Today should be a day of 90s cartoons because we’re taking it all the way to 64 – Nintendo 64! The Christmas gods do not agree for not only does today not include any 90s properties, but it doesn’t even include a Nintendo one. It does include a video game turned cartoon and there are some 90’s adjacent stuff, but that’s as far as it goes. It’s also a bit of a mix in terms of demographic. There’s stuff here that’s definitely intended for kids and some stuff that most certainly is not. In fact, I would say this may be the darkest installment yet of the countdown and the lead-off special is doing quite a bit of the heavy lifting there as it just may be the darkest Christmas special I’ve ever taken in.
Moral Orel is a stop-motion animated show that aired on Adult Swim about a good-natured boy named Orel and his quest to live life in God’s image. It’s very much a subversive take on Davey and Goliath, just minus the talking dog. Orel, being a young kid, is completely oblivious to his surroundings in which all of the adults in his life are selfish and miserable and there basically isn’t one genuine person in his life. His father is an abusive alcoholic, his mother a bitter adulterer, and even his priest is a sexual deviant. “The Best Christmas Ever” was actually the show’s premiere, though it was never intended to be. If you caught it in the proper order, the episodes started off as a Davey and Goliath parody with Orel misunderstanding some church teaching and doing the wrong thing leading to a trip to his dad’s study to get taught a lesson. Physically. By the time the show reached this season finale, it just got depressing as his dad slipped further into the bottle and was forced to confront the fact that one of his children isn’t even his. And since Orel overhears the discussion between his parents, he gets the idea that his little brother was conceived immaculately and is actually the second coming of Jesus. In reality, the kid is terrible and his own parents regret not getting an abortion. It all ends with Orel and his brother smashing a nativity scene, because he thinks his Christ-brother is bringing about the Apocalypse, only for his mom to tell him that: He’s right that his dad isn’t his brother’s father, and they’re getting a divorce. Orel tracks his dad down at the local bar where his track coach is hitting on him and Orel comes to the conclusion that this is not the best Christmas ever. He notes there’s still two minutes left though and he has faith in the Lord to turn things around! And that’s how the episode ends which just feels even more bleak. This is definitely a very cynical look at the idyllic Protestant family and not the sort of special that’s for everyone. There’s a bit of an “edgelord” vibe to the humor, but the audacity of it all worked on me and it’s one of those specials I return to just to see if it’s as dark as I remember. And, yeah, it pretty much is. The only thing missing is a suicide joke.
This episode of American Dad! pairs rather well with Moral Orel as it’s another cynical take on Christmas with some sacrilegious displays of violence. It’s also far more lighter in tone due to the more slapstick nature of the show when compared with Moral Orel. In this one, Stan gets passed over as Jesus for his church’s play only for Roger to get the part. When Stan loses it and beats up Roger on camera over the alien’s disrespect towards his religion, he finds himself excommunicated from his church. Lucky for him though, his daughter and her husband just so happened to adopt the antichrist and if Stan can just kill his toddler grandson it will get him back into God’s good graces! It’s quite the farcical Christmas plot with numerous funny moments and some pretty strong animation from the show. It doesn’t advance the overarching Christmas plot the show has with the Smith family and Santa Claus, but it’s fun.
Smiling Friends is a much celebrated animated show in the circles I frequent mostly for its brand of humor and rough animation. It’s the latest in what appears to be cheaply produced animation for Adult Swim that turns into a hit. I confess it’s not as big of a hit with me as it is others. I don’t think it’s bad, but the show is just so damn ugly. I feel like I’ve hit my limit with ugly adult animation – why can’t we get stuff that looks nice? This is another Christmas episode from Adult Swim that’s not exactly packed with feels. Charlie dies while out looking for a Christmas tree with his friends and co-workers only to wander through Hell and find himself face-to-face with Satan. If he helps the guy out, he can go back, and since he’s one of the main characters I don’t think it’s a spoiler to acknowledge that the title of this one is a bald-faced lie. The humor is mostly dark, and even though I called this show ugly, there are some spots in Hell that are pretty inventive and surprised me. As I think about it, I probably should have switched this with Moral Orel, but it hardly matters when we’re talking two positions on a 200 episode countdown. This one fits in with a lot of the other subversive Adult Swim Christmas specials so if that’s something you like then you can easily make yourself a solid marathon of content.
Second Christmas looks pretty sweet, but of course Robin hates it. He’s no fun.
Here’s one that’s a bit more lighthearted. Our second installment of Teen Titans Go! just confronts what we all hate about the holiday – it’s end. To stave off those post Christmas blues, the Titans invent Second Christmas complete with its own Second Santa and customs. It’s basically just good-natured fun, though at the expense of Starfire who is ignorant of Christmas, and no one really learns a lesson or anything. Instead, they all fall victim to a horrible accident when Starfire is denied a Second Christmas miracle and they get to spend much of the following year in a coma which is actually a happy ending because they get to basically skip right to Christmas again! Take that, Arbor Day!
Spectacular Spider-Man was a short-lived animated series that really did an excellent job of condensing a lot of Spider-Man material into something new and fun. Unfortunately, the Marvel acquisition by Disney seemed to kill it as the House of Mouse wasn’t interested in boosting characters it didn’t have film rights to or that were animated on deals outside of their usual reach. Disney would make its own Spider-Man shows and none of them could hold a candle to Spectacular Spider-Man. In this one, Peter tries his luck at courting not one, not two, but three different women and kind of strikes out with all three (Pete, it’s never a good idea to let a woman feel like she’s not your first choice, pal). It ends up being the least of his worries as he’s soon set upon by the show’s version of the Sinister Six. It’s a lot for Peter to deal with, but he’s Spider-Man so you know he’ll figure it out. It’s basically an episode full of action and holiday puns from our hero and it’s pretty entertaining, just not really a self-contained Christmas special. You definitely won’t get as much out of it if you haven’t watched the episodes leading up to it, but even if you haven’t, it’s still the best Christmas episode any Spider-Man show has had up until now.
Chuckie and his dad do not see eye to eye when it comes to Christmas trees.
This Rugrats spin-off arrived when I stopped caring about the franchise. I wish it had come earlier as I think I would have enjoyed it in those early teen years where I was still kind of watching Nickelodeon, but not sure if I should still be. The show surprised me in the little bit of time I spent on it as it took Rugrats, a show about babies going on wacky adventures, and made it a teen drama. I wasn’t sure that could work, but what do you know? It kind of does. And the result isn’t a show as reliant on Tommy. He almost feels like an afterthought, but this is a Chuckie centric episode as he mistakenly steals a Christmas tree and feels horrible about it. There are some inconsequential B-plots as well, but the meat and potatoes is Chuckie trying to do the right thing and finding it difficult. It mostly works out in the end and Chuckie gets to learn a lesson about the importance of family or something and it will leave you feeling pretty good about things. It’s sweet and I was charmed by the conflict between Chuckie and his dad. I considered ranking this one ahead of the Rugrats Christmas episode, but nostalgia kind of won out there.
We already looked at the Christmas episode from the better, more popular X-Men animated series. Now, we’re looking at the better Christmas episode. That other X-Men special is a “so bad it’s good” kind of special while this one is mostly just plain good. It’s a more grounded episode even though it’s all about a guy with actual wings and dudes with laser eyes and such. It’s more teen drama with the orphaned Cyclops and Rogue being left behind by their peers at the X-Mansion for Christmas. While that does kind of suck, it forces them to bond a bit which is good for Rogue who has a crush on Summers that’s unlikely to go anywhere since he’s all about Jean. Since Wolverine was too old in this show to shoehorn into that love triangle I guess Rogue is a decent consolation. The two end up in the city investigating tales of an actual Angel, which is of course just another mutant. It turns into something of an arm’s race as Magneto wants to recruit him, but so do the X-Men, and the two battle over the reluctant mutant until finally he’s allowed to have a say of his own. It’s just a good-natured Christmas special with some nice action tossed in. It’s not as reliant as Spectacular Spider-Man on the audience being up to date on what is happening in the show and basically all you need to know is contained in this one. It also mostly avoids the slapstick elements of the show and plays it straight. There’s a nice little montage at the end showing how the others spend Christmas and there’s that nice touch of melancholy present in so many Christmas episodes and it’s just the right amount. If you thought the older X-Men Christmas episode was just too silly, this one will likely please you more.
It just wouldn’t be Xmas without a brutal rampage!
Enough of that sentimental bull crap, let’s cause some mayhem! Futurama is unique in that it turned Santa into a villain. Well, it was unique until American Dad! and Teen Titans Go! came along, but their murderous robot Santa is still his own brand. In the follow-up to the first Xmas special, the Planet Express crew is tasked with finally putting an end to Santa’s murderous rampage and they’re actually successful! A problem arises when they take it one step further and have Bender serve as a new Santa, one that will actually deliver presents to all the good girls and boys. After generations of growing up with an evil Santa, the people of Earth aren’t so willing to accept this reformed Santa and Bender is put through the ringer. He’s eventually jailed and sentenced to death for being Santa and the only way to save him is to free the real Robot Santa whom the crew trapped in the ice of Neptune. Do you believe in Xmas miracles? Well your faith is rewarded! Robot Santa is freed and saves Bender and the two are able to inflict carnage and mayhem on the world just as Jesus intended. Merry Xmas everyone!
Who could forget such classic characters as these?
If you’re a show that likes to do an annual Christmas episode and you’re on for many seasons, chances are you’ll eventually wind up doing a musical. I wouldn’t call this episode of American Dad! a full blown musical, but it has multiple musical numbers most of which are pretty damn fun (Haley’s is not though, that one sucks). In this episode, we get to further the plot of Santa and the Smiths by having Stan accidentally free the demon of Christmas, Krampus, whom his father had trapped in a copper pot many years ago. Krampus immediately kidnaps Stan’s bratty son, Steve, and demands he send his father to save him. Stan’s dad is a jerk though and ditches him so Stan has to seek the aid of Santa himself. The two form an unlikely alliance and go after Steve who is basically in a parody of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast where he gradually warms up to Krampus and becomes a better kid. There’s a wild battle to end things and a new part of the lore is established in the process. It’s a rewarding episode in that respect for longtime viewers of American Dad!, but for anyone else it’s just an absurd Christmas story that will probably elicit some laughter.
Is it possible for the Devil himself to get on Santa’s Nice List?
This second Christmas episode of The Cuphead Show! dares to ask the question “What does Satan want for Christmas?” Turns out it’s a choo choo as this show’s version of the Devil tries to get onto Santa’s Nice List in order to get what he wants, but the only way for him to do so is to make a deal with the big man and take his place! The Devil as Santa? That’s a worthwhile spin on what is essentially a take on The Santa Clause and the end result is pretty funny. It barely features the titular character of Cuphead, but that’s okay because the Devil is a great character on his own. It’s also really well animated and just looks fantastic for a modern piece of animation. It’s also much longer than a typical episode of The Cuphead Show!, but it doesn’t feel bloated. I was really entertained by it and it’s snuck onto my annual viewing list as a result.
If you can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
If you watched a lot of cartoons in the 80s and 90s then you probably remember Nelvana. Their cartoons, like many others, would end with their own production logo which was a polar bear, I think. It was all one color and white and since Nelvana is Canadian it would certainly make a lot of…
This year, I’ve taken some time out to watch Christmas episodes of shows I’m pretty unfamiliar with. This is yet another one of those posts, only with this show I did make an attempt to get into it. A mild one. We Bare Bears is a show created by Daniel Chong that aired on Cartoon…
Hugh Harman was one of the early stars in the field of animation. In fact, we talked about one of his shorts already this year, but perhaps his most famous and most celebrated is the 1939 anti-war film Peace on Earth. According to Harman, the short subject was nominated for The Nobel Peace Prize, but…
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:
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.
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.
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.
You know it’s a big tree when the candle needs to be put on it from the balcony.
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.
Despite what the image suggests, the whole gang does not get together to celebrate 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.
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.
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.
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?
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.
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.
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.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
The 2024 edition of The Christmas Spot has been a year in which we return to a show we haven’t talked about in a little while. Today’s subject is certainly one such show as we’re heading back to Arlen, TX for a Christmas episode of King of the Hill. Up to now, the only episode…
I have a pretty tremendous blind spot for most animated shows produced between 2005-2015. If it was a show animated and marketed at adults, then I might have checked it out. If it was a show created primarily for kids and not based on some existing IP I knew from my childhood then I almost…
This one has been a long time coming. One of my all-time favorite television shows is The Venture Bros., but it’s a show I really haven’t spent much time discussing on this blog. I guess because I view it as contemporary, even though the pilot premiered almost 20 years ago now. For most of this…
I can feel it, folks – we’re getting closer! Closer to the Christmas specials that are almost universally worth watching! That’s not to say the specials that have appeared in the countdown thus far are not worth it, they just might require more nuance. These are the specials that are watched year in and year out chiefly due to nostalgia. They’re the ones you grew up with that you just have to watch each year or the holiday just wouldn’t feel complete – even if they’re objectively bad. And I do think we’re beyond the objectively bad, well past that even, and just into the splitting hairs category. Yeah, you could watch the specials spotlighted today, but each moment spent with one of these could also probably be spent watching something superior. Take our first Christmas special of the day…
Some redesigns are fine, while some are just “meh.”
Alvin and his chipmunk brothers Simon and Theodore are no strangers to Christmas. They had a stand-alone TV special in 1981 as well as a Christmas episode during their run in the 1980’s in a show with a very similar name. This particular Christmas episode comes from the most recent iteration of the franchise which aired on Nickelodeon in 2020. If you’re familiar with the 80s cartoon, then this one should feel very similar. It just looks different. Alvin and his brothers, while still not the size of actual chipmunks, are a great deal smaller than they have traditionally been depicted in cartoons, but also their features otherwise are a bit deemphasized. They look more like kids with weird noses. And it’s a CG-rendered show that while not as ugly as some of the CG shows from the early 2010s, is still far less pleasant than the 80’s cartoon. In this holiday episode, Theodore is feeling unwanted at home, and when he gets mistaken for an elf and brought to the North Pole, he thinks no one back home actually wants him. And Alvin kind of gave him to the North Pole because in most versions of this franchise Alvin is a selfish dick, but he learns his lesson, Theodore makes it home for Christmas, and everything is fine. It’s just why would you spend your time with this one when you could be watching the far superior A Chipmunk Christmas? I don’t blame you though for preferring this to the It’s a Wonderful Life parody that showed up in the 80s series.
By sheer coincidence, we have another CG program from the 2010’s that aired on Nickelodeon starring a character who was pretty popular in the 1980s: Garfield. And like Alvin and the Chipmunks, Garfield has a much better Christmas special from the 80s you could be watching instead. Garfield and his pals made an okay jump to 3D. The models are a bit texture-less, but not unpleasant to look at. Frank Welker takes over for Lorenzo Music as the titular fat cat and does a solid job of capturing the same tone as Music. He’s low energy, almost bored, and rarely genuine. This episode, which is a tidy 12 minutes, features Garfield caroling because he sees it as a path to free food only no one he carols for seems to enjoy his antics. Meanwhile, Nermal and Odie are caroling together and dragging a wagon full of food behind them because they’re just so cute! There’s a few moments of genuine humor and since it’s so short it requires a much smaller sacrifice of time than most, but in the end it might still leave you wishing that you watched the more famous Christmas special featuring the orange cat.
I can think of something very wrong with that title. Yogi Bear’s All-Star Comedy Christmas Caper is pretty light on comedy, as most Hanna-Barbera things are. What it is not short on are cameos. That’s the “All-Star” part as you’re going to see most of the classic Hanna-Barbera characters in this one, even Fred and Barney! That’s actually the only part that did get a little laugh out of me as Snagglepuss points out the absurdity of the situation. Anyway, this one is about a lonely, mistreated, girl mistaking Yogi for Santa and him being unable to come clean about it because he doesn’t want her to feel worse. They need to help her greedy, selfish, father see the error of his ways. It’s not very good, and if I’m being objective about it then I probably should have ranked this one lower, but I do have some nostalgia goggles for it. It did get a genuine reaction out of me when I was younger which is hard to let go of. And I am a sucker for big ensembles, just not enough for me to make it through Yogi’s First Christmas. That damn thing is an hour and a half and I refuse to ever watch it again.
Space Goofs is a Fox Kids cartoon that started airing when I started tuning out on Saturday morning. Once X-Men and Spider-Man finished their respective runs I was all done. After watching this Christmas episode though, I do think I may have missed out. This is a bit of an ugly late 90s cartoon, the aesthetic for the era is not one that I look back on fondly, but it was pretty amusing. The premise of the show is a bunch of aliens are hiding out in a house and they’re oblivious to human culture, save for what they can get on their television. When Santa shows up on Christmas Eve, they think they’re being invaded. This Santa is incredibly stubborn though and insists on delivering presents so he keeps trying to sneak into the house which results in him getting caught by the various traps inside. He takes a beating, but he keeps on coming. It’s a bit like Smokey and the Bandit in that Santa keeps absorbing more and more punishment until he’s in a full body cast by the episode’s end. It’s an easy one to watch these days and if you like that 90s physical comedy that was present in many cartoons then you probably won’t need the benefit of nostalgia to find some enjoyment here.
If you didn’t like Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales then it makes sense why you’d give New Looney Tunes and its Christmas episode a try. Unfortunately, it’s not that great. It’s not terrible, and I am ranking it ahead of that first one, but it doesn’t take advantage of the holiday very well. This one has two segments. In the first, Bugs is Christmas shopping and after a hot item, but so is Yosemite Sam. This means the two go to war in a Walmart-type store for the last item available. There are some decent gags, but nothing particularly memorable (except maybe Porky having to mop up spilled ham). The second segment features Bugs’ friend, Squeaks, misdelivering his letter to Santa to a guy called The Barbarian on account of the fact that he kind of resembles Santa Claus. Bugs has to get the letter back so he can get it to the real Santa, but Barbarian is apparently not interested in giving it back. It’s kind of stupid. Again, it’s just Bugs inflicting pain on his opponent (with some pain returned) through comedic means none of which is particularly memorable. You’re unlikely to hate it, but it’s not the sort of Christmas special you’ll be inclined to watch again. And there are better Looney Tunes specials to come.
The Pink Panther is basically a silent cartoon star. The cartoons are not absent sound, but there’s no dialogue from anyone. The story is moved along through animation and the object is usually to convey pretty basic emotions that almost anyone can understand. Like most cartoon stars, The Pink Panther is accustomed to short subjects, but this television special had to fill a half hour and it really hurts the pacing. In this one, Pink Panther is basically homeless and just wants a hot meal. He goes through all kinds of hoops to land one which also lands him in trouble with numerous people along the way eventually leading to him getting arrested. It has funny moments, and there’s a nice ending to it as well, but it’s the sort of special that just wares me down. I don’t have any particular affection for the Pink Panther. I don’t think there’s anything especially sympathetic about him in any of his cartoons, but even so I get sick of him constantly losing throughout this one even knowing it’s going to work out in the end. Had this been a cartoon short, I think it would have worked better. It’s a bit too miserable in this form, but some may find that the constant misery leads to a better payoff I suppose.
Don’t be fooled by his cuteness, he just kicked the crap out of Santa.
Here’s one for the British readers. SuperTed is a living teddy bear that’s also a superhero. I really liked this guy as a kid and had pretty much forgot all about him until I stumbled upon this Christmas episode a few years back. In this one, the villainous Texas Pete is out to steal Christmas and it’s up to SuperTed to stop him. The amusing wrinkle in this one is that SuperTed thinks he gets the drop on ole Pete only to find out it’s the real Santa Claus, err, Father Christmas. He actually beats him up pretty well too in what is an almost shockingly funny little bit. Outside of that, it’s a perfectly fine little Christmas episode that probably works better if you have some affection for the character.
I swear it’s just a coincidence that SuperTed is followed by Super Dave.
Comedian Bob Einstein’s Super Dave alter ego actually had his own cartoon series in the early 90s. It was short-lived, but it’s one of those things that impresses me to this day. Super Dave, if you’re unaware, was a daredevil. Since this was a bit by a comedian, he was a terrible daredevil. None of his stunts go right and he often winds up in extreme pain. It makes sense to turn that type of guy into a cartoon since you can really do some damage to a cartoon character and he’ll always come back ready for more! In this Christmas episode, Santa is kidnapped and Dave has to rescue him. Why does a daredevil have to be the one to rescue him? Who knows? It has its moments, but mostly it ends up getting ranked this high because I remain tickled that this is a thing that exists. I also appreciate that it really has no moral. Sometimes we don’t need a preachy ending, we just need an ending.
Eek is the good-natured cat that roamed the Fox Kids Saturday morning lineup in the early 90s. He is an eternal optimist which makes him a great fit for a Christmas special. He can also scream like a bastard and take some serious punishment which makes him an ideal cartoon character. In this Christmas episode, Eek comes across a gift for Little Joey and takes it upon himself to make sure it reaches him. Along his journey, he’s going to get the snot kicked out of him. He’s also going to help people along the way which just in turn leads to more misery, but the cat comes through in the end and delivers the present to Little Joey. Who turns out to be a rat or something. It’s entertaining, it’s just not one of the better looking shows from the era. And since it doesn’t really invoke the “feels,” it comes up just a tad limp for me in the end. If Eek was your guy, or cat, when you were a kid then you’ll probably derive far more enjoyment out of coming back to this one than I ever could. I also think his other Christmas special is just a little bit better.
