Today’s installment of the Christmas Special Countdown basically ends at the halfway mark. After four days in a row of countdown installments, tomorrow’s solo entry comes at a pretty good time. Though in looking ahead, we’re not going to have another one for a week! I guess that’s the problem when you integrate those solo entries into an overall ranking system because they have to post where they rank. I could have taken liberties with the rankings to prevent that, but I have integrity! That integrity forced me to also break-up yesterday’s final entry with today’s first one. I think the two pair well when it comes to discussing the pros and cons of a Christmas special, but I couldn’t figure out a way to make that happen. Especially considering that yesterday’s post included 11 entries and today’s does as well. Had one included 10 it would have been easy enough, but that’s just the way things ended up. Without further adieu, here’s number 115:

115 – Toy Story That Time Forgot

I feel this one pairs well with Yes, Virginia because it overcomes the weaknesses of that special, while somewhat lacking its strengths. In case you forgot, Yes, Virginia is a nice little Christmas story with some unfortunate CG animation. It’s not good. This being a Pixar television special, it looks fantastic! It’s just very light on Christmas. Toy Story That Time Forgot is really a post Christmas special. Originally, I even considered doing it as a gag December 26th post. It takes place after the holiday has come and new toys have been bestowed upon young Bonnie, but none appear poised to push out her old favorites (wait until they meet the spork later on). As for her friend, on the other hand, he got something way more interesting: video games. On a playdate, Bonnie gets to experience the same while the toys are left to peruse this other kid’s playroom which has been filled with a new dinosaur product line. This kid got a ton of stuff for Christmas and it kind of takes me back to when my son got into Paw Patrol. As a dad who grew up adoring toys (and still does), I had to get him everything Paw Patrol I could get my hands on and I probably went a little overboard. The same happened for this kid and it’s overwhelming. He doesn’t seem to care and the toys are left to fend for themselves and they’re basically all a bunch of Buzz Lightyears. Woody and the gang have to prove to them they’re actually toys and while it feels a bit familiar, it’s still pretty fun. It’s just not very Christmassy.

114 – The Real Ghostbusters – XMas Marks the Spot

This is our second Christmas special (though chronologically, it came first) where the Dickens tale A Christmas Carol is treated like a historical reality. In this holiday themed episode of The Real Ghostbusters, our favorite busters somehow travel back in time and accidentally bust the ghosts that were supposed to show Ebenezer Scrooge the error of his ways. Now, I’ve been pretty vocal about my disinterest in adaptations of A Christmas Carol here, but this one is legitimately clever. Especially when your main characters are known for fighting ghosts. And apparently, that night was extremely important for the world as busting those ghosts changes the future for the worse forcing the Ghostbusters to try and set things right. First, by taking the place of the ghosts, and then by actually springing them from the containment unit. Longtime viewers get to enjoy a trip into where all of the ghosts they’ve been capturing all series long are held and there’s some fun cameos. This one is ranked this high because the premise is fun and this era of the show had some pretty nice animation and vocal performances. If you’ve never cared about Ghostbusters or The Real Ghostbusters then you might not enjoy it as much as I, who was raised on this stuff. Let’s hope Mondo never makes X-Mas variants of their Ghostbusters figures because my wallet may never recover.

113 – Johnny Bravo – ‘Twas the Night

Johnny Bravo was another early Cartoon Network original that found success. He’s basically a meat head with an Elvis obsession and this short Christmas cartoon puts that on display. It’s a bit like The Santa Clause, or “Christmas Flintstone,” in that Johnny takes over for Santa because the jolly old elf has become incapacitated. The twist here is Johnny is the one who incapacitated him. I guess Tim Allen did the same when he startled the Santa on his roof, but Johnny literally beats him up. Santa then demands he take over and Johnny reluctantly complies. There’s some good gags as Johnny pops in on characters featured in the show and some who are not, including a famous cameo. Perhaps the best part though is it’s all narrated by Adam West. His dry, yet earnest, delivery is perfect for this sort of thing. The segment is one of three from a half hour show so it’s extremely brief compared to most of the specials on this list which works to his advantage. I can only handle the character of Johnny Bravo in small doses and this is perfect.

