Today’s review has been a long time coming. It was on December 26th, 2024 that I received in the mail a NECA Ultimate Santa Jack action figure based on The Nightmare Before Christmas. Christmas had come and gone so it didn’t make much sense to post a review, so I waited. Nearly a year, in fact, but I’m finally going to take a look at this figure. When NECA returned to The Nightmare Before Christmas in 2024 it went the predictable route by doing two Jack figures and pairing him with Sally. They also did the Mayor, so I guess that part wasn’t typical, and based on how many of those figures I see hanging around store shelves I would assume most were content to just get Jack and Sally. For toy companies, doing two versions of Jack makes a lot of sense. He spends considerable time in the movie with both looks, but also they can conceivably use a lot of the same tools to create both figures. Only, NECA actually opted not to do that from what I can tell.
Santa Jack is actually a little bigger than standard Jack.
The sculpt for this one is credited to the trio of Kyle Windrix, Marty Henley, and Andrew Lawson which is the same trio that brought us the standard Jack. This one comes in the same style of packaging that’s just credited to Chris Longo. Usually NECA credits the artist who made the actual drawings that factor into the packaging, but since one isn’t present that either means Longo did it all or Disney supplied the artwork and declined to include the artist’s name. Regardless, it fits thematically with the other figures we already looked at and will make for a fine coffin for the figure eleven months out of the year.
The prior Jack came with a bunch of expressions while with this one we have to settle for three.
Santa Jack stands approximately 8 3/8″ to the top of his head which is actually a little taller than the standard Jack. Why is this? I’m not sure, but it would appear that most of this figure is new tooling. I was expecting a new upper torso that conforms to the Santa suit and maybe new forearms and shins, but I also thought NECA might add the trimmings of the suit in another fashion. The texture of the red, which is a nice, vibrant, shade, is a little bumpy and almost chalky. I wasn’t sure if this was achieved via paint or by sculpt, but considering the different size I’d guess it’s just all new. The only parts this figure appears to share with the regular Jack are the hands as even the included expressions are different. This one necessitates holes in the sides of each portrait for the beard as well as a port for the hat, but I thought they might be able to reuse the prior heads and just insert something into the mold to create the needed ports. What we end up with though is a very nice presentation of the character from the film in his Santa guise. The paint is clean and the red has a nice matte appearance while the black boots are appropriately shiny. The skull head is a touch off-white and has that cold appearance it has in the film. There are no soft goods present and I suppose some might have preferred actual faux fur trim or a soft goods beard, but I’m content with the all plastic approach.
As long as you can’t see the hole in the top of his head, hat-less displays are possible.
Perhaps because of all that new tooling we don’t get quite as much in the box this time around. That Ultimate Jack is perhaps the figure I own that best lives up to the billing as he came with a ton of different expressions. This Jack comes with just three: smile, wink, and a surprised look. The smile and surprised look are both slightly different from the same expressions found with the standard Jack. You can use the heads from that release with this one, but you won’t be able to make use of the hat or beard as both peg into the heads. The beard is on a double ball peg while the beard has a peg on each side. It’s a little bendy and forgiving, but also mushy. I could not get it into the alternate heads without first dunking them in a cup of hot water. Santa Jack also has an array of hands including sets of relaxed, clutching, pointing, and flat hands which are all repeated from the previous release. To complete the look, he has a plastic sack and three different, wrapped, presents to go along with a candy cane and his clipboard with a picture of himself in this Santa suit. The accessories are all quite fine and will help to build out a little scene on your shelf. He also has the same stand that came with the other figures and you will need it. In fact, I recommend borrowing a second one from another release if you have one. I put regular Jack and Sally away so I had another to make use of and it helps to keep him upright.
All of Jack’s accessories will contribute to your holiday display.
The articulation for Santa Jack is exactly the same as it was for the standard Jack (linked at the end of this post). The only difference is we now have the hat and beard. The beard, since it just pegs into each side of the face, can swivel forward and back which helps a little with adjustment posing. The hat is a double ball peg so it can rotate, but also slide around a bit to be posed at slightly different angles. It’s a nice touch and obviously the only downside here is it means the hat isn’t usable with the standard Jack heads. I do wish NECA had found a solution there. A magnet makes the most sense, but maybe they couldn’t get one into the heads without putting an ugly seam on the top. It also wouldn’t solve the beard issue. If the beard could have just pressure fit to the heads somehow that would have been great, but probably tough to get right. Even something like sunglasses on a figure or the faceguard on the movie Shredder still has tabs to click onto and there’s just no way to do such here without making them visible. Or we could have just got more heads like we did with the regular Jack. I’d have loved more expressions, but it wasn’t in the cards here.
Sally may have been returned to her box, but not Zero. He gets to stay.
Santa Jack is perhaps a little less “ultimate” compared with the standard Jack Skellington, but it’s still a nice figure. The likeness is terrific and the articulation is just enough to make him rather expressive, provided you can keep him standing. That’s my one lingering critique of this line as the disc stand we get just isn’t quite enough in this case. It’s a nice holiday decoration though and if you like the film and this version of Jack it’s an easy recommend. To my surprise, I have not seen a single copy of this figure at stores this year. I’m guessing NECA has been shipping them, but apparently not in tremendous numbers. He can be found online though with hopefully enough time to arrive before Christmas.
If you like The Nightmare Before Christmas or just Christmas toys in general then take a look at these other reviews:
When Tim Burton created The Nightmare Before Christmas while working for Disney I don’t think the powers that be had any idea what kind of a gift he had just given them. Obviously they didn’t since they didn’t even believe enough in the film to release it as a Disney film instead opting to put…
If you buy a Jack Skellington action figure, then you almost have to get him a Sally. That’s exactly what I did, though it proved mildly difficult to track down. I have seen NECA’s Ultimate Jack Skellington around throughout the year as I head into stores that carry NECA products, but Sally had proved elusive.…
There are a number of Christmas specials out there that are basically known by all and I’ve written about most of them here. Some have been annual traditions especially when we had more of a monoculture in the US, but the slow death of cable television has made those annual traditions fade away. One holiday…
I’ve been pointing out quite a bit as we move along through this countdown how I like to group similar shows together. I don’t want to go from The Smurfs to Beavis and Butt-Head if I can help it. Well, sometimes I can’t help it. Today is a little bit of a mix of adult shows and kid’s shows. I wouldn’t consider any of the children’s stuff to be particularly wholesome or anything, but could (or should) an 8 year old watch everything on today’s list? Probably not. It is a very Fox heavy lineup though of both Saturday morning and primetime stuff which is not by design, but kind of interesting to me. And these Christmas episodes are also interesting to me and most of them are pretty good. We also have some more tumblers from my very first list which is one of those things that’s going to happen again. A lot has changed since that first list ten years ago.
Rick and Morty seems like an odd fit for Christmas, which is why it was so surprising to see the show go to that well so early in its first season. One would definitely expect the show to have a cynical take on the holiday, but that’s not really the case. Christmas is just a framing device for this episode and excuse for Jerry’s parents to show up for a nice, family, get-together. They just happen to bring along their new playmate. Yup, Jerry’s parents are in what the kid’s call a “thrupple” these days where Jerry’s dad likes to watch from the closet (often wearing a Superman costume) while Jerry’s elderly mom makes love to a young, African American, gentlemen. And the rest of the family enjoys watching Jerry squirm. Meanwhile, Rick is busy building an amusement park inside the guts of a homeless man who just so happens to be dressed as Santa. Crazy science things happen and soon it’s raining blood over all of North America. Yeah, it’s a weird turn. This is a B-tier episode of the show. It finds humor in putting the characters in awkward positions, but it’s certainly different and a unique addition to the Christmas special database.
Bob’s Burgers loves to churn out holiday themed episodes year in and year out. The show’s meat and potatoes is Thanksgiving as the writers have kind of staked their claim to that holiday, but the show’s collection of Christmas episodes is strong as well. “The Bleakening” is a really interesting one as it’s a two-part episode with a mystery plot, not really the sort of thing the show is known for. The second part especially has a suspense/horror vibe to it as the family tries to figure out who stole a mini Christmas tree from their restaurant which definitely gives this one a unique vibe. It’s only weakness is the plot probably isn’t dense enough to sustain the double-episode run length. It’s not a slog or anything, but the ending is a bit anticlimactic and feels a little dragged out. Not the show’s best Christmas episode, but a worthwhile watch each year.
The Simpsons did a weird thing in 2020 when it decided to end Season 31 with a Christmas episode. If you know anything about network TV, then you know seasons typically end in May which is pretty far removed from the Christmas holiday season – which is pretty damn long as-is. Basically what happened is Carolyn Omine, longtime writer on the series, wanted to do an episode about the family dog, Santa’s Little Helper, and how do you separate a character with that name from Christmas? There was some talk of holding it over until the next season to air at Christmas, but that didn’t happen. Maybe COVID stuff made that a no-go or the network just said “Screw it” and aired the finished episode when it was ready. Either way, this is a solid examination of the pooch that answers some questions. Were they necessarily pressing questions? No, but it’s fine. There’s a B plot of sorts that doesn’t work for me, but the episode makes up for that in other ways. I just wish showrunner Al Jean stayed true to his word and let Santa’s Little Helper’s mom become a permanent member of the family (I don’t think she’s been seen or heard from since).
Cuphead and Mugman will risk life and limb for a tree.
For what I assume is The Cuphead Show‘s final season there was not one, but two, Christmas episodes. This is the one that came first and it’s a typical short subject episode where Cuphead and Mugman are entrusted for the first time to secure a Christmas tree. They basically screw it up by first trying to bargain too hard with the only tree guy in town and then by trying to cut down their own. The show is a throwback to old style shorts and the pacing and gags are very much in line with that. How many of those old Warner cartoons had characters nearly disemboweled in a saw mill? That’s practically what they’re for! It’s a great looking show and there’s some solid laughs and a good ending to be found. I like the longer special that follows more, but this one is pretty great too.