I apparently named this image “Dick Dexter.” I amuse myself sometimes.
Our final entrant for today is Dexter of Dexter’s Laboratory fame. He was one of the original Cartoon Cartoon stars for Cartoon Network and I have mostly positive memories of his show. In his Christmas segment, Dexter is confronted by his own ignorance for he gets into an argument with his sister about the existence of Santa Claus. Dee Dee insists that he’s real while Dexter insists that it’s merely their father in disguise. He seems to think his dad puts on an elaborate show to keep up the ruse indicating that while Dexter may be a boy genius, he’s also still a boy. Dexter then waits up all night and catches the real Santa in the act, only he still thinks it’s his dad and does horrible things to the big man in order to prove it. This just leads to injuries and destruction. Santa even loses his beard (coincidentally, the same thing happens to the Santa in Space Goofs)! Yeah, it’s kind of unsettling. What I love about this one is the continuity. This being a Hanna-Barbera Christmas episode that aired in 1998, it still made sure to have a Santa that looks exactly like the one from A Flintstone Christmas. That’s pretty neat, even if other versions of Santa have appeared over the years in other Hanna-Barbera productions. If you’re going to copy one though, that’s the one to copy. This Christmas episode is brief, but funny. A little dark, perhaps, but we need that from time to time out of our Christmas specials.
What’s not dark, is tomorrow’s Christmas special. Actually, it technically is dark, just not in tone or humor. You’ll see what I mean in short order, but tomorrow is a full write-up of a Christmas cartoon I never got around to. It’s one that has been on my “to do” list year after year and even pre-planned on at least one occasion, but I just never got around to it. That all changes tomorrow so come on back and see what ended up in slot number 147!
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
I told you we would probably take a look at the other Christmas episode from The Cuphead Show!, though maybe you expected a buffer. I considered it, but why not pair them up just like the creators and Netflix already did? This second Christmas episode comes right after the first. Titled “A Very Devil Christmas,”…
When two billion dollar organizations butt heads, it can be hard to know who to root for. Take Disney, somewhat of an “evil” overlord when it comes to content, which seemingly owns everything these days and likes to throw its weight around when it comes to copyright claims. And then there’s Fox, owned by the…
In 1964, Arthur Rankin and Jules Bass unleashed a Christmas Classic upon the world in the form of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. The special basically put the company on the map and put it on the path to holiday domination for decades to come. Despite that, few of the specials that followed Rudolph truly hit…
We’re getting closer, ever closer to the Christmas specials that are most worth watching every year. That’s not necessarily a bad thing that we’re still kind of in the weeds considering today’s entry covers entries 180 through 171. It’s a reminder that there are a lot of Christmas specials out there. Yesterday’s entries on short subjects is so far the outlier in that some of them are worth watching just because they’re so brief. And there’s some historical value. Today’s entries are not so brief and not so old so they need to get by on entertainment value and nostalgia. And, for me anyway, there’s not a ton of nostalgia to be found in this cast of Christmas specials. Oh, there is some, including one that I pretty much watch every year because of how I know it, but there’s a lot of “filler” here as well. These are mostly from children’s entertainment and if there was a theme I suppose it would be Christmas episodes from cartoons that are not well-remembered. There are a few exceptions and as I look over my list and the days to come I can see some that I could have flip-flopped out of here. Though in the case of many, it’s more an issue of seeing a special yet to come that I really don’t think is all that good and wondering why it’s not here, but then I look at what we’re talking about today and it starts to make more sense. I could tinker with this list all month and never feel like it’s perfect so let’s just move on, shall we?
Donkey Kong managed to elevate himself above his more popular genre-mates Sonic and Mario, but let’s not pretend like his Christmas episode is all that great. For me, it’s most memorable for being the kind of show I had very low expectations for going in and it managed to exceed them. That doesn’t mean it rose to the level of something I’d consider good, but it’s not terrible. There’s some silliness to be found with the long lost brothers plot to the point where it kind of works. What does not and never will are the visuals. If this ranking was purely on visual quality, Donkey Kong might be in last place. It’s hideous. Those early 3D CG shows have not aged well.
This is a Christmas episode that was always going to have to really knock it out of the park to be placed higher in the rankings. That’s because it’s a Christmas in July episode and in it our monstrous protagonists find themselves trapped in the mall after hours. The Christmas element is purely visual as the mall is decorated for a big summer sale, but there’s a lot of actual Christmas episodes that don’t do much more than add a visual element as well. This one is also short since it was only one segment from a half hour television spot and judged strictly on the quality of the entertainment it’s probably better than where I have it. It’s just not very Christmassy. Plus, I’ve never liked the visual style of this show.
This is the one I teased as being a special I watch annually, even if I don’t really like it that much. It was featured on my beloved Christmas tape growing up so I saw it all of the time and I still see it quite often. As a kid, it was the spot on the tape where I was most likely to drop-off. Thankfully, it had Rudolph backing it up so that’s what usually got me through. Had it been last on the tape then I probably would have seen it far less. If you somehow have not seen this Rankin/Bass production, it’s the origin story for Santa Claus and Mickey Rooney’s debut as the character. The story is pretty silly with a local ruler outlawing toys, but the approach isn’t silly. There’s a lack of fun here and it’s just so long and plodding. None of the songs are particularly good either. Sure, “One Foot in Front of the Other” can get lodged in your head, but that doesn’t mean I want it there. For nostalgia’s sake, I’ll sit through this one at least once this month, but that’s all I’m giving it.
For a little while, there was an attempt at making the Flintstones into some sort of holiday tradition in the 90s. There was a A Flintstone Family Christmas and there was this, A Flintstones Christmas Carol. Now, I have some affection for The Flintstones. I never actively sought the show out, but if it was on I’d often watch it as a kid. I do like A Flintstone Christmas and the episode of the show “Christmas Flintstone” it was based on, but that’s sort of my limit. And when you take a dated franchise like The Flintstones and pair it up with one of the most overused Christmas tropes on record by adapting A Christmas Carol, well, you don’t really end up with anything remotely special. I’ll give it some credit in that the special tries to blend a meta component by having it be a production in-show, but Fred lets stardom get to his head to the point where he starts acting like Scrooge. It’s for serious fans of The Flintstones only, the rest need not apply.
There have been many attempts at melding Halloween with Christmas. The most famous is obviously The Nightmare Before Christmas and it’s also probably the most successful. On television in the 90s though, we had stuff like Little Dracula. It’s a cartoon where the cast is basically all monsters, but the approach to the macabre is so tepid that it tends to undermine any real spooky element it could have. In this one, the goal is to capture Santa Claus. I guess that’s what vampires do. It’s very by the numbers for such an unusual plot as we just get a lot of setup where the entertainment is supposed to be seeing how monsters decorate for the holiday, but nothing is particularly clever. The villain of the show, Garlic Man, wants to pose as Santa to enter the house or something, even though he knows they’re trying to capture the big man. And, of course, the real Santa shows up and we all learn something. Or not? It’s not very memorable.
Make way for Don Coyoooooote! Don Coyote hails from a mostly forgotten Hanna-Barbera cartoon and rightly so. The main character is incredibly annoying and he just bumbles his way through adventure after adventure in a model similar to Inspector Gadget, only Don Coyote didn’t have a niece and a really smart dog looking out for his well-being. The only saving grace for the show is that most of the other characters see Don Coyote for what he is: an idiot. The villagers in the town he tries to help in this one all think he sucks and it’s a bit humorous to see. It’s not a big Christmas vibes sort of episode either, it just takes place at Christmas and the bell referenced in the title has some meaning for the holiday. There is a light faith element to the plot, so if you like your Christmas to appeal more to that aspect of the holiday as opposed to Santa and Rudolph then maybe you can appreciate this on that level. Maybe. It’s still not very good.
Heathcliff may have originated close enough to Garfield that the two can be considered peers, but he’s mostly lived in the fat, orange, cat’s shadow in my lifetime. And that’s despite sounding like Bugs Bunny! Heathcliff did have a solid run on television in the 80s getting two similar, but separate, cartoons and around 100 episodes of entertainment. His grand finale is a Christmas episode in which his letter to Santa is returned so he and Spike (all dogs were required to be named Spike in cartoons) head to the north pole to investigate. There they encounter a jerk of an elf who is hell-bent on destroying Christmas, but as is often the case, things work out in the end and it turns out the elf isn’t such a bad guy after all. There aren’t any memorable gags to find and this one does something I hate. It has Santa literally tell the audience that a year of bad behavior can be redeemed at the last second to get on the Nice List. What a crock! I get needing to give kids something to reach for, but to come out and say it like that is just wrong.
Okay, I really didn’t know where to rank this one. Visually, it’s offensive to my eyes. It’s cheap and ugly. It’s also Ace Ventura who is a pretty annoying character. On the big screen, at least the physical acting of Jim Carrey can help make him tolerable, but as an ugly cartoon the charm is gone. This one does have a somewhat clever plot though and it feels pretty original. Since the character is a detective (which allows them to make liberal use of the term dick), there’s a mystery component and it’s not bad. Santa’s reindeer have gone missing, and Ace needs to get them back. It’s a good setup for a pet detective. It’s just…a lot. I can only handle so much of this character. I do think if you really like the character then you’ll like this a lot more than I do. It’s the sort of Christmas episode where I’m glad I did experience it, but once is enough.
The Nickelodeon Christmas special by Ralph Bakshi that doubled as a pilot for a show that never was, Christmas in Tattertown is quite possibly the most uneven special in this countdown. There are moments in this one that look terrific. There’s a throwback quality to the character designs and animation of the 1930s and it mostly works. There’s also moments where the quality dips and then there’s just the uneven performances. This is especially seen in the character Muffet, who is at times sympathetic and at times a horrible villain. She is a doll that doesn’t really want to be a girl’s doll and she’s frustrated that her life has seemingly been decided for her. She just decides to go full villain in response to that. The voice work is also so up and down that watching this is like experiencing whiplash. I wanted to like this because the premise is solid, but there are too many moments for me where I questioned if I actually hated it. It’s exhausting to watch, but it looks so interesting that I think it’s something everyone should see once. At least, everyone who has ever been enchanted by a cartoon.
Our last entry for today comes courtesy of that other children’s cable network, the Cartoon Network. I Am Weasel was a spin-off from Cow and Chicken which in turn was born out of the What a Cartoon workshop. I have no idea why I Am Weasel was chosen to be spun-off. I liked Cow and Chicken to a certain degree, but I did not care at all for I Am Weasel. It’s a setup where the weasel is basically an ideal character and does everything right and he’s juxtaposed with I.R. Baboon, a selfish, stupid, jealous character. He basically tries, and fails, to undermine the weasel and steal the spotlight for himself. In this Christmas edition, Baboon is surprised by his family when they show up for Christmas. He is ill-prepared, so he runs out to get a tree and all the trimmings, but leaves his family out in the cold. Weasel then comes by and notices the frozen solid group of baboons and invites them into his palatial estate. They become rather enamored with Weasel which just makes Baboon jealous when he finds out. He then tries to sabotage Christmas. It has a happy ending, and it’s actually a lot of plot for what is a short cartoon. It’s a solid setup and premise for the show, it’s problem is it’s just not very funny. Maybe I’ve aged out of this era of visually loud humor, but I didn’t really laugh. If you have fond memories of this or Cow and Chicken then maybe you’ll get more out of it.
And that does it for today’s entries. Tomorrow, we take a break from the countdown to spotlight a forgotten Christmas special. I think it’s a bit of a crowd favorite, but maybe the winds have changed for it over the years and I’m mistaken. Or it’s just become properly rated since we are talking about entry #169. What is it? Well, you’ll have to come back tomorrow and find out. Unless you’re not reading this on December 4, 2025. In that case, you can just click the little button for the next entry. I hope you were surprised!
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say last year on this day and beyond:
Last year, I made an effort to get to a lot of the Nicktoons that I had yet to cover. My initial thinking when I started doing this Christmas blog was to try and avoid the specials that had been covered in depth many times over. Then I realized that, hey, if you want to…
Last year, we covered in depth the inaugural Christmas episodes of Rugrats and The Ren & Stimpy Show, two of the three original Nicktoons that premiered in 1991. Now, we’re going to look at the Christmas episode for the other original Nicktoon: Doug. Doug was created by Jim Jinkins and was one of the first…
Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising were among the first stars of cartoon creation to burst onto the scene. Together, the duo would work for Disney, Warner, and MGM (among others) creating and overseeing some of animation’s most memorable characters from the golden age. After working with Leon Schlesinger’s studio to produce Looney Tunes shorts, the…
Come 2008, the DC Animated Universe had been dead for 2 years. Justice League Unlimited aired its final episode in 2006 bringing an end to something that had been ongoing since 1992. As I touched on earlier in this year’s countdown, the DCAU wasn’t something I was particularly invested in so it’s end went unnoticed by me. Hell, it’s continuation mostly went unnoticed as I stopped at Batman Beyond! With it in the past though, it seemed there was a desire at Warner to do something completely different. Enter Batman: The Brave and the Bold, a far more light-hearted and cheeky depiction of the caped crusader loosely based on the comic of the same name. The premise was to take Batman and focus on more contained stories that would feature a team-up between Batman and other DC superheroes, some of which would be well known and some that wouldn’t be. This new start came with a new art style and a new voice for Batman. Kevin Conroy (R.I.P.) will always be my Batman, but I get the desire to want to explore a different aspect of the hero which is how we ended up with Diedrich Bader. Bader’s more one-dimensional Batman is the anchor of this show. He has to take himself seriously and play the straight man in a world that is rather outlandish.
It’s a show that is not as campy as past Batman media, but it’s not as grim as the Batman of the 80s and 90s.
Despite all of that, Batman: The Brave and the Bold is not a show I sought out. It was sold to me as more of a kid’s show, and being well into my adult years at this point it didn’t make much sense to seek it out. Like Justice League, the show aired on Cartoon Network which just wasn’t really on my radar in 2008. I admired the visual style from afar, but that was as far as I went with it. Now, I’m more curious about the animated shows I passed on. I never fell out of love with cartoons, be they aimed at kids or adults, and if they’re well-animated then they have value to me. And let’s be honest, we’ve seen a ton of dark and gritty takes on Batman at this point. I love Batman ’89, Batman: The Animated Series, and Batman Begins – they’re all terrific, but at some point I just got tired of the same old Batman. I have yet to watch the latest film and I don’t have much desire to do so. A Batman that’s a bit more lighthearted where the individuals behind the production don’t take the character quite as seriously as others has appeal. I’m not saying let’s go back to the Adam West show and I definitely have no appreciation for the camp that was Batman & Robin, but something more offbeat can work. Batman is allowed to have a sense of humor.
The fifth production episode, and fourth to air, of Batman: The Brave in the Bold is the subject of today’s post. “Invasion of the Secret Santas” is going to team Batman up with Red Tornado, a character I have zero knowledge of. That’s part of the appeal of the show as it seeks to spotlight some lesser heroes in the DC back catalog. I assume it also intends to do the same with villains since today’s villain is another character I have zero experience with: Fun Haus. He certainly sounds like a villain that could work with a Christmas plot, and at least Red Tornado has red in his name. A green outfit leading to a red-green tornado would have really made him fit even more.
Tom Wilson is such a good voice actor, he doesn’t get enough accolades for his work in this area.
The way this show works, is it begins with a “teaser” that features Batman teamed up with a hero as they finish a job. It’s basically unrelated to the show’s main plot. And in this episode, we open with Batman (Bader) and Blue Beetle (voiced by former Batman Will Friedle) as they tangle with Sportsmaster (Tom Wilson)! It starts as a broadcast of The Professional Bowling League’s Christmas Tournament where the top bowlers in the country are competing for a sweet cash prize. Almost right away, Sportsmaster shows up to declare that bowling isn’t a real sport. Sportsmaster is basically a guy who has a costume composed of sports equipment. With him are a trio of goons one is a football player, one a baseball player, and the last is a hockey player. I’m not sure if he intends to steal anything or if he’s really out for money (he says he won’t steal their prize, but win it) or if this is more of a personal crusade against bowling. The bowlers don’t put up any sort of resistance apparently as we cut to them all placed in human-sized, transparent, bowling pins and the goons are setting them up. Sportsmaster then grabs a bowling ball, which is also a bomb, and rolls it in the direction of the pins. He’s a southpaw, in case you’re curious. Just before the ball strikes the pins a well-timed batarang intercepts it and detonates it before it can reach them. Enter Batman and The Blue Beetle!
I hope you’re not too attached to Blue Beetle, because he’s only here for a hot minute.
Batman is here to tell Sportsmaster he expected to find him…in the gutter! See, Batman gets to use puns with regularity now. Blue Beetle is basically just along for the ride. Sportsmaster welcomes the challenge, and Batman instructs Beetle to take the goons and leave Sportsmaster to him. Beetle is fine with that, but his suit might not be as he starts arguing with it and refers to it as a “goober.” Since only Blue Beetle can hear what the suit is saying (and that is true for us, the audience), it sounds like he’s insulting Batman, but he just ignores it. Beetle is embarrassed and a bit angry with his apparently sentient suit (I guess I should have watched the movie that came out this year), but orders it to conjure up some weapons for him to tackle the baddies with. It responds by morphing both forearms into Mega Buster-like canons, which is certainly aided in that both characters rely heavily on the color blue. Beetle requests something less likely to level the place and the suit responds by just bulking him up, and he seems satisfied. I had no idea Blue Beetle operated in such a fashion.
You didn’t really think a guy in sports equipment was going to be much of a match for Batman, did you?
Meanwhile, Batman is battling Sportsmaster who is tossing several bowling balls at him. Batman just punches them out of the air causing them to shatter so this is one beefy bat. He closes in on the villain, who responds with kicks as he’s apparently “sporting” some rather fiendish cleats. Unable to connect with Batman, Sportsmaster tries to make a run for it, but Batman is able to take him out with a bowling pin. Blue Beetle had no difficulty with the goons and the two regroup to bask in the glow of a job well done. Beetle then tries inviting Batman back to his place for Christmas Eve dinner, boasting that his mom is a great cook so he apparently still lives at home, but Batman turns him down on account of the fact that crime doesn’t take a holiday. Smash to intro!
I don’t think that eye color is natural.
After a pretty spectacular intro with an old school flair (think Johnny Quest), we settle on a small town gearing up for Christmas. We see some festive sights around town before the camera takes us to a university. It’s there a professor is teaching an archeology class. Professor Ulthoon (Corey Burton) takes a question from a kid (James Arnold Taylor) wondering if archeology is as exciting as someone like Indiana Jones makes it out to be, and the professor is forced to tell him that it is not. It’s mostly reading books. When he turns to address the kid we see his eyes are an unnatural shade of blue and his rather stilted speech would imply this gentleman is not human.
Meet Red Tornado, the communist superhero!
The sound of a runaway box truck gets the professor’s attention. He apparently has a super sense of hearing to notice the out of control vehicle and excuses himself from class for a moment. Once the door is shut behind him, he rips off his whole face to reveal a robotic one underneath. This, ladies and gentlemen, is Red Tornado! He whirls into action to save two children about to be struck by this vehicle, which comes to a complete stop shortly after, and delivers them to their father. There he tells the old man that his children need to be more mindful of traffic and he receives no objections from the man and his two kids. They thank him for saving them and for all that he does and make a reference to The Christmas Spirit in doing so. Red Tornado responds with, “Christmas…spirit?” as he’s apparently unfamiliar with the term. The boy (Zachary Gordon) describes it as a tingling feeling you get inside and when Red Tornado confesses he’s unfamiliar with that emotion the little girl (Liliana Mumy) laughs at him like he’s an idiot – “Of course you can’t, you’re a robot!” The three all have a hearty laugh while Red Tornado looks legitimately hurt.
Decorating is apparently quite easy when you’re some sort of magic tornado machine.
Later, we find Red Tornado as his alter ego back at his home. He’s just standing in his living room at first, but then it cuts to him seated on his sofa reading a book titled Get That Holiday Spirit! He closes it, apparently finished, and then goes into a whirling tornado form once more. As a tornado, he decorates the exterior of his house with holiday decorations and then the interior. We see him putting on a festive, ugly, Christmas sweater and he stands in the living room looking things over. Deciding that he’s still missing something, we cut to him knocking on someone’s door. It’s the man and the two kids from earlier and when they all answer the door, Professor Ulthoon (he’s apparently not concerned about giving away his identity) clears his throat and begins to sing “Jingle Bells” in a very monotone, emotionless, fashion. The family just slams the door in his face leaving poor Red Tornado looking rather sad.
It’s something Jack Skellington struggled with too, buddy.
