The VHS Corner: My Childhood Barney VHS Collection (for Barney's 35th Anniversary)

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I hadn't planned on doing a blog post today, letalone two, but here I am, because I just found out that today is the 35th Anniversary of Barney the Dinosaur, so I decided to finally do my VHS Corner post on the Barney VHS tapes that my siblings and I owned when we were kids, as well as the ones we rented. I'm gonna start with the ones we owned, since we actually only owned five tapes in total, while we rented the rest. And then, join me later for another post, where I'll be discussing watching Mighty Morphin Power Rangers on YTV and Global, because my dad got out a VHS tape for me that has five episodes of Mighty Morphin recorded on it, three from Global and two from YTV, from late March or early April 1994. Right now, let's talk about Barney VHS tapes. Let's get into it.

The first tape in the collection was The Backyard Show, which also happens to be the first tape released in the Barney & The Backyard Gang series all the way back in 1988. The tape we had was the 1992 re-release. In fact, except for one of the tapes, all of the Backyard Gang tapes we owned or rented were the 1992 re-releases. This tape was actually my sister's. She got it for her birthday, but I don't remember if it was in 1992 or in 1993. Just like I don't remember if we got this tape after Barney & Friends started airing or if this was our introduction to Barney.

Up next is the eighth and final tape in the series, Rock with Barney. Unlike The Backyard Show, I don't know when exactly we got the tape, or from whom we got it from. What I do know is that we got it before we moved in the summer of 1993. One of the reasons I like this tape so much is because it works as a transition from Barney & The Backyard Gang to Barney & Friends. The four kids who made the transition from The Backyard Gang to the PBS series look the way they would look on the TV show, Barney and Baby Bop look the way they would look on the TV show, and it introduced the character of Kathy, played by Lauren King, who would go on to appear in the first three seasons of the PBS series.

The next Barney tape we got was Barney's Birthday. While it shares the same box art design as the 1992 versions of the Backyard Gang tapes, it's not part of Barney & The Backyard Gang. It's actually the first home video release of the Barney & Friends season 1 episode, "Happy Birthday Barney!". No edits were made for this release, nothing was changed for the opening title cards, nothing. It's exactly how it aired on PBS in 1992. Which is funny because my mom had actually taped this episode off TV for me because, for whatever reason, the day it was on, I wasn't going to be home from school before the show started, so I asked Mom if she could tape it for me, and she did. It's the only time that actually happened to me. I don't remember when I got this tape. We were still living in the city at that point, so it wasn't for my birthday or Christmas, I don't think. It was the only Barney & Friends episode we ever owned on home video.

The next tape we got was Waiting for Santa and I do remember getting it for either my birthday or Christmas in 1993 as it was the last Backyard Gang tape that we actually owned, and we'd already moved to the log house by then. This was actually in our rotation of Christmas movies right up until 1999 or 2000.

The last Barney tape we ever owned was Barney Live! in New York City, which was Barney's second live stage show after Barney in Concert, which I'll be talking about later on in this post. We had the clamshell version, though apparently there was also a slipcover edition, which I've only ever seen in people's collections on YouTube. Anyway, we were at the log house by the time we got this tape. Again, I don't remember when we got this tape or who gave it to us, but I'm pretty sure it was either Nana or Grandma who got it for us, because they're the ones who were most likely to get these tapes for us. It was the only tape to come out around season 3 of the PBS show that we got, because my siblings and I didn't watch season 3 of Barney & Friends. I saw an episode of season 3 in reruns during the big ice storm in January and February of 1998, but that's because I was at the house of the nurse I had at school at the time so I could have a bath since our power was still out, and her young son was watching it on the TV. This live show was definitely more of a show than a concert. And also Carey Stinson, who was the suit actor for Barney during the last few seasons of the PBS series, performed as Barney for the first time during this live show.

There isn't really an order that I remember renting these tapes since we rented them around the same time. First up on the list is Barney's Campfire Sing-Along, which I talked about last week in my post on the movies and TV shows that we rented from Rogers Video, so I won't say too much about it here. However, what I will say is that I also watched it at CHEO a few times too. Especially one time where I was at the Cardiology clinic and the technician put it on for me while she did my Echo. 

