10 Favorite Films I Saw in 2015

I was able to see a lot of movies this past year. From classics to new releases - popular films and obscure titles - one thing most of the movies I saw had in common: they are light hearted. At the end of the day, when I have an hour or two to sit and take in a film, the last thing I want to do is use my brain. But here's a list of 10 of the best films that I saw for the first time in 2014.

Airport (1970; dir. George Seaton)

I got into a bit of a disaster film phase earlier in the year and watched a handful of classics in the genre, including all four entries in the Airport series. The first one is a real bang up of a motion picture with about 17 different storylines going on - some of them funny, some of them serious and a whole slew of great actors that I love. Dean Martin, George Kennedy, Helen Hayes, Maureen Stapleton...and even good ol' Gary Collins show up in this nail biter about an evening at an airport where just about everything goes wrong. It was really cool to see how much the beloved Airplane! (1980) borrowed from Airport in terms of style, pacing and some of the situations and characters. This is a really good movie, it won Best Picture for the year it came out. If you can handle the slower paced action films of the early 70's, this one certainly holds up and I highly recommend it. 

Bad Words (2013; dir. Jason  Bateman)

Jason Bateman finds a loophole in the National Spelling Bee's rules that allows him to enter as an adult and get revenge on the system that made him a looser in his childhood. Painfully funny and fantastic script, this is one of the few films that lays out a really solid story while never forgetting to be laugh out loud hilarious.
 

          Cinderella (2015; dir. Kenneth Branagh)

Kenneth Branagh makes awesome high culture Shakespeare pictures and he is an absolute master at making fantastic popcorn movies. This live-action translation of Disney's beloved animated Cinderella (1950) is both luxurious and playful. So many modern updates of fairytales and cartoons try to deviate from the original source material. Branagh's Cinderella delights in bringing the memories of the cartoon movie to life while filling in some holes and offering alternate vantage points on some of the key story elements. The result is a fresh take on an old tale that is every bit and magical and Disney as the animated film we all grew up with.  

Gone Girl (2014; dir. David Fincher)

Every year, one or two Oscar-worthy films make it into my DVD player. Gone Girl was just an intense thriller with twists and turns and surprises all over the place. A really well made movie that I thoroughly enjoyed. It was also cool to see supporting players Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry and Casey Wilson in such a high caliber dramatic production.

Inside Out (2015; dirs. Pete Docter & Ronnie Del Carmen)

Inside Out is Pixar running full throttle and doing everything right. Hysterical, touching and wildly creative, this film has everything going for it. There's also perfect cartoon casting with Amy Poehler as the optimistic Joy, The Office's Phyllis Smith as Sadness and even Mindy Kaling (who I usually cant stand) was really good as Disgust. Lewis Black as the fiery haired Anger is one of those rare moments when a comic's physical and creative voice are matched perfectly with an animated character. As with any really good animated film, this one plays equally to children and adults.

 

 

Jurassic World (2105; dir. Colin Trevorrow)

I was never really a fan of the original Jurassic Park but something about this movie looked like it would be a fun Summer afternoon with my kids and boy was I right. I really liked how they completely fleshed out the idea of a theme park this time, showing how a real working tourist attraction with living dinosaurs might actually work out. The performances are great, not only Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard but the really solid comedic pairing of Jake Johnson and Lauren Lapkus as well.

On The Town (1949; dirs. Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly)

Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra and some other dude are sailors with 24 hours of shore leave in New York City. They step off the boat and then just go at it singing and dancing and chasing girls for two solid hours of entertainment. Unrelenting in it's energy, this was one of the first musicals to be shot on location and it's packed with great shots documenting what The Big Apple looked like in the late 40's. Man, I just enjoyed the hell out of every minute of this film.

 

The Peanuts Movie (2015; dir. Steve Martino)

This was my Facebook post the night I saw The Peanuts Movie: "When they announced years ago that they were making a computer animated Charlie Brown movie, I immediately thought of all the ways they were going to screw it up - like making them look like real kids and farting and crude humor. And then the teaser and eventually the trailer came out....and they relieved my worries somewhat but I still had no faith that a modern movie was going to do justice to a group of friends that have been so near and dear to my heart my entire life. I went into The Peanuts Movie tonight with very high expectations and very little confidence that I would be satisfied. I'm happy to report that every single frame of The Peanuts Movie is wonderful and magical. My boys (who have also grown up with these characters) laughed and giggled with glee throughout the entire movie. I was really proud that my kids loved a movie so simple and wholesome and that somebody created a movie worthy of the legacy of Charles Schulz."