The first Christmas episode of Family Guy is still the show’s best. I liked it so much ten years ago that I ranked it all the way up at number 14 overall! That was clearly me overrating something I had watched a lot of in college, but I still think this is a good episode. It definitely has some of that old Family Guy DNA in it where it’s mostly a Simpsons knock-off, but with an even dumber father character and a liberal use of cutaway gags. In this one, Peter screws up and donates all of the Christmas presents to charity so the family has to brave the mall on Christmas Eve to rebuy everything. That’s one area where it does do things perhaps different from what The Simpsons would do as the family isn’t in financial ruin by losing all of those gifts, but they do end up taking Lois for granted and she goes berserk and runs amok in downtown Quahog. It is a relatable premise if you’re one of the adults who makes Christmas “go” each year. And especially so when your kids are at that age where they know how everything is supposed to go, but they don’t actually do anything to help out. It’s mostly funny and they even manage to shoehorn some Santa stuff in there via Stewie. This is the only Family Guy Christmas episode on my watch list each year, though “Road to the North Pole” is close. I just tend to fall asleep during that one since it’s a double length episode (which is why I never got around to covering it).
The other Animaniacs Christmas episode from 1993 is one I’m a little torn on. It’s hard to rank because it is pretty funny, the animation is superb, but it relies on some bad tropes of the Christmas special. I’m talking A Christmas Carol and too many fruit cake jokes. Fruit cake jokes are perhaps my personal pet peeve. Yeah, I think the holiday treat is pretty terrible, but I’m sick of hearing about it. No one gives that stuff out anymore. This episode puts the CEO of Warner Bros, the fictional Thaddeus Plotz, in the role of Scrooge. In the role of Bob Cratchit is Ralph, the dim-witted security guard whom Plotz fires at Christmas. Slappy Squirrel gets to play Marley while your trusty Warner siblings serve as the ghosts. The humor is your typical brand of Animaniacs humor which is a mix of topical, pop culture references, and old school gags. There’s no real twist which is perhaps the biggest criticism one could levy against this one. Well, if there is a twist it’s that Plotz is clearly acting out of kindness in the end because he fears damnation and figures he can go back to being a jerk on Boxing Day. The cartoon takes up nearly the entire length of the episode, but there is a “We Three Kings” cartoon short that follows for those who prefer a more secular celebration. It has some gag lines, but mostly plays it straight.
You may not realize it right now, Santa, but you’re actually in pretty good hands with Eek. Or should I say paws?
Eek the Cat received quite a bit of attention from Fox back in the day and was sort of like a mascot for the kid’s programming block Fox Kids. He hasn’t had much staying power over the years, but he did contribute a couple of Christmas specials to the scene and both are pretty solid with this first one being the better of the two. In it, Santa’s reindeer go on strike and the big guy needs help delivering presents. Meanwhile, Eek’s girlfriend’s dog, Sharky, who hates Eek and never misses a chance to maul him, is depressed and misses his family. Eek vows to help out Sharky because that’s what Eek does – he is an eternal optimist who always does the right thing even if it means tremendous pain for him. They hook up with a scab reindeer named Elmo and basically have to be the elves, reindeer, and Santa in order to deliver Christmas to the world and reunite Sharkey with his family. There’s a lot of physical humor and even some dark stuff (the special ends with Eek about to become Christmas dinner) while also just some strange things like a cameo by the Barbi Twins who were basically famous for being in Playboy. And for being twins. That was Fox though and it wasn’t for everyone, but it sure was unique.
Samurai Pizza Cats is a weird show. It’s sort of like Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers in that it was imported from Japan and then “Americanized.” Only with an animated show like this one, there was no room for new shots or anything so it was just given the weirdest dub imaginable. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles had been popular so the new title the show was given was an obvious play on that and since the characters did work in a pizzeria it wasn’t entirely out of left field. The actual show is more like a goofy version of Ronin Warriors, but with cats. There’s not much plot here. The main villain, Big Cheese, impersonates Santa and causes some mischief so the heroes go out and take care of business. It’s very comedic and made even more so by the dub. I’ve never sought out an undubbed version of this show, but I assume it too was fairly comedic in nature as well. The animation is fun and it’s the sort of offbeat Christmas special that feels quite refreshing among more traditional options. If you’re into anime, then it’s definitely worth a look.
Not the Santa you want to see coming down your chimney.
What’s this? A live-action sitcom? Yes, I never set out to make my list exclusively animation, but it did mostly happen that way. There’s just way more Christmas cartoons out there and I tend to love cartoons. When it comes to live-action it’s mostly traditional sitcom stuff which, for me, never ages particularly well. There isn’t one sitcom I used to watch in the 80s or 90s with a Christmas episode I seek out each year. Well, with one exception, and it’s this one. Married…with Children was the first show I can remember my mom telling me she didn’t like me watching, and I can see why. She never stopped me from watching it, but she didn’t like it and hoped I just wouldn’t watch it on my own because of that. She was wrong. It is pretty sleezy and it was the type of show Fox was staking its reputation on. The Bundy family has little love for one another. The husband is miserable, the wife selfish and lazy, the daughter an airhead, and the boy basically spends all of his time lusting after women and jerking off. In this one, we see how shitty Christmas is for the Bundy family because they’re poor and because patriarch Al just doesn’t care to make an effort. Then a mall stunt goes wrong and a parachuting Santa lands in their backyard dead. It’s a plot that could only happen with this show. And even though Al Bundy is a pretty loathsome individual, he does at least try to assuage the kids in the neighborhood that Santa Claus is fine and the family has a Merry Christmas in the end when they discover the sack of mall gift certificates the now deceased Santa was supposed to give out. It’s pretty dark, but also pretty funny.
The Wrigley family yearns for Christmas every day.
Back to back live-action shows – this will not happen again in the countdown. I think this is actually the end of the live-action stuff, unless you include puppets in there. Nickelodeon had a ton of unique programming in the 90s and few shows sum up the vibe of the network like The Adventures of Pete & Pete. It’s just two brothers, both named Pete, and their day-to-day lives in an absurd world. It borders on cartoonish, but usually doesn’t quite go that far, especially in these later episodes where Artie is no longer around. In the Christmas episode, Young Pete refuses to give up on Christmas. Why does it have to go away when it’s so good? The interesting thing is, despite the fact that he’s a kid, he’s not hung up on the whole presents thing. He’s not looking to score a new gift every day, he just likes the overall feeling of the season. And standing in his way is the garbage man. He wants those trees, but Pete needs to rally the neighborhood to withhold them. Things get crazy as there’s a garbage strike and eventually people start to crack. Pete gives in since everyone else does, but then a final act of Christmas spirit thaws the garbageman’s heart and the magic of Christmas lives just a bit longer. It’s cute and fun and as someone who hates saying goodbye to Christmas every year I can totally empathize with Little Pete. If only we could feel that way the whole year round – wouldn’t we all be a bit nicer? Big Pete, via narration, claims the neighborhood was a nicer place after that even if they did eventually put Christmas away and that’s certainly a nice way to end the episode and today’s entry.
If you can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
We’ve taken a look at a lot of animated sitcoms this year and so far they’ve all been repeat visitors to The Christmas Spot. It feels like it’s time for something new, though it has a very familiar feel. The Cleveland Show is a 2009 spin-off of Family Guy created by Seth MacFarlane, Richard Appel,…
It was just over a week ago that we took a look at the Christmas episode of The Looney Tunes Show. That show featured the cast of Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies in an animated sitcom and it was…okay. It definitely didn’t feel like Warner stumbled onto something with that idea and the search for a worthwhile…
Yesterday, we talked about South Park and its very first holiday special from the late 90s and today we’re talking about the Trey Parker/Matt Stone of the 2010s – Justin Roiland. Roiland was able to hook-up with Dan Harmon in the mid-2000s which put him on the path to comedy writer and actor, usually of…
Yesterday’s installment of the countdown trended more adult. Lots of cartoons not for the kids, but today’s list definitely is more general audience. I like the spread today. It’s dominated by animation, as it so often is, but we also have a live-action, puppet, type show. We have weekend cartoons, and week day cartoons. There’s shows from Disney, shows from Warner Bros and it’s almost all entirely dominated by 90s properties. I haven’t really been keeping tabs on the decades as I go through this list, but it makes sense that the 90s would be heavily represented all throughout. That’s when cable really exploded and we had a whole bunch of cartoons with massive episode orders and throwing a Christmas one into that mass of stuff sure makes things a whole lot easier. Networks originally were said to dislike holiday episodes, but I think they changed their tune when they realized they could program an entire day, or even week, around a holiday like Christmas or Halloween. Even the prime time shows tended to do this sort of thing. Anyway, I feel like I’ve talked about all of this before so let’s cut the preamble and get to number 93:
It pretty much looks like Christmas, but with a fridge instead of a tree.
Dinosaurs was a real treat to come back to when Disney+ launched a few years ago. I watched it as a kid when it was airing on ABC, but kind of lost track of it. I think it got shuffled around some, or maybe my family latched onto something else in the same timeslot. I don’t know. What I do know is the show is great. It holds up very well in basically all respects. The satire it went for is still biting and relevant today, which is both a good and bad thing. Dinosaurs never technically did air a Christmas episode, but instead we got “Refrigerator Day” which is basically their version of Christmas. Since there is apparently no dinosaur Jesus, they worship at the altar of the refrigerator which changed their lives so completely. It’s a society that’s very consumer-driven, if you couldn’t tell. Despite that, the plot is pretty conventional and, for some, may be a tad too much like The Simpsons since Earl’s horrible boss foregoes Christmas bonuses and things get tight for the Sinclair family. However, they stumble upon a million dollar idea, the concept of store returns, and in exchange for making a huge company even more wealthy they get a few measly gifts and their repossessed appliance is returned. It’s a bit dark, but pretty funny. If you haven’t checked out Dinosaurs in a long time then do yourself a favor and go back to it. I promise you, it’s not as dominated by the baby character as you may remember.
It’s a weird environment for Bugs and pals, but it also kind of works?