Next is Barney Goes to School. This is another Barney tape that I talked about in my list of movies we rented on repeat post last week, so again, I'm not going to talk about it much here. This is probably the Backyard Gang tape I saw the most out of all the ones we rented and borrowed, just because it was the one that was always the most available. Plus I've watched it on YouTube a couple of times over the years. The last time I actually saw it on VHS was back in January of 1998. My family was evacuating to a shelter during the ice storm because our power was still out and I had a feeding pump that needed to be charged up, plus it was really REALLY cold out. Anyway, between leaving the house and going to the shelter, we stayed at the house of a friend of my parents until Dad could get things arranged with the shelter. I don't remember if it was the 1992 VHS release, or a later VHS release that we watched there, but I'm pretty sure it was the 1992 release, just because it had the white slipcover case, which you can see above.

The last Barney tape that we rented from Rogers Video was Barney's Magical Musical Adventure. Despite sharing the box art design with the 1992 Backyard Gang releases and Barney's Birthday, this isn't a Backyard Gang video or a Barney & Friends episode video. It's actually the first non-Backyard Gang direct to video Barney special that the Lyons Group produced and released under the Barney Home Video label. These special, longer, episodes usually came out between seasons of Barney & Friends. For example, this one came out between season 1 and season 2 and acted as a bridge between the two seasons. I remember renting this tape alot when I was a kid, but not nearly as often as Barney's Campfire Sing-Along and Barney Goes to School. We were in the log house the last time we rented this tape as this was the period where we weren't going into Rogers Video as much as we used to since it would take us 30 minutes to get into the city. Now the last two tapes that I'm going to talk about in this post are ones I either borrowed, or watched at CHEO.

So the tape I borrowed was A Day at the Beach, the third tape to be released in the Backyard Gang series, but the first to be produced, and the one that acts as the pilot episode in terms of most of the kids, except for Michael and Amy, meeting Barney for the first time. I borrowed this from the medical clinic at OCTC because I started watching it there while I waited to see my orthopaedic doctor, and because I didn't get to finish watching it, the nurse, whose name I can't remember for the life of me, let me borrow it, as long as I promised to bring it back the next day, which I did. Of course, being a kid, I had no idea that The Backyard Show was the first tape to be released in the series since the 1992 re-releases all came out at the same time, but chronologically, A Day at the Beach is the first episode of the Barney franchise, even though it was supposed to be released second, and ended up being released third due to some production difficulties. See, not even Barney is immune to the woes of production.

And finally, the last tape on this list is one I watched at CHEO, when I was in the hospital for something. That tape was Barney in Concert, which was also Barney's first live show, and introduced Baby Bop. Now, I had it at home as my dad had taped it off PBS in 1993, but I'd never seen the actual home video release of it before. Of course I watched it right after seeing Batman Returns for the first time. I don't remember which roommate it was that I watched this and Batman Returns with. I don't think it was my frequent roommate, Justin, who had a ton of Batman toys, including the 1992 Batman Returns version of the Batcave Command Center playset, and one of the Batmobiles, but it might have been. I just don't think that his mom, who looked after me when my mom had to go home to take care of my brother and sister, would've let me watch Batman Returns, at least not without making sure my mom was okay with it first. But he also liked Barney, so it's very possible that it was Justin that I watched Barney in Concert and Batman Returns with. What a weird combination eh? Barney and Batman. 

And that is my childhood Barney VHS collection. Like I said, I hadn't planned on doing this blog post today, but I found out earlier that The Backyard Show came out 35 years ago today, and I figured that this would be the perfect day to do this post. So, happy anniversary Barney, you've given so many people so much joy over the last 35 years, and also started the careers of both Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato. Yes, for those of you who don't know, Selena and Demi got their start in acting on Barney & Friends, not too long before they moved over to the Disney Channel. Anyways episode 3 of Ahsoka is coming out in a few hours, but I think I have time to do the blog post I had intended on doing today. So stay tuned for that. See ya!