TV Guide Review: "The Banana Splits Adventure Hour"

The following is a review of "The Banana Splits Adventure Hour"  by critic Cleveland Amory, first published in TV Guide May 21, 1969. The episode in question is show #17 ("The Great Banana Split Race"), first aired January 4, 1969.

This is a fine program for the 1-and-under set. For the 2-and-older,
however, we're doubtful. You might be better off with straight
commercials. But don't worry--the commercials are not neglected here. In
fact, the program is officially entitled "Kellogg's Presents The Banana
Splits Adventure Hour," and the commercials are so well integrated, it's
almost imposible to tell where the serial ends and the cereal begins.
"Action! Adventure! Suspense! Laughs!" are the first words you see--and
you'd better enjoy them, because they're the last time you'll get them.
As for the songs, you better believe they really rock. And the lyrics!
What is the use of us just telling you about them? You've got to hear
them. "One banana two banana three banana four/Four bananas make a bunch
and so do many more." Doesn't that just send you? Come down off the
wall, though, because that isn't all. Later on, the same song goes,
"Four bananas three bananas two bananas one/All bananas playing in the
bright warm sun."
The Splits, not to keep you in action, adventure, suspense and laughs
any longer, are a quartet of live performers dressed as animals. These
are: Fleegle, a cool dog; Drooper, a hip lion; Bingo, a bongo gorilla;
and Snorky, an undersized baby elephant. They enter each show by opening
the door and falling down, and from then on it's straight downhill all
the way. In one recent episode, the entire performance consisted of a
dune-buggy race which, since they raced in a circle, turned out to be a
real bargain--for the producers, that is--because it afforded them the
opportunity to give us each shot at least three times. In between, they
had a terrific announcer. "It looks," he said, "like that buggy has gone
buggy. Maybe its fuel float has a fluke in it." Then, after the buggy
joke was repeated three times, it was time for a new joke. And sure
enough, it came. "The Bananas," the announcer said, "are in a bunch.
Wait a minute," he went on. "They're about to split."
In between bashing each other over the head and knocking each other
down--all in a nonviolent way, of course, because this is the new era of
the "constructive" approach to children's programming--there are also
regular "educational" features, such as Fleegle's "Dear Drooper." "Who,"
he asks, "invented spaghetti?" Replies Drooper, "Spaghetti was invented
by a guy who used his noodle." Because Fleegle speaks with a slight
lisp, some of this persiflage isnt always clear to the older set.
"What," he asked on one show, "ith the thecret password?" We never did
find out, but it was our feeling, whatever it wath, it thould thtay a
thecret.
Then too the Splits intersperse three regular features with the various
episodes of their own adventures. Two of these are animated cartoons,
"The Three Musketeers" and "The Arabian Knights," which are awful, and
the other is a serial called "Danger Island," which is definitely worse.
But one thing is certain. Compared to the Thplits, they are
thenthational.