The Looney Tunes Show is perhaps a more interesting concept than show, but the little I’ve seen is honestly not bad. It’s basically a sitcom starring the cast of Looney Tunes. Bugs Bunny is dating Lola Bunny and is roommates with Daffy. Foghorn Leghorn is the mayor, and Yosemite Sam is more like a rich Texas guy than an outlaw. This Christmas episode of the show involves Lola directing a play, the titular A Christmas Carol, while Foghorn and Daffy head to the North Pole to try and find a way to make their local climate cooler. Their adventure is a bit more madcap, while the story with the play is more grounded. Lola turns out to be a very interesting and funny character. She’s very self-confident without any reason to be and a lot of the characters in her orbit are too polite to tell her when she’s making a bad decision. The play is basically terrible and goes way off the rails, but also the real Santa shows up for it which I honestly didn’t expect. I can’t figure out what the audience was supposed to be for this show, but I do know I was entertained by this more than I was the conventional Looney Tunes Christmas specials and that sure surprised me. It’s still not the best Looney Tunes Christmas special though.
The folks over at Warner Bros. got a lot of mileage out of this bit.
Our second look at The Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries is the stronger of the two Christmas episodes. It’s a sort-of parody of It’s a Wonderful Life, only instead of focusing on the George Bailey character it centers on a stand-in for his drunk uncle. If you’ve never seen the movie, what sets the plot in motion is George’s uncle Billy losing a deposit of money that their savings and loan business was to make that night. Essentially, they lost the money of a bunch of people and would have probably been arrested for theft or misappropriation or something. For this cartoon, Granny and her animals are going to help her brother find the money he lost by retracing his steps from the prior night. They do a solid job of tiptoeing around the whole alcoholic aspect of the Uncle Billy character to keep things PG, and we do get a Potter stand-in to act as the villain. There are some solid gags throughout and none of the characters really dominate the episode, which is a full-length one as opposed to the half-length one we looked at days ago. It will amuse you if you’re familiar with the movie, but also you don’t have to be in order to be entertained. And it even one-ups the movie by having the Potter stand-in actually face some consequences for his thievery.
It’s kind of weird that they can’t share the same tree.
The Nicktoons tended to have solid Christmas episodes, few great ones, but most of them are fine. CatDog was one I had ignored for a long time because I simply wasn’t watching Nickelodeon when it was airing. I knew it had a Christmas episode and it was on my list for years until I finally sat down and watched it just a year ago. And you know what? It’s fine. I liked it more than I expected and I’m even ranking it ahead of shows I did watch a ton of like Doug and The Ren & Stimpy Show. I’m not elevating it to the level of Rocko’s Modern Life or even Rugrats, but this episode is fun enough. It’s almost a little like Mickey’s Good Deed in that CatDog essentially sells itself to a wealthy family as a Christmas present, but then has second thoughts. It’s the Christmas special that taught us being a whore isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Everything works out though and even the bratty kid that bought them comes around. It has a pretty straight ending where everyone learns something, but it’s not too syrupy sweet or anything. If you’re like me and didn’t really give CatDog much of a chance then you may want to reconsider this Christmas.
I still can’t believe I enjoyed an episode of Bonkers more than Darkwing Duck – and a Christmas one at that! Bonkers is the character no one wanted. He should have been Roger Rabbit, but that just wasn’t possible so we got this weird bobcat character. At least he’s better than Bubsy. This episode is a solid one though and it actually doesn’t feature a ton of the titular character. It’s centered more on his partner Lucky and an amnesiac Santa Claus. Poor Santa got knocked out of the sky and stuck with the character Fall Apart. Since no one can find him, the elves turn to the police and Lucky is chosen to basically be a stand-in. His motivation to help out is his daughter’s belief in Santa Claus. Pretty conventional stuff, but it all wraps up nicely. The animation is also gorgeous as it often is for the Disney Afternoon and the antics between Fall Apart and “Jim” are pretty funny. This also is just a fun world and the premise of the show is terrific, it just rarely came together to form a cohesive half hour of entertainment. For Christmas though, it nailed it.
Maybe this is why Batman doesn’t seem to like Christmas?
This Christmas episode of Batman: The Animated Series is fine. It’s funny, the Joker is a good villain for this type of thing, and I usually watch it every year. It’s also an episode that I just wish was better and that’s because of the show it hails from. Batman is the greatest superhero show to ever come around. I say that as a lover of X-Men, but the quality was just so much better. The writing was tighter and the budget greater so it looks terrific. It also helps that the cast was small and that’s one reason why I just can’t get into shows like Justice League following this one. This episode is a fairly standard Joker plot where he’s kidnapped some people and there’s a bomb or something. It just happens to be at Christmas so we get some Christmas puns and festive attire out of the Joker. It unfortunately doesn’t look as good as some episodes and there’s some awkward shots in here. Maybe it was rushed so there was no danger of missing the holiday? I don’t know, I just know it’s a pretty even episode of Batman, but not one of the show’s best.
You just know they’re going to spoof some holiday classics.
Batman’s network-mates the Tiny Toons got to make a contribution to Christmas. Unlike the more seasoned Sylvester and Tweety, their It’s a Wonderful Life parody mostly plays it straight. In the role of George is Buster Bunny who is questioning his own worth. Not to the degree that George was, but maybe he’s just not cut out for the life he wants? Through the magic of his guardian rabbit, Harvey, Buster is going to see what life would be like had he never been on Tiny Toons. Plucky is the star, Montana Max owns the Looniversity, and Babs is a humorless solo act. Naturally, Buster has a revelation and has his life restored where he’s able to help the other toons put on an entertaining Christmas show. It doesn’t do anything to upend the framing device, but the humor of Tiny Toons is able to carry this one. Tiny Toon Adventures is a show I can only handle in small doses, but when done well it’s usually pretty rewarding. This one is animated well and there’s some easy Christmas special gags to be found as well which are real crowd pleasers. I tend to lose track of this one among the many other Warner Bros. Christmas episodes and specials, but it’s worth returning to.
TaleSpin, like Bonkers, is another Disney Afternoon show I didn’t really care for in the moment, but it has a good Christmas episode. This one centers around the child character Molly, who is the daughter of Baloo’s boss, Rebecca. She’s having a bit of a Christmas crisis where her belief in Santa Claus is in doubt and it’s mostly all because of Baloo. He, with the help of Louie, tries to stage a North Pole to trick Molly into believing, but when Louie’s bar is closed for way too long on Christmas Eve the local drunks overrun the place and blow the whole thing. Now, this episode does fly too close to the sun for me when it comes to whether or not Santa Claus is real. I don’t particularly like it when a show aimed at young children places too much doubt on his existence, but they do rectify it at the end (as if there was any doubt). And that’s really my only complaint with the episode. It otherwise is pretty entertaining and it’s very well animated and heartbroken Molly worked on me so when her moment of triumph came it also affected me in much the same way. TaleSpin isn’t reinventing the wheel when it comes to Christmas episodes, but it brings the feels.
And that’s not even close to capturing the whole Anderson family.
Life with Louie is one of those forgotten Fox Kids shows. The network never celebrated its works like a Disney or a Nickelodeon would. They kind of just paid for them for the moment, then sold them off when it no longer suited them. As such, I think this show is owned by Disney who bought most of Fox Kids if not all. The company kind of treated most of these shows the same way Fox did using them to pad out expanded, digital, cable channels until it was no longer profitable. Some shows saw DVD release, and many did not. Life with Louie was supposed to according to series creator Louie Anderson, but it never happened. It’s too bad because Life with Louie is a sweet coming of age cartoon. There’s not a ton of stuff like that, especially from the 90s, and it managed to be plenty funny too. In this Christmas episode, Louie basically finds out a kid he thinks is the greatest is actually an orphan and it forces him to reexamine his own relationship with his family. It’s all heartwarming stuff and we get to see Louie’s dad be forced to play Santa which is where a lot of the comedy comes from. I prefer the first Christmas episode from this show more, but this is a worthy (if unexpected) follow-up.
Sing it with me, “It’s time for Animaniacs!” Yes, the first of three entries for the series is “‘Twas the Day Before Christmas.” In 1993, Animaniacs did the odd thing of releasing two Christmas episodes. I guess when you’re a weekday afternoon program you can afford to do that. It also helps that Animaniacs was a pretty large ensemble so giving everyone their own Christmas arc was just not possible in a single half hour episode. Maybe they first envisioned an hour long prime time affair? I don’t know, but this is the lesser of the two despite the other one being a parody of A Christmas Carol. I know – shocking! And the main segment is basically designed to squeeze most of the cast into one short as Aunt Slappy relays the story about the day before Christmas on the Warner lot. It’s the strongest segment across both specials, but it’s not very substantial since its just Slappy reading a parody of A Visit From Saint Nicholas with some funny stuff animated to it. The second segment is Chicken Boo who is playing a mall Santa. One kid sees the character for what it is, a chicken, but no one else does and he freaks out. It’s pretty damn funny, but also brief. The third segment is just the Warners in a toy store after hours where the toys come to life. It’s pretty weak and drags this one down, but it’s not terrible. It’s still an entertaining 25 minutes and most of these characters work best in quick bursts anyway, but there’s better stuff ahead. Especially for a couple of laboratory mice.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
When it comes to Christmas themed cartoons featuring Popeye, I’ve somehow managed to work backwards. We’ve looked at two previous Popeye cartoons that center around the holiday, but today’s Christmas short is Popeye’s very first. It comes to us all the way from 1933 where it premiered as just the fourth Popeye cartoon. I don’t…
Today we continue our lookback at the best holiday specials ever sent to television and today’s subject is everyone’s favorite pair of Gen X deadbeats Beavis and Butt-Head. Beavis and Butt-Head were created by Mike Judge and the pair got its start on MTV’s Liquid Television in 1992. There they were a cruel, destructive, pair…
Today we are continuing our look back at the best of the best when it comes to Christmas specials and today’s entrant comes from the quiet, mountain, town of South Park. South Park burst onto the scene in 1997 and basically transformed the Comedy Central network from the get-go. The show about four foul-mouthed kids…
Today is a big day for our little Christmas special countdown for today we crest number 100. We are now past the halfway point on the road to the number one Christmas special and we’re also beginning a string of six consecutive days of countdown-style posts. That’s right, the next solo effort won’t be here until December 20th when we’re really close to Christmas. Basically, I have my work cut out for me to keep things lively and fresh for the next week so things don’t get too stale. Helping me out today is that we’re coming up on a day of mostly adult animation with a bit of teen animation mixed in. I try to keep the more adult stuff somewhat separated from the kid stuff when it makes sense and doesn’t throw off the rankings. And today works for that and after doing the very family friendly The Little Drummer Boy yesterday, it might be kind of nice to wallow in the misery of a horse man, but first we have something much closer to an all ages affair:
This is the most jerk-ass Santa you’re likely to ever meet.