 

Road to Bali (1952; dir. Hal Walker)

This is the year I discovered "the Road pictures," a series of seven super lightweight comedies made between 1940 and 1962. The films don't have much to do with each other but all star Bob Hope, Bing Crosby and Dorthy Lamour. Hope and Crosby always play some sort of scam artists, Lamour is always a beautiful woman they run into somewhere along the way who helps them out of a pickle. The boys always come to blows over the heart of Lamour, there is always singing and dancing and there is never too much of a story. But if I had seen these movies when I was younger, my head would have exploded! There's ad-libbing, breaking the fourth wall, jokes about the movie studio, insults lobbed at each other, super corny bits and gags...they are all just great fun! I managed to track down 6 of the 7 films this past year. They were all really fun, but Bali is the one I saw first so it took me by surprise the most. 

 

Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015; dir. J.J. Abrams)

The new Star Wars did so many things perfectly. It took key ingredients from the first film, reshuffled them and dealt them out with a deck of new ingredients which resulted in a movie which serves as a nice souvenir of all our childhood Star Wars memories and paves the way for new adventures (and merchandising) to come. Force Awakens needed to do about 50 things to live up to it's own hype and serve as a worthy sequel to what is easily the most loved film of all time. It delivered on all 50 of those points, added in another 30 things you didn't even realize you were looking for and then topped it off with about 50 things that made itself a unique and entertaining movie all it's own. Not only has Star Wars: The Force Awakens become the highest grossing movie of all time, it has set the stage for a new wave of nostalgia films that will pay homage to film franchises of the past while attempting to move forward with new chapters. The ripples of the film go far beyond the box office numbers and toy isle sales.

 

 

Honorable Mentions/Almost Made The List: Let's Be Cops (2014) was nothing new, but it was just about the laugh out loud, gut busting, funniest movie I've seen in a long time! Tina Fey narrating the Disneynature documentary Monkey Kingdom (2015) is an inspired idea that accompanies a compelling and fascinating story about a group of monkeys in Asia. Another documentary, I Am Big Bird: The Carol Spinney Story (2014) traces the amazingly cool life of the guy inside the Big Bird suit. And while at 58 minutes it's hardly a movie, but of course I ate up every minute of The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age Smackdown (2015) even if professional wresting wouldn't by first choice of subject matter for the first new piece of Flintstones animation in 14 years.

 

 

What were your favorites that you saw in 2015?

Snoopy Sunday Matinee

Joe Cool's Driving School

As Kings Dominion transforms Nickelodeon Central into Planet Snoopy, the most work so far has been on upgrading a unique kiddie car ride from Rugrats Toonpike to Joe Cool's Driving School. Here, kids get a chance to drive "real" cars on trackless city streets.

After taking a quick driving lesson kids are led out into a little cityscape where they pick a car and have a turn at driving through the little town. I suppose there are some sort of sensors in the car that prevent it from banging into other cars and driving through intersections without caution. However, Elias still managed to clip a curb on his journey.

The cars have all been given fresh paint jobs and each adorned with the likeness of a Peanuts character. When Tanner called out to Elias, "What car did you get?" Elias leaned over and checked out his hood and screamed back, "I've got Franklin!" I knew my work as a parent was done because no other kid in the park that summer will know who Franklin is.

Tanner behind the wheel of his Charlie Brown roadster.

Joe Cool's Driving School also features a faux gas station where kids can drive through. The graphic design of the station is reminiscent of an old Sinclair gas station.

There are big 3-D statues of most of the Peanuts gang throughout the attraction. The city that the kids drive around is so big that it was hard to get good pictures of some of the characters.

Here's Linus and his security blanket...

...and Lucy and her psychiatry booth (awesome!)...

...and good ol' Franklin!

Here's a shot of the attraction at night from the Eiffel Tower. It's a pretty impressive amount of land that they devoted to this ride.