Back at his home, we find the professor working out an equation on a chalkboard. He seems to hypothesize that decorations plus lights plus presents plus caroling equals Christmas Spirit. Or he’s dividing by Christmas Spirit. My algebra teacher would have scolded me for writing an equation like this. Nonetheless, it would seem he can’t figure out why he has yet to feel this so-called Christmas Spirit given that he’s done what he feels is required. The television is on in the background and a black and white movie is on where a father asks his son if he’d like to know the true meaning of Christmas? Red Tornado responds out loud with, “Yes, please elaborate,” only for the movie to be interrupted by a news broadcast. Flying saucers are attacking the city and there’s a transmission from a Neptunian Leader (Friedle) demanding that Earth hand over the one known as Santa Claus. The anchor then informs us that Batman is on the scene and alone in defending Earth from these alien invaders. Not for long as the professor dawns his Red Tornado guise intent on joining the fray.
Oh, hell yeah!
We cut to a close-up of some woman screaming as she and several others run for their lives. The flying saucers are blasting everything in sight, but Batman is on the scene. He’s shown riding on top of one of the saucers stabbing it repeatedly with a batarang. He sends it careening into the ground, does a backflip off of it, and takes out several others with batarangs in the process. He moves to another saucer and as he rides and stabs some more he’s able to direct the ship’s weapon blasts at other saucers in the process. He eventually sends that one crashing into a giant Christmas tree which goes up in flames, hopefully not an omen of what’s to come. Batman remarks to himself this isn’t how he imagined spending Christmas and soon deploys a jetpack of sorts. Why he didn’t use this thing from the beginning is a mystery. When he’s about to get nailed by a few more flying saucers, he’s saved by the entering Red Tornado. The robot wishes Batman a “Merry Christmas,” and responds by saying “Now’s not the time, Red Tornado.” This confuses Red Tornado who asks, “Isn’t Christmas tomorrow?” and I like his very literal response.
This is the team-up we’re getting, whether wanted or not.
Batman is unable to explain the nuances of the English language at this time to Red Tornado for they’re still under attack. They manage to avoid the saucers and return to the offensive with Red Tornado capable of taking them out with relative ease. He mentions to Batman that Neptune is uninhabited, to which the caped crusader responds with “No kidding.” He instructs the robot to search his database for Christmas movies featuring aliens and Red Tornado is able to find one: Holiday for Neptunians. He is also able to confirm the broadcast they saw earlier on television was taken from the film. Batman then tells him he’ll draw their fire so that Red Tornado can do his thing. He takes off forcing the saucers to fly in a group after Batman. Red Tornado is then able to line them up and blast them with…red tornadoes. That’s basically all he does.
Being a detective is pretty easy when all of the bad guys put their face on their weapons.
With the saucers now obliterated, the two return to the ground. Batman’s jetpack just sort of magically turns back into a cape. It makes no sense, but it looks pretty cool, and this is a cartoon about superheroes battling flying saucers so I’ll allow it. Batman examines the debris and finds a marking on it indicating it’s a toy. Red Tornado suggests he can search his database for the logo, but Batman tells him he won’t find it. Red Tornado comes back to say he could not locate it’s source, which seems to irritate Batman since he already told him he won’t. This logo is actually a mark of today’s villain. A flying saucer flies into view and from it emerges Fun Haus (Gary Anthony Williams)!
Fun Haus is clearly Toyman and that doll is definitely supposed to look like Baby Doll.
Fun Haus looks like a scary jester of some kind. He looks like a villain from the old Super Friends shows, but I’m pretty sure he was called the Toyman or something. A little bit of research tells me that Fun Haus is indeed meant to resemble that version of Toyman, so look at that. He’s shown standing in the saucer holding a doll which looks an awful lot like Baby Doll from Batman: The Animated Series. As he caresses her hair, he remarks to the pair that he was just playing with his toys asking rhetorically “Is that so wrong?” Red Tornado, who has to take everything seriously, confirms that it is indeed quite wrong and adds that most of the things Fun Haus does are wrong. He starts listing off all of his crimes he can find in his database until Batman basically tells him that’s enough once he hits jaywalking. He then tells Fun Haus “If you think we’re going to let you continue your deranged rampage you’re wrong.” Fun Haus is unimpressed and simply retorts, “If if’s and but’s were candy nuts we’d all have a merry Christmas!”
Spoiler alert, this is not the most unsettling image we’ll see from this one.
Fun Haus lobbs some threatening words at the heroes before pulling the drawstring on his dolly and tossing it to Batman. He flies off in his saucer as Batman catches the doll. As he looks it over, the doll’s head spins around and asks “Won’t you play with me?” When it does, the eyes fade to black and the doll’s right eye is replaced with a red, digital, “1” and the left eye a zero. Batman cries out, “It’s a bomb!” and we get a suspenseful act break. When we return from the break, the doll adds “My Christmas wish is to blow everything to smithereens.” This must be the hot, holiday, item for this year. Batman instructs Red Tornado to give this doll some altitude as he chucks it high into the air. Red Tornado obliges and blasts the doll ever higher where it detonates harmlessly.
Batman probably has an entire cupboard full of these things. What else is a hero supposed to gift a billionaire?!
Red Tornado then declares that they cannot let Fun Haus ruin Christmas. Batman sort of corrects him by saying Fun Haus is a crook first implying they just need to stop whatever scheme he’s up to. Christmas is apparently of little concern to Batman. He then asks, “Besides, why do you care?” in response to Red Tornado’s apparent concern about Christmas. Red Tornado then confesses it’s because he lacks Christmas Spirit and it’s something he would like to experience. Batman retorts that it’s overrated forcing Red Tornado to observe that he is not the only one lacking in Christmas Spirit. He then hypothesizes that something will help the both of them and produces a gift for Batman. He responds with “You shouldn’t have,” and I get the sense that he means that sincerely. He opens it anyway and finds a black coffee mug with the words “World’s Greatest Detective” printed on it.
Young Bruce clearly going for a Dennis the Menace look with that hairstyle.
This apparently triggers something in Batman as the screen gets all wavy and we see a flashback. It’s Christmas morning at Wayne Manor and little Bruce is making a b-line for the tree. His parents are standing by along with Alfred and his dad asks him what Santa brought for him. Young Bruce (Gordon) inspects a gift by shaking it, testing its weight, and seems to know what’s inside causing his dad (Burton) to remark “Our little detective.” He then rips it open, but we don’t get to see what’s inside (not yet, at least) as we’re taken back to the present. Batman is just staring at the gift while Red Tornado observes that he’s still not detecting any Christmas Spirit within the crime fighter. Batman snaps out of it and points out that he doesn’t have a gift for Red Tornado. He’s unbothered by this as he points out that he understands it’s the giving, not the receiving, that best exemplifies the Christmas Spirit. He’s then left wondering why he still doesn’t sense it within him and asks Batman to confirm that it’s a tingling sensation, no? Batman just smiles and says “When you start tingling, I’d see a repairman.” He then reminds him that they need to resume their hunt for Fun Haus and the pair dash away.
A barber shop with a space theme – I’d check it out.
We’re treated to a few shots of the town basically healing after the attack by Fun Haus. Some guy with a barber shop has incorporated one of the fallen saucers into his sign and is stringing lights over it while the giant tree that was half burned has been relit. A couple of kids approach a Santa seated in a sleigh and ask him if he has any Presto Playpal toys left, but he’s apparently just a robot and only responds with “Ho ho ho.” This seems like something that might scare these kids. Above the city, Batman and Red Tornado are flying past and the robot inquires with Batman why he dislikes Christmas so much? Batman corrects him and says he does not dislike Christmas – he dislikes crime! Batman is so single-minded that he doesn’t even have room in his heart to dislike anything but crime.
You kids ever want to see Santa’s eyes explode from their sockets?!
As he says that line, Batman spies a Santa stumbling through people on the sidewalk and the two head down to get a closer look. Batman accuses him of sipping too much eggnog, but we the audience recognize this Santa as the same robot one from just a moment earlier. His face is frozen in a smile and the “Ho ho ho” emerges from it same as before. Santa then dispatches the two heroes with a double uppercut, much to their surprise. From their backsides, Batman informs this imposter Claus that he just made the naughty list, while Red Tornado makes the useful observation that Santa does not typically behave in this manner. Batman points out that’s because this guy isn’t Santa. As the robot turns its attention towards the many pedestrians in the street, Batman nails him through the chest with a Batarang. The robot goes through a surprisingly gratuitous death scene that includes a close-up of its eyes bulging out of its head and exploding before the whole thing catches fire. Like a Terminator, this thing has a pretty detailed endoskeleton which stands in the middle of the street for a moment as all of the “flesh” is burned away before falling into a heap of Santa bones on the ground. I thought this show was for little kids?!
Geez…this show goes hard!
Batman and Red Tornado approach the remains to inspect it, when the sound of more Santa laughter causes them to whirl around. An army of these things are waiting for them and the head on the apparent lead Claus pops open to reveal a monitor with an expected face to follow. Fun Haus then makes the same observation as me by sarcastically stating “Gee, that won’t give kids nightmares,” as he taunts Batman and Red Tornado from the safety of his base, or wherever he is. The Santas then attack and Batman and Red Tornado brawl with them in the streets. The same screaming woman we got a close-up of earlier gets another chance to shine screaming just as she did before. These Santas seem like they’re here to just be bad guys as one walks over to a little girl and snatches her teddy bear so it can rip it in half. They don’t seem that interested in just hurting people. Some people are also shown running from a department store and the character model for one of the ladies running out appears to be a direct homage to “Christmas with the Joker” as she looks pretty much exactly like the older woman a kid returns a purse to when Batman and Robin are on patrol. A fun little Easter egg for those who have been watching Batman cartoons for a long time.
Gray-haired lady on the right appears to be another BTAS cameo.
Back at that big tree and sleigh, those kids are still pestering the obviously robotic Santa. Apparently this wasn’t the unit that Batman and Red Tornado encountered a moment ago. The eyes on the Santa flip to red as it stands up and the kids start screaming. This apparently scares the reindeer – yes, apparently they were real, who start running. Batman sees this going down and throws a batarang that cuts the harness off one of the four reindeer. That leaves three still pulling the sleigh which is flying down the street at this point. The freed reindeer continues running as well, and Batman leaps onto its back leaving Red Tornado to handle the other robot Santas, which he is apparently more than capable of doing. Batman is able to ride the reindeer alongside the sleigh until he’s able to jump on it just before it looks like the Santa robot is about to actually harm the children. He punches the head of the robot off of the body and it comes to land at the feet of the children. Batman tells them to pretend they didn’t see that and they respond with a scream.
Good thing you brought your robot friend, Batman, because that was a tough one.
The scream was apparently not due to the severed Santa head at their feet, but because the sleigh was heading towards a cliff. What city is situated this close to a giant cliff? It’s actually a bit humorous how they went from a city center to a setting that is pretty remote, but hey, it’s good suspense! The sleigh goes over the cliff, and if you were watching this on television back in 2008 you would have to sit through a commercial break to find out if Batman can save himself, the children, and the three reindeer still attached to the sleigh. And the answer is…he can’t, but Red Tornado can! The sleigh basically levels off and starts flying causing one of the kids to declare it a Christmas miracle. We pan back enough to see Red Tornado flying beside the sleigh as he created a whirlwind below it that is holding the sleigh in place. I don’t think tornadoes work that way, but as has been the case with a lot of stuff in this one so far, we’ll allow it.
The toy at the top of every kid’s Christmas list.
We return to the city and Batman and Red Tornado appear to be surveying the wreckage. I’m guessing they’re looking for clues, but they’re interrupted by the sound of a child crying. Red Tornado approaches and asks the boy’s father, who is standing with him, if the child was frightened by the Santa carnage. The dad says, “Nah,” the kid just wants some toy. The Presto Playpal is the hot toy, and the same one the kids earlier were asking Santa for, but it’s sold out. This triggers another flashback for Batman and we return to the same scene of him opening a present under the tree as a child. Little Bruce unwraps the gift to find it contains a nutcracker. He looks surprised and Thomas Wayne chimes in that it was a gift given to him by his grandfather and now he’s passing it onto Bruce. A sweet sentiment, but apparently Thomas doesn’t know his kid too well. Bruce gets mad because it’s not the swashbuckler action figure (aka Zorro!) he asked for. He chucks the nutcracker at the wall and it bursts into pieces as he runs off. Thomas is left to look downtrodden on the couch while Alfred is left to silently pick up the pieces.
Batman always has a pretty sweet ride.
When we return to the present, Batman looks a bit pissed. I’m expecting him to teach a harsh lesson about material possessions to this boy, but the sound of an alarm snaps him out of his trance. It’s one of the busted Santa robots, the one with a display monitor, and Fun Haus appears once again. He’s there to taunt him with his last setup, “‘Twas the night before Christmas, and I’ve hidden a bomb!” Batman and Red Tornado are forced to spring into action with Red Tornado searching from the skies and Batman from the Batmobile, which has a really cool design in this one that feels like a mashup of the ’66 Batmobile and the one from Batman Forever. Both heroes apparently have some sort of bomb-detecting radar and they just search all over town for this thing. Eventually, we see it’s 6:40 and the pinkish tint to the sky means it’s morning. Batman and Red Tornado are shown regrouping where Red Tornado refers to the bomb threat as “a wild goose chase.” I wasn’t aware he was able to speak so figuratively. Batman wonders what Fun Haus was trying to distract them from, and Red Tornado suggests Christmas morning. We then center on a theater marque that says “Happy Holidays” as Red Tornado expresses his hope that both he and Batman get what they want this year.
Spoiled little brat! Don’t you know your dad is about to die?!
The shot on the marquee fades into another flashback. The Waynes are leaving a showing of The Mark of Zorro, and I think we’re going to find out why Batman isn’t a big fan of Christmas. Any Batman fan knows what happens when little Bruce sees a Zorro flick with his mom and dad, but I don’t recall that fateful night ever occurring on Christmas before. As the family leaves the theater, Thomas bends down and acknowledges that Bruce didn’t get the toy he wanted for Christmas, but he hopes the swashbuckler movie helped to make up for that. Young Bruce just scowls and turns away and the disappointment on the face of Thomas pains me more as a viewer than if he just got angry with his spoiled son. He indicates it’s time to head home and the family starts walking into that fateful alley. Two gunshots rings out and all we see is a muzzle flash for each one before hearing Bruce cry out “Mom! Dad!”
Judging by mom’s expression, the action figure must have been dad’s idea because she has “I told you so,” written all over her face.
We return to the present to find a stern Batman once again, only this time he reacts to his memory by stating, “Sometimes what you wish for most is the one thing you can never have.” Red Tornado says nothing, but that might sting for him a bit and his quest to experience the Christmas Spirit. Batman then notices that on a nearby poster advertising the Presto Playpal is the mark of Fun Haus. Really, Batman? You’re a master detective and you didn’t notice the face of Fun Haus on these posters all over town? Recognizing the evil plan about to unfold, we then find ourselves taken to a nearby home. A young boy is excited to unwrap a Presto Playpal, until the toy comes to life and smashes its way out of the blister package. It goes after the kid’s parents and swipes his mother’s necklace before jumping out of the window and taking off.
A scheme that would make the Grinch proud.
A montage ufolds of similar experiences of kids opening these toys and promptly getting robbed. That’s apparently the end game of Fun Haus – steal Christmas! It’s pretty amusing to see one, little, action figure dragging boxes of presents out of a house while the family just looks on in horror. Just step on the damn thing! They take all of their loot to a box truck for Fun Haus and there’s basically an assembly line of toys delivering their loot while Fun Haus basks in the success of his glorious heist from the roof of the truck. Batman arrives and does as I suggested – he steps on a toy. He informs Fun Haus that he’ll be serving hard time by New Year’s, while Fun Haus counters with “Not if you’re in the grave by lunch!” Ohh, delicious!
Fun Haus is clearly an evil genius. Who else could have invented this thing?!
Fun Haus hits a button on his belt and the toy soldiers form-up in response. They jump on each other’s shoulders forming stacks of three, then we get an animation cheat where they jump together and a bright light obscures everything as they form a massive version of the Presto Playpal. Fun Haus appears in a cockpit located in the machine’s chest, like a Gundam, and informs Batman and Red Tornado that if he can’t steal from these people at Christmas, then he’ll steal Christmas from these people! I guess that’s a sweaty death threat as he then just tries to stomp on the people who came out for a peek. The screaming lady returns for a third time and this time it did get a chuckle out of me. Batman and Red Tornado spring into action by saving people from getting murdered by Fun Haus, but they’re unable to save the town water tower which says “Happy Holidays” on it. Fun Haus blows it up. That water tower has been in the community for generations – has he no shame?!
Don’t do it, Red Tornado!
Red Tornado approaches and declares that he will do no further harm. He starts blasting the mighty robot with his trademarked red tornadoes, but declares he needs more power. He apparently possesses it, as some flaps open up and his tornadoes increase in size and intensity. Soon it starts to break the robot apart, while Batman shouts from the ground for Tornado to stop since his body can’t handle that much output. And it looks like he’s right as cracks start to appear on Red Tornado’s body. The mecha toy thing explodes and we see Fun Haus go flying through the air. He’s really high, and he goes really far, so he might be really dead when he hits the ground.
Well, that sucks.
We don’t have time to worry about Fun Haus though, as Red Tornado looks to be in rather bad shape. He’s all cracked and broken, but he notices he feels something – a tingling sensation! Is it the Christmas Spirit? Or, as Batman suggested earlier, he needs to see a repairman? Batman looks to have the leading theory as Red Tornado explodes. His head winds up at the feet of Batman who picks it up and urges him to hang on referring to him as an old friend in the process. I had no idea they went way back!
Worry not children, for Red Tornado is a robot and he can be rebuilt!
We cut to Fun Haus being loaded into a police car. He looks no worse for ware so maybe he landed on a pillow factory or something. We then pan to a truck branded to be from Star Labs. A guy has a box of Red Tornado body parts that he hands off to another fellow in the truck. This episode has a lot of mild body horror, doesn’t it? We then hear Batman assuring Red Tornado that they’ll have him back together in no time. A gurney is wheeled in and we see Red Tornado’s head has been returned to his torso and he’s alert. Red Tornado then tells Batman it was an amazing feeling. Batman doesn’t try to discourage him and simply smiles and responds with, “Merry Christmas.” Red Tornado smiles in return as he’s loaded into the truck.
I had a feeling we’d find out what happened to that old nutcracker before this one was over.
As the truck pulls away, the Batmobile comes speeding over. Batman hops in and is startled to see a present on the passenger seat. He opens it to find the old nutcracker from his flashback has been put back together. It’s a little rough looking, but looks pretty good considering what happened to it. Batman smiles warmly and we hear him think to himself, “Merry Christmas to you too, Alfred,” implying that his loyal butler re-assembled the toy and placed it in the Batmobile before he left the previous night. The dashboard then starts beeping and Batman’s face hardens as we hear him declare (in his head) “But crime doesn’t take a holiday, and neither do I!” He steps on the gas and the Batmobile goes speeding off towards the source of the beeping and it would appear that there will be no rest for Batman this Christmas.
The episode does a good job of giving equal weight to both Batman and Red Tornado, who gets to experience the true feeling of Christmas without having to crack open a can of 7Up.
“Invasion of the Secret Santas” was a pretty fun little adventure for Batman and Red Tornado. For me, it was an introduction to Red Tornado who I can’t recall ever encountering before this. There are a lot of DC superheroes that I’m not familiar with, but usually I can at least say I’ve seen them in artwork or something, but with Red Tornado I have no frame of reference. It’s amusing to me that I looked at the Justice League Christmas episode earlier this year because Red Tornado and Martian Manhunter play similar roles as emotionless beings seeking to connect with Christmas. With Red Tornado, he’s more eager to experience an emotion he has no reference for. Maybe because the audience for this show was intended to skew younger is why Red Tornado is so vocal about his desire where as we’re expected to observe J’onn’s struggles in that episode without them being made so obvious. Though I’d argue it’s not exactly subtle, either. I wasn’t that enamored with the Justice League episode, but I like this. This show has a terrific visual style and it’s not really trying to look like a 90’s cartoon animated traditionally. It’s more willing to embrace the digital medium with bright colors, thick lines, and an intentional flatness to the characters. Batman himself reminds me a little bit of the character’s depiction in the minimally animated intro to the classic 1960s show. And it still has room for a little subtlety of its own, or at least audience autonomy, when it comes to Red Tornado’s experience of the Christmas Spirit in the end. Was it a mere malfunction, or something more? You decide.
I wasn’t expecting the episode to add a touch of sadness to this version of Batman, but it’s welcomed. Maybe this show has more depth than I thought? Or maybe this is just a Christmas thing?
