By Michaela Gordoni
THE WALTONS franchise has three Thanksgiving specials in its legacy, and they all share the warmth and joy of family.
WALTONS fans can watch the latest Walton celebration, the 2022 movie A WALTONS THANKSGIVING, which won a Movieguide® Teddy Bear Award®, on Saturday, Nov. 22 at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.
The movie shows an all-new Walton family get-together on Walton’s Mountain with a new cast. The movie is set during the Great Depression. It’s time for the yearly Harvest Festival Fair when a mysterious orphan boy appears. The family is already large as it is, but there’s always room for one more.
Magnolia Hill Productions producers say their goal for the movie was to preserve THE WALTONS’ legacies and values.
Related: A WALTONS THANKSGIVING
“To put a little love and kindness into the world, to spend time working at that all day, and then to get to share it with the world, it was the best,” said A WALTONS THANKSGIVING star Bellamy Young, who also starred in 2021’s THE WALTONS: HOMECOMING. “And to come together and do it again was icing on the cake.”
The original show aired from 1972-1981. It’s based on the childhood of THE WALTONS creator Earl Hamner Jr. Each episode shows how families support one another through different trials and happenings that they face.
“I think it was just the first multi-generational television show, and it just really showed what you felt like at home…it was really people just loving each other and doing the best they could,” Young said.
The 1973 “Thanksgiving Story” episode is one of the most memorable WALTONS episodes. They returned to that loving family feel 20 years later for their 1993 reunion movie, A WALTON THANKSGIVING REUNION.
Hamner said of the reunion movie, “I found myself thinking about other Thanksgivings we had as a family back in Schuyler. It was generally a happy and important holiday for us. In addition to the 10 of us, our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins always joined us for the celebration.”
“Whatever we had was shared. Even if we were having just one rabbit for dinner, dad invited anyone who was around to eat with us,” Hamner said.
Remind Magazine asserts that viewers love THE WALTONS holiday episodes because they are relatable. It’s about family pulling together and making the best out of what they have when they don’t have much.
The new Thanksgiving movie and the old Thanksgiving episodes are available to stream with purchase on YouTube, Prime Video and other outlets.
Read Next: A WALTONS THANKSGIVING’s Bellamy Young Says Movie Teaches ‘Love and Kindness’
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