It's - It's - The Banana Splits!

Or - Yes, Fleegle The Beagle Is Completely Legal
Your Humble Scribe is not entirely sure that you snappers of whip and youth out there are going to be familiar with The Banana Splits, so a little background is needed.  

"The Banana Splits Show" was a positively psychedelic television show, for children (that qualification is important), that shoe-horned several Hanna-Barbera cartoon shows together.  The sets and costumes were designed by Sid and Marty Krofft, which explains the psychedelic bit, as these fellers seem to have been permanently in the land of <insert drug of note here>.  Or maybe they just drank lots of cocktails.  Art?

Bingo, Fleegle, Drooper and Snorky

     You will note, observant reader, the trenchant fact that we see nobody's faces here.  I mean, we don't even know if they have faces, there might be hideous mutant cyborg zombies under there for all we know are male or female.
     Now, the programme was originally broadcast for 2 years, 1968 to 1970, when it stopped because the Sixties and pot had gone out of fashion*.  
     Okay, now let's look at The Residents, those lovable art-rock jesters who don't appear on the scene until 1974.  Art?


     I think you can see a trend here, readers.  Once again, nobody knows who they are, or what's really under those giant eyeballs.  The Residents in fact prize their anonymity quite as much as Thomas Pynchon, because, and here's the thing -

     - THE RESIDENTS USED TO BE THE BANANA SPLITS!

     Just think about it.  They have to perform someone else's music on the television programme, when they are consummate musicians in their own right. They long to move on and develop their artistic leanings, instead of being entramelled within the strictures of a bubblegum pop format.  Their own designs are considerably darker than the callow, youth-oriented, family-friendly format of TBS.
     So, obviously, they wait for everyone to forget TBS before emerging from the shadows, having perfected The Residents' brand of art-rock.

That title blurb is satirical, believe me.  I've got this record and I know of what I talk.

     Now, this is where things start to get a bit strange, because we can all do with some weirdness in our lives (or is that just me?) for whilst looking for some relevant pictures of the Banana Splits, I came across the rather bizarre news that TBS is going to be rebooted as an R-rated horror comedy. Art?

Er.  Quite.

     It will be released anytime now, and Your Humble Scribe will most certainly try to watch it, nefariously or not, and get back to you about it.     I say, motley, shall we go for a stroll in the park before the storm clouds roll in?  A breath of fresh air will do you good, you look a bit peaky.  Hey, this being nice instead of murderous is starting to come naturally!
Meanwhile, Back At The Mansion -
Earlier today Conrad was banging on about "UFO", which I am somewhat horrified to realise is nearly 50 years old, on a par with Conrad's age.  I did have the complete collection on DVD but sold it ages ago, which I now regret <sad face>.  Okay, the Coincidence Hydra is obviously sticking close to my tender and exquisitely tasty buttocks, because what do I find on Facebook earlier this afternoon?  Art!

     That's a shot from the opening credits, with Commander Ed Straker looking at a model of the Earth-Moon system.  I think he's in the secret underground SHADO headquarters here.     I would like to make a small detour here, and mention that SHADO's resident doctor and psychiatrist, Doctor George Jackson (!) was played by the Polish character actor Vladek Sheybal, who obviously had an interesting back story, as despite his Scottish name, he had an accent you could slice and put on toast.  Art?

You wouldn't dare ask for a second opinion, would you?

     He simply oozes Sinister and his casting here is a brilliant bit of going against type, as he is genuinely one of the good guys -
     I think we might re-visit "UFO" as an item, since there is plenty there to be going on with.  You have been warned!

The Six-Pounder Anti-tank Gun
You might consider this an adjunct to those articles I've been putting forward about the Second Unpleasantness in North Africa, and where the pamphlet got it wrong, got it right, or omitted it altogether - published in wartime, you can understand how they didn't want to give all their secrets away.
     Anyway, I did mention Axis anti-tank guns, then neglected to say anything about those of Perfidious Albion.  Although some 37 mm a/t guns that were supposed to be in transit elsewhere were - er - "borrowed" by the Western Desert Force in 1940, the principal British anti-tank gun was the 2 pounder.  Art?

In action

     This had been produced en masse after Dunkirk, because a hundred soon-to-be-inferior guns now was infinitely better than an excellent-gun-oh-dear-we've-been-invaded never.
     By the end of 1941 it was definitely obsolete, yet it still soldiered on.  A replacement weapon, the 6 pounder, had come into production at the end of that year; between having to tool-up for production and transport around the whole of Africa, it wasn't until April 1942 that the 8th Army began to get these guns.  The anti-tank gun regiments fell upon them with love and kisses, and passed their 2 pounders on to infantry regiments.

Ready to pound in doses of six

     British tanks were also all armed with the 2 pounder up to this point, with some models having their turrets adapted to accommodate the much bigger 6 pounder.  This often meant having to get rid of a crew member; don't forget a 6 pdr round was much bigger than a 2 pdr round, thus taking up more internal space.
     I can see your brains beginning to glaze over, so shall pause at this point.  But we will come back to it!

Finally - 
Nearly done and over the Compositional Ton, I thought we ought to have more than just three items on here.  Of course, that means I now have to think up a pithy, poignant and appealing subject -
     - nope.  Nothing doing.  Art?

Mara Corday.  I might have known.

     That's a wrap!


*  Perhaps.  It's a theory.