Yogi the Easter Bear

Yogi the Easter Bear is a television film starring Yogi Bear. Produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions, it premeried in 1994.

Plot

Ranger Smith is nervous. His boss the Supreme Commissioner (portrayed as a strict military-type general) is attending Jellystone Park with his two grandchildren that intend to participate in the park's annual Easter celebration. Concerned about making sure the event goes off perfectly, Ranger Smith picks out an Easter Bunny suit and orders a truckload of candy for the celebration. He then proceeds to threaten Yogi with deportation to Siberia if he disobeys the Ranger's orders. Ranger Smith then asks his guard, Mortimer, to watch over the Easter candy truck. Mortimer, however, is legally blind. Undaunted by Smith's threats, Yogi steals the Easter Bunny outfit and dupes Mortimer into thinking he is the real Easter Bunny. Mortimer is fooled, and Yogi helps himself to the entire truck.

Ranger Smith is furious, but Boo Boo offers to find the real Easter Bunny to fix things. Ranger Smith is struck by Boo Boo's kind offer but is unbelieving; nevertheless, he accepts Boo Boo's offer. Yogi and Boo Boo seek out the Grand Grizzly in the mountain to see if he knows anything about the Easter Bunny's whereabouts (everyone knows where Santa Claus lives, but nobody knows where the Easter Bunny lives). He instructs the two to seek the "big ears in the sky," which turn out to be a geologic formation similar to Rabbit Ears Pass although smaller and green. They climb the mountain only to find that the Easter Bunny has been kidnapped.

Behind the kidnapping is a diminutive and deranged corporate executive named Paulie, hellbent on replacing all of the world's Easter eggs with plastic ones, and a massive but dim-witted sidekick. Yogi and Boo Boo follow a trail of jelly beans to the executive's factory, where the Easter Bunny is being held captive above a vat of molten plastic. Posing as health inspectors, Yogi and Boo Boo successfully free the Easter Bunny only to find that his supplier, Millicent the Magical Easter Chicken, is the real source of the Easter eggs. The executive hears wind of the plot, and a race to reach the chicken commences. However, the chicken's tough-as-nails guard dog refuses to let anyone near the chicken's domicile, except for the big, dumb sidekick in an Easter Bunny outfit, who the dog mistakes for the real Easter Bunny. A madcap chase after the chicken begins, with the Easter Bunny getting injured (usually by falling off a cliff) at least three times.

Meanwhile, back at Jellystone Park, Ranger Smith is trying in vain to impress the crowd at the Easter celebration, which has no candy and no Easter Bunny. The stunts he tries either are ridiculously lame or fail spectacularly, and the boss's children show no response but a few sarcastic claps and a stern look. The boss is on the verge of firing Ranger Smith when the Easter Bunny, Millicent the Chicken, Yogi and Boo Boo conveniently fall in to save the day. The boss changes his mind and instead promotes Ranger Smith, and Ranger Smith apologizes to Boo Boo for not believing in the Easter Bunny.

Cast

* Greg Burson - Yogi Bear
* Don Messick - Boo Boo Bear, Ranger Smith
* Charlie Adler - Paulie
* Gregg Berger -
* Marsha Clark - Female Ranger
* Jeff Doucette -
* Ed Gilbert -
* Rob Paulsen - Easter Bunny, Male Ranger
* Jonathan Winters -

Availability

VHS and DVD copies of the telefilm are readily available.

External links

* [http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0198033/ Yogi the Easter Bear] at The Internet Movie Database