112 – The Legend of Prince Valiant – Peace on Earth

This episode of The Legend of Prince Valiant was a tough one to rank. On one hand, it gets a little preachy and the episode’s resolution is perhaps too tidy for the weighty material leading up to it. On the other hand, it’s a more serious addition to the Christmas special lineage which makes it refreshing and the weighty material is handled pretty well, for the most part. It’s all about seeking peace in a war-torn land. A local lord has been killed and his son is expected to rule in his place. His followers want vengeance, but he just wants an end to the long-running feud. Our titular character, Prince Valiant, is politically bound to defend his allies so if a battle is to be waged then he and his knights are duty bound to join in when they want nothing more than to go home for Christmas without bloodshed. It’s not afraid to show some violence and death, it’s just not gratuitous. And such subjects are spoken of plainly. It’s also a relic of the original The Family Channel so, yeah, there’s a religious component to it as well. The plot even centers on a book, though to my shock the book was not the Bible. The animation is solid and if you want something non-comical for your Christmas viewing then this might be worth a look.

111 – Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmas

Mickey’s first animated Christmas special in years is a bit of a mixed bag, hence why it’s here in the middle. The animation and overall look of this one is great, some of Disney’s best television animation for the era. The special is an hour and a half broken up into three segments making it essentially three half-hour specials in one. The sequel special kept the running time, but broke it up into more segments which is about the only thing that special got right. This one kind of struggles with each segment getting long and repetitive. It doesn’t help that the first one is a “Christmas Everyday” story with Donald’s nephews in the lead role. That one is repetitive by design. The middle segment, which stars Goofy and a younger version of Max than we saw in Goof Troop, is probably my favorite and it’s just all about Goofy trying to get his son to believe in Santa Claus. The third is a telling of The Gift of the Magi starring Mickey and Minnie and it’s as satisfying as most adaptations of that story – which is to say not very. Each segment has its moments, but this one falls short of being a true Christmas classic despite its pedigree.

110 – The New Batman Adventures – Holiday Knights

Oh yes, we’re including the Batman episodes! Years ago, in celebration of the 25th anniversary of Batman: The Animated Series, I did a weekly rundown of each episode in the show as well as its sequel show, The New Batman Adventures. As such, these existed outside of the usual Christmas Spot countdown, but since there are two Christmas episodes among them it only felt right to include them here. This one is the series premiere for The New Batman Adventures and it’s like an anthology episode. The first segment features Harley and Ivy going on a shopping spree with a drugged-out Bruce Wayne, the middle segment features Batgirl stopping Clayface at a shopping mall, and the third and final segment actually takes place on New Year’s Eve where the Joker is up to no good and it falls on Batman and Robin to stop him. It’s a weird one for the show because it comes first in production order despite the Robin character getting introduced later on in the series, but we don’t really care about that for this purpose. All you need to know is this is a perfectly fine episode of the show that takes place at Christmas. The segmented nature of it does prevent it from being able to lock-on and tell one cohesive, satisfying, story instead opting more for the Looney Tunes approach. It’s entertaining, and the final scene is a nice piece of Batman lore for this universe, and overall I just find it more enjoyable than what The Justice League did.

109 – Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice

I am a big fan of the original Prep & Landing holiday special. I hope to be a big fan of the new one coming this year. I am not that big of a fan of Naughty vs. Nice. It obviously isn’t bad since I’m placing it roughly in the middle of my countdown, and by virtue of its association with the better special I tend to watch it annually, but it does some things I don’t like. Namely, it makes the lead, Wayne, just completely unlikable. The first one flirts with that idea, but it’s a bit more reasonable and relatable. This one just gives Wayne a case of sibling rivalry where he comes across as extremely petty, self-serving, and really just an asshole. Can you have a successful Christmas special where the lead is an asshole? Sure, but probably not when it’s ultimately trying to be a wholesome take on the holiday. It’s not all bad as there’s some humorous bits and the presentation is still fantastic, it’s just way less enjoyable.

