Rein-Toon-ation: Olive Oyl in the Army (1981)

Well, blow me down! As we all know, Popeye served in the Navy. In 1981, some genius at Hanna-Barbera decided to enlist Popeye's girlfriend, Olive Oyl, in the Army, along with Alice the Goon. The result was Private Olive Oyl, 1/2 of the rebooted Popeye & Olive Comedy Show, as the former All-New Popeye Hour was trimmed to 30 minutes. The idea was to do a sendup of the movie, "Private Benjamin", which later became a TV show itself. However, Olive came off more as a distaff version of that other military cut-up, Gomer Pyle, USMC!

H-B had also decided to send primetime icons Laverne & Shirley into the Army over on ABC, but Olive & Alice, it seems, got the better of the deal. They had a female commanding officer in Sgt. Bertha Blast (Jo Anne Worley, ex-Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In), while Laverne & Shirley were stuck with a pig (Ron Palillo, ex-Welcome Back, Kotter). Both series lasted two seasons, with Laverne & Shirley being joined by their pal Fonzie (Henry Winkler) for season 2.

One of these days, I'll find a Laverne & Shirley in the Army clip, but for now, here's Olive & Alice in "Snow Foolin'":

And ya wonder why this show aired at the bottom of CBS' lineup......

Rating: D.