The depiction of Batman is also a lot of fun. He dishes out the corny one-liners, but with total sincerity. Diedrich Bader sounds authentic and he plays it straight so there isn’t a winking at the camera moment when it comes to Batman. He’s also allowed to possess some dry humor, though is largely a no-nonsense straight man expected to play off of his ally for a given episode. It was interesting to see Christmas incorporated into his origin story and actually surprising to see a new layer of grief added to that. It’s a very similar tactic to what we’ve seen done with Spider-Man’s origin. I think of the first Toby Maguire film where he basically tells off his Uncle Ben and his last discussion with him is one in which he hurt his father figure. He never got to make up for that, and Batman never got to apologize to his own dad for how he reacted to a very personal and meaningful gift that went unappreciated. Separately, it’s also interesting to see young Bruce portrayed as a spoiled, little, rich kid as opposed to some ideal. It makes more sense for him to behave that way as a rich kid so in a way it was sort of refreshing. And it can be inferred that the murder of his parents gave him some new perspective and began his transformation from a very selfish child to a selfless adult. The ending also has a hint of sadness, or melancholy, to it since Batman is so focused on being this crime fighter that he won’t even allow himself a moment’s reprieve after an all-nighter dealing with Fun Haus.
Despite the nice little bow put on this one, the lasting image for me is definitely this gruesome Santa “death.” Good god!
The actual scheme of the episode is almost secondary. It incorporates Christmas in a pretty simple and direct manner and having a toy-themed villain for the episode definitely makes a lot of sense. I have no idea why they chose to call him Fun Haus instead of Toyman, since he appears to just be Toyman, but it doesn’t matter either. There’s some solid action, including the opening teaser with Blue Beetle, though it does start to get repetitive. There are lots of shots of Batman just taking enemies out with Batarangs and more than enough shots of Red Tornado and his tornado effect. That’s my one criticism for this one as it didn’t need to be as long as it is and was starting to drag come the climax. Maybe some of the action could have been substituted with another flashback, something that took place after the murder, or maybe just some actual detective work. It was a pretty lame reveal to have Batman see the Fun Haus logo on the poster for the most popular Christmas toy of the year, but I get the impression this show isn’t trying to be overly clever with its plot. The violence directed towards the Santa robots was certainly memorable and downright shocking to a point. I found it fun, but it wouldn’t surprise me if some kids are legitimately disturbed by it. That frozen, smiling, Santa face is a bit unsettling.
This episode of Batman: The Brave and the Bold is an easy recommend for me and I think a viewer only needs to have a basic understanding of who Batman is to enjoy it. I’m talking like just knowing that there’s a character that dresses in tights to fight bad guys at night sort of thing. There’s genuine humor in this one and it even has moments of actual emotion via the flashbacks. I do wish the “death” of Red Tornado hit a little harder, but it’s fine. I found more here to connect with than the intentionally sappy episode of Justice League and consider this episode a far greater success in basically every way which isn’t something I expected going in. And it’s also aided by having a fun visual style, great sound design, and some solid performances from the actors involved. Like Justice League, this one was rumored to be getting delisted from the Max platform, but it appears it has received a stay of execution and is still there as of this post going live. The series was released multiple times on both DVD and Blu Ray so it’s not that hard to obtain and it might even be a series worth watching beyond this Christmas episode. I’m certainly interested in doing so, which is why it’s such a shame to see Discovery Warner play games with these tentpole franchises. Why can’t we just have easy access to your stuff, Warner Bros? Are the tax savings worth the constant worry of losing access to quality shows like this one? To a heartless executive, I’m afraid the answer is “Yes.”
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
Today, The Christmas Spot temporarily alters it’s name to The X-Mas Spot. As a sort-of celebration for the animated series X-Men turning 30 this past Halloween we’re going to look at the show’s lone holiday special – “Have Yourself a Morlock Little X-Mas.” The show X-Men was a pretty serious affair as far as kid…
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After doing write-ups for the two cartoons inspired by Jim Carrey films from 1994, you must have figured I’d do the third today! Just as Carrey stormed the cinematic gates with Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, and Dumb and Dumber in ’94, the television world followed suit in ’95 with an animated series based…
This year, I’ve taken some time out to watch Christmas episodes of shows I’m pretty unfamiliar with. This is yet another one of those posts, only with this show I did make an attempt to get into it. A mild one. We Bare Bears is a show created by Daniel Chong that aired on Cartoon Network from July 2015 to May 2019. That’s a nice overlap with my early years of parenthood and I often found this show about three bear brothers playing in the evening hours. I tried to see if I could get my kids into it as I wanted to spend some time at the end of the day watching TV with them as my parents had done with me. It feels like there can be a negative stigma about a family sitting around the TV tuning each other out, but I always found it to be more collaborative and it’s really enjoyable when everyone can enjoy the show. That part can be challenging when you’re trying to appease toddlers and adults, but it can be done. Unfortunately, We Bare Bears did not become that show for my family and I, but I don’t blame the show for that.
We Bare Bears is essentially a show about fitting in. The main characters of Grizzly, Panda, and Ice Bear are obviously bears who live mostly like regular bears. They are anthropomorphized to a degree as they talk and walk upright, but they’re still bears living in a predominantly human world. They have some animal instincts, and a bit like a teenager first setting out, there’s an excitement for the bears whenever they uncover something new to them. It’s a digitally animated show, but one that’s in 2D with an emphasis made to have the show resemble a water colors production. It animates pretty well from what little I have seen and also has a solid cast of voice actors to bring the characters to life. Episodes for the show are about 11 minutes, and while there seems to be plenty of episodes where the bears learn a lesson of some kind, the show is predominantly a comedy where the humor is situation-based as opposed to one that relies on one-liners or non-sequiturs. The bears each have their own distinct personality and they, for some reason, travel in a stack with Ice Bear on the bottom and Grizzly on the top and Panda situated in the middle.
During the show’s second season it was decided that Christmas would be a topic. “Christmas Parties” is an episode about social obligations and how to manage them. It’s also an episode about acknowledging who your real friends are and making sure they feel loved and appreciated and Christmas is a pretty good time of year for such reassurance. It’s not the only Christmas episode for this show, but it is the first, and its simple premise attracted me to it. If I like it, maybe I’ll bring the bears back next year with a look at one of their other Christmas episodes.
Big bears need a big tree, I guess.
The episode begins in the den of the bears. A festive yule log is on display and the music of “Oh Tannenbaum” is softly playing. It sounds very similar to the Vince Guaraldi trio version from A Charlie Brown Christmas, but I don’t know if it’s that exact recording or not. A tell-tale triangle image pops up indicating this is an online video of some kind. Panda (Bobby Moynihan) presses play and the video restarts. He’s seated on the couch sipping a hot beverage while Grizzly (Eric Edelstein) is doing some holiday decorating. Both look nice and festive as Grizz is sporting a Santa hat and Panda a scarf. Grizz is having some issues hanging the stockings and Panda offers up some vegan nogg, which contains no eggs, but an abundance of nogg! Grizz politely declines and then a pounding of the door indicates the arrival of Ice Bear (Demetri Martin) who has returned with the Christmas tree. It’s massive, and when Panda points this out Ice Bear dismisses him with an “Ice Bear’s motto: go big or go home,” but, he is home?
The invitation from Charlie is obviously the best.
The tree discussion is interrupted by the mailman who has to shove the mail through the tree clogging the door. The bears are excited to find invitations to not one, not two, but three separate Christmas parties! Panda is particularly happy as they usually just stay home and eat, but now they have a place to be! As they look over the invites, an email from Nom Nom comes through. The bears are perplexed at this development as apparently they do not see eye-to-eye with the famous koala, but it’s yet another invite to a Christmas party! And since Nom Nom is some big shot influencer type, it’s looking like it’s going to be the party to end all parties. The capper being that every guest gets a free puppy! It’s just like Bridesmaids! The only solution to this sudden predicament is for the bears to go to all four parties tonight setting a timer for each one so they don’t miss Nom Nom’s. Grizz is pretty stoked as the bears set out to try to pull this thing off.
Hard to blame the bears for wanting to bail on this party.
Up first is Ranger Tabes (Cameron Esposito) who is hosting a party for the bears and the other rangers at the ranger outpost. When the bears arrive, they find a very excited and enthusiastic Tabes, but no one else present appears to share in her excitement. There’s a fellow female ranger eating some snacks, an old guy sleeping in a recliner, and a bearded fellow sipping a beverage who at least acknowledges the bears upon entering by raising his cup. Tabes is excited the bears have arrived so that they can help liven things up. Her solution? Limbo! They break out a candy cane patterned pole and get everyone on their feet, including the sleeping guy, with some tunes from a boom box. Things were getting pretty intense, but then Panda’s alarm goes off. Time for the bears to run though Tabes can hardly believe they’re bailing already. As they rush out, the boom box gets knocked over and the spicy limbo music is accidentally switched to “Silent Night” and the party is back to being lame.
I feel like we could use an entire episode about Christmas with Big Foot.
Up next is a party at Charlie’s house. Charlie (Jason Lee) is the local big foot who has decorated a large tree for his party. The bears come upon it and aren’t sure where the party is, until Charlie pops out of the tree to tell them it’s inside! The bears climb inside and are pretty confused why Charlie would have a party in an actual tree. Charlie seems to think it’s the only place you can have a proper Christmas party and his cheerful demeanor is not at all insulted. Charlie then points out how his party is plenty traditional because he has everything needed for a traditional Christmas party. He’s got cards (two squirrels playing Poker or a similar game) stockings hung with care (underwear full of rodents), reindeer (a deer clinging to a branch for “dear” life while Charlie pours water over its head) and food which is eggs with the word “Nogg” written on them. What Charlie doesn’t have, and needs help finding, is a star for the tree. He starts rummaging through a box of junk and seems to settle on a fractured doll head which would make a mighty creepy tree topper. Before they can get too far into this exercise, Panda’s alarm goes off and they have to go. Charlie seems sad, but the alarm knows when it’s time to go. They leave, but Ice Bear at least remembers to thank the sasquatch for the eggnog.
How can bears, creatures that are typically known for making decisions based on their stomach, turn down a spread like that?!
The next party is the home of Chloe Park and the bears are already behind schedule as it took them too long to get out of that tree. Chloe (Charlyne Yi) is a young, Korean, girl though she and her family aren’t drawn in a way that makes them look obviously Korean. She welcomes them into the home and the bears have to have their paws inspected before entering since they don’t wear shoes they can remove. Chloe is enthusiastic, like Tabes and Charlie before her, to have the bears over for Christmas and she leads them into the dining room where her family has gathered for Christmas dinner. They’re having what I assume is a traditional Korean dinner and are seated on pillows at a low table covered with delicious looking food. The bears look immediately distressed knowing they don’t have time to stay for dinner, but Chloe is insistent that they join her family at the table. Jon (Bert Youn), Chloe’s cousin, is immediately amused to see real bears as they try to fit under the table. The table gets jostled around prompting the others to look a little concerned, except Jon who laughs and points out their size. Chloe shushes him and tells the bears to ignore him.
And that’s why you won’t find carpet in my house.
Chloe’s dad (Jinkoo Jeong) then sets down the turkey and encourages everyone to start. Grizz and the other bears are clearly at a crisis here because the food looks so good, but they know they have to leave in order to make it to Nom Nom’s party. And sure enough, the alarm does go off. The bears try to excuse themselves, but Chloe tells them not to be ridiculous on account of the fact that they just got there. Chloe’s grandmother then tries putting items on Panda’s plate while Chloe force-feeds Grizz. Jon takes a moment to ask Ice Bear what baby seals taste like. He doesn’t offer a response, but does not appear amused by the question. Chloe’s grandma then starts putting meat items on Panda’s plate which causes him to freak out a little since he’s a vegetarian, but when he points that out she just replies with “Yes.” Panda’s alarm goes off again, and now they really feel like they need to leave. The bears awkwardly rise from the table, but in the process accidentally flip it over spilling all of the contents on the carpet. They look supremely embarrassed and offer apologies, but Chloe is clearly upset while the rest of the adults seem too shocked to respond, except Jon who laughs. The bears then try to help clean up, but Chloe tells them to just go. Her parents try to reassure them everything is fine as they awkwardly make their way out. Jon calls after them “Merry Christmas, ya filthy animals!”
Apparently Nom Nom sucks. They should feel bad about ditching Chloe for this.
The bears are making their way to Nom Nom’s residence and Panda seems pretty down. Grizz tries to raise the spirits of his brothers by dismissing what happened at Chloe’s as just an “off” party. They arrive at Nom Nom’s and it’s a massive house up on a hill. They enter to find an elaborately decorated rave that even Ice Bear has to admit is pretty impressive. There’s still some puppies left too, but as the bears walk through the room they get Nom Nom’s (Patton Oswalt) attention. Apparently, they weren’t supposed to be invited and Nom Nom has no problems letting them know they’re unwanted. He also fires his event coordinator and begins laying into the bears, but finds he’s on camera. This must be getting livestreamed or something and Nom Nom screaming at some bears would not be a good look for him as he changes his tone. He tries to make friends with the bears and even hands them a puppy, but once the camera is off he demands they get out!
That’s pretty damn adorable.
Outside, the bears are alone with their thoughts and their newly acquired puppy, who appears to be a german shepherd or something. They realize the obvious in that by prioritizing the hip party thrown by the guy they don’t even like they ended up hurting the people they care about the most. Grizz rises up and says he has an idea, and we spring forth into a montage! First, we see the bears all stacked up and running through the night each wearing festive attire including Ice Bear who now has reindeer antlers. They first arrive at the ranger station and leave a gift for Tabes on the front porch. It’s full of holes and that’s for a good reason as the box jumps out of her hands and the puppy the bears got at Nom Nom’s emerges. He’s someone that can match her energy and she’s delighted by the gift and the two immediately start playing.
I would say that tree looks pretty good in spite of its decorator.
Next is Charlie’s tree where the bears leave a box for him to find. He opens and inside is the Nom Nom-shaped tree topper from the party only they scribbled over Nom Nom’s face. Charlie looks excited to have a star for his tree and it cuts to him removing the creepy doll head from the top of the tree and replacing it with…the box the star was in. No matter, as he seems pretty happy to have a cardboard box over the top of his tree.
Makeup dinner.
Last, and definitely not least, is Chloe’s house. Now it’s Christmas morning, and Chloe has come downstairs rubbing her eyes roused from her slumber by an enchanting aroma. A feast has been set out and the family is most confused. Naturally, that’s because it was prepared by the bears who welcome them all to the table for Christmas dinner…or breakfast. There’s a turkey, so it’s a bit confusing, but the gesture is sweet. Grizz apologizes for what happened last night and the family rushes over with excitement, except Chloe who looks shocked. Ice Bear then hands her what he deems a peace offering and it looks like a pastry of some kind. Chloe accepts it with a smile while Grizz reiterates that they’re sorry for last night and that they just want Chloe to know that they really care about her. Throughout all of this, the Guaraldi “Oh Tannenabum” is playing once again which adds to the sweet mood. The family, and the bears, all gather around the table and the soft chatter of a family enjoying a meal together takes us out.
Looks like those bears aren’t too bad in a kitchen.
Well that was certainly a sweet little Christmas episode. I don’t know a lot about this show, but I do know that I liked that. It was a simple setup in that the main characters had too many places to be at once and spread themselves too thin in the process. It wasn’t quite that simple, because they clearly have no love for Nom Nom and yet they prioritized attending his party (where they weren’t even welcome, it turns out) for superficial reasons and in the process hurt the feelings of their true friends. They probably could have visited Tabes and Charlie letting them know they were also expected for dinner at the Park residence and it would have worked out fine. Christmas is busy and hectic, after all, and it’s a problem faced by many each year. Instead though, they really short-changed them and then made a disaster of a scene at Chloe’s house. The awkwardness that follows the bears flipping the table is most uncomfortable. I looked at that table and tried to imagine the amount of hours that went into that meal that’s now completely ruined and winced a bit. Talk about a nightmare scenario. I wonder how the Parks spent Christmas Eve following the departure of the bears? Cleaning. Lots of cleaning.
The bears clearly screwed up, but did manage to set things right in the end while seeming genuinely remorseful. It helps that they come across as likable characters that just got their priorities messed up temporarily. It’s fun that the show doesn’t ignore that they’re actual bears in a human world and the reactions from Jon were possibly the most amusing parts of the episode. There were other moments of humor, but it’s sort of a quiet humor. It’s not in your face, but it is pleasant and effective. That’s the word I keep coming back to with this special: pleasant. I smiled when I was supposed to, I felt sad when Chloe was clearly hurt, and the final scene brought about some happy tears. It’s just a nice, wholesome, Christmas episode of a show that I should probably spend some more time with.
The bears were able to save this Christmas, I suppose now I should see how they do when the holiday comes back around.
If you would like to view this episode of We Bare Bears the easiest way to do so is via the Max streaming platform, which I must say I’ve been able to get a lot of use from this holiday season. There’s still time to just drop a few bucks on a month-long sub if you don’t have one and there’s certainly enough Christmas content alone to get your money’s worth. Not that I want to be a shill for a giant corporation, but at least it has its uses. This episode might also see an airing on Cartoon Network at some point, if it hasn’t already, as this show hasn’t been completely banished from the air waves as far as I can tell despite ending years ago. If you couldn’t tell, I think this is worth tracking down and it’s the rare 11 minute short that I actually wouldn’t mind spending a bit more time with.
Hugh Harman was one of the early stars in the field of animation. In fact, we talked about one of his shorts already this year, but perhaps his most famous and most celebrated is the 1939 anti-war film Peace on Earth. According to Harman, the short subject was nominated for The Nobel Peace Prize, but…
One of the big, early, cartoon stars was Popeye the Sailor. Popeye starred in newspaper strips, radio plays, and theatrical shorts with contemporaries like Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny. His star has faded over the years, but few would deny Popeye’s place among the greatest cartoon stars of all-time. Come the 1960s though, Popeye and…
In the world of film, 1994 belonged to Jim Carrey. On television, 1995 belonged to TV shows based on those 94 movies. Well, not exactly, since all of the shows based on Jim Carrey movies made little impact, but like yesterday’s show I’d hesitate to call today’s subject a failure. The Mask began life as…
Yesterday, we took a look at a Cartoon Network original aimed at a pretty broad audience. Today, it’s an Adult Swim original very much aimed at an adult audience. Or at least one older than eight. Smiling Friends is the creation of Michael Cusack and Zach Hadel and it’s an animated sitcom about a couple of guys who work for a non-profit dedicated to making people happy. People call in with a problem, and the Smiling Friends spring into action in order to make them feel better. Only this isn’t a show where the characters just dress up as clowns and do a quick a bit to make someone laugh. It’s more that they’re tasked with helping someone out of a depressive episode and the end results often aren’t achieved in the cleanest of manners.
The show premiered originally during an April Fool’s event in 2020 on Adult Swim. The show was well-received, but at the time was basically just a pilot. Adult Swim ended up ordering an entire season which would consist of 8 episodes and apparently had a season budget of 2 million dollars, which is roughly equivalent to the per-episode budget of Family Guy. Adult Swim is somewhat notoriously slow to act when it comes to greenlighting a show or a renewal, which I assume is part of the reason why it wouldn’t premiere properly for nearly two years. This despite the show being digitally animated with a voice cast largely comprised of just Cusack and Hadel. Each episode is roughly 11 minutes and in an odd twist the network chose to burn them all off in a single night, January 10, 2022, which actually means that today’s subject missed the Christmas season by about two weeks. It’s a bit odd, but Adult Swim rarely seems to care about such things.
The creators of Smiling Friends actually made a name for themselves via Newgrounds, a website I hadn’t thought about in probably a decade.
The main characters of Smiling Friends are Pim (Cusack) and Charlie (Hadel) who are friends and co-workers. Pim is the optimist of the two and would seem especially cut out for the type of job he has. Charlie is essentially the opposite of Pim who really doesn’t want to do anything except show up, do his job, and go home with a steady paycheck to follow. Their boss is simply named Mr. Boss (Marc M.), an old man with a giant head who seems to always be sporting some kind of pants-less bondage apparel. He is a typical terrible boss with unreasonable demands who doesn’t seem to value the lives of his employees, but he makes up for it with a cheerful demeanor. They have some additional co-workers in Glep (Hadel) and Allan (Cusack). Pim, Charlie, Glep, and Allan look more like aliens of some kind. Pim is a little purple guy with a single hair on his head while Charlie is large, yellow, and his head is about 90% nose. Glep is a little green guy with rounded, pincer-like, mandibles and Allan is lanky and red and often wears a tie. I’ve only ever caught a handful of episodes of this show and found it to be pretty typical of Adult Swim in that it’s absurd, but funny. There’s a dryness to the humor in this one and the leads are rather well-defined characters that play off of each other well. A lot of the character designs are crude, but not really ugly. Super Jail is an Adult Swim show I’d call ugly, this is not. There are also different animation techniques at play and guest stars to be found and at 11 minutes it basically doesn’t waste your time.
Charlie isn’t really in the Christmas mood, but considering he’s at work on Christmas Eve, I’d say he’s justified.