Teen Titans Go! is the little show that could. Seriously, it’s pretty crazy that it has outlasted basically every other DC animated superhero show. For awhile, it felt like “serious” Teen Titans fans looked down at it and blamed it for their preferred show no longer existing, but as it’s staying power has been proven time and again I think it’s starting to be properly recognized for what it is. And that’s just a good, solid, comedic, superhero show that has helped make household names out of some pretty D-list superheroes. During its run, the show has been able to establish some Christmas lore for itself and one of the most interesting takes the show has embarked on is with its depiction of Santa. Like American Dad!, the Santa here is a villain. He frequently refers to children as garbage, and in this episode he has decided that Halloween gets too much attention and he wants to dominate the calendar even longer. It’s an absurd premise for an absurd show so it works very well. The Titans end up on the side of Halloween and turn to a being that resembles Samhain from The Real Ghostbusters to do battle with Santa Claus. Things get pretty “Looney Tunes” in the battle for the soul of Halloween, but it’s never not entertaining. If you’re the sort of person who vastly prefers Halloween to Christmas then this is the one for you.
The original Popeye Christmas short is still the best one. There’s not a lot to it as there’s really not a lot to a Popeye short from Fleischer Studios. They just create opportunities for Popeye to beat up Bluto and win Olive Oyl’s affection all while looking pretty damn fantastic in the process. In this short from 1933, Popeye brings his sweetheart some ice skates and the pair head over to a frozen river to give them a try. Olive isn’t very graceful, but it’s easily forgiven since it would appear she’s never skated before. Things are going well until Bluto shows up using a small dog to pull him along in his skates like a jackass. He and Popeye come to blows and we get a classic waterfall scenario where the ice ends and the water rushes over a ledge. Popeye has to take care of Bluto and save Olive at the same time. Is he up to the task? Naturally, for he’s Popeye the sailor man!
Now here’s a special that has none of the Christmas feels. Aqua Teen Hunger Force is about as absurd a show as it gets considering our main characters are talking fast food items. In this one, the always scheming and all around bad person/cup Shake tries to steal the identity of Chuck D from Public Enemy in order to record a Christmas album which he thinks will make him rich. The scheme is entirely ridiculous as Shake basically just stole some mail and thinks that’s enough. Plus, his Christmas song is improvised on the spot and totals all of 12 seconds. He still manages to land some recording time on Christmas Eve to lay the track down, but a serious case of space eels basically ends his life. It’s surprisingly coherent for such a nonsensical plot and Shake is in good form as the asshole you can laugh at because he’s such an overconfident idiot. Chuck also gets to make a cameo at the end to compliment Meatwad on his recording of “Silent Night,” which is also set to the sound of Shake evacuating his bowels (yeah, lots of poop stuff in here). And if you think it’s really lacking in that Christmas atmosphere, this is one of the few specials to have a scene set in an actual church. Shake spouts a bunch of blasphemy and has to get dragged out by Frylock, but hey, it must count for something?
I love me some Ren and Stimpy, but I’m not as big on their holiday episodes as some other fans might be. Placing the first Christmas special at number 100 feels like a great place for it. This one is pretty well known, but if you’re new to it this is an episode where Stimpy passes gas for the first time in his life and becomes obsessed with the result. The best part of the episode is right at the beginning when we bare witness to this momentous occasion and then watch Stimpy try to explain what happened to an unamused Ren. Following that, Stimpy becomes obsessed with finding this thing he created which he starts referring to as Stinky. Stimpy views his fart as his child and the fact that he can no longer smell him sends him into a deep depression. It seems the whole premise of the episode was to take a truly outrageous situation and play it straight. A father trying to reunite with his son at Christmas is a pretty conventional holiday plot, only here it’s a cat and his fart. Because the episode is so committed to playing it straight it suffers in the comedy department. We feel bad for Stimpy, but it can only go so far. And there’s plenty of gross throughout this one (as one can imagine) which really prevents the viewer from getting into the heart of the story. Is that the point? Did the writers and producers of The Ren & Stimpy Show want us to feel uncomfortable and confused for 24 minutes? It’s possible. There’s some funny stuff in here, but it went too far. The ending goes over like…well, like a wet fart.
Nonsensical sketch comedy made out of old toys with a Christmas theme – that’s a Robot Chicken Christmas special. It’s going to throw several bits at you, some good, some not so good, but the sum of the parts is usually a solid 11 minutes or so of entertainment. There are a few segments starring Santa that are pretty solid including one where he’s late for Christmas and another where he battles Jason Bourne for some reason. I also like the longer skit with the Christmas tree who is personified and feels at home with his new family, only to get thrown out on Christmas. The capper to this one though is the Robot Chicken Nerd character waking up on Christmas to find it’s all been stolen. There’s only one suspect: The Grinch, and the Nerd seeks vengeance for all who were wronged this Christmas. And it becomes a lot easier when the Nerd discovers that the Grinch responsible is that awful Jim Carrey one! It’s not the best Robot Chicken Christmas episode, but it’s hard to not at least be mildly amused with the short run time and I give a lot of deference to this show because I do like the stop-motion animation. Also, there’s a Larry Hama cameo!
I’m pretty sure I think of this joke every time I watch Frosty the Snowman.
Another one from the land of Adult Swim, this episode of The Venture Bros. is the rare short subject and also the only Christmas episode. I was dismayed to learn that series co-creator Doc Hammer hates it, but it’s really not that bad. It’s just brief and not able to tell the sort of stories the show is accustomed to. It also devotes a large swath of the episode to a parody of Christmas specials at the beginning which is all the result of a drugged-out dream by Dr. Venture himself. The rest of the special takes place at a Christmas party at the Venture compound where the Monarch has infiltrated the festivities via a new agent: Tiny Joseph. This little guy has planted a bomb in a manger scene in the house of Venture that will go off at midnight when baby Jesus is put in place. Only the boys accidentally summon the Krampus and everything goes to Hell. It’s fine, there’s some good jokes in here, and the episode is basically all one big fake-out so it fits canonically. It was supposed to be part of a much larger block of animation dedicated to Christmas on Adult Swim, but it never came together and this was the only thing that came of it.
TV Funhouse was a short-lived Comedy Central show that was essentially a spoof on Saturday Morning variety shows for children. It had a host, live-action segments, puppets, animals, and cartoons only it was all intended for an adult audience. In this one, our affable host Doug has his spinal fluid stolen (because that’s where Christmas spirit dwells) by his animal companions who then go off and do a ton of drugs leaving Doug paralyzed in the studio to introduce segments. We get one about Christmas tension and another that’s a parody of the Harlem Globetrotters cartoon with this one featuring them dunking on Jesus. In between sketches, we just watch the “AniPals,” a collection of puppets and live animals, get high on the Christmas cheer they stole from Doug’s spine and attend church. It’s a lot of dark humor and the show is able to get obscene acts onto air, like one character sucking drugs off another character’s penis, because it’s all demonstrated through puppets. It basically comes down to two stuffed animals just smashing together. This is not a Christmas special for everyone and for me I have to be in the right mood for it. It’s all presented in a sincere manner, but it’s all farce.
The closest we ever got to a Dragon Ball Christmas special.
Yes, another from Robot Chicken and it’s quite close in proximity to the other one. That’s because they’re pretty hard to separate since we’re dealing with sketch comedy. I ranked this one ever so slightly higher because the bits stand out in my memory just a little bit more. That could have something to do with me seeing this episode more than the other one and less to do with the quality, but I’m sticking to this spot. This is the Christmas episode where Santa gets revenge on Coca-Cola, Frosty gets high, and we get a Godfather Part II parody starring Hermey from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. It culminates with Christmas coming to Japan (sort of) as Santa enlists the help of Goku to takedown Composite Santa, the half Santa half Snowman monstrosity. This episode of Robot Chicken has a higher batting average when it comes to the sketches even if nothing lands as well as the other one’s Grinch sketch. It’s just more solid, stop-motion, entertainment.
The most recent Christmas episode of The Simpsons we’ve looked at (recent as in we just did this one last year) is the lowest ranked of them all, but that’s not bad! “‘Tis the Fifteenth Season” comes from, what else, the 15th season of the show and features a plot about Homer being selfish. He learns from his mistake rather early on and tries to redeem himself which just puts him in competition with Flanders. When Flanders one ups him by giving everyone in town a Christmas present, Homer decides he can’t compete so he just steals them instead. This brings about a fourth act Grinch parody which I’m always down for. This is also the rare episode for this era of the show without much of a B plot as it just goes from one Homer situation to the next and it’s punctuated with a Moe suicide joke. It just wouldn’t be Christmas without a Moe suicide joke on The Simpsons now would it? What this one lacks in heart, it makes up for with laughs.
