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No, it's not a Word Salad Title, but neither does it actually describe what happens in the show.
In 1979, Fred and Barney Meet the Thing was an hourlong Saturday morning cartoon on NBC in which, ironically, neither Fred Flintstone nor Barney Rubble ever met the Thing. It consisted of a half-hour of The Flintstones and a half-hour of The Thing. Eventually it was expanded to 90 minutes with the addition of a half-hour Shmoo segment, at which point the title of the show was changed to the equally inaccurate Fred and Barney Meet the Shmoo (although it did happen in the "Bedrock Cops" shorts on The Flintstone Comedy Show).
The Flintstones segment consisted of episodes of the late 1970s spinoff The New Fred and Barney Show, a series of new half-hour Flintstones stories told in a style somewhat closer to the original series versus the previous few spinoffs (i.e., Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm were depicted as toddlers instead of as teenagers).
The Thing, which was loosely based on the character of the same name from Marvel Comics' Fantastic Four series, followed the adventures of young Benjy Grimm. His magic ring would transform him into a rock-covered monster whenever he touched the two halves together and said, "Thing Ring, do your thing," a particularly cheesy example of By the Power of Greyskull. This was quite a departure from the original character, Ben Grimm, an adult test pilot who was transformed permanently into the rocky-skinned Thing after having been exposed to cosmic rays.
The New Shmoo stars the titular creature from Li'l Abner as the Team Pet of a trio of teenagers in yet another of Hanna-Barbera's own apings of the Scooby Doo formula.
Even the staff who worked on this barely believe this show existed.
This inaccurately named show contains examples of:[]
- Beach Episode: "Beach Party Crashers"
- Cowardly Lion: Billy Joe.
- Cryptid Episode: One of the first episodes is "Bigfoot Meets the Thing".
- Expressive Hair: Mickey and Nita in "Monster Island". The hair of both of them stands on end with fright in reaction to seeing the giant cyclops when they turn around and notice he's behind them.
- Extra-Long Episode: Some of The New Shmoo segments ran for approximately a half-hour, but others lasted for 10-11 minutes.
- Getting Crap Past the Radar: Nita's panty shots in "Monster Island" and "The Terror of the Trolls". See the Panty Shot trope examples below.
- Gratuitous Spanish: Nita, as considering her Latina heritage, she tends to drop the occasional Spanish phrase, such as mentioning, "Un gato" ("A Cat") when she sees that and a few others in "The Crystal Ball of Crime".
- Marilyn Maneuver: Nita in "The Terror of the Trolls". After she tries to stop the Troll King from driving away in a motorboat with a lasso, she's dragged along across the water and her skirt begins to billow, but she promptly and abashedly stops for a moment as she crouches to keep it in place before telling Mickey, and Billy Joe, to assist her.
- Ms. Fanservice: Nita.
- The New Adventures: The New Fred and Barney Show and The New Shmoo.
- Panty Shot: Nita gives a frontal flash of this briefly in "Monster Island" as she and Mickey are lassoed, pulled up, and yanked onto the top of a cliff, and saved by the cyclops.
- Nita has another one briefly from the side in "The Terror of the Trolls" as her skirt begins to blow up as she holds tightly to a rope she used to lasso a motorboat to stop the Troll King from escaping.
- Picnic Episode: "Picnic Panic"
- Plucky Girl: Nita most of the time.
- She's Got Legs: Nita whenever her skirt is raised.
- Two Guys and a Girl: Mickey, Billy Joe and Nita from The New Shmoo.