The final episode of the first season, which is somewhat irrelevant since they all aired on the same day, is the Christmas one “Charlie Dies and Doesn’t Come Back.” It’s not a very festive title, but it doesn’t need to be. The episode begins at the Smiling Friends headquarters where Pim is decorating for the coming holiday. Nobody else seems all that interested with Glep passed out and Charlie playing some kind of computer game. Pim prods Charlie for some help, but he has no interest on account of their shift is about to end and it’s Christmas Eve so he hardly sees a point in decorating now. Mr. Boss then enters with an unreasonable demand of his staff: find a Christmas tree for the office so it can be put up. Charlie is understandably pissed, while Pim is excited for a Christmas adventure! There’s being an optimist, Pim, and there’s you.
Pim is aggressively cheerful. He’s exhausting.
Pim, Charlie, Allan, and Glep take a ride out to the woods to apparently chop a tree down. Pim is very enthused about it while Charlie expresses a desire to get this over with. Pim is hurt by Charlie’s lack of enthusiasm and seems to not understand why Charlie is so grumpy. Charlie explains it rather plainly that it’s Christmas Eve and he wants to go home. He tries bringing Allan and Glep into the conversation, but they’re not really interested. Pim expresses his frustration that it’s not just now, but every time they want to do something for work Charlie acts like this. I get the sense that this is something that’s been building all season and is now coming to a head. Pim even makes reference to the first episode by bringing up Desmond.
Well that didn’t go well.
Allan interrupts the pair to point out a tree that seems fine. Everyone is in agreement that it’s suitable and Charlie takes it upon himself to cut it down to prove to Pim that he can be helpful. As he strikes at the tree with the axe, he taunts Pim who seems wary. I’m guessing he’s uncomfortable which Charlie swinging an axe in anger and not really paying attention to the task at hand. As Charlie calls out, “Is this putting anyone in a bad mood?!” the tree suddenly falls crushing Charlie in the process scattering blood and guts all over the snow. Pim looks horrified, while Allan and Glep look more stunned than anything. We then get a fast assortment of stock, live-action, images. There’s images of space, plants, binary code, a random guy screaming, and it’s all designed to be somewhat random and unsettling because it’s signaling Charlie’s journey to a very special place: Hell.
What’s the first thing you see when you wake up in Hell? I don’t know, but this is as good a guess as any.
Or as the creepy screaming face calls it, “H E double hockey sticks!” That’s the face that wakes Charlie up from…death? It’s gruesome, but once the camera isn’t zoomed in on it he looks a bit more cute. He’s some chubby, pink, demon, with a pitchfork and he informs Charlie that he’s the one in charge. He then points out Charlie’s hell mattress and hell toilet that he’ll be utilizing and both are supremely awful and terrible. There’s also Steve, some black, squiggly, guy who just screams and wiggles at Charlie prompting him to threaten Steve with violence if he ever does that again. The demon thing tells him that won’t be happening and that he needs to get used to it because we’re in Hell, baby!
Hell just isn’t what it used to be.
After the little guy is finished threatening Charlie, the background falls down revealing that all of the fire and horror was just a poster taped to the wall. They’re in a cell and it’s pretty plain looking. The demon comes clean when Charlie asks where all the fire is and explains that Satan hasn’t been himself lately. He’s pretty down in the dumps about something which has caused Hell to literally freeze over. Charlie then offers up his services as a Smiling Friend claiming he can help get Satan out of whatever funk he’s in. The demon at first denies Charlie’s request for an audience with Satan and threatens him with his pitchfork, but Charlie points out that it’s made of cardboard and the demon just hangs his head in shame. Defeated, he tells Charlie to just get out of there as he’s making him too depressed. Charlie does just that as the gate was apparently left unlocked leaving Steve to console the weeping demon.
On a list of places you don’t expect to run into your grandma, Hell is probably at the top.
Charlie then exits to find Hell is indeed frozen over. He walks through the snow while demons look frozen and upset about the climate until someone calls out to him. It’s his grandma, and Charlie is pretty surprised to find her condemned to Hell. She seems chipper about it though, and explains that she said “damn” one time in reference to her husband’s murder and that’s the strike that put her in Hell. Charlie comments that it seems pretty harsh, but Grandma doesn’t seem to mind. Charlie then asks her if she knows where he can find Satan and she points out a rather ominous looking pit. Charlie thanks her, and as he leaves she offers him a piece of hard candy which happens to be a dirty looking, oversized, lollipop. Charlie politely declines and Grandma is happy to keep it for herself as she shoves the whole thing in her mouth and makes unpleasant sucking sounds.
If it weren’t for all of the creatures trying to eat you, frozen Hell would be a pretty neat place to visit.
Charlie heads down the pit and it’s set to a musical number. It’s a bit of a jazzy sounding song with lyrics such as “It’s Christmas time in H-E-Double-L,” and during the song we see Charlie encounter a bunch of horrible things like predatory demons, fire-breathing monsters, and hordes of little, red, creatures he has to walk over. His journey ends at a frozen lake with what Charlie assumes marks the end of the worst of it. Then Steve pops up in his face screaming again and Charlie socks him right in what I assume is his stomach. As he doubles over in pain, Charlie taunts him by saying he promised he would do that to him if he ever did that again showing no remorse for Steve’s pain. Charlie then walks across the ice while the frozen heads of the damned trapped in the ice taunt him, except the last one who apologizes for not being able to think of something. Charlie takes it in stride telling him “No pressure.”
Hey Satan, how’s it going?
Charlie arrives at two large doors and works up the courage to knock. Once he does, a booming voice from behind the door asks him why he’s come here. Charlie replies “To make you smile,” and the doors open. Inside, Charlie meets Satan, who is a massive, hideous, demon, seated at a computer playing a game. He’s pretty chill for the lord of darkness, and Charlie asks him what’s wrong. Satan explains in a rather casual manner that he’s simply lost his enthusiasm for the job. The worst part is, he doesn’t get paid until the job is done, and considering it’s for eternity, he’s essentially never been paid. He explains that he just doesn’t care at this point and turns to his game. Charlie proposes that if he can help get him out of this depression that Satan let him return to the world of the living and he agrees. They’re then interrupted by a delivery man and there’s a somewhat awkward exchange of food and the driver requesting to take a picture of the food as proof of delivery and such before finally leaving. Satan then inspects the contents of the bag which includes a massive burger, fries, and a drink. He’s irritated that they, once again, forgot the straw.
Note to self: don’t piss off Satan.
As Satan chows down, Charlie points out that maybe he’s lost some of his enthusiasm because he’s stuck in a loop and relying on these quick dopamine hits via junk food and other vices. Satan is immediately put off by this accusation and turns to a vape pen to calm his nerves. Charlie points out that this is just more of said behavior and that’s the last straw (heh). Satan orders him to be tortured and some of his minions come out and strap him down to a rack table. While they crank on it, the little, red, demon guys from earlier start stabbing Charlie and then Steve shows up to get some revenge by punching him in the face. Now Satan is fired up as he tells Charlie it gives him great joy to inflict torture on a pathetic creature like him. This is it! Satan is out of his loop and Charlie points this out to him. Satan thinks about it for a second, and then agrees with Charlie’s take, but since he did piss him off he’s not going to be letting him go anytime soon. Charlie points out that isn’t fair, but Satan doesn’t care because he’s, well, Satan!
Behold! The nipple of God!
From off camera, we hear an unmistakable voice shout “A deal’s a deal.” It’s the late, great, Gilbert Gottfried, but he’s not playing himself, he’s playing God! God himself lands in the room superhero style, his face obscured by a bright light. He’s massive, about the same size as Satan, and sporting some sandals and a toga. He orders Charlie to jump onto his hand, and once he does the two fly out of Hell. Along the way, God tells Charlie that he passed his test. By confronting the evil Satan and restoring his smile he’s confronted the unhappiness in himself. God finishes up the explanation by saying he hopes he learned something from this “cool” experience and wishes him a “Merry Christmas” as he whips Charlie like a fastball at the Earth from way up in outer space.
Just what exactly is Charlie made of?
Charlie goes streaking towards Earth looking like the force of the throw will peel the skin from his skull, or whatever is under there. On Earth, Charlie’s friends are gathered for his funeral. They’re at the cemetery plot where a priest (Hans Van Harken) is delivering the eulogy for Charlie. Mr. Boss has chosen to say a few words via a free verse rap of some kind. The priest thanks Mr. Boss when he’s done, and then gives the signal that the casket is to be lowered. As it does, Charlie seemingly returns by smashing into it and exploding into yellow goo which covers all of the people in attendance and leaves the casket smashed. The goo shivers for a second before it all comes together and Charlie is reborn!
Friends don’t let something like an exposed penis get in the way of a good hug.
Pim and the others can hardly believe what just happened as a naked Charlie stands before them. Mr. Boss gets to declare it a Christmas miracle as Pim excitedly asks what happened? Charlie says a lot took place, and that he doesn’t want to get into it. He at least adds that he met Satan and apologizes for how he was acting. Pim apologizes too for their argument earlier and gives Charlie a big hug, who is very much uncomfortable with Pim hugging him in his present state. We then see a book close and find out an elder Glep had been telling this story the whole time to his grandson. The little Glep excitedly asks if all of that stuff really happend. Very casually, the grandpa confirms it and says it’s all real, including Christian Hell before adding “Sorry” as his grandson looks upset. He then cheerfully waves at the camera and says “Merry Christmas, everyone!”
The whole time it was just a grandfather telling a story to his grandson. Wholesome.
That was a very different sort of Christmas special, but one that I consider pretty entertaining in its own way. I’m assuming it was a lot of fun to see Pim and Charlie’s two very contrasting personalities come to a head as they did in the first act, and then it’s always fun to take a tour of Hell. Getting Satan out of a state of depression feels like an escalation of the problems the group encountered all season. It’s almost surprising to see them go to such an extreme in just the eighth episode. What could be a greater task than that? And on Christmas, no less!
As is often the case with these more offbeat Adult Swim shows, the Christmas element isn’t a huge player. It’s there to help get this one off the ground, and then it mostly fades into the background. Satan and God wishing others a “Merry Christmas” both serve as jokes because they jolt the viewer’s brain back into Christmas mode. These episodes are rather perfectly placed on a broadcast schedule often airing around midnight after one has indulged in a full course of more traditional holiday fair. This is the kind of thing you turn to when that’s getting just a bit too much.
This isn’t the type of show that induces hysterical laughter, but Hell’s toilet did get a chuckle out of me.
Smiling Friends is a show that’s simply animated, but this episode has a lot of flourish to it on account of the setting. The various areas Charlie finds himself traversing through in Hell are pretty interesting. The shot of Charlie walking over the frozen river while a massive beast swims beneath him is not the sort of thing this show needed to do, but I was happy for it. The approach to Satan was certainly interesting as he was done with a more traditional CG approach. He looks plenty demonic, and I’m not sure what the thought process was that resulted in the approach, but it was fine. It felt rather appropriate that a being such as Satan was depicted in an almost different medium from a mortal like Charlie or Satan’s various underlings. I’m just surprised that God didn’t get a similar treatment. The inclusion of Charlie’s grandmother was a bit of dark humor, and I liked the small arc with Steve. I’m surprised we didn’t hear from the little imp character again, but we didn’t really need to.
I don’t know if Charlie actually learned anything in the end, or if we’re supposed to expect a change in his behavior going forward. A second season is on the way, so I guess we’ll have to wait until then. Since this show isn’t even a year old, Cartoon Network is likely to show this episode during the Adult Swim block at least a few times this month making this one of the easier specials to view. If you still have cable, that is. If not, it’s on the Max streaming platform and available for purchase as well. Smiling Friends is a show that I should watch more of, and while this episode isn’t a classic, at least the show seems pretty good.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
The Ren & Stimpy Show burst onto the scene as part of the original trio of Nicktoons in 1991. The other two, Doug and Rugrats, were fairly gentle cartoons. Rugrats could sometimes get a little blue since the main characters were all babies, but the occasional poop joke was hardly something to get offended by.…
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Five years ago The Christmas Spot did its first advent calendar countdown to Christmas and the theme was “The 25 Greatest Christmas TV Specials.” With that list, my approach wasn’t entirely forthright. I really had a list of 20 specials that I deemed worthy of such an honor and I devoted the back five to…
I have a pretty tremendous blind spot for most animated shows produced between 2005-2015. If it was a show animated and marketed at adults, then I might have checked it out. If it was a show created primarily for kids and not based on some existing IP I knew from my childhood then I almost certainly did not interact with it. And when it comes to the Cartoon Network shows of that era, I basically only saw snippets of the programming when I turned my TV on if I had been watching Adult Swim the night before. That’s why I completely missed out on Regular Show. I say missed out because I’ve heard it’s quite good, but I don’t know that for sure. I know the name and I know it as the cartoon starring the bird and the raccoon, but that’s basically where my knowledge ends. I couldn’t tell you when it debuted, when it ended, or if it was associated with any of the other programs airing around the same time on Cartoon Network. For some reason I thought it was tied into Adventure Time, another show I am not familiar with at all, but aside from the creators knowing each other it would appear I was mistaken.
Now that I’ve done a little bit of reading, I can tell you that Regular Show was conceived by J.G. Quintel, a former Cal Arts student and a lot of the show is based on his experiences there. The show was part of Cartoon Network’s search for more original content via its Cartoonstitute initiative which allowed creators to submit a pitch without network interference. It’s a pretty neat idea and sounds similar to how the network first got into creating its own animation via the Cartoon, Cartoon model in the 90s which was similar to what Nickelodeon had done in creating its Nicktoons. And just looking at some of the shows the network greenlit during this time, it would appear it was a pretty big success. It’s somewhat baffling that the network seems to have moved away from this approach in favor of relying on existing IP, but that seems to be an industry wide thing and not something unique to Cartoon Network.
Regular Show aired on Cartoon Network from 2010 – 2017.
Regular Show may be a show I’m not familiar with, but it looks like I should probably reconsider that since it produced multiple Christmas episodes during its run. Given that, I’m a little surprised to see that the first of those episodes, and the subject of today’s post, didn’t come along until Season 4. Regular Show is one of those cartoons that gets a half hour block to air two roughly 11 minute shorts. For Christmas, 11 minutes just wasn’t going to cut it so both segments were devoted to one story as have many cartoons of similar formats before it. Christmas just isn’t suited for such a meager duration, as much as that pains my fingers each holiday season. I decided not to watch any Regular Show before watching this episode so I’m going in cold turkey. I know the two lead characters, Mordecai (Quintel) the blue jay and Rigby (William Salyers) the raccoon, are slacker types in their early 20s. They’re probably like a lot of men that age who would rather play video games and goof off than work or study. They would probably also like to drink beer, but this wasn’t an Adult Swim show so I’m guessing that’s out. I don’t really know what’s going on with the world they inhabit. There appears to be animal types as well as normally inanimate objects that are sentient. There’s also people. Is there an explanation for this in the show? I have no idea. Does there need to be one? Not really.
It’s rather amusing how the size of the sleigh changes to suit the shot throughout the fight. Some of the interior shots make it look more like a barge.
The episode begins with a cold open. A shadowy figure is in the midst of a heist in a cold climate and would appear to be using the sleigh belonging to one Santa Claus as a way of escaping. The sleigh is not only outfitted with eight reindeer, but even a ninth at the head of the team signifying Rudolph – that’s commitment! The show is hand-drawn with digital animation and it looks pretty fluid, but a little simplistic when it comes to lighting. It’s very similar to Rick and Morty in that respect. As the sleigh takes off, we see a sign indicating that this is the North Pole so the factory this guy is running from (and blew up) might just be Santa’s workshop. The shadowy figure is coveting what looks like a present and he also has the pointed features of an elf, but before he can open the gift he’s attacked by some sort of sky-sledding ninja! And not just any ninja – Santa! He removes a scarf to reveal his beard and this Santa isn’t your usual portly guy with red cheeks. He’s large, and intimidating, though he still retains the beard. He’s also voiced by the incomparable Ed Asner, probably the greatest Santa voice there ever was. He tells the elf, Quillgin (Thomas Haden Church) that he can’t let him leave with that gift, but he’s not going to just give it up. The two fight over it, and Quillgin is able to get it away from Santa momentarily. As he opens the lid, a light pours out. Santa cries out “No!” and then adds “Rudolph! Diene nase!” This command, which Google tells me means “Serve nose” in German, prompts the reindeer to cock his head and blast a laser from his nose at the elf. This dislodges the present, which Santa grabs and dives out of the sleigh with. Quillgen reaches over the side of the sleigh brandishing a gun, a realistic looking one at that, and shoots Santa three times in the stomach as the old man falls out of sight. Quillgin taunts him as he disappears through the clouds with a menacing, “Merry Christmas, Santa Claus.”
Benson’s sweater is going to be a source of consternation for him throughout.
That takes us into the title, which is some rather ominous music over dark, red-tinted, clouds. When the credits are through, we’re taken to a festive holiday gathering. Brenda Lee’s “Rocking Around the Christmas Tree” is playing and the warmly lit house is nicely decoarated. Here is where I have to do my research as I don’t know who anyone is. In the kitchen, a green guy in a Hannukah sweater is singing the praises of Christmas cookies to a yeti. This is apparently Muscle Man (Sam Marin) and the yeti is Skips (Mark Hamill), who doesn’t say anything. In the main room, a living gumball machine in a reindeer sweater is chatting it up with a human female. This is Benson (Marin) and the girl would appear to be named Audrey (Courtenay Taylor) via process of elimination when I look at the cast list. She compliments the sweater Benson is wearing who takes the compliment with grace, then she adds it’s sure to win the “Ugliest sweater” competition, if there is one. Benson gives a nervous laugh indicating he just thinks it’s a nice sweater, then excuses himself to get more soda. It’s technically a kid’s show, after all, no beer.
These are our main characters, a blue jay named Mordecai and a raccoon named Rigby.
In the kitchen, Benson runs into a Mr. Maellard (David Ogden Stiers) who looks like an old man, but his head is the moon. I have no idea who he is, but he’s leaving since he has six other parties to attend. He compliments Benson on his party though (this must be his home then) and gets in a dig about the sweater on his way out. Benson seems irritated at yet another jab at his sweater and gets further irritated when he finds nothing but empty soda bottles on the refreshments table. He then calls out to a Thomas (Roger Craig Smith) as he heads back into the living room and we see who Thomas is. It’s some goat guy and he managed to get his head stuck in the railing of the stairs. Mordecai and Rigby make their entrance here as they’re doing some sort of Christmas rap, or song, for someone on the phone. When the brief little diddy is concluded, Mordecai picks up the phone to ask a Margaret if she liked it. She must be a friend, or a girlfriend, who couldn’t attend the party. She seems to have a lukewarm reception to it since Mordecai says you need to be able to see the dance that goes with it, but he doesn’t seem bothered in the least. Benson then enters, and finding Thomas unable to procure soda, asks Mordecai and Rigby to go over to Skips’ garage to get some more. They agree to do so, but on the condition that this be considered their Christmas gift to Benson. He basically restates the offering in an irritated tone, then adds a fine, and the two slackers high five in celebration for seemingly getting out of spending money on a friend (he’s apparently their boss too, and yeah, don’t buy your boss Christmas gifts, folks).
Santa’s not looking so hot.
Mordecai and Rigby, with festive scarves around their necks, head through the snowy night to retrieve soda for the party. As they walk they both share their enthusiasm for Christmas and the getting gifts part, which is hardly a surprise. Rigby even adds the holiday should occur once a month, at a minimum, which his fine, feathered, friend agrees with. Their conversation is interrupted by what looks like a meteor streaking towards the home of Skips. It smashes through the roof of the garage (oh no, the soda!) and Mordecai beckons his friend to hurry. As they open the garage door, their scarves have mysteriously vanished. Damn, I liked how they looked. Inside the garage, they find an unconscious man on what was once an automobile. Mordecai asks the guy if he’s okay, and he speaks indicating he’s not actually out cold. He tells them not to worry about him, but to take the box. He then rolls over and groans when he realizes who is standing before him. Naturally, Mordecai and Rigby have questions, and when he says he’s Santa they’re not ready to believe him. Mordecai lists out the qualities they would anticipate Santa to have like smelling good and having rosy cheeks noting this guy has bruised cheeks and smells like he stepped in something. Santa, seeming more than a little irritated, informs them that stuff is just marketing and he’s the real deal and proves it by telling them what they keep writing him letters for every year: an invisibility cloak. Apparently, he’s not allowed to give out magical gifts as it’s against the rules, which Rigby is pretty surprised to hear that even Santa has to follow rules.
I wonder how you get to be part of a Santa focus group?
Santa then gets back to the box and tells the two they need to destroy it. When they ask what’s in it, he tells them it’s not what’s inside, but the box itself that’s the issue. We then are treated to a flashback. Santa explains that his head toy designer, Quillgin, had spent his life working on this thing. It’s a box that gives the opener whatever they desire most. Santa didn’t know at the time, but it was crafted using dark magic. They tested it on a focus group, a family of four and one box, to see how kids would react to it on Christmas morning. It made them violent as they coveted the box and wouldn’t let anyone else have it. The kid in the scenario even bites his mother on the forearm when she tries to open it. Santa orders the box be sealed away and all of the notes pertaining to its construction destroyed, but Quillgin challenged him on it. Santa is shown easily overpowering him, but acknowledges that he should have expected the elf to seek revenge at some point.
