this clean presentation.

Colors fared well. The show’s primary hues looked lively and full throughout the programs. At times, the tones really popped, as the transfers reproduced the basic colors nicely. Black levels also looked deep and rich, and shadow detail was just fine. Overall, this was a fine presentation given the age and origins of the program.

All Stars provided relatively satisfying monaural audio. Dialogue sounded clear and crisp, with no edginess or dull qualities. Effects were sporadic and cartoonish but seemed acceptably clean and accurate.

Vince Guaraldi's music was fairly lively and even offered some mild bass at times. The overall production showed some thinness commonly found in recordings of the era, but I found it to provide pretty nice sound as a whole.

One extra appears here: A Charlie Brown Celebration. From 1982, it gives us a bunch of comic strips brought to animated life. That means no coherent overall narrative, but the show manages a fair amount of charm and humor. I have to admit I really like the bizarre thread in which Peppermint Patty goes to obedience school!

A largely forgotten Peanuts special, Charlie Brown’s All Stars lacks the broad appeal of its holiday-themed shows, but it still entertains. The program boasts good charm and humor. The DVD gives us very nice picture along with acceptable audio and an interesting bonus episode. Peanuts fans will enjoy this fun cartoon.