THE FLICKSTONES

THE FLINTSTONES (1994)
dir: Brian Levant

After this cover by Mort Drucker and Frank Jacobs, they parodied the movie

THE FLICKSTONES
MAD #334, October/November 1994
w: Dick DeBartolo
a: Angelo Torres

The main cast was Fred Flintstone (John Goodman), Barney Rubble (Rick Moranis), Wilma Flintstone (Elizabeth Perkins), Betty Rubble (Rosie O'Donnell), Wilma's mother (Elizabeth Taylor), Pebbles (Elaine & Melanie Silver), Bamm-Bamm (Hlynyr & Marino Sigurosson), and Fred's Dictabird (Harvey Korman). The movie reportedly had 30-35 writers, depending on the source you read, but only three were credited after guild arbitration.

Fred and Barney are the best of friends, working in the quarries together in the town of Bedrock, and Fred has lent Barney his life's savings so Barney and Betty can adopt a son. Wilma tried to buy a new garbage disposal but saw they were out of money. Fred didn't want her to know he gave the money to the Rubbles, and when she finds out, she admires him for his selflessness. At the quarries, Cliff Vandercave (Kyle MacLachlan), the supervisor, gives all the workers an aptitude test and whoever gets the highest score will be promoted.

Fred gets the promotion, not knowing Barney switched tests with him. At his new office he meets his new secretary Sharon Stone (Halle Berry), and has a dictaphone/bird. Part of his new job is to fire Barney Rubble for scoring the lowest. There is a surprise party for his promotion that night, and he has to break the news to Barney.

Katharine Gibbs was someone who invented the system of secretary-ing as we know it. I guess they thought it would be funny to associate her with the bird.

The Flintstones take the Rubbles in while Barney take several new jobs and tries to land back on his feet. His dictabird lets him know that he was promoted to take the fall for mass firings and that the requisition forms he's signing will allow Vandercave to set up fake companies and embezzle funds.

Since Fred has been framed for the firings and everyone hates him, he has to go into hiding, but the angry mob finds him and tries to hang him. Not shown is Fred running into Barney and making up with him again after a big falling out they had. Wilma moves back in with her mother after Fred becomes a scapegoat, but she and Betty know he's innocent, break into his office, and steal the dictabird that has the evidence. The company retaliates by kidnapping Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm and putting them in peril. In saving them from a conveyor belt to a machine that would have smashed them into rocks, they pull a lever too hard and end up drowning Cliff Vandercave in a flood of stone, sand, and water. Mr. Slate, owner of the quarry shows up, and impressed that Fred inadvertently invented concrete, demands all workers be rehired.

THE FINKSTONES
Cracked #292, September 1994
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Walter Brogan

I mentioned before that the movie went through several script revisions, so I think this parody was written off an earlier draft of the script without seeing the movie, since it isn't at all like the movie I saw. The plot here has something to do with Fred and Barney inventing some kind of new material that proves profitable for the company (???)

But unlike the other parody it has Mr. Slate and the Water Buffalo Lodge.

When the original TV show was on, viewers noticed how derivative it was of The Honeymooners. It wasn't exactly an accident, since most early Hanna-Barbera series were based on live action counterparts (Yogi Bear=Art Carney, Top Cat=Sgt. Bilko, etc.). MAD pointed this out in their piece Adult TV Cartoons in #63, June 1961.

They did another piece about it, in #69, March 1962, showing stone age versions of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, Paladin, and Lassie

UPDATE:
From TV Theme Songs in MAD #266, October 1986, by Frank Jacobs and Sam Viviano.

Cover for German edition of Mad

For Mexican edition.

The American cover combined the Flintstones with Bill Clinton and his family, which wouldn't have translated in other countries.