Great Pumpkin

From Peanuts Wiki

The presence of the Great Pumpkin is a strongly-held belief by Linus, who has often been described as the most intelligent of the group, and yet, the most gullible.

Linus' vision is actually the result of a confusion of Santa Claus and the commercialization of Christmas with the Halloween holiday. While the other Peanuts characters go trick-or-treating on the holiday, Linus spends his time in a nearby "sincere" pumpkin patch, hoping for the Great Pumpkin's arrival with presents for Halloween. For decades, even as Linus' intellect grew and became more apparent, his mistaken notion was never to be outgrown. He would spend days on end trooping door-to-door, trying to make believers out of everyone he encountered. He very seldom succeeded... and even when he did (with Sally Brown once, and once with Marcie, who accidentally labeled it as the "Great Squash"), no Great Pumpkin would show (as Sally told him, "You owe me restitution!")

Linus' faith would never waver, however, and he would catch himself quick at the first sign of self-doubt ("I'm doomed! One quick slip like that could cause the Great Pumpkin to pass you by!")

One year, Charlie Brown awoke a sleeping Linus in the pumpkin patch to say he heard a Great Pumpkin sighting "by... Freeman in New Jersey" over the radio. Whether Charlie Brown had actually heard this, or whether it was a subtle effort to encourage Linus to pursue his fantasy thoughts, remains open to debate. Linus was declined as crazy because he believes in the Great Pumpkin and talked about it in his speech in 'You're Not Elected Charlie Brown'.

The character is parodied in a recent Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episode, as the Grand Pumpkin, who is brought to life by Milhouse. He also made a non-canon role in the episode of Robot Chicken called Vegetable Funfest, murdering the majority of the Peanuts cast before being destroyed by the Kite-Eating Tree.