Snoopy Comes to Kings Dominion

As I've mentioned, this year Snoopy and the Peanuts gang take over the duties as Kings Dominion's park mascot. The park has been promoting an all-new kids area called Planet Snoopy, which has also been introduced at several other parks owned by parent company Cedar Fair. From looking at other park's websites, it seems that Kings Dominion's Planet Snoopy hasn't quite got the same attention as Kings Island, Carowinds or any of the other Cedar Fair parks.

Planet Snoopy now covers the area formerly called Nickelodeon Central. Four attractions have been given an overhaul. Nickelodeon Space Surfer, a giant swing ride, has been given a new color scheme and rechristened Flying Ace. The water playground known as Green Slime Zone is now called Snoopy's Splashdance. A nice reference to a mid-80's Peanuts special, but just a new sign was added - nothing else. Paramount Showplace, which recently housed a live show featuring Nickelodeon characters and originally presented a dolphin show is now Peanuts Showplace where the show Camp Snoopy Day can be seen. (Except on Thursdays, which is when we were there.)

The most effort has been put into the Rugrats Turnpike which is now Joe Cool's Driving School. It's pretty neat...and we have enough pictures of it to share it with you tomorrow in it's own post.

This is Elias following Snoopy's footprints along a path leading to the Joe Cool's Driving School attraction.

An odd addition to Planet Snoopy is this giant moon bounce which isn't listed on the park's website or in the guide map at the park. It didn't look open when we passed by it, either.

One of my favorite spots in the original layout of the park was the old Hanna-Barbera toy store. Of course, that's gone now. But so is the lame-o Nickelodon store that was in the space for a while. Now the building is home to Snoopy Boutique, an awesome shop which I easily could have dropped $300 bucks in.

The outside of Snoopy Boutique is lined with these large comic strip frames. Great picture opportunities.

Among all the really cool stuff they have in the store, there are plush of all of Snoopy's brothers and sisters. Where else are you gonna be able to take home your own Marbles, Spike, Andy, Belle or Olaf? Well played Cedar Fair merchandising department...well played!
And look at this....Franklin and Pig Pen even get their own plush! How cool is that? Franklin never gets any love!

The strangest thing in Planet Snoopy is that instead of playing the jazzy Vince Guaraldi Peanuts music that everyone instantly associates with Charlie Brown cartoons, through out Planet Snoopy they were playing Hannah Montana songs. Schroeder would be mortified!

They are off to a good start with Planet Snoopy, but they need to keep going with the rest of the kids section and bring it all together under one Snoop! Some of the other kiddie rides need a Peanuts makeover. Perhaps next year we'll see the rest of Kings Dominion's kiddie section get the same attention as other parks in the chain. Until then...Good Grief!

It's An Obscure Ride, Charlie Brown

I've mentioned before not to ask me why I search for the stuff I do on YouTube, but one of my favorite subjects to find videos of is cartoon themed amusement park rides in other countries. I recently discovered a place called Snoopy's World, an outdoor playground which can be found on a balcony of a 49 acre mall in Hong Kong called New Town Plaza. This place actually looks more like the kids section of an amusement park than it does a simple playground. There's some play areas for the kids and some shops and even an eatery...and it's all surrounded by giant statues of Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang. What caught my eye is the playground's boat ride, which appears to just be called Boating Canal. I gotta tell ya...the ride looks pretty sweet. Guests board a canoe with Beagle Scout Snoopy as your guide as you travel through a few Peanuts inspired scenes. Here's an overview of the ride:

It's kind of simple looking but you gotta applaud what they're trying to do.

Now, here's the video that tipped me off on this whole Snoopy's World venture. This clip is just someone's private home video but it shows off the scenes of the ride nicely. Just give the video 20 or so seconds to get to the footage of the ride...



I'm not quite sure what any of that really has to do with Snoopy...especially the scene where Snoopy reenacts Saving Private Ryan, but I'd be willing to hop on an 18 hour flight to Hong Kong - just to check it out!