The box turns everyone into assholes.
That’s when the flashback ends. Santa, in the present, tells the boys they must destroy the box because Quillgin is still out there after it. And when he gets it, he’ll use it to get what he wants most: the destruction of Christmas! Mordecai and Rigby obviously don’t want that to happen and they vow to help Santa destroy the box. He doesn’t seem enthusiastic about enlisting their aid and wishes he had landed in someone else’s garage. Well, he’s stuck with them! The two try to help Santa up, but he’s in far too much pain to try and stand and tells them to take the box and go. They do as their told, though not before momentarily misplacing the box first, and once gone they get their friends and return to the garage to show them what happened, but Santa is gone! Everyone is pissed at the pair, and by everyone I mean Benson, Pops (a guy with a lollipop or something for a head voiced by Sam Marin), Muscle Man, Skips, and Hi Five Ghost (a little ghost with a hand coming out of its head that has a basic shape not unlike the ghosts from Pac-Man that doesn’t seem to do or say much, but the noises that come out of him are provided by Quintel). Not believing a word they’re saying, Benson takes the box and looks into it. We don’t know what he desired, but his pupils dilate and the box is snatched by Muscle Man. The same happens with him, and soon Pops and Hi Five Ghost have a gander and they all start fighting over it until Skips yanks it from them and leaves the lid on.
I’m guessing this place holds more significance for regular viewers of this show.
Now that the powers of the box have been demonstrated, the group asks what they’re supposed to do with it. Mordecai tells them that Santa entrusted the box to them so they could destroy it. Muscle Man decides to take care of it with a sledge hammer, but his strike bounces off and sends him sailing into the wall of the garage. Skips gives the box a sniff and confirm the presence of dark magic. The only way to destroy such an item, according to the yeti, is to cast it into molten lava. Rigby asks how they can possibly do that and Skips tells him he knows a place: East Pines. This is either the park all of these guys work at, or a rival one, as Rigby is kind of pissed that Skips lead them here. He mentions a Gene and some rival park rangers, but Skips informs him there’s an abandoned mine shaft on the other side of the park that will lead them to where they need to go.
These rangers are very committed to making sure their snowmen remain dickless.
The crew heads in and as they run through the park they pass a fairly conventional looking snowman. Rigby decides to get a little mischievous and indicates he’s going to “fix” the snowman. He reaches for the carrot nose, suggesting it’s likely to become another part of the snowman’s anatomy, but the second it’s disturbed an alarm goes off and a whole bunch of park rangers spring up from the bushes. They’re armed with some kind of guns and they order the group to step away from the carrot and they’re forced to comply. We then cut quickly back to the garage to see Quillgin finding the wrecked car where Santa once lay. He’s got a small army with him and he tells them the box couldn’t have gotten far from here. They mount snowmobiles and head off towards the park.
This is Gene, who happens to be a vending machine. We’ll get to see that he has a wife and son, also vending machines. How they procreate is a mystery.
At a ranger station, the crew is tied up and getting chewed out by a vending machine named Gene (Kurtwood Smith). He laments that he thought the “Prank Wars” were over and accuses the group of sneaking into their park to play some lame, Yuletide, prank this evening. Benson tells him that’s not what they’re after (and gets his shirt insulted in the process by Gene) and Mordecai tells him about the box. Predictably, Gene doesn’t believe him and orders one of his men, Larry (Salyers), to open it to see if it’s a prank. He doesn’t really want to, but he does as the vending machine commands. He reacts favorably to whatever he’s seeing, so Gene snatches it and does the same. Then another guy tries to get it and the three start fighting until the box squirts away and they get chewed out by Mordecai and the others. They bring Gene up to speed and let him know that Christmas is at stake. Right as they do, Quillgin and his team storm the place and all of the people in the station can see what’s happening via the monitors. Gene basically freezes as Mordecai and Rigby plead with him for his help. He just keeps looking at a picture of his family taken on Christmas morning (his wife and son are vending machines as well, it’s probably pretty easy for a vending machine to give birth) and then back to the monitor as Quillgin takes out the rangers. Rigby is pretty shocked to see that Quillgin isn’t some tiny, little, elf and soon the door to the room starts shaking. Someone is pounding on it, and they want in!
Ever see a vending machine drive a snowmobile? Yes, once.
The door bursts open and it’s just another ranger with his arms full of eggnog. He reprimands them for not helping him, then matter-of-factly mentions the attackers just outside. Gene finally comes to his senses and throws out a “Let’s ride” to transition us to the next scene where everyone is riding snowmobiles. Gene leads them to an abandoned mine, but then tells them he will go no further. He plans to try and stall the elves, but as he drives away he calls out to them to watch out for the booby traps. When Benson responds with “What booby traps?” Gene just shouts back, “Merry Christmas!” The crew then heads inside on their sleds until they reach a dead end. Before they can assess the situation, the floor opens up and sends them all down a long, icy, slide. It’s a slide that ends at a chasm, but the sleds have enough speed to clear it and crash on the other side where an impaled skeleton in a foreboding hall awaits them.
You can’t dance in a sweater, so Muscle Man discarded it.
Despite the ominous looking skeleton, Benson seems to think they can just walk around it to the door behind it, but the skeleton was clearly the victim of a booby trap. Or should I say, the human that the skeleton used to be was a victim of a booby trap? When Benson approaches it he steps on a tile causing spikes to shoot out, but he falls backwards to avoid it. It’s Skips who notices some glyphs on the wall which seem to suggest the right way to tiptoe through the would-be lethal trap. Mordecai decides to try and use the skeleton as a way to follow the directions as Rigby reads them. It’s basically like a 9-digit number pad on the floor, and activating each panel in the proper sequence should theoretically disable the trap. Only it’s not working and Mordecai casts the corpse aside in frustration. Then Muscle Man decides he’s got this and removes his shirt (despite his name, he’s not very muscley) for some reason and jumps into the trap. He basically breakdances in the pattern which he apparently memorized and a video game like chime lets him know he did it right. Everyone then heads through while Muscle Man boasts how that thing didn’t even touch him, then the trap springs all of the spikes at once and he changes his candor to “Whoa! I almost just died!”
This episode has me wondering if I too am good enough at pinball to allow my friends to traverse a dangerous chasm or if I’d end up getting them killed.
Skips encourages everyone to continue on which involves going down a slide. Meanwhile, Quillgin has taken over the ranger outpost and is analyzing the security footage of the crew heading into the mine and spots the present in Mordecai’s lap. Gene, who is bound up and placed on his side, taunts them that the box is probably already destroyed at this point so one of the elves just kicks him over so that he’s face down and they can’t hear him. At the bottom of the slide, the gang comes upon the next test: a snow-covered pinball machine. The clue indicates that they have to rack up points to make a bridge appear, but should they lose a ball “Watch out below.” The machine is positioned at the edge of a cliff and their destination is on the other side. Mordecai and Rigby bemoan this test as they consider pinball dated and out of fashion. Benson just tells them to step aside and starts playing the machine. As he racks up points, an ice bridge appears, but when he loses a ball the ground beneath Muscle Man breaks away, but Skips is able to grab him. Rigby criticizes Benson’s playing which earns him a punch in the head from Mordecai who is offering nothing but encouragement to the gumball man. Now three balls are deployed and Benson is going off. Quillgin and his team of operatives then show up and Benson tells everyone to make a break for it. Once they’re safely on the other side, he lets all three balls slip past the paddles and makes a break for it himself. As he runs across the ice bridge, it breaks apart behind him. Quillgin’s operatives are chasing him, but soon are overtaken by the crumbling ice and presumably fall to their death. Benson is able to make it across and Quillgin is left to wail “Noooooo!”
Pops is apparently a very accomplished grappler.
The good guys find themseleves in yet another room, this one with a circle of glyphs on the floor. Skips takes a gander at the glyphs and translates them for everyone. It’s the final trial, and apparently they have to wrestle a bear. Once Skips makes that announcement, a roar from offscreen can be heard and a massive polar bear comes sauntering in. Now it’s Pops’ turn to make himself useful as he volunteers to wrestle the bear and seems pretty confident in his ability. He gets into the ring and the bear starts tossing him around. Rigby, ever the optimist, declares that Pops is dead while Mordecai tells him to shut up. The bear gets Pops in a hold who then calmly informs the bear that this is a fight he cannot win. He then overpowers the bear by standing up and hip-tossing him onto his back. He grabs the bear in a hold similar to a Dragon Sleeper and proceeds to choke the bear out. The others celebrate his victory, then the bear stands up and surprises everyone when it speaks. The bear (Fred Tatasciore) congratulates them on passing the final trial and informs them that they may now proceed. He then opens a portal of some kind on his chest and the crew is just expected to walk into it. As Mordecai approaches, he’s dismayed to see yet another slide, but Skips just slaps him on the back forcing him onto it.
They managed to get through all of that, but still wind up at gunpoint before the task is done.
The guys head down the slide and it ends in a warmly lit room. The pit to the core of the Earth is here, but as the group approaches it with the box, Quillgin appears! They’re all pretty confused that he could beat them to this room, and he points out he took the stairs. Apparently, that was an option this whole time. Unfortunately for them, Quillgin has a gun and demands that Mordecai hand over the box. Benson encourages him to do so, pointing out the whole gun and all, and adds they did their best, but now it’s over. Mordecai reluctantly starts to head in Quillgin’s direction, but some weird steam or smoke encircles the elf and seems to take over his arm. He’s unsure of what’s happening, but some unseen force causes him to toss his gun down the fire pit. Then we hear some laughter, and above the pit is Santa! He was concealing himself with an invisible cloak! He’s also riding a pretty sweet hoverboard. The others are in awe at the sight of the legend himself while Rigby is actually ticked off about the invisibility cloak. When he accuses Santa of claiming they couldn’t make such things, he corrects him by saying they can totally make them, they just can’t give them as gifts.
There goes Christmas…
Santa joins the others leaving Quillgin enraged and in disbelief. He thought he had killed Santa, but the big guy reveals he was wearing a bulletproof vest which he also pulls aside to reveal some chiseled abs which Muscle Man seems to really like. Quillgin counters with a grenade and Santa is forced to dive in front of everyone with his hoverboard to shield them from the blast. In the process, the box is dropped and directed towards Quillgin who picks it up and proceeds to explain his nefarious plan. Or thought process, anyway, as he reasons if they just gave everyone in the world one of these boxes they wouldn’t have to fight over them. He accuses Santa of not wanting to do that as then no one would need him anymore if they had what they desired most. Santa denies this, but Quillgin is not going to be swayed. He opens the lid and demands he be given what he wants most: the destruction of Christmas forever!
That’s pretty bad ass, boys.
With the box open, the background turns into a nightscape. Images of holiday stuff appear floating in the air all with sticks of glowing red dynamite strapped to them. “Carol of the Bells” comes in and a remote control detonator appears inside the box. This is apparently how Quillgin will get his destruction of Christmas. As he reaches for it, Mordecai leaps into action! He tackles Quillgin and both fall into the pit! “Carol of the Bells” either morphs into, or was always, the Trans Siberian Orchestra version as Mordecai and Quillgin battle over the box and detonator while they fall to their certain death. Rigby dives in after his friend, though I’m not sure what he thought that would accomplish? Mordecai gets punched by Quillgin and loses his bid at the box, but Rigby is able to grab it. Quillgin gets his mitts on it too, and we see the image inside the box change from a detonator to a cone of ice cream as the two try to create what they desire most. Or in the case of Rigby, basically anything other than the Christmas-destroying detonator. Rigby is able to pull it out of Quillgin’s hands, but he grabs Rigby’s ankles. Mordecai then calls out to his friend to release his hold on the box so that he can fall to it. Rigby does as instructed and Mordecai is able to get control of the box and makes his own desire appear: a two-person hoverboard! He hops onto it, grabs Rigby, and leaves Quillgin to his fate. Which is lava. Lots, and lots, of lava.
Count it.
Mordecai rides out of the chasm with Rigby to applause from his friends. The box is no more, and the same is true of Quillgin. We’re then taken back to Benson’s house. Santa flew everyone there, and as they all head into the house Benson pauses to ask Santa a question. Declaring him the authority on all things Christmas, he asks for Santa’s opinion of his sweater. Santa curtly informs him that he should have tossed it into the lava pit. Benson says nothing in response, but removes the sweater and heads inside. Santa then has a chance to speak with Mordecai and Rigby. He confesses he didn’t think they were up to the task, but they surprised him. The two suggest that this should get them onto the nice list and Santa responds “Stranger things have happened.” He then takes off and the pair watch him fly towards a crescent moon, but not in front of it. Should we count this as a moon shot? It’s iffy. He vanishes with a blast of speed and Mordecai and Rigby seem very tickled by this as they high five declaring it “Just like in the movies!”
With invisibility cloaks, they’ll never have to work again! Though I’m guessing they probably lost them eventually.
Benson heads inside to find Thomas asleep with his head still stuck in the banister. He shouts “Thomas!” which startles the goat man awake and in the process gets him unstuck. He says nothing, though it looks like the other party-goers decorated him with lights and such while he was out. He walks off as Mordecai and Rigby enter. Benson points out that the house is a mess and they need to clean it up. They both groan, but Benson smiles and lets them know he plans to help. He heads off into the kitchen for some cleaning supplies leaving the two alone to discover a gift under the tree. It’s addressed to them and when they open it they find a card inside that simply reads “Sometimes you have to break some rules.” Benson re-enters the room with a mop and bucket, but Mordecai and Rigby are gone. Irritated, he marches back into the kitchen. Mordecai and Rigby then appear on the couch as the gift contained the invisibility cloaks they coveted. Shouting “Best gift ever,” the two head back under their cloaks and we see two game controllers rise up from under the coffee table. The camera then moves outside of the house and pans to the sky to find Santa Claus once again. He’s flying away from the camera shouting his customary, “Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas!” He turns the sleigh around so it’s facing the camera head-on, then in a flash of light he vanishes leaving behind two trails of flames a-la the DeLorean in Back to the Future as a sound-a-like musical number to that film’s theme comes in to take us out.
This version of Santa knows how to make an exit.
So that was Regular Show. After watching my very first episode, I can see the appeal. While it didn’t really make me laugh out loud, there was humor to be found. Mordecai is pretty likable as a lead character since he’s positive and seems sincere. He’s a nice guy and supportive of his friends, he’s just a slacker. Rigby is a little more plucky, a little less someone to aspire to, but still likable. The rest of the cast seem fine and I’m sure there’s more to them, but you can only learn so much about a show in 22 minutes. I always welcome an Ed Asner appearance, especially as Santa Claus. This show’s version of Santa was more of the bad ass kind and it works. The plot wasn’t anything special, but it gave the heroes a quest and provided a villain that could be disposed of in the end. It probably didn’t need the full runtime to tell the story as the trials did get a little long, but it was fine. It was still fairly breezy to take in.
I am here for bad ass Santa.
The visuals were also fine. It has that modern aesthetic that has been utilized most by Rick and Morty of late and I like how some characters look, but don’t care for others. I hate how Santa’s nose is drawn as it looks like a lump of flesh that got smashed with a shovel, but the design of the rest was fine. I especially liked Benson and how the untextured gumballs serve as a beard. The animation is fluid and the colors saturated, plus bonus points are in order for giving some of the characters holiday attire. I kind of wish Mordecai and Rigby kept the scarves they wore for a hot minute throughout the special, but oh well. I was surprised at the amount of licensed music, especially because this is a show that was released on DVD, so kudos to Cartoon Network for paying for it. Of course, I’m not watching it on DVD or Blu Ray so I don’t know if they were left in, but I’m assuming they were since I didn’t see any mention of it on all of the places I checked out to read up on the show.
Will I watch more Regular Show? Maybe. I don’t know. It was enjoyable, but I’m not feeling any urge to watch more. I also don’t feel the need to add this to the usual rotation of annual Christmas specials. I suppose I am curious about the other Christmas episodes the show did, especially to see if Santa or even the should-be-very-dead Quillgin return. If you would like to experience this one on your own, there are the aforementioned physical releases, plus digital ones available. It’s also streaming on the Max platform, and being a newer Cartoon Network property, there’s some chance the cable channel actually airs this one. It should be relatively easy to come by, just maybe not for “free.”
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
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In 1995, Warner Bros felt it was a big enough entity that it could launch its own broadcast television network. Dubbed The WB, it would try to compete with the big four of ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox, but never really achieved that level of success which is why it no longer exists. The strategy seemed to be to go for a younger demographic with its prime time shows, similar to Fox, but even younger. Maybe they felt there was a market for the kids who had outgrown Nickelodeon and were searching for something else to watch. The American household had long since evolved past the one television per home model and kids basically had as much access to TV as adults so I suppose it made some sense. Warner never did leave the little kids behind entirely though as they also programmed afternoon and Saturday mornings tailored to children. Kids WB was definitely meant to challenge Fox Kids who had become the dominant brand for broadcast children’s programming behind the strength of shows like X-Men, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Spider-Man, Batman, and Animaniacs. The interesting part about Warner’s decision to launch its network when it did is that a lot of its intellectual property was tied-up in other places, like Fox. They basically had to run out the clock on the likes of Batman and Animaniacs until they could get those rights back which meant in the meantime turning to other characters like Superman and Tweety (seriously, Tweety was somewhat inexplicably popular in the mid 90s).
Eventually, Warner did get those rights back and Batman was able to join Superman on Kids WB with his old collection of episodes from the Fox days as well as some new ones. We’ve already talked about this pretty extensively in the Batman section of this blog, so we probably don’t need to dawdle any longer. That power hour of Superman and Batman would eventually give way to Batman Beyond as the continuation of what was becoming the DC Animated Universe. Bruce Timm, Paul Dini, Dan Riba, and other creators behind those shows would continue to flesh out their world. It seemed obvious to anybody keeping up that the end game was to collect all of these heroes in place for a new Justice League show. The problem with that strategy ended up coming from an unexpected place.
Something that has not aged well is the CG intro. The shoulders on these guys are absurd!
A little known cartoon outside the US called Pokémon made some headlines in the 90s due to it causing a bunch of kids in Japan to have seizures during an episode. It was basically just a peculiar story and I bet a great many folks who read it assumed they’d never hear about this show again. They would be wrong as the game would arrive in the US eventually and the show followed. While it didn’t make a huge splash at first, it would gradually rise in popularity until it became the ratings king of Saturday morning. And it was on the Kids WB Network. The success of Pokémon seemed to convince the powers that be at the network that the future lied in licensing Pokémon adjacent programming for their network essentially forcing out their homegrown stars. Those shows were costly to produce and the only revenue they saw from them was ad revenue. Luckily for fans of the DC shows, there was a new home waiting for them in Cartoon Network, which had found tremendous success on weekday afternoons with its action block Toonami. That network started airing reruns of Batman and they performed well enough that they were willing to make a deal with Warner for new content thus becoming the home of the Justice League.
Justice League premiered on November 17, 2001. It’s another animated series from Warner and DC developed by Bruce Timm with Butch Lukic and Dan Riba returning as directors. Stan Berkowitz and Rich Fogel are the credited head writers, but they received contributions from the likes of Dwayne McDuffie, Paul Dini, and a host of other writers. It would definitely seem that Dini was less involved with this show than past DC animated programs, but he is the writer of today’s episode “Comfort and Joy.” This is, obviously, a Christmas episode and it excludes Batman. Maybe because he already did two Christmas episodes? It’s the only episode of the series, which was one order of 52 episodes, that’s a stand-alone one. Every other episode is either a two-parter or more. The main team consists of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, The Flash, Hawkgirl, and Martian Manhunter. It’s not a show I ever watched so I’m banking on my familiarity with these characters from outside this show to help me through this one. And even so, I mainly know Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman and both Wonder Woman and Batman aren’t featured. I guess it’s time to get acquainted with Martian Manhunter!
It’s certainly a Christmassy setting.
The episode begins with Martian Manhunter (Carl Lumbly) standing in a snowy environment silently assuring some alien lifeform that they will save their world. Apparently, these aliens (who look like uglier versions of The Snorks) have entrusted the Justice League with some sort of gravitational device. I guess we’re not on Earth, even though the snowy area has evergreen trees on it, and the aliens that Martian Manhunter is communicating with are on a different planet. Superman (George Newbern) and Green Lantern (Phil LaMarr) are assembling the device which is rather massive and ugly looking. This show is digitally animated and the characters and backgrounds mostly look fine and can pass as cel-animated. The device, however, is rendered in 3D and just looks really bad. It’s the type of thing that probably looked bad even back then, but so many shows loved incorporating that sort of thing into their look.
These are the guys the Justice League are trying to save.
As the two super men do their part, we see Hawkgirl (Maria Canals-Barrera) delivering some rope and parts to The Flash (Michael Rosenbaum) who dashes about the assembled device and inserts what looks like circuit boards into a compartment. He indicates that J’onn (apparently Martian Manhunter’s real name, which just sounds like “John” but they had to make it annoying to type since he’s an alien, or whatever) is “beaming the directions” into his head as he goes along. When he’s done, he dashes over to the others who have assembled where J’onn has been standing and we see the device in action. The planet they’re on is some ice planet and it was going to collide with the planet those Snork guys are inhabiting. The device envelops the ice planet with some green beems and basically backs it off. It’s all done with some pretty bad CG. It worked though as the aliens cheer and Superman remarks that the ice planet will never threaten the other one again.
All in a day’s work, I guess.
Show’s over, right? No, because now we can get to Christmas! Flash indicates that this was the best way to start a holiday break, which apparently Green Lantern is no fan of? He immediately bails, I guess he can just fly through space, and Hawkgirl decides to join him. Flash asks J’onn what his plans are for the holidays and he responds, without a trace of emotion in his voice, that these times hold no special meaning for him. He then walks onto the device which apparently doubles as a spaceship, or the this is an unrelated spaceship. Flash remarks that his personality is rather “frosty” and then Superman, with a sly smile, indicates that they’ll have to do something to change that. And that’s our A plot – show Martian Manhunter the spirit of Christmas!
Real creative, GL.
That takes us into the usual opening credits and when they end we’re back on the ice planet. Green Lantern has created a green snowboard using his power ring and is blasting down the side of a mountain with glee. Hawkgirl is there to watch and when Green Lantern comes to a stop she remarks that she thinks it’s odd for a man who can fly through space to get so worked up by snow. Green Lantern tells her it reminds him of his grandmother and how he used to play in the snow as a kid. He offers a “See?” like he’s going to prove to her how awesome snow is and goes on to assemble a snowman with his ring. When Hawkgirl doesn’t heap praise upon him he flops to his back to show her another “secret” and makes a snow angel. He points out his “wings” and Hawkgirl is appropriately unimpressed. What is this? Are we to assume Hawkgirl has never seen snow before or the things that kids do with the snow? When she turns her back to him he nails her with a snowball and when she angrily asks what that was for, he responds with “It’s supposed to be fun.” Predictably, Hawkgirl returns the remark with a smile and uses her mace to conjure up a wave of snow herself and sends it in Green Lantern’s direction. They both then enthusiastically commence what is sure to be an epic snowball fight before we cut to another scene. That might be the worst thing Paul Dini has ever written.
You can’t have Christmas without orphans.
The next scene begins with an exterior shot of an orphanage. It would seem the structure of this episode is going to be “how each member of the Justice League (minus Batman and Wonder Woman) spends Christmas.” And for this one, it’s The Flash. Well, I suppose I ruined the surprise there as the scene begins with a woman (Kimberly Brooks) prepping a group of kids for the arrival of the man in the red suit. We’re probably supposed to think she means Santa, but The Flash comes zipping in to the delight of the kids. I was hoping they’d be bummed it wasn’t Santa, but I guess we’re playing things pretty straight. He mentions he’s there and he’s bringing gifts and questions what the kids want this year. They direct his attention to the TV where a commercial for a DJ Rubber Ducky is playing. It’s terrible, but likely intentionally so, as it’s a rapping duck who shakes his ass at the screen and makes farting noises. I can’t tell if they’re supposed to be farting noises or if they’re just a poor imitation of traditional, animated, duck noises that we see from the likes of Donald Duck or Quackers. Flash seems amused though and promises the kids he’ll get that for them while the woman cautions him about making a promise he can’t keep since the stores are apparently sold out. Flash is dismissive of her concerns setting up this plot for us as Flash needs to supply some orphans with a sought after Christmas toy. This is definitely going to be a low stakes episode.
He’s feeling just a bit out of place.
Next we check-in with Superman and Martian Manhunter. Superman has apparently decided to take his green buddy back home to the farm for a good old-fashioned Christmas. Hey, if it worked for Garfield then it can work for the Manhunter. J’onn is unsure of his presence here, but Clark insists he wasn’t leaving him alone at the Watchtower, which I assume is their headquarters. We also get our one mention of Batman as Clark remarks that he insisted on monitor duty tonight. When they enter the house we’re introduced to Martha (Shelley Fabares) and Jonathan Kent (Mike Farrell) who welcome their son in. Clark tells them he brought a friend, and J’onn introduces himself and lets them know that their son insisted on his coming. He also introduces himself as a martian which naturally doesn’t phase the Kent parents and they welcome him into their home. Once inside, Clark asks where Kara (aka Supergirl) is and we’re informed she’s skiing with Barbara (Batgirl) and won’t be home until New Years. Clark remarks that J’onn can stay in her room then we cut to the big man entering a very, girly, looking bedroom. He indicates to Clark that it’s a bit strange seeing this side of him, but Clark just lets him know that’s because here he can be himself and relax. We then hear his dad call out from the other room that he’s lighting the tree causing Clark to bolt out of the room like a child crying out “That’s my job!” Left alone, J’onn takes a seat on the bed and seems a little sad. A cat saunters in and we actually see the green guy smile and call out “kitty,” but he just gets a hiss in return which seems to wound him more than a scratch would have.
That’s better, much more creative this time around.
We next check in on the snow fight (yay). Green Lantern has magicked up a trio of glowing, green, catapults which sling a volley of massive snow balls in Hawkgirl’s direction. She maneuvers around them through the air and smashes her mace into the ground sending a shockwave in Green Lantern’s direction. He takes a direct hit which knocks him into a tree causing a mass of snow to fall from its branches and bury him. Hawkgirl lands with a cocky grin on her face that soon fades when a dozen, green, hands emerge from the snow all brandishing a snowball. They fire off an assortment of snowballs in her direction causing her to give up. Immediately after her concession a snowball hits her square in the face to add insult to injury. Green Lantern then emerges from the snow to inquire if she’s feeling more festive now. She indicates she’s not and that she just doesn’t get the holidays on Earth. She mentions that on her home world (okay, so she is an alien which makes the last scene slightly less ridiculous) they had a different sort of celebration and that she’s only encountered one other like it on another planet. She apparently can’t get home, but she could get to this other world and Green Lantern seems game. It sounds like we’re going to see an otherworldly holiday when we next check-in with this pair.
Is Flash going to meet Santa?!
Back on Earth, Flash is shown running through traffic pausing for a moment to wave to a little kid riding in a car. He whirls past a Santa on the corner and deposits a dollar into his collection box and helps himself to a candy cane. His ultimate destination though is a toy store which is surrounded by a mob of angry folks. When Flash gets there, one man urges him to do something and accuses the store owner of hoarding this DJ Rubber Ducky toy, but he insists he’s completely sold out as he tries to hold the doors closed. The crowd disperses and we’re shown Flash race from store-to-store and all have a “Sold Out” sign posted regarding the toy. Flash then grumbles how dealing with Gorilla Grodd was easier than finding this thing, but takes notice of a store display featuring Santa’s workshop. He then remarks that’s his solution – to go straight to the source! Is Flash going to visit Santa? No, apparently not. He heads to a factory in China where the toy is made and we see him walking out with the factory’s last DJ Rubber Ducky. A Mr. Hama (Robert Ito) tells him that they’re happy to pass on the last unit to someone like The Flash and we see that this silly toy is freaking huge! It’s basically the size of Flash’s torso.
“You drink from the skull of your holiday idol?”
Next we return to the home of the Kents to see how Martian Manhunter is doing. The family is gathered at the kitchen table and the Kents are telling stories about young Clark at Christmas. Jonathan remarks that they used to have to wrap his presents with lead foil so he couldn’t peek and Clark rather sternly remarks, “You mean Santa wrapped my presents,” and the Kents just go along with that. Meanwhile, Martian Manhunter looks a touch confused and looks down to the steaming mug in his hand which bares the visage of Santa Claus. Martha then informs J’onn that anyone who attends Christmas at their home leaves with a present and she hands over a box to J’onn. He seems surprised, and conjures his inner little drummer boy by pointing out that he brought no gift in return. Martha insists though and J’onn opens his gift to find it contains a rather nice looking sweater, not an ugly Christmas sweater. She says she hopes it fits as he slips it on, over his cape I might add, and then tells her not to worry as he smiles and expands his body to fill the sweater. It’s actually pretty absurd that the sweater was too big in the first place since this guy is a massive man, or rather, a massive martian.
Sometimes you want to go…
We cut to a billboard of a scantily clad woman on a foreign world. I’m guessing Bruce Timm is responsible for this shot. This is the planet Hawkgirl was talking about and we spy she and Green Lantern descending to ground level. Despite that billboard containing a shot of a human looking woman, the streets are largely filled with inhumanoid aliens including one that’s just a big snake scooting about. Green Lantern asks if this is the place she goes to relax and Hawkgirl responds with a no, this is the place she heads to for fun! She leads him to a sleazy looking nightclub and the two make their way to the bar. She orders a pair of drinks that just look like frothy milk in a beer stein. She chugs one and lets out a loud belch when done remarking it’s delicious and slides the other one over to Green Lantern. He gives it a try and promptly spits it out. When he looks at the drink he spies two worms floating in it. I suppose it makes sense that a hawk girl would enjoy such a delicacy. She then turns to him and the background audio drops as she remarks only one more thing is needed to make this evening better. Green Lantern says “Yeah?” and he seems to think she’s looking for a kiss only for her to whirl around and smash this gigantic alien seated at the bar with her mace. She quickly hands the mace to Green Lantern while the monster rages and when he turns to her she gestures to Green Lantern indicating to the creature that he is the one responsible for the pain in his hand. The monster pounces on him and the two roll around the floor. A pair of aliens look at the brawl and then smile at each other before one blasts the other in the face with its mug. This sets off a bar-wide brawl leaving Hawkgirl to sip her drink with a contented smile upon her face. I thought this was the sort of carnage heroes were supposed to prevent, not start.
Finally! Some action!
We find The Flash racing towards Central City duck-in-hand. Upon arrival though he encounters an explosion at a museum and heads over there to survey the damage. As he walks inside he sets the duck down and wonders who would blow up a bunch of priceless artwork? His answer is Ultra-Humanite (Ian Buchanan), a big man-ape in suspenders with a huge cranium indicating he’s rather intelligent, though lacks fashion sense. He apparently finds the use of public money to fund art offensive so he decided to blow it up – makes sense. He’s also armed with a laser gun and starts firing off at Flash who manages to avoid it. He ends up under a suspended sculpture that the villain blasts from the ceiling and it falls on him. He even looks up to see it, but still gets nailed. I thought this guy was fast? Ultra-Humanite then approaches eager to finish him off, but he takes too long for when he blasts he finds no Flash. Worse, his gun won’t even fire as Flash brandishes the giant battery he yanked from it when he ran by and taunts him by suggesting he should have asked Santa for some more. This enrages Ultra-Humanite, but Flash just pummels him. The shot is from behind Ultra-Humanite so we don’t actually see his fists land, but it’s more than implied. Unfortunately though, he lands right on old DJ Rubber Ducky.
No! Not DJ Rubber Ducky!
Flash hears the crack and knows what happened immediately. When Ultra-Humanite gets up to reveal the broken toy, Flash runs over to, I guess, check on it. Ultra-Humanite doesn’t care and just casually strolls away remarking how it’s just plastic and crude electronics. Flash tries to appeal to him by asking him if he can recall having his hopes and dreams dashed when he doesn’t get what he wanted most and Ultra-Humanite just remarks it happens quite frequently and the Justice League are usually the ones responsible. He thinks the kids would be better off with a book, and he’s probably not wrong, though impractical. Flash is pretty heartbroken and as Ultra-Humanite reloads he even suggest he can go ahead and use that gun on him since he couldn’t possibly feel any worse than he already does. When he said this, his back was towards the villain and Ultra-Humanite is happy to oblige! As Flash turns his head he gets smashed in the face with the butt of the gun.
This is an unexpected development.
Flash is then shown waking up from his concussion laying on the floor. He’s in a lab, or work shop, of some kind and as he rubs his head he sits up and finds Ultra-Humanite at a work bench fixing the duck. Ultra-Humanite tells Flash that his words did not fall on deaf ears and in the spirit of the holiday he proposes a truce. Flash is confused, but seemingly accepts the truce by shaking the hand of the man-ape. He’s then told by Ultra-Humanite that he is repairing the toy while also making some improvements. Flash asks him if he’s rigging it with explosives and Ultra-Humanite rather sternly says “Flash, it is Christmas!” Flash then counters with the question we’re likely all wondering, “Then why did you hit me?” “You hit me first.” Okay, seems fair. He then asks Flash to hand him a screwdriver and I guess we’re just all going to forget about that whole blowing up the museum thing?
They always wind up at a church.
We return to Martian Manhunter who has apparently ditched that nice sweater gifted to him by the Kents. He’s just staring out the window, but then goes intangible and passes through the floor. From there he spies the Kents doing the dishes and making out a bit in the process. It’s an odd kink, but we don’t kink shame here. He then moves onto the living room where Clark is placing gifts under the tree. He picks one up and remarks, “Lead,” so he’s not placing gifts, but peeking! Good thing you have a lot of good will built up with Santa, Clark! J’onn then moves outside and into town where he returns to a solid state and transforms his appearance to that of a human. He then sees a couple walking down the sidewalk who wish him a “Merry Christmas,” and he returns the gesture with a polite wave. He observes them head into a diner and then moves on. J’onn finds himself outside a home and he can hear a young girl inside assuring a “Tommy” that Santa is real and she just knows he’ll come and eat the cookies she left out. This seems to stir something in J’onn who smiles a bit. He drops his disguise and flies up onto the roof, the sound of which wakes the little girl up with a start. We see the cookies and milk left out, and J’onn’s hand pops out of the fireplace to snatch one of the cookies. We next find J’onn outside a church and we can hear singing from within. He’s just standing outside in the snow back in his normal, green, appearance listening to the hymn which is “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear.” When the verse ends with “The world in solemn stillness lay to hear the angels sing,” he almost winces and perhaps a look of understanding crosses his face.
This is going well.
Back at the brawl, Green Lantern is still tangling with the big guy while Hawkgirl is now involved smacking around some poor fools of her own. The whole place is in chaos and Hawkgirl is quick to point out that this is way better than a snowball fight! Green Lantern agrees, but I’m detecting some sarcasm here, as he blasts the big monster man away with his ring. He then conjures up a green boot to kick an alien off of Hawkgirl and goes to help her up, only for her to call out “Don’t let your guard down!” He turns and finds the monster has returned and he knocks him into Hawkgirl.
You know what, I like it.
We somewhat abruptly cut back to the orphanage and Flash and Ultra-Humanite’s silhouettes appear on the door as they approach the building. They’re arguing about Ultra-Humanite wearing a costume and Flash points out that he put on the beard and also suggests that the big gorilla guy wouldn’t want to scare the kids, would he? We can tell he’s trying to place a top hat on him, and I’m guessing it’s a Frosty look. Flash then enters the room and declares himself Santa Flash! The prior shot made it look like they were at the entrance to the orphanage from outside, but the entrance shot makes it seem like they were already in the orphanage. I’m guess it’s just an error. Flash is sporting the hat and beard, but that red suit of his could really use some padding. He’s greeted with cheers and then goes on to introduce his helper: Freaky the Snowman! Ultra-Humanite enters to no reaction from the children. He’s clad all in white and sporting the top hat and deadpan expression. He rather curtly instructs Flash to give them the toy and then take him to jail, so I guess we aren’t just going to forget about the arson from earlier.
Time for a Christmas rave!
Flash once more seeks to confirm that it won’t explode and Ultra-Humanite seems offended by the suggestion. He places the toy on the floor himself and turns it on. The kids are then surprised to hear the voice of Ultra-Humanite come from the toy duck as it beckons them to come closer and hear a story. It’s going to tell them the tale of The Nutcracker and Ultra-Humanite rather smugly mentions to Flash how he improved upon the original. Flash doesn’t seem convinced and remarks he preferred the “poopy noises.” He then notices the kids all sitting around the duck with smiles on their faces. They may not have received the duck they thought they were getting, but they seem content with this one. Flash then smiles and agrees that this present is good too. We then fade out to see Ultra-Humanite being lead into prison by two guards. As he enters his cell he remarks “Haven’t I seen enough of you for one night?” He’s speaking to Flash, who was waiting for him. He setup a little Christmas tree in the big guy’s cell and tells him he thought he could use a little Christmas cheer. Ultra-Humanite approaches and observes that it’s an aluminum tree. Flash basically starts to apologize for being corny and all, but Ultra-Humanite stops him by saying he had one just like it as…though he trails off a bit. Flash leaves him to his tree and once out of the cell Ultra-Humanite turns on a floor lamp that projects Christmas lights all throughout the cell. He sits on the bench and a hint of a smile seems to cross his face as Flash looks on with a more obvious smile from outside the cell.
It’s an unconventional relationship, but this is a no judgement zone.
We return to the D plot of the episode where the bar brawl has apparently come to an end. The place is trashed and there’s one, lone, janitor uselessly sweeping the floor which is littered with numerous unconscious bodies. The camera pans over to find Green Lantern and Hawkgirl in a seated position with the big monster guy. His arm is draped around the two of them and it would appear they’re enjoying a post brawl cuddle session. Green Lantern and the monster guy are unconscious, but Hawkgirl isn’t. She’s sporting a very contented smile and plants a kiss on Green Lantern’s cheek and says, “Merry Christmas, John.” Too many John or John sounding names in this show. That’s apparently the end of this one though as she basically returns to the cuddles.
Martha seems to be a little freaked out by J’onn’s singing, but is trying to put on a nice face.
At the home of the Kents, it’s still dark. We find Clark asleep in his bed, but his eyes soon pop open and a smile crosses his face. He hops out of bed and puts on his robe apparently intent on heading for the tree on Christmas morning. He opens his bedroom door and we can see from the window that the sun is just starting to rise, so the tree is fair game at this point. As he walks into the hall he finds both of his parents standing there with smiles on their faces outside the bedroom door where J’onn is staying. We can hear singing coming from within the room, and the melody is similar to “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” but the words are unintelligible as he’s apparently singing in his native tongue. Clark places a hand on the shoulder of each parent and remarks “And he said he didn’t bring a gift,” so I guess they’re enjoying the song. We then cut to inside the bedroom and J’onn is seated by the window, naked, stroking the cat. He’s in a more alien form than usual and I suppose the takeaway is that he found the Christmas spirit and apparently the cat did too. We get one last exterior shot of the Kent home before the credits roll.
Petting a cat with no pants on is definitely a bold move.
The premise of “Comfort and Joy” makes a lot of sense for this show. If you’re going to do a Christmas episode about a superhero team it would seem the approach is to either have some big, Christmas, mess or just try to show what the holidays mean to each hero. It’s a bit odd to completely exclude Wonder Woman (Batman is essentially excused by Clark and we’re left to assume that Christmas Eve is just another work day for grumpy Bruce, or an act of selflessness on his part since he doesn’t have a family to spend Christmas with), but that’s the issue with superhero teams: it can be hard to find room for everybody. And on the surface, the approach makes sense. For Flash, we just see how he solves a problem that arises from the mere existence of Christmas. For Hawkgirl, she’s from another world and needs to find a way to relate to Christmas and also wishes to share her interpretation of a holiday with her apparent lover. And for Martian Manhunter, who seems to be mostly devoid of emotion, he really has nothing in his past to allow him to relate or identify with the holiday so Clark takes it upon himself to bridge that gap.
This guy is the show-stealer for me. His motivation to educate the children with finer points is both clever and amusing.
The problem lies in the execution. This episode really wants to be profound. It wants to be a feel good story and also likely seeks to ask the audience what Christmas means to them. It’s just overly simplistic with the approach that leaves little room for a genuine emotional response. The first half of the episode is pretty dreadful. I hated that initial scene between Hawkgirl and Green Lantern and honestly their plot never landed for me. There were no stakes and nothing about the resolution was all that fun or interesting. The plot with Flash had some stakes, albeit they weren’t exactly important. I mean, I want orphans to have a nice Christmas and all, but the material possessions aren’t that important. At the same time, I do appreciate it not completely dismissing the material component as we all know kids want to wake up on Christmas morning to find that toy they want. And if it doesn’t happen, they’re going to be pretty bummed. Still, it found its footing once Ultra-Humanite was introduced via the humor he injected into the story. I liked his deadpan delivery and he’s a well-written character in a very literal sense as his words and delivery are quite entertaining. The resolution was corny, as Flash pointed out, but what Christmas episode isn’t?
Hey look, he gets it!
With the Martian Manhunter plot, Dini was really trying to hit a home run, but he only managed a bloop single. There’s some good character animation with Manhunter via his reactions to what is around him and his struggle to find something in the holiday he can relate to is interesting on the surface. I enjoyed the small bits of humor sprinkled into the story via Clark and his attitudes towards Christmas. I love that Superman believes in Santa and he’s very serious about it and his regression to a more childlike state is handled well and not overdone. Manhunter finding some meaning in the song he hears from outside the church feels forced. It’s like Dini was trying to find a unique way for J’onn to find the Christmas spirit, but the manner in which he settled on is just an empty one. The climax of that plot just doesn’t do it for me. I’m not a talented enough writer to offer a suggestion on how to better craft the climax, I just know it doesn’t land for me. And as someone who consumes and enjoys consuming a lot of cheesy Christmas stuff, it’s not hard to move me with such a tale, but I got nothing out of this one. Sorry, J’onn.
If you like your superhero shows to possess some realism and a serious approach, then I suppose this is still worth giving a look since there really aren’t a lot like it. The Christmas episodes for Batman and The New Batman Adventures aren’t particularly strong either, but they are more fun. I would much prefer those to this one, but maybe you’re a Superman or Martian Manhunter fan more than you are a Batman one. If you want to watch it, it’s presently streaming on the Max platform despite threats of removal earlier this year. If this is after 2023 that you’re reading this, then who knows if it’s still there (or if Max is even still alive)? It’s also still available to rent or buy digitally from places like Amazon. The show was released on DVD and they were still reasonably priced at the time of this writing, but if the show were to get delisted, it wouldn’t shock me if aftermarket prices started to rise. I think such an approach is only merited by those who want to take-in the full series as dropping some coin for the full 52 episodes just to experience this one is probably not worth it.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
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When the credits started to roll in 2010 signaling the end of Toy Story 3 I think most who were watching it assumed this was “good bye.” The toys which had captured the hearts of movie-goers going on two decades were saying good bye to their former owner and playmate, Andy, and so too were…
This one has been a long time coming. One of my all-time favorite television shows is The Venture Bros., but it’s a show I really haven’t spent much time discussing on this blog. I guess because I view it as contemporary, even though the pilot premiered almost 20 years ago now. For most of this blog’s life it has been considered ongoing, but the eighth season of the show ended up being a COVID casualty, or whatever Warner Media wants to blame it on, so it has come to an unceremonious end. As of this writing, a finale is said to be in the works that will someday air on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim block, but with how things have been going with Discovery and Warner that finale seems to be very much in doubt. Hopefully, I won’t have to update this to say it’s been cancelled, though it would be nice to have to update it to say it has a release date.
The Venture Bros. began life as a Johnny Quest spoof. Doc Venture, his bodyguard Brock, and his twin sons Hank and Dean travel the world in their high-tech jet and go on adventures. Only with the Ventures, Doc is basically a huge failure who is often just after a quick buck. He gets by on selling his dead father’s legitimate inventions and sometimes to the wrong people. The central theme of the show is failure as Doc Venture isn’t a real doctor of anything who basically fell backwards into the role his dad played (he was a boy adventurer and basically his world’s version of Johnny Quest, though there’s also a character named Action Johnny, it gets confusing) when he died suddenly before the events of the show and he’s basically just treading water. Because of his name and reputation, he has a bodyguard in Samson issued by the government to keep an eye on things. The show’s lore would expand exponentially as it went along and the Johnny Quest spoof was essentially dropped as a result.
This is the rare Christmas special that has two title cards. I couldn’t decide which I liked more.
The show’s first season ended its broadcast back in October of 2004, but waiting for Christmas of that year was a special: A Very Venture Christmas. Cartoon Network had (has?) a notoriously tight checkbook when it comes to its original content and especially so with Adult Swim. They were able to get by with very cheap, but also very entertaining, shows like Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Sealab 2021 in the early days and that basically had a ripple effect on everything that follows. The Venture Bros., being a more traditionally animated show, was also scrutinized by the network due to its costs relative to those other shows even though its animation budget was nothing compared with Saturday morning cartoons or even primetime ones like The Simpsons. It would get better, but that first season especially didn’t look that much more impressive than the rest of the original content airing on Adult Swim.
This one begins with an almost perfect recreation of the old CBS Special Presentation animation.
Because of that, the budget for the special was small and it was so small that it remains the only episode that’s 11 minutes, basically half the length of a standard episode. This made it more like a standard Adult Swim original and there’s another reason for that. Originally, series co-creator Jackson Publick (real name Christopher McCulloch) conceived of the special as being part of a block of Christmas originals to air in 2004. Making this one shorter than usual made sense since it could slot in with the other shows to form an hour or a half hour’s worth of content. He thought he had the network and the other shows onboard, but it apparently all fell apart and the only episode of TV to come of the whole thing is the one we’re about to talk about. It was even supposed to be shorter, but Adult Swim wouldn’t be able to find time for a 7 minute thing and by filling a quarter of an hour it at least worked well enough for them. Partly because of that, Publick doesn’t seem to think much of this episode because it ended up being rushed and the unique running time only adds to that feeling. Other series co-creator, Doc Hammer, is even less complimentary of it saying “I hate that fucking Christmas special.”
Oh no, not another Christmas Carol parody…
This one begins with a spoof on the old CBS Special Presentation graphic. According to Hammer, he got it so close to the original that they had to make some changes because it looked too much like it. This homage has certainly been done a lot since, but this is one of the first I can recall seeing (I think South Park beat them to it). After that, we’re taken to a cemetery in an obvious parody of A Christmas Carol. Doc Venture (James Urbaniak) is being shown his own grave by the Grim Reaper-like Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come and he’s obviously in some distress. When he asks the ghost to confirm it is indeed his grave, despite the tombstone being clearly marked, he throws back his hood to reveal himself to be Brock Samson (Patrick Warburton), Venture’s bodyguard, and responds to him sarcastically since the grave is obvious.
Nah! This isn’t a straight parody of anything, but it is front-loaded with a bunch of quick hits to more famous Christmas specials.
Venture wails and begs on his knees until he wakes up grasping an orange husband pillow in his own bed. He is delighted to find he has woken up and declares he will live in the past, present, and the future. As he says that, we get an X-Ray shot identical to the one from How the Grinch Stole Christmas that shows his heart growing in size until it breaks through the frame. He goes into the Scrooge routine of jumping around and declaring his glee before running out onto a balcony to call out to a boy. The boy is his son, Hank (Jackson Publick), who is clearly dressed to resemble Charlie Brown and is even carrying a sad, little, tree. Venture asks the kid what day is it and Hank responds, “Duh. It’s Christmas Day!” which just further delights this Scrooge-Venture.
Why if it isn’t old Hank Brown and his pathetic little tree!
Suddenly, Venture’s nose glows red and his pajamas disappear as he starts to float. He then soars over the Venture compound like Rudolph wishing a “Merry Christmas!” to all he passes over like George Bailey at the end of It’s a Wonderful Life. He passes by Dr. Orpheus (Stephen Rattazzi), a necromancer who rents an apartment on the Venture compound, who returns the greeting by calling him Mr. Venture. I love that he refuses to acknowledge Venture’s phony doctorate. He also wishes a merry Christmas to the family robot, H.E.L.P.eR., which is dressed as Tiny Tim. After he passes the camera pans over to son Dean dressed as a clown who wonders why his dad didn’t wish him a merry Christmas. The camera zooms out further as Dean (Michael Sinterniklaas) declares “No one wants a Dean-in-the-box!” and we see he is dressed as Charlie from the Rudolph special.
You’re right, son, no one wants a Dean-in-the-box.
The image then dissolves into static and we see Dr. Venture waking up yet again. It would seem he fell asleep on his TV remote causing the channel to just keep changing. At it does, we hear lines from famous Christmas specials like the ones we just saw depicted in the dream. Some of the lines are modified slightly, while others are left completely unchanged. Most sound like they’re voiced by Publick and I do really like his “Thirty-nine and a half foot pole!” chant. Venture then sits up and rubs his head and says “Oh thank God, I thought I turned into a complete [censored],” It’s bleeped out even on the DVD release, but I think he just said “asshole,” but I’m not certain. We then smash-cut to a festive rendition of the traditional show opening. There’s snow falling and jingle bells playing and there’s wreaths and a new red-green color scheme and other festive stuff inserted. It’s very corny and silly, but what can I say, this stuff works on me!
This is extra funny because the Sears Wish Book really would hang around for years. It was as big as a phone book and must-read for kids year in and year out.
When the credits end we find Doc heading down the stairs to the kitchen with a cup of coffee in-hand. It’s apparently no good as he winces when he takes a sip. Brock is on the phone with a store of some kind and he can be heard asking if they have the Joker Mobile in-stock. The voice on the other end of the phone tells him they haven’t had that in-stock for years and he hangs the phone up with disappointment. Doc smiles and asks if he’s still shopping for the boys and Brock confirms he’s all set with Hank, but Dean is proving to be a challenge. When Doc suggests it’s because he’s too feminine, Brock just says he’s hard to shop for, which is sweet of Brock. Doc points out that Dean has been not-so-slyly leaving some Sears catalog laying around for a month and Brock encourages him to check the date on the cover as he holds it up. It’s a Sears Wish Book from 1976, which explains the Joker Mobile thing, and Doc just grumbles that the Green Machine he ordered probably isn’t showing up too as he walks out.
Old man Venture sure enjoys some novelty Christmas pornography.
Dean enters the kitchen to see if Brock is done with the phone. As Brock exits, Dean sees the catalog and asks if anyone misplaced it in a cheeky fashion. His question is ignored, but he doesn’t seem too disappointed by it as he starts dialing a number on the phone. It’s for some Christmas story hotline. As Dean settles in for a Christmas story from Holland, Hank can be seen snooping in a closet. Brock catches him and tells him his present isn’t in there, but Hank tries to dismiss the accusation by saying he was just looking for the Christmas videos. He then pulls out a stack and reads off some of the titles: Miracle on 69 Street, Jingle Balls, and my personal favorite, Frothy the Blowman. We get a quick look at the box art for some of them and it’s rather bawdy. For some reason, Frothy looks like the Pringles guy with a top hat. Brock interrupts him and takes the obviously X-Rated novelty films and tells Hank he needs his help hanging up the lights and hands him a staple gun. Hank twirls it like a revolver and holsters it somehow on his belt as Brock returns the tapes to the closet. As he does, Hank asks him “What were those elves doing to that lady?” and Brock just replies with “They’re called dwarves, Hank.”
Quick! Get out of there, Tiny Joseph!
As Hank goes to head outside he says, “Oh! Baby Jesus is out of the manger!” Brock reacts by checking the fly on his pants, then realizes that Hank was actually talking about the Baby Jesus porcelain doll which is just laying beside a manger scene on-top of a shelf. Hank goes to put the baby in the cradle, but Brock stops him and tells him the baby doesn’t get put in there until midnight. It’s apparently a Venture tradition that Hank forgot about, or just never knew. They head outside and the baby Jesus rolls over to reveal some wiring. The camera cuts to the manger and then to a bunch of C-4 under it!
You must have known we’d get a Monarch sighting in this one.
We immediately hear the voice of the arch nemesis of clan Venture – The Monarch! Monarch (Publick) orders Tiny Joseph, which is revealed to be the Joseph statuette in the display, to get out of there! He mops some sweat from his brow and returns the real Joseph statue to its place as he bails. Monarch is relieved they didn’t lose an agent on this mission, though he does concede that his specialty is rather limited.
He is good at these villain speeches.
In the background, Dr. Girlfriend (Doc Hammer) can be seen trimming a tree with a pair of henchmen. She’s dressed in a festive, girly, Santa suit, and questions Monarch about what he’s up to. Monarch tells her it was supposed to be a surprise, but she’s irritated that his surprise for her is killing his arch enemy on Christmas. Monarch tries to assuage her by saying he has stocking stuffers too, but it’s not working. Dr. Girlfriend, ever the understanding partner, asks him what the plan is since it’s obvious he’s dying to tell her. Monarch then walks over to a model of the Venture compound and explains how at the stroke of midnight during Venture’s annual Christmas party, the baby Jesus will be placed in the manger which is wired with C-4. At that moment it will explode decking the halls with bowels of Venture! He’s really into it, but Dr. Girlfriend just tosses her hat on the floor in anger and says “That model was supposed to be a surprise!” which forces the Monarch to respond in a meek voice, “I peeked.”
They included almost everyone from Season One as a background character for this party.
Back at the compound, it’s night time and the party is in full swing. In the background are basically all of the guest characters from the first season with the exception of Jonas Jr, who was revealed in the season finale. This thing takes place sometime before that. The Impossible family is there, including Sally who looks pregnant, Sasquatch, the old Team Venture, and even one of the lucha libre guys from the first episode. H.E.L.P.eR. is serving drinks in a festive apron and reindeer antlers and some of the guests have different attire, including Triana Orpheus (Lisa Hammer) who is in a crimson dress with holly in her hair. Lurking behind her are Pete White (Publick) and Billy Quizboy (Hammer) as the two eye Triana. It’s rather gross since both of them are adults, and Triana is a minor. Pete is extra gross since he’s wearing a mistletoe headband. As he tells Billy he’s going to talk to her, Billy just tells him he has no chance because he’s 1. Totally gay, 2. She’s hot and he’s an albino, and 3. He’s totally gay. He’s not really gay, but he has a feminine cadence to his voice which makes him the target of gay jokes. This was made in 2004.
You deserved worse, Pete.
Pete and Billy then venture over to the couch and sit on either side of Triana. Pete tries to impress her by saying he was one of the first DJs at his college radio station to play The Bauhaus which causes Triana to say “Wow, you must be, like, 60?” clearly not impressed. Pete ignores the sass and tries to make use of the mistletoe on his headband but it immediately goes up in flames. Dr. Orpheus is the reason for that, and Pete makes a hasty retreat as Triana tells her dad she can take care of herself. He responds in a calm manner with understanding, but drops the façade quickly and declares dramatically to the rest of the party goers that “My pumpkin’s maidenhood is not a prize to be,” further embarrassing the poor kid.
Probably shouldn’t just leave that laying around, Dr. O.
Orpheus leaves his daughter to sulk on the couch and encounters Venture coming down the stairs. Venture remarks that he’s surprised to see a necromancer like Orpheus attending a Christmas party. Orpheus responds that Christmas is about as real as Kwanzaa or the Wookie’s Life Day, but that he finds it charming. Me too, Byron, me too. In the kitchen, we see Dean on the phone yet again listening to another story as Hank enters, sporting a white and green sweater that I think depicts a reindeer, to warn Dean that the “Gay albino is hitting on your not girlfriend.” Dean can’t be bothered as he’s maxed out their dad’s credit card and still doesn’t have a good story. I think the implication is they’re being counted on to tell a Christmas story at this party? Either way, the problem appears to have a solution sitting on a nearby table: Dr. O’s Necronomicon!
The beast approaches!
The boys open the foreboding book and immediately a black cloud emerges. They think nothing of it and start flipping through it and Dean finds an entry that intrigues him: Krampus! He starts reading it aloud and it’s written in another language, which looks like German and would make sense given a joke to follow. As he reads it, we cut back to the party and a bored looking Orpheus is stuck listening to Venture talk about a book he’s writing. Some creepy chanting has been added to the background music as the rest of the sounds of the party fade out. Orpheus’s face then changes to one of worry and he springs into action. A first person shot of something running towards the compound is shown before we cut back to the kitchen where Dean declares this book makes no sense. A lock appears over his mouth as the door slams shut and Orpheus is revealed to be the source of this magic, but he cries that they’re too late!
This dude looks ready to party!
The front door gets blasted in and the Krampus enters! He’s mostly faithfully depicted as a brown-furred demon with a long tongue and a basket of children on his back. This version has very pronounced nipples and we get a sequence of quick cuts of people reacting to the entrance, including Monarch who is watching a video feed. He demands to know who this guy is, but pauses to admire the costume. As Krampus stalks the party, everyone just looks on. Doc asks Orpheus what the thing is and he informs him it’s Krampus. He describes him as a demonic spirit that once rode alongside Saint Nicholas dishing out punishment to bad children. Doc is confused since he though Santa was fake, but Dr. O tells him he was real up until 1963 when a plane took him out. He adds that Krampus hasn’t been seen since the Pope banished him to Purgatory during Vatican II.
Everyone seems rather calm about the whole demon in the room thing.
Hank and Dean, who still has the magic lock over his mouth, emerge to proclaim their innocence in this whole mess when Dr. O tells their father that it was they who released him. As Hank blames Dean, we see Krampus licking the face of Triana. Hasn’t the poor girl suffered enough tonight? Doc asks Dr. O what kind of kinky spirit this thing is and he responds “Well, it is Germanic in origin.” Doc then asks Orpheus if he can “magic” it away and his response is “No more than you can ‘science’ it away,” He then explains it will merely punish those it deems wicked and be on its way.
Now there’s a Christmas card for ya!
Doc insists there’s no one wicked in this house, which is just the cue for Krampus to grab him! He starts flaying him with his reeds with a look of delight on his face as Doc hangs upside down in the grasp of Krampus. The rest of the crowd gasps as Krampus slams Doc’s head into the floor then drops him on all fours and starts dry-humping him from behind. Doc has no idea what to do aside to call for Brock who soon enters dressed as Santa Claus. He informs Krampus that he’s been naughty and promptly swings his sack of gifts at the demon. He knocks him from Doc and begins pounding on him. Krampus gives as good as he gets and the two are locked in fisticuffs when the clock strikes midnight.
He didn’t even get a chance to put his beard on.
Suddenly, Krampus stops and Brock backs off. Dr. Orpheus informs him that it’s now Christmas and the Krampus is done for the night. Krampus very calmly walks towards the door, but pauses when he sees the baby Jesus figurine still sitting on the shelf. He picks it up and we cut to Monarch who was covering his eyes in terror, but immediately perks up when he see Krampus pick up the porcelain baby. He places it in the manger, and we cut to an external shot of the compound exploding.
That’ll wake you up.
Doc Venture, once again, awakes from a dream. Brock is telling him to wake up and we see his head is wrapped in bandages and they’re aboard their supersonic jet, the X-1. He’s relieved that everything is all right, but Brock informs him that they’ve crashed in hostile territory, but the boys are excited because it’s the town of Bethlehem. Doc also presently has no pants on and H.E.L.P.eR. has a thermometer inserted into his anus because it’s funny to wake up with something in your bum. The boys declare this the best Christmas ever because they got to see where Jesus was born and Hank tells their dad that there was magical god-fire shooting out of it. Brock then tells Doc he thinks they hit a gas line, then explains their situation further to be that if the Israelis get there first, they should be fine, but if it’s the PLO then they’re in trouble. Doc doesn’t seem dismayed as he reminds Brock their plane runs on plutonium and declares that the PLO will love them! Dean gets in a “And that’s what Christmas is all about,” before we smash-cut to another title card and the credits roll as this one is over and it’s the rare episode to not feature a post credits scene.
Suddenly, getting assaulted by Krampus doesn’t seem so bad.
And that is how the Ventures celebrated one Christmas. Or, how they didn’t? I guess it was all a dream, though Brock mentions he’s giving Hank his old bass guitar for Christmas and Hank will be shown with that bass in future episodes so I guess some of it came true. It is weird to rely on the dream trope for more than one gag in an episode, especially an 11 minute one, but given that this thing came together so quickly I guess it can be forgiven. Though maybe they could have just written Monarch’s bomb to be a dud to avoid having to play the dream card again? Interestingly enough, the bit at the end with the gang in Bethlehem is actually how the special was originally conceived and it’s one of the few things that survived the change from a 7 minute thing to an 11 minute one.
There’s a solid amount of laughs in this brief special and definitely some quality visual gags.
As a Christmas special, and one that lampoons others, I think this one is fine. I don’t really get why Doc Hammer hates it so much, but he has a very specific sense of taste so I guess I can see him just not being at all onboard with a Christmas special. Especially one he had very little input on. There are certainly moments I don’t like, such as the adult characters hitting on a minor. I suppose it’s not that bad to see such a thing in here because part of the show is that many of these characters aren’t of strong, moral, character, but I feel like Pete deserved more punishment than what he got. Plus, Billy was basically an accomplice and he gets nothing. A lot of the stuff with Krampus and the pornography joke earlier is a bit lewd, or crass. It definitely dates this one as it feels very much like something that aired on Adult Swim in 2004. A lot of the jokes here aren’t something they would have done in later seasons. The gay jokes are the most cringe-inducing, but they’re not as bad as some jokes from that era are.
The animation for this one is pretty much on-par with the rest of the first season. It’s perhaps a bit simpler with some of the character movements, but the effort in presenting a lot of them in different outfits is certainly something to commend. Some of the character animation also saves the more bawdy scenes, like just how happy Krampus looks as he’s violating Dr. Venture. The demon is just so joyful in his work, it’s infectious! The little we see out of The Monarch works too and I enjoy that early series dynamic he has with Dr. Girlfriend.
Part of me wishes they didn’t blow up the compound so that the continuity was more clear, but I suppose it doesn’t matter much in the end.
This special from The Venture Bros. is perfectly fine for what it is. It would have been great to get something longer with a bit more effort put into it, but they did what they could with it. There’s enough humorous lines and visuals and at this point in the season I think the character voices were pretty well established too which helps carry it. The Christmas parody stuff this thing is front-loaded with is also fun and a bit clever as it would have been easy to assume they were just going with a full-blown parody for their special, since many shows have gone that route. If you’re into The Venture Bros., I think there’s enough here to make an effort to watch this one. If you’re not, well you’ll probably be lost since the show is very reliant on the viewer being familiar with it. And if you do want to watch it, the special was included on the Season One DVD release and is also streaming on HBO Max. There’s also a chance Adult Swim runs it at some point this month so you have options.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
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