Yesterday, we watched Sabrina the Teen-Age Witch expose a horrible Santa Claus by bursting his evil schemes one balloon at a time. And today, we are going to feature a tale in which some Christmas magic is responsible for showing a misguided soul the way.
Only this time, the magic isn't coming from a witch. It's coming from a brownie. And I don't mean the chocolate kind either.
Before we introduce this character though, let's take a look at the book where the story first appeared. Apparently, this story was first released in 1974 in the Archie Giant Series title "Archie's Christmas Stocking #228".
It's a story called "Brownie Points", and it stars everybody's favourite apprentice to Santa Claus, Jingles the Christmas Brownie. Now, Jingles has been an annual tradition in Archie comics since the 1960s, and only the teenage members of the Riverdale community can see him. By 1974, at least Archie, Betty, Veronica, and Jughead are aware of his existence...and probably Reggie is as well, though Reggie seems to be more on Santa's naughty list than his nice list. But anyway, Jingles is almost always in a good mood being all in the Christmas spirit and all...but in this Stan Goldberg drawn story, Jingles is anything but holly jolly.
Jingles is upset that some people are taking advantage of kids during the holiday season, and he sets out to seek justice. In a way, he's kind of like one of those social justice warriors that have to lead a stand against everyone and everything - but in this case, Jingles makes a very valid point.
Above is a television commercial for one of the most sought after toys of 1974. The airplane - made by the rather unfortunately named Sleezy Toy Company - had made the lists of many boys and girls who wrote letters to Santa, and normally this would have been a good thing.
That is until Jingles shows the gang what the toys REALLY look like.
Blech is right, Betty. These toys are definitely not holiday heroes at all. And I totally understand Jingles' frustration because I remember getting disappointed over faulty toys at Christmas. This one Christmas...I believe I was like eight years old or something like that. I got a VHS copy of a movie that I really wanted for Christmas, and since my family had just gotten a VCR the previous year, I was really excited to watch it. And the day I put it in the VCR was the day that the tape got eaten. But it wasn't the VCR that was the problem as we tried a couple of other tapes and they played fine. I got stuck with a tape that was defective. I mean, I know that Kid Flicks tapes were low quality anyway, but still...I was left very disappointed. So, I can definitely understand Jingles frustration with the Sleezy Toy Company.
However, Jingles is so uncharacteristically angry that Archie and his friends are worried that he might take revenge and cause even more harm than good. Archie tells Jingles that perhaps he and his friends might meet with the CEO of the toy company and they hope to make him listen to reason. Jingles seems to think that it's a waste of time, but he agrees that they should try. However, should they fail to make him listen to reason, they'll have to step aside and let Jingles handle it. Sounds reasonable.
On their way to their meeting with J. Sleezy of Sleezy Toys, they pass a child who is very dissatisfied with his toy, and this confirms Archie and the gang's belief that Jingles is telling the truth about the evil toy company. But does their meeting with J. Sleezy go according to plan? Well...not exactly. Archie passionately tries to tell Mr. Sleezy that his toys are shoddy and that he needs to go back to the drawing board to make them better, but Mr. Sleezy is not hearing any of it. He angrily tells them to leave because they are wasting his time. He has to deal with more important matters such as picking up his new sportscar from the car dealership. Nice to know that evil toy manufacturers have their priorities straight at Christmas, eh?
And for that to happen, he has to make sure that he is seen and heard...by using magic to transform himself into...a used car salesman? Seriously, that's what he looks like. But he's not selling used cars. He's taken over the sale of J. Sleezy's new sportscar!
Of course, this is all Jingles magic here, and the car can likely be put back together again with magic, and J. Sleezy would not be seriously harmed. But it's quite the hilarious tale as the car disintegrates all around them, J. Sleezy is screaming about why they hired that idiot to design a car while being fearful for his life at the same time, and Jingles acting as if he is completely unaffected by the whole thing. I do believe that this is a lesson that J. Sleezy needed in his life. A terrifying car ride down Main Street was just the ticket.
So, after the scrap metal is shoveled off the streets, J. Sleezy's toy company is shut down for retooling (and renaming), and Archie happily remarks that he sees the toy quality for Christmas 1975 improving a great deal from 1974's line. Jingles simply states that if he doesn't, like the Terminator...he'll be back.
The moral of the story? NEVER mess with a Christmas Brownie. And the moral of this weekend? Never mess with a child at Christmas.
Tomorrow on Day #3, we're going back to the 1960s with a classic tale about a present mix-up...with a surprise twist ending!
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