Peanuts From The 70's

• I'll be looking forward to getting my hands on this new DVD set at the end of next month. Paramount continues it's parade of releases from the Charlie Brown vault with Peanuts 1970's Collection Vol. 1. There will be two new specials added to my collection: It's a Mystery, Charlie Brown and Play It Again, Charlie Brown. Th two disc set also features these previously released to DVD titles:
• A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving
• It's The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown
• There's No Time For Love, Charlie Brown
• You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown
  

I Like My Smurfs in Mountains and on Glasses

I was so thrilled when I saw that Burger King was going to have Star Trek glasses as their promotion tied to the new film. It's not that I'm excited to get my hands on a Star Trek glass (although I did pick one up with my Angry Whopper the other day) but I was delighted to see one of the fast food chains bring back the glasses promotion. Back in the good ol' days, I found nothing more exciting than when McDonald's or one of the other guys would offer drinking glasses for a buck or two when you bought a sandwich or a meal or whatever they wanted you to buy. Growing up, our kitchen cupboard was filled with many of these cartoon character glasses. But the surprising thing is that these glasses have stuck around. I have glasses from fast food restaurants that have been in daily use for over 20 years! When I got married my wife thought the cartoon glasses would all go on a display on a shelf somewhere in the basement or something like that...but I had to put my foot down. Everything tastes better from a cartoon character fast food glass, so the Smurfs, Muppets, Flintstones and other childhood friends all moved into the same kitchen cupboard as her boring glasses that match the plates.


When I thought about doing a post on this topic, I figured I would take pictures of some of the glasses in my collection. But I found some great pictures from various sources on the internets to illustrate my article so we'll use those for this discussion...


To me, these are the pinnacle of fast food glass promotions: Smurf glasses from Hardee's circa 1982. There are a few reasons these glasses are so near and dear to my heart. First of all, 1982 was the height of the Smurf craze and I was a huge Smurf fan. I could simply not wait to get my hands on one of these bad boys. But, here's what made the passion for these glasses all the more intense. There was not a single Hardee's anywhere near where we lived. But, there was on right down the street from my grandmother's house. In fact, a trip to Gram and Poppy's house was usually accompanied by a visit to Hardee's. Luckily, my grandparents only lived about 25 minutes away and we visited often. Then, to make the deal sweeter...the collection was made up of 8 glasses! Usually promotions of this kind featured four different designs/characters, but eight just seemed like a ton! We managed to snag most of them at the time. Over the years all eight of the glasses have made appearances in my cupboards. A few years ago when I started going to flea markets and antique malls I discovered that these (and other glasses) are pretty common finds so I've replaced and added some to my collection. I still have the original 27 year old Brainy Smurf glass at work in our kitchen today. We also have Grouchy and Smurfette still serving us drinks. (Sadly, just this past week Papa Smurf was knocked off the table and shattered into a million pieces. So did my heart!) The great Smurf Glasses promotion of 1982 was such a hit for Hardee's...

...that in 1983 they came out with the Party Collection. Again, my 9 year old jaw dropped to the ground when I heard they were coming out with more Smurf glasses. This time around the glasses were more colorful and alive. I've had my hands on all six of these babies as well, although right now only Smurfette and Baker Smurf still party on! Well played Hardee's, well played! They also struck gold in my heart the following year with another of the all-time greatest fast food promotions: the Gremlins Book and Records. After that, Hardee's seemed to fade off the pop culture promotions landscape. Although, we'll give an honorable mention to their late 80's California Raisins figures.

My love of restaurant glasses actually starts here with McDonald's The Great Muppet Caper glasses from 1981. Before anyone knew what a Smurf was, the Muppets were just about my favorite thing in the world. A Muppet movie was an event and this promotion made more anxious to see the movie than I already was! The four glasses in this collection capture four great scenes from this fantastic movie. The picture here is actually a tray liner from McDonald's used to promote the promotion. We had the first three glasses but never snagged the Miss Piggy glass which was a shame because I always remember when we saw the movie in the theatre how hard my mom laughed at the scene where Piggy rides the motorcycle through the stained glass window. A few years ago at a flea market I found someone who had a whole case of the Piggy glasses - brand new. Now, the Miss Piggy glass and the Happiness Hotel glass (another flea market find) reside amongst our glasses.

Mickey D's struck gold again in 1983 with their Camp Snoopy Glasses. Camp Snoopy is the kiddie land section in a handful of theme parks across the country. When these glasses came out in `83, Knott's Berry Farm in California was the first park to welcome Snoopy and the gang as their mascot. These glasses don't mention the theme park as they were sold all over the country. The nice thing about McDonald's glasses promotions as stated in this tray liner is that each restaurant offered only one glass a week. So, it was actually easy to keep up with your collection and buy all 5. I've still got the Charlie Brown glass, Snoopy in the sleeping bag broke a few years ago and I've never had the other three. But Wait! I hear an antique mall calling my name!

This was the last truly great fast food restaurant glass promotion and it popped up (or all places) at Hardee's in 1990. The Flintstones glasses were super exciting. Even though I've watched the Flintstones all my life, I really became a huge fan and collector later in life. There's actually four glasses in this 30th Anniversary set but this was the only good picture I could find. Each of the glasses features a scene from a classic episode and a little write up on the other side of the glass with the plot and year of the episode. The episodes where Pebbles, Bamm-Bamm and Dino were all introduced are included as well as the classic opening theme song. I lost two of these glasses to "party fouls" but the Dino glass still rocks on at our family meals!

The Flintstones glasses were the last full sized drinking glasses. The `90's were filled with disappointing variations on the glasses idea. McDonald's offered glass mugs to promote The Flintstones movie in 1994 and Batman Forever in 1995, but neither of them had anything to do with the movie nor did they hold much liquid. (Although I did buy all the Flintstones ones because I'm a completest). Ronald also rolled out two sets of glasses celebrating Walt Disney World. While I appreciated the effort, the glasses are not full-sized drinking glasses and the second set of glasses were square making them hard to drink out of. Burger King put out two sets of Disney themed glasses, one set for Pocahontas and another promoting various Disney VHS titles. However, these aren't made of glass - they are plastic and I can't tell you how much I hate drinking out of a plastic cup!

As with the movie they promote, the new Burger King Star Trek glasses are a great throwback to the way things used to be and for all intents and purposes: the way things should be!

More Snoopy From The Vault

In a few weeks we'll be treated to more goodies from the Peanuts television specials library. Set to release April 7, is Snoopy's Reunion a 1991 special that isn't quite up to par with the majority of the cartoons Charles Schultz worked on. First of all, it's one of only two Peanuts specials to not include Charlie Brown's name in the title. Second, this animated special drops the sophisticated dialogue found in previous shows and concentrates on the cuteness factor. Snoopy returns to the puppy mill where he was adopted from and is reunited with his sister and brothers. Kids are sure to enjoy it...I know mine will as they love anything filled with puppies.

But I did say this DVD is a treat...also included on this disc one of my favorite Peanuts specials: the 1984 time capsule It's Flashbeagle, Charlie Brown. For those of you who don't remember (or know what I'm talking about) a few years after the very sexual film Flashdance was a hit at the box office, CBS aired this Charlie Brown and Snoopy take on the box office hit. It's totally dated, and kind of stands out from all the other Charlie Brown cartoons, but it's a good one! There's some really good songs in it. (In fact, somewhere around here I have the soundtrack on cassette tape!) There's even a breakdancing scene which of course features Franklin - the only black member of the Peanuts gang. When Snoopy takes the spotlight and performs a dance similar to the one in Flashdance, the film makers even went to the trouble of hiring and filming Marine Jahan, the dance double for Jennifer Beals, to use as reference footage while animating Snoopy. Flashbeagle is certainly an odd and off-beat choice to release so early on in the roll out of Peanuts titles, but I'll be glad to replace my beat up ol' VHS copy with a shinny new DVD.

I also found out that come July 7, Warner Bros. is putting out Peanuts 1960's Collection. This will be a 2-disc set that serves up the first six of the Charlie Brown specials, which happen to span the years 1965 - 1969. The shows included in this set are:

• A Charlie Brown Christmas
• Charlie' Brown's All-Stars
• It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
• You're In Love, Charlie Brown
• He's Your Dog, Charlie Brown
• It Was A Short Summer, Charlie Brown.

The first four of these cartoons have been released to DVD before, although they will feature better picture and sound than their initial digital releases. The last two listed are new to DVD, and two of the titles from the whole Peanuts library that I've been most looking forward to seeing again. Hopefully, the price of this set won't be too high to justify rebuying four of the shows.

Charlie Brown Beyond the Holidays

When you think of Charlie Brown and the Peanuts you probably don't think of "stories". In fact, the problem is most people associate Charlie Brown and Snoopy with Halloween and Christmas and that's about it. When I was younger, I read lots and lots of Peanuts books. I pretty much read anything I could get my hands on. I read compilations of the daily comic strip and I read book versions of the numerous television specials. While the daily strip provided a laugh every day, if you read everyday or read them collected in book you'd find great stories being told like the time Lucy buried Linus' blanket in the backyard and Linus dug up the whole neighborhood looking for it. The animated Peanuts television specials offered a more narrative venue for Snoopy and the gang. While I love the holiday specials, I'm equally as fond of a number of the animated half-hours that didn't have anything to do with a holiday. Sadly, most of these specials have fallen through the cracks and haven't been seen on television in decades, yet alone a DVD release.

So I couldn't be more excited for January 29, 2009 when You're A Good Sport, Charlie Brown breaks the mold and becomes one of the first non-holiday releases from the Peanuts Vault (which is located in Snoopy's dog house, of course). This awesome 1975 tale tells the story of when Charlie Brown and Peppermint Patty enter a motocross race against a mysterious challenger known only as The Masked Marvel. If you don't all ready know, look at the DVD cover art pictured here and you can probably guess who the Masked Marvel is! (I love this show so much is was even mentioned in a 1998 episode of The Ed South Show.) And if adding this great show wasn't cool enough for my DVD library, the disc also sports You're The Greatest, Charlie Brown. This is an equally awesome Peanuts outing which debuted in 1979 and has Charlie Brown entering a Decathlon in the Junior Olympics. Can-Not-Wait-my friends! Don't be a lame grown-up...this is an hour of solid television entertainment you should reconnect with!

Good Ol' Charlie Brown Specials

Here's two old school TV Guide ads for "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving." The special first aired in 1973 and was a yearly tradition until the 90's. The special disappeared for a long time only to resurface not too long ago when ABC took over the Peanuts collection from CBS. Before 2001 the Peanuts specials had aired on CBS for 35 years! This classic program will be rebroadcast yet again tomorrow night at 8:00pm on ABC. (That's Channel 2 in Baltimore and Channel 27 for Southern PA.) Following "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" will be a repeat of "He's a Bully, Charlie Brown" at 8:30pm. We mentioned this show last year on WWoB when it made it's debut.

It turned out to be a really good show and in my opinion the best Peanuts TV outing since 1986's "Happy New Year, Charlie Brown." Although Charles Schulz did not get to write the script for "Bully" he was working on the idea for the show before he passed away in 2000. The script is based on comic strips published in April of 1995.

So pop yourself some of that microwave popcorn and grab a diet Vault and settle back for a solid hour of entertainment!

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Snoopy's Choice

This picture shows a number of grocery store items that Snoopy and the Peanuts gang have appeared on all over the world. There's peanut butter from Australia, Cola from England and even corn snacks from Japan. But right smack dab in the middle of all this international goodwill is a little product fondly remembered as Snoopy's Choice Frozen Dinners! Few things go together as well as a tiny TV Dinner and a free Peanuts sticker! These tasty meals hit grocery store freezers around the time I was 17, however that didn't stop me from stocking the freezer with them every chance I got. Jeez, I'm such a sucker for products with cartoon characters on them! I was a huge fan of TV Dinners when I was younger, but these Snoopy meals which were probably aimed at grade school children had less than 1/3 the food a Swanson HungryMan dinner had. But really, in the end, isn't a free Snoopy sticker all you need to fill your tummy...and your heart!?!?

It's rare that my memory banks can stump the Internet, but I wasn't able to find a single image of these Snoopy's Choice meals anywhere online. There is barely a mention that the food ever existed! I was able to find this picture in a book called Peanuts The Home Collection: A Collector's Guide to Identification and Value. I tried to zoom in on the Snoopy's Choice products, but I'm no William Randolph Hearst when it comes to the ol' scanner and Photoshop and all the stuff! My zoom in here on the left offers nothing more than a larger, grainier look at Snoopy pointing to some unrecognizable food. For a really good tie-in, the microwavable food should have come in little red dog dishes! That would have made it all even cooler!