108 – Popeye the Sailor – Mister and Mistletoe

Another old school holiday short, and one I deemed much better than the collection of old shorts featured further back in this countdown. Popeye is one of the original stars of black and white cartoons, but this Christmas short comes after that when he was in color and no longer part of Fleischer. That was the best era for Popeye, but these color ones from Famous Studios aren’t all bad. And this mad cap Christmas short is pretty fun and what most probably want out of a Popeye short. Olive and Popeye have put his nephews to bed when Bluto shows up dressed as Santa Claus to try and steal Popeye’s girl. Only Popeye thinks he’s the real deal and is probably more captivated by this rather bulky Santa than Olive seems to be. There’s some funny bits where Popeye is basically throwing himself at Santa until the big guy finally gets rid of him for good. Once the cat is out of the bag, Popeye can get to kicking some ass and eventually Bluto gets his due and violence solves everything. Popeye ends the short in the Santa suit because how could he not?

107 – Nerds and Monsters – Zanti-Clops

This is one I wanted to rank lower. It’s a 2014 cartoon I had never heard of with only so-so animation, but each time I went back to it for this ranking I was reminded that, “Hey, it’s pretty good!” Now, it’s not sentimental or anything and is just about some kids stuck on a monster-infested island. It’s got some gross-out humor. Poop plays a pretty central role to the monster version of Santa, the aforementioned Zanti-Clops, who takes old junk from kids and leaves behind a steaming pile of green, jewel-encrusted, dung. One of the nerds, Dudley, is anti-Santa or whatever and takes it upon himself to find out the truth, which nearly gets him killed. See, Zanti-Clops eats all who see him, but it turns out he’s not such a bad guy. He still inflicts some terror upon the kids before this one is over and we get even more poop jokes. If you can look past so many poop jokes then you’ll probably be entertained by this. It’s another short one too with some solid character work.

106 – Prep & Landing: Operation: Secret Santa

Yeah, we’re doubling-up on Prep & Landing today with this one being the short the franchise has produced. As the title implies, this one is more like a spy mission and it’s a pretty simple one: infiltrate Santa’s work shop and retrieve something for Mrs. Claus. The stakes are a bit undefined. We can clearly see that Lanny and Wayne fear Santa and what might happen should they be caught snooping around, but he’s also Santa. What’s he really going to do? Despite the stakes seeming awfully small, it still manages to create some solid tension while the elves are on their mission. There’s some nice set pieces and stunt shots and the item they’re after leads to a solid enough conclusion. It’s brief, but benign. I usually watch it out of habit at this point after I watch the truly special original.

105 – A Muppet Family Christmas

This is a popular one I tend to enjoy less than most. Maybe it’s because I grew up with this one on VHS so it didn’t have that unobtainable quality it had for a lot of people. Now it’s far easier to see thanks to streaming and there have been some physical releases, though some stuff had to be cut for copywrite reasons. The special is great on paper: the Muppets gather at the home of Fozzy’s mom and get snowed in with the gang from Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock. It’s all of the major Jim Henson properties literally under one roof. It just runs out of steam for me. A lot of the setup is fun and seeing the Muppets interact with the cast of Sesame Street is surprisingly entertaining. The Fraggles though are kind of wasted and the back half gets bogged down by concern for Miss Piggy and songs. So many songs. It’s as if they couldn’t fill an hour, so they decided to just have everyone sit around and sing Christmas carols. It’s really not good. Still, some people love The Muppets so much that it’s worth sitting through, but this is the rare special you can turn off about halfway through and not have really missed out on anything. Well, except that Jim Henson cameo at the very end which is pretty sweet. And it’s made all the more so by him no longer being with us.