Our last entry for today belongs to BoJack Horseman, the Netflix animated series about a has-been actor who lets his own depression and overall bad guy vibes take everyone down in his orbit. Or at least he tries to and ultimately fails in many respects. The Christmas episode is basically a stand-alone Christmas special that exists between seasons. In it, BoJack and his roommate Todd don’t have much going on because they don’t have a happy family life so they sit in BoJack’s bed and watch the Christmas episode of his old sitcom, Horsin’ Around. The premise of the show is that BoJack plays a horse who adopts some orphans. One of the orphans, Sabrina, learns about Christmas and Santa and thinks he has the power to bring her parents back to life, but when all she gets is a letter from Santa explaining why that isn’t possible she gets irate. Don’t worry though, because just like in an episode of Full House, BoJack and his adopted daughter have a talk and everything is fine. In fact, it’s better than fine as both confess they’re glad her parents are dead otherwise they’d never know each other! Most of the episode is dedicated to just watching what is essentially a sitcom parody and it’s done very well. The tropes are highlighted and some awkwardness is worked in when one of the kid characters can’t get his catchphrase over with the studio audience. And our framing device is BoJack, angry at Todd’s mere presence, but also extremely lonely and narcissistic enough to enjoy watching a bad TV show starring him. It’s hard to imagine the show doing a better Christmas episode as it perfectly captures why BoJack, the character, sucks so hard and presents a very believable Christmas for him. Like a lot of the programs we spotlighted today, it’s not a show that’s for everyone, but if you’re into dark humor and grew up on bad family sitcoms this one will probably amuse you.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
I did not grow up with SpongeBob Squarepants. He is very much a post-Nick show for me as I wasn’t paying much attention to the cable channel when he premiered. Over the years, little has changed for me when it comes to SpongeBob Squarepants save for the fact that I’ve come to appreciate the show’s…
In 2001, Rugrats had the honor of being the first Nicktoon to make it 10 years. The path to that honor was not a smooth one as the show had effectively been cancelled in 1993 with the third season. That appeared to not be performance related, but more strategic on the part of Nickelodeon as…
Yesterday, we took a look at the 1992 Christmas special from the third Nickelodeon Nicktoon The Ren & Stimpy Show. Today, we’re basically working backwards and talking about the second Nicktoon to premiere: Rugrats. The Ren & Stimpy Show is probably the most celebrated of the original Nicktoons when it comes to animation circles, 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…
We’ve got another 11 special slot for you today. After all, it is the season of giving, is it not? And once again, we’re mostly sticking to the land of children’s fair or G-Rated content. In fact, our most aggressively G-rated special leads things off today.
I detailed in the write-up for this one that I basically have a “No Preschool” shows rule when I do this and that’s because that’s a genre that is very specialized. It’s not that adult comedy isn’t, but preschool might be the only genre that really can’t entertain a demographic other than its intended one. However, one show rises above them all: Bluey. I know many adults who adore the Australian import and her canine family – I’m married to one of them. The show is charming and clever and it manages to impart worthwhile life lessons without feeling too formulaic. The adults are incredibly patient with their children and always down to play making them seem like the idealized version of a parental figure. Unfortunately for our purposes, the Christmas episodes aren’t the best. This one unfortunately is a bit formulaic as Bluey is wronged by her toddler aged cousin and basically seeks revenge by hurting her feelings. Still, there’s some fun stuff and I really like the food coma impacted adults. Bluey might make the parents play like kids, but it’s also not afraid to show them as adults.
Pokémon may not be as popular as it was in the late 90s and early 2000s, but it’s still plenty relevant. The show, in its various forms, number hundreds of episodes and yet this Christmas episode from 1999 is one of the harder to view today. That’s all due to the presence of Jynx, the pocket monster who resembles a character in blackface. Even though she’s been recolored to deemphasize that, this episode still remains “lost.” Is that a big deal? Only if you really like Christmas episodes. In this one, Ash and his pals wind up at Santa’s village and need to help him out and thwart Team Rocket in the process. There’s a bit of a B plot with Jessie and her connection with Christmas, but it’s nothing profound. It’s a pretty okay episode of TV with some interesting lore (that I think the show dropped) if you’re a Pokémon fan.
It still blows my mind that the 1987 iteration of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles never tackled Christmas. There was no Christmas episode, no Christmas themed action figures, nothing. The 1991 movie The Secret of the Ooze got a Christmas-themed poster to help sell VHS copies of the movie which feels like the closest thing we got. We really should have had a mutant reindeer or something in the Playmates line. Anyway, this holiday episode comes from the 2003 series and it remains the only Christmas episode any TMNT cartoon has featured – which is perhaps even more insane. It’s based on the Michelangelo one-shot from Mirage Studios and features a simple plot where Mikey thwarts a Christmas robbery and also adopts an adorable kitten. Klunk is the original ice cream kitty. The issue was adapted for the show and it’s pretty faithful. The only major change is that while Mikey is out doing stuff the rest of the gang is back at the lair hosting a bunch of friends they’ve made throughout the show. It’s solid, nothing spectacular or revolutionary, and it does feature some nice Christmas outfits during the final scene that I’d love to see in action figure form. At least in 2025, the Christmas drought comes to an end for TMNT with the theatrical short Chrome Alone 2: Lost in New Jersey. It’s from the current version of the franchise and is attached to a new SpongeBob movie opening on the 19th. Hopefully, it can be viewed easily without seeing that movie.
At least it gives Disney a new look to sell as a doll for Belle.
In 2017 I had the crazy idea to dedicate one of my write-ups to a movie – what was I thinking?! If I had to guess, I was just curious if this direct-to-video midquel for Disney’s Beauty and the Beast was any good. The actual movie is one of my wife’s favorites so it was something we could check out together. And it’s okay. Honestly, most of the direct-to-video Disney stuff I’ve seen has been perfectly fine. Not on the level of the theatrical output, but mostly entertaining. It doesn’t look as good, naturally, and features some regrettable CG that hasn’t aged well, but it tells a decent Christmas story that mostly fits into the movie without creating too many obvious plot holes. And it has Tim Curry who is wonderful in everything. Honestly, if you’re able to separate this from its theatrical better then it’s perfectly fine. That’s just an admittedly difficult thing to do if you’ve already seen it a bunch.
The Disney show that asked “Do you want to build a snowman?” way before Anna.
Interesting that we wind up at The Weekenders a mere three spots ahead of Pokémon. That’s because the legacy of this show seems to be that it temporarily dethroned Pokémon as the Saturday morning ratings king. I honestly don’t really know why. The Weekenders isn’t a bad show or anything, it’s just a bit of a low energy one which feels a bit out of place for Saturday morning. Then again, it’s from ABC which always had the low energy Saturday morning shows. It was like their specialty or something. I was a Fox Kids kid so I didn’t watch much of the stuff on ABC and by the time this show was airing I wasn’t awake on Saturday morning anyway. This one is fine though. It does the thing where it gathers a bunch of kids from different backgrounds, gives a snapshot of their holiday experience, and also sneaks in one wacky adventure that mostly goes wrong. I don’t like the look of this one at all, but the kids are well represented and feel authentic. It’s an emotionally mature cartoon, whether or not that’s something you like is more subjective than anything.
The Christmas special where Nickelodeon tortures a kid and his dog.
Interestingly enough, this leads us to Doug. Doug was the quiet Nicktoon. It’s grounded, to a point, but has its own cartoon traits to distinguish it from live-action. And most of those traits rest with the dog, Porkchop, who is the subject of “Doug’s Christmas Story.” Porkchop is a bit like Scooby Doo, though without the talking. He gets accused of attacking one of the kids in town which is preposterous for all regular viewers of the show, but it gets taken very seriously. We basically see the titular Doug imagine his dog getting put down and it’s made rather apparent that euthanasia is on the table for old Porkchop. It’s a humorless Christmas special that’s rather weighty as a result. And that’s fine as long as the show does the plot justice. As far as that goes, the results are a bit mixed. It loses me in the final act, but it’s not bad and a sad story about a dog at Christmas is sure to bring about some Christmas feels.
I didn’t know how to separate these two, so I didn’t! This episode comes from Disney’s take on Doug which is largely viewed as inferior to the Nickelodeon years. I mostly subscribe to that notion, but I honestly didn’t keep up with the Disney version. I am by no means the authority on Doug, but I did enjoy this episode just a little more than the first one. The plot is Doug’s family is preparing for a new baby and that basically consumes his parents at Christmas time. His dad is apparently afraid to leave the house or has money concerns with a new kid on the way so the Funnie family won’t be buying anything or doing anything this Christmas. Doug hates this lack of Christmas spirit so he and Porkchop vow to have their own, secret, Christmas up in his room. It honestly takes up only a few minutes of the episode’s duration as most is devoted to Doug navigating the holiday and then the final act is all about the baby. It’s charming though and the final act hits better than the first Christmas special.
The DC Animated Universe has made a few attempts at Christmas episodes, but I don’t think any are really a home run. This is the one from the ensemble show which brings its own challenges, but also opportunity to view the holiday through different perspectives. Writer Paul Dini attempts that with “Comfort and Joy” and the results are just decent as opposed to a Christmas classic. I think I enjoyed the more offbeat plot between Flash and Ultra-Humanite the most. It had some solid humor and I like the depiction of Ultra-Humanite. The Martian Manhunter plot is the one that I think the episode wants us to be moved by, but it’s pretty conventional “Guy goes to small town and finds the Christmas spirit,” plot. It’s fine, but it’s been done before. And the Hawkgirl and Green Lantern plot is a waste of time. No Batman and no Wonder Woman so if you wanted to see them you were let down. Considering Batman has already taken a go at Christmas, it’s not a big loss. I guess I would have liked to see what Wonder Woman was up to, but at least she wasn’t shoehorned into one of the other plots which were crowded enough.
If you want a brief, Christmas, short that looks pretty cozy then have I got the cartoon for you. Bedtime for Sniffles is a Chuck Jones directed Warner Bros. cartoon starring the mouse in his cute days. Sniffles would evolve into more of a pest since his cartoons weren’t funny enough, but here he’s just a sweet character trying to stay awake on Christmas Eve. There’s some visual humor, but nothing outlandish. This is Jones really trying to audition for Disney as the look of this one is very evocative of a Mickey Mouse short with realistic and well-detailed backgrounds and a character that emotes in the cutest way possible. It’s harmless fluff and better than a lot of other Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies Christmas specials.
Bobby – slamming doors in the face of carolers since 1995.
More cutesy stuff as we’re onto the Fox Kids series Bobby’s World. This was a Howie Mandel creation back when it felt like a lot of comedians were getting opportunities in television. We had Camp Candy, Little Rosie, and Life with Louie among others. Bobby’s World felt like an early breakout hit for the Fox Kids Network on its march towards Saturday morning dominance. Bobby was pretty wholesome, but the show was also a comedy so there’s plenty of silly stuff to entertain the kids. For this one, Bobby travels to see his grandparents and engage with his extended family. He wants a video game for Christmas really bad, but he’s going to have to learn the Christmas spirit instead because everything goes wrong. It’s solid, though I did kind of hate the resolution. It’s worth watching and you could really put together a solid viewing party of Christmas specials from Fox Kids if that was your goal.
My mom loves the kid on the left so much she named her cat after him.
Boy, did this one take a tumble since I first mentioned it? This one was part of my initial list of my 25 favorite Christmas specials which I compiled back in 2015. Then, I had it ranked all the way up at number 16! There may have been some recency bias at play for even though this special debuted in 2009 I think I had seen it for the first time fairly recently in 2015. Back then, I mostly stuck to “the classics” when it came to my Christmas viewing and it was doing this blog that really caused me to both branch out and to rediscover Christmas specials I had not seen in years. Yes, Virginia suffered as a result, but it’s still plenty fine. It might have worked a little better as a shorter subject as it is a little slow, but I enjoy the story which is loosely based on reality. In it, Virginia is a believer in Santa, but she’s at that age where her peers stop believing and she’s getting left behind. Her dad has a saying that “If it’s in The Sun, it’s true,” referring to the local paper so Virginia decides to write to the paper asking if Santa Claus is real. And wouldn’t you know, they print a reply that says “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus!” It’s a great climax, it just takes a bit to get there and some of the stuff along the way is less fun. Plus, it revolves around mostly adult characters who dismiss the idea of Santa which limits the special’s reach with kids. I never liked showing my kids stuff that might create doubt about Santa so maybe this is more of a special for kids in Virginia’s age range. They do sneak in a real Santa at the end, but I don’t know how reassuring that is. By far though, the real reason why this has dropped so much is it is ugly to look at. Cheap, 2000’s, CG has not aged gracefully and maybe that’s why it’s no longer on TV? There are other versions of this story out there which I should check out, but even though I no longer have this one in my top 20, I still think it’s worth watching provided you’re not bothered by the Santa stuff I already mentioned.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
This year we’re doing not one, but two classic Mickey Mouse shorts set at Christmas time. The first one, Mickey’s Orphans, was a cartoon I had failed to mention years ago when doing a scattershot look at Mickey-related Christmas specials. Today’s subject, Mickey’s Good Deed, was mentioned in that post and is the second Mickey…
I don’t think there’s much debate that the most popular and enduring character churned out by the Hanna-Barbera factory during its hey-day is none other than Scooby Doo. About the only franchise that even competes with the big dog is The Flintstones, which hasn’t been relevant for ages. Scoob has basically had an omnipresence ever…
When I was a kid growing up in the 80s The Berenstain Bears was a popular series of books that usually imparted a simple, clear, message. I seem to recall a fire safety book being a go-to in school for fire safety week and I know I got a copy of one about not eating…
Today’s portion of the countdown is a little like yesterday’s. We have a few adult cartoons mixed in with mostly kid’s stuff. I liked the flow of yesterday’s list so I’m going to stick with that and front-load today’s list with the few adult cartoons I want to talk about before moving onto the general audience television specials. And if you’re curious, my arbitrary ranking for all of these pretty much coincides with that approach. I haven’t been including my scores for each special because they’re purely subjective and not part of my original review/write-up. They’re simply the product of my gut reaction to looking at the list of all of the specials I’ve covered and only used to help get me started when it came to organizing this thing. If you’re curious though, everything here has the purely arbitrary score of 6.5-6.75 on a 10 point scale. We’re firmly past mediocre and bad and into the “fine” portion. I know everyone’s reaction to 10 point scale scoring is either different or everyone thinks anything under 8 is bad, but for me it’s something like this:
0-1 – Abysmal
2-3 – Bad
3-5 – Time Waster
5-6 – Mediocre
6-7 – Fine
7-8 – Good
8-9 – Very Good
9-9.9 – Excellent
10 – Near Perfect
My approach may not be a 10 on my own scale, but it worked to get things in order and then I moved stuff around as I saw fit. In general, I don’t like numerical scales for deciding if something is simply good or not which is why I don’t use them. That’s just a little peek behind the curtain though, now let’s talk Christmas!
The Christmas Peter was visited by the ghost of Patrick Swayze.
Family Guy has probably never been celebrated for its creativity, even among its fans. It’s more about subversion and shock so when I found out the show did a parody of A Christmas Carol in 2017 I can’t say I was very surprised. The twist, if you want to call it one, is that instead of someone Peter actually knows serving as the ghosts of Christmas it’s Patrick Swayze (voiced by his brother Don) in the role of all 3. He takes Peter on a trip through time to examine how selfish he is and also to revisit the show’s Patrick Swayze jokes, of which there may be more than you think. It’s a bit self-indulgent and likely only works if you’re a long time fan of the show and enjoy callbacks. I think Family Guy relies on such tactics far too much and they rarely work on me. The jokes are mostly predictable and the episode ends exactly how you would it expect it to, but it’s also Family Guy where there’s a joke every 10 seconds so you’re almost guaranteed to laugh at something. How often is what will determine your overall enjoyment of it.
That doesn’t seem like the best way to win over a kid, Santa.
Yes, I’m ranking the Family Guy spin-off ahead of not one, but two Family Guy Christmas episodes. Considering this one is only one spot ahead, I wouldn’t read too much into it. I’m giving it the nod because it doesn’t rely on the A Christmas Carol trope and because the next entry on the list is going to be…well, you’ll see in a moment. The Cleveland Show was not something that worked for me. I didn’t stick with it for very long before dropping off which I suppose is unfair since many shows don’t truly find their footing until the second season or so, but also no show just deserves your attention until it gets good. My issue with it was it was just way too similar to Family Guy to the point where it felt redundant. The Cleveland character seemed to have to become mean like Peter and the family dynamics felt all too familiar. Nevertheless, the first Christmas episode is all right. Cleveland’s stepson Rallo hates him, but worships his biological father who’s a total deadbeat. Cleveland loses it while playing Santa and informs Rallo that his real dad is a piece of shit which sends the kid spiraling out of control. In the end, his real dad shows up for Christmas and invents a new lie for why he never has time for his kids: he’s the real Santa Claus! It was a clever way to return the show to the status quo, which most of these sitcoms aim to do. It’s just along the way there were many dud jokes of questionable taste, but some not so bad ones. If you’re a Family Guy fan who has exhausted that show’s Christmas offerings then you could do worse than turning to Cleveland.
Yup, a trio of Seth MacFarlane cartoons are leading off this section of the countdown. I honestly can’t really separate these three in terms of quality, they’re all very similar flavors. It’s like choosing between 7Up and Sprite. This one gets the nod over the other two because it actually has a little heart. This episode takes place in the brief period of time when Brian, the dog, is dead and replaced by a new dog named Vinny. Stewie ends up going on a time travel adventure to prevent Brian’s death, but the lead-up to that moment is pretty clever and doesn’t really occupy the whole episode. Instead, we have a Peter and Carter B-plot for that which includes bukkake jokes which I suppose is pretty unique for a Christmas plot. Nevertheless, this is Family Guy so the sweetness has to be undercut at every opportunity which lessens the payoff and makes the preceding 20 minutes feel like it may not have been worth it in the end. I did enjoy the resolution enough to slide it past the other two, but I don’t blame others if they find the other episodes funnier.
If I liked this series more I’d be calling for a Christmas Duckula action figure to be made.
Count Duckula is basically the unofficial first Nicktoon. It’s the first cartoon Nickelodeon produced for its network, though by the time the network got to the actual Nicktoons the process was changed up and they had a firmer grip on the legal component. Duckula is a spin-off of Danger Mouse and a superior one at that. I never cared for Danger Mouse, but Duckula was okay. I think I like the idea and character design more than the execution. This Christmas episode of the show is a bit odd as about half of it is devoted to Duckula reading an in-universe comic book and we get to see the story unfold on screen. It has basically nothing to do with Christmas. The plot of this one is that Duckula is your typical selfish protagonist eager for Christmas, though he’s more general kid selfish and not over-the-top Scrooge selfish. Santa is delivering presents, but gets lost in the maze that is Castle Duckula while the local vampire hunter is basically in the same predicament while trying to deliver a trap. It’s a very low stakes episode and no one learns anything in the end. Santa does escape while the vampire hunter’s Christmas trap literally blows up in his face. It has a bit of a British feel to the humor so if that’s your thing you may enjoy this one more. I enjoy it mostly for the animation and character designs as you don’t find too many of these spooky Christmas specials. It’s way better than Little Dracula.
Most people are probably familiar with the Disney feature Lilo & Stitch, especially now that it’s been given the live-action treatment. Fewer are probably aware of the animated series Lilo & Stitch and even fewer there are familiar with the anime, simply titled Stitch! This one was mostly for Japanese audiences, but it did receive an English dub and I do believe it aired on the Disney Channel at some point, but it has yet to make the leap to Disney+. There is no Lilo to be found in this one so maybe Disney thinks it wouldn’t play well with American audiences. It is animated just fine and supremely cute. The plot is pretty safe as well and similar to the other animated series as Hamsterviel is the main antagonist. He dresses up as Santa and lures in children with mind control cookies which Stitch easily counters with cookies made by Jumba. It’s just to kill time as the last act is reserved for Stitch helping Santa Claus out by playing him. It mostly just leads to a fun character design of Stitch as Santa and we get the customary sweet ending. It’s cuteness for the sake of cuteness. If you love Stitch then you’ll probably enjoy it.
Not to be confused with the comic of the same name, Ultimate Spider-Man is another perfectly cromulent Disney Channel vehicle for the webslinger. In this holiday episode, Spider-Man has to house sit for Doctor Strange and things get out of hand when Moon Knight crashes the party. The enigmatic hero mistakes Spidey for a villain and the two soon find themselves teaming up to stop the spawn of Mysterio who uses her mind-altering powers to conjure up a violent Christmas. If you ever wanted to see Spider-Man and Moon Knight battle against Christmas themed rogues then this is the special for you. The Spider-Man here is likable and full of his usual quips and it amounts to a mostly satisfying experience. It even manages to sneak in a little Christmas feels in the end with a redemption arc of sorts for Mysterio. Humanizing villains in superhero cartoons is always a pretty solid path to a successful Christmas episode.
Okay, here we have yet another adaptation of A Christmas Carol. As far as adaptations go, this one isn’t any better or worse than the usual lot. And the show it hails from is merely decent. I rank it this high though because Captain Hook is played by one Tim Curry and he’s fantastic. I absolutely adored this take on the pirate brought to life by Curry and some of that praise should definitely go towards the writing staff who do a tremendous job with Hook’s dialogue. He’s cultured, articulate, but also vicious, mean, and vile. It may be another version of A Christmas Carol, but in this one the protagonist (who is actually the antagonist) learns almost no lesson. He emerges from his visit with the ghosts of Christmas just as mean and vicious as before. If anything, he’s even more committed to his life of villainy! That’s a Captain Hook I can get behind. We just talked about a villain receiving redemption in the Spider-Man show and that’s all well and good, but sometimes villains need to just be that and no redemption is necessary or even wanted.
Sometimes a Christmas special just hits right for me when, objectively speaking, it probably shouldn’t. That’s why I do this though because I like the corny aspect of Christmas specials. I like the feel good moments. If a special can penetrate my wall of cynicism then it usually wins me over. That was the case with ‘Tis the Season to be Smurfy. Where the other Smurfs special almost completely failed, this one succeeds. It’s somewhat a retelling of The Elves and the Shoemaker substituting in the Smurfs in place of elves, but it goes about things differently. It’s very much a “Christmas Magic” plot where we need a character, a woman named Elise, to have plot sickness and the only cure is Christmas. Sassy and Grandpa Smurf find out about the poor woman and take it upon themselves when no other Smurf will. A thief sees the error of his ways, some rich guy learns to not be a dick, and everyone has a merry Christmas in the end. Along the way you get the usual Smurfs antics with Brainy, Hefty, and all of your favorites. If you have no affection for this sort of thing then scroll on by. If you’re in the mood for a surprisingly well-animated Christmas special with a feel good ending then go for it.
One of the most surprising experiences for me in doing this countdown was this episode of RoboCop: Alpha Commando. Prior to discovering it, I had no idea this show even existed. It came out at a pretty odd time for a new RoboCop cartoon and that it seemed to be a continuation of the short-lived 80s cartoon was even more surprising. And it’s not bad! It does some silly, late 90s, “extreme” stuff like giving RoboCop Roller Blades, but the animation is competent. The voice performances are fine, but what surprised me the most was the humor. The villain, appropriately named Tannenbaum, has some pretty suggestive language in this one that kept making me laugh. Was some of it only funny because it was so unexpected? Probably, and it’s not the sort of humor that could sustain an entire series, but for someone like me just dropping in for Christmas then ducking out it connected. There’s also just enough cynicism and sarcasm owing back to the film to make this not feel too foreign as a RoboCop property. It doesn’t have much Christmas sentimentality, but that’s definitely not something I’d expect from a RoboCop cartoon.
It’s Christmas Eve and the dog is about to die – sounds like a great setup!
Like The Smurfs, this one just happened to hit me in the right way on the right day. I can still remember watching this one in my bedroom on my little 13″ tube TV. It almost certainly would have been airing on Cartoon Network and I was somewhere in my teens when this one did something I wasn’t expecting it to: it made me cry. I can’t recall if I was feeling especially susceptible at the moment, but Christmas has a way of doing that. At the time, it was a rarity, but now it’s almost a guarantee with anything uplifting. And what got me here was the damn dog. They kill Astro! It’s Christmas, so it all works out in the end, but that got to me. And as the title implies this is yet another adaptation of A Christmas Carol. This time, it’s George Jetson’s boss, Mr. Spacely, in the role of the Scrooge figure and the special plays it straight. Jetson gets a raise and Astro is saved, though I don’t think anything changes from a continuity aspect. I don’t think there are many more episodes to follow anyway. Plus, Spacely’s motivation to save Astro is because the Jetsons sued him following the dog’s death since it was caused by a toy made by Spacely’s company which bankrupts him. In other words, he’s just out to save himself and his money. In the grand scheme of things, A Christmas Carol adaptations are boring and overdone, but in the case of The Jetsons this is one of the more successful ones.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
It was a week ago that we took a look at the Seth MacFarlane produced American Dad! and I remarked it had been a minute since we did an American Dad! Christmas episode. Well, it’s been even longer for the MacFarlane original, Family Guy, the show that was famously unloved, cancelled, and then brought back…
Today, we return to my best Christmas specials of all-time list with television’s first family: The Simpsons. The Simpsons are the brainchild of series creator Matt Groening who allegedly came up with the idea as a spur of the moment one when he needed something to pitch to the Fox Network. He essentially based The…
Alvin and the Chipmunks is one of the oldest, family-owned, pieces of intellectual property left in the world. And it might not be for much longer as the franchise is reportedly up-for-sale and has been since last year, but as-of this writing nothing has been agreed upon. The Chipmunks date back to the 1958 novelty…
December 9th brings us perhaps the most eclectic part of the countdown yet. As I mentioned in an earlier entry, I tried to group similar specials together when it came to tone and audience. I didn’t want to create too much whiplash going from Mickey Mouse to Eric Cartman. That doesn’t mean I’d stick to that approach at all costs because the rankings are what they are. I’m not going to elevate a bad Christmas episode of a show just to slot it into a friendlier place on the list or do the opposite to a good special. Sometimes, there’s just no way around it. Today is one of those days, but I’m going to frontload it with the adult comedy specials before transitioning to the more general audience stuff. And sure, maybe I’m more likely to watch one of these adult cartoons over one from The Flintstones on a given day, but they’re so close together that the rankings are purely subjective. I could say that for any entry, if you want to reorder these ten I wouldn’t fight you on it, but let’s get to it.
Family Guy is making its first appearance on this list, but it has a few to contribute and plenty more I never covered. This episode is one of the more recent ones and it’s also the most recent episode from the show I took a look at. It appealed to me because the plot, a frustrated Lois ditches her family for Christmas, felt very similar to the show’s first Christmas episode which remains my favorite one it’s done. The main difference is in that episode Lois goes to great lengths to be a beacon of positive energy who wants her family to have a great Christmas and then she eventually snaps because her family just isn’t willing to help her at all. This one, being many years later, is more typical of modern Family Guy where there’s a mean-spirited energy throughout. Lois experiences basically the same thing, but rather than have a nervous breakdown she just leaves and hopes to watch her family fall apart without her. When that doesn’t happen, she returns to steal Christmas in a very Grinchy segment which ends up being the highlight. It’s all right, but it all has a feeling of “Haven’t we done this before?” Doing a Grinch parody in this day and age also doesn’t help. We somehow managed to go decades as a society with doing The Grinch before the floodgates just suddenly opened in the 2000s.
During its Fox run, Futurama gave us two excellent Xmas episodes centered around a murderous robot Santa. This one from the Comedy Central era decided not to go all-out on Xmas and instead gave us an anthology style episode with a segment on Xmas, Hannukah, and Kwanzaa. It’s…okay. None of the segments are really long enough to feel substantial, but they’re also not good enough to feel like we were deprived anything. Some of the jokes are too reliant on callbacks, a frequent problem for the show when it came back, and the Xmas segment in particular is rather weak. Recently, Futurama added another Xmas special to its bank of episodes and it’s a lot better than this one. I considered doing an entry on it this year, but decided against it. Maybe some other time. This is the Futurama holiday episode I usually skip.
This Christmas, you’ll believe Charlie Manson can be reformed.
South Park‘s second season is somewhat maligned. It lacked the novelty the first season brought with it, but wasn’t quite the satirical force it would become in later seasons. “Merry Christmas, Charlie Manson” is pretty much emblematic of that. It’s not as shocking as the debut of Mr. Hankey in the first Christmas episode, and it’s not as brilliant as “A Very Crappy Christmas,” an episode I probably should have covered at some point. I only did this one because no one talks about it, but that is with good reason. Making Charlie Manson a central character in your Christmas special is certainly subversive and having the spirit of the holiday save him sounds like a decent South Park premise on paper, but they just don’t really pull it off. Maybe because it takes awhile to get Charlie into it? The payoff just isn’t all that funny and once the family of Cartmans runs its course the episode just limps to the finish line. If I’m throwing on the Christmas Time in South Park DVD I’m not skipping over this one, but I’m also not going out of my way to watch it annually.
Want to fall out of love with Stimpy? This episode will try and make it happen.
Ren and Stimpy feels like a good transition from the adult section of our countdown to the more family friendly stuff to come. I actually wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with the show’s second holiday episode. I very much enjoy The Ren and Stimpy Show. For a long time it was my favorite Nicktoon, but I think now I’d rank Rocko’s Modern Life ahead of it. That’s still pretty good and the show is funny, but I don’t love their Christmas episodes. There are aspects of this one that I think work a little better than “Son of Stimpy,” and I considered ranking it ahead of that one, but ultimately settled on this spot. In this one, Stimpy really wants a scooter for Yaksmas and is not subtle about it. He always gets his buddy Ren thoughtful gifts, while Ren takes Stimpy for granted. That’s what happens here and it drives Stimpy crazy to the point where he basically steals the scooter and is on the run for a lot of the episode. It has its moments and it’s full of the Games era hallmarks of subversive jokes and misdirection, but it’s yet another episode that’s just brutal to Stimpy. He’s a sympathetic character and it’s just not fun to see him in so much distress and the jokes just aren’t frequent enough, or clever enough, to rescue this one.
Nope, not the movie about the kid and the BB gun, but the Hanna-Barbera stand-alone Christmas special about a mouse and dog trying to get a letter to Santa. This special is mostly interesting to me because it must not have made much of an impact. I don’t know if I ever saw it as a kid. I definitely didn’t remember it when I returned to it for the blog, but I’m sure Cartoon Network would have aired this thing in the 90s. I conclude it made little to no impact because most of the original songs were lifted and repurposed for A Flintstone Christmas a few years later. It’s like if The Little Mermaid bombed so they had Aladdin sing “Part of Your World.” As for the actual special, it’s animated and produced competently enough and the story is a bit syrupy sweet. Daws Butler voicing another mouse is cute and it’s kind of amusing to hear Paul Winchell lend his Tigger voice to a dog. And it’s an original story for a stand-alone Christmas special so I’m giving it some bonus points for that. It’s not great, and I may be overrating it, but for whatever reason I just don’t hate this one and I think it’s more deserving of your time than a lot of what I ranked behind it.
The character who put Dic on the map in the 1980s made a brief return in the early 90s for a proper Christmas finale. Inspector Gadget is the comically inept detective who is some sort of cyborg or something. He’s got lots of gadgets, as the name implies, and they’re built into his body. Are we sure he’s a cyborg and not just a robot? Anyway, he gets all the credit for thwarting Doctor Claw when in reality its his niece Penny and her super smart canine Brain getting the job done while also keeping Gadget out of harm’s way. In this one, Doctor Claw overtakes Santa’s workshop and Gadget is deployed to put a stop to it, but in the process assaults the real Santa Claus because he’s incredibly dumb. Dic was able to get the voice cast back for the most part and even spent a little money to make this thing look good. There’s some musical moments that don’t really work for me, but otherwise this is a pretty good episode of Inspector Gadget that also happens to be a Christmas episode. If you liked the show then you’ll probably enjoy this.
When Warner Bros. (R.I.P.) had a new network to stock with children’s shows they turned to some old stars: Tweety and Sylvester. Joining the adversaries is Granny and the dog, Hector, who I don’t think ever had a name in the golden era, but maybe I’m mistaken. The plot then required this group to become a detective agency of sorts because why not? It worked for Hanna-Barbera all those years so why not a pair of Looney Tunes? The Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries is a pretty mid-tier animated series. It’s well put together, but not very inventive, the kind of show you leave on if you can’t find anything better to watch (or can’t find the remote). “Feather Christmas” is also a fairly benign episode of the show. It occupies one segment, so roughly 11 minutes or so, but it also lacks what the title promises: a mystery. In this one, a bratty girl has a pet bird her parents hate so they snatch it in the middle of the night. They have their butler or something (they’re rich) return the bird, but come to regret it. Since the help is on vacation for Christmas, they need Granny and her animals to find the store the bird was returned to. Meanwhile, Sylvester is trying to be extra good so he gets something better than a rubber mouse for Christmas. There’s some slapstick, pee jokes, and Sylvester ultimately makes the right choice and the bratty little girl has a Merry Christmas while Sylvester gets…another rubber mouse. The cat can’t win.
Future Worm! is a show I had never heard of until it popped up on Hulu one day as a recommend. I looked through the episodes, found a Christmas one, and then had to get acquainted with this interesting series. I’m not going to rehash the nonsensical plot and setup, but all most likely need to know about Future Worm! is that it’s Rick and Morty for babies. The look and tone is so similar to the more popular adult animated show that it kind of blew my mind. That had to have been the premise, right? As in, someone at Disney wondered if they could adapt a popular show like Rick and Morty for a more general audience. It’s the only explanation. And the crazy thing is it mostly works. This episode isn’t laugh out loud funny, but it’s clever. The main family gets lost in the mall, the patriarch (who is such a Gerry) falls in with some goths, and it turns out the villain is Mrs. Claus with a head made out of gingerbread. It’s weird, though maybe not as weird as it’s trying to be. If you ever wondered if Rick and Morty could work with a PG rating, then maybe give this show a look.
Fred is going to learn the true meaning of Christmas the hard way.
Yes, another 90s Flintstones holiday special. This one is much better than the franchise’s take on A Christmas Carol. This is a made-for-primetime television special so it has the production values and it’s also an original story. In this one, a juvenile delinquent comes into contact with the Flintstone family and it’s upon them to reform this Stony. He’s legitimately a bad seed at the start, but he’s also a product of neglect. The kid then tries to repay the Flintstones for their kindness, but he’s not equipped to do so and his bad decisions just create more problems for Fred and the family. It’s a very sitcom-type premise with the typical sitcom results. I confess that I’m still somewhat charmed by The Flintstones so this one probably works a little better for me than it would someone who doesn’t care about the show, but it’s a perfectly fine Christmas special.
I may have liked this as a kid, but I never liked how Santa looked.
The Ranken/Bass animated special closes out our ten for today. Is this one a classic? It was in my house so I guess that’s all that matters for this countdown. And it was a favorite of mine as a kid. I naturally gravitated more towards the hand drawn stuff over the puppets so that probably played some role and I’m a sucker for the “Will Santa Claus come?” plot and the payoff always hits me. I feel like I frequently cite the songs in a lot of these things as being bad, but this one has some bangers. I think the big song, “Christmas Chimes are Calling (Santa, Santa)” is great and it’s kind of a shame it never made the jump to radio or something. I like the animation, I like the voice work. The special gets a little long and the plot is kind of goofy. Is Santa really so thin-skinned? If he’s omnipresent, how does he not know one editorial in the newspaper was the result of some kids? You can really pick this one apart if that’s your aim, or you can just be along for the ride. My kids don’t really like it, but it still charms me.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
It was a few years ago that South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone gave an interview to Entertainment Weekly in which they picked their favorite and least favorite episodes of the long running show. I couldn’t find an active link for that interview, but it’s covered in various other places on the web…
Come 1996 the Nicktoons were an established brand. Launched in 1991, Nickelodeon had tremendous success with the likes of Rugrats and The Ren & Stimpy Show and soon more shows followed. Nickelodeon seemed to be a bit stingy with their in-house shows when it came to renewals as when a network looks to renew a…
If the 70s were defined by Scooby Doo when it came to Hanna-Barbera, then the 80s belonged to The Smurfs. The little blue creations of Pierre Culliford, better known by his pen name Peyo, had an animated series that basically spanned the entirety of the 80s totaling an insane 258 episodes. And once the 80s…
When it comes to the Disney Afternoon, my mind doesn’t always go to Christmas. I attribute that to my viewing habits of the legendary programming block to mostly coincide with its earliest days. Then, the block consisted of DuckTales, Chip n’ Dale’s Rescue Rangers, and TaleSpin only I tended to just watch DuckTales and Rescue Rangers. Why? I’m not entirely sure, but I’m guessing TaleSpin conflicted with another program I was more invested in (likely The Real Ghostbusters or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). If you’re intimately familiar with Christmas and its association with the Disney Afternoon, then you may know that both DuckTales and Rescue Rangers did not feature a holiday themed episode. I know – it’s crazy. Scrooge McDuck is named after a Christmas icon and his debut occurred in a Christmas story while the Rescue Rangers save Christmas is a story that practically writes itself, but that’s how it was.
Despite my personal viewing habits, it’s not as if I was unfamiliar with what came after the original block. Darkwing Duck is a show I watched some and also liked to a degree. Due to my affection for Batman and other caped heroes, there was a part of me that very much wanted to like Darkwing Duck, though I don’t think it ever came to be. It was a thing that was on and once it started to conflict with shows I preferred, like an actual Batman cartoon, I mostly dropped it. From afar, it feels like Darkwing Duck has a pretty strong reputation these days as a quality children’s cartoon and a high point for the Disney Afternoon. It of course looked great and what essentially amounts to a Batman spoof with ducks is a solid concept for 1991. And that theme song is an absolute banger. Has there been a television block of any kind with as consistently strong theme songs as the Disney Afternoon? Of the first four (and if you want to toss-in legacy cartoon Adventures of the Gummi Bears) only TaleSpin is just kind of okay, though I know even that one has its fans. Goof Troop had a great theme, Gargoyles was awesome, and even Bonkers was okay. Toss-in sister series The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and holy cow do you have a strong collection of opening themes.
Darkwing Duck aired from September 1991 – December 1992 totaling 91 episodes.
When it comes to the quality of the show I would say Gargoyles stands head and shoulders above all other Disney Afternoon cartoons. That one is also decidedly different from the rest given that it’s not a comedy. After that though, I won’t fight you if you want to say Darkwing Duck is the best. As such, it would make perfect sense for Darkwing Duck to have the best Christmas episode of them all, but to my surprise I’ve found that isn’t the case. “It’s a Wonderful Leaf” is not a bad episode and if you’re a big fan of this show you probably watch it annually, but is it better than Goof Troop‘s take on the holiday? TaleSpin? Bonkers?! I don’t think so, but maybe after going through it in exhausting fashion as we’re about to do I’ll feel differently.
Before we really get into the nuts and bolts of this thing, allow me to just indulge once again in the theme song. When it comes to Christmas episodes of television shows, I do appreciate when they dress-up the opening title for the holiday. Usually this can be accomplished with some added bells or chimes to the song, maybe an altered lyric here and there, or the addition of falling snow over the animation. Some shows go really far and completely change the performance. Take DuckTales, the reboot, which altered its theme song to that of a crooner performance reminiscent of Sinatra or Crosby. It’s neat, but when I only return to the vast majority of these shows for holiday viewings I tend to enjoy the ones that don’t mess with things if they have a great theme already. Those holiday performances of the DuckTales theme often leaving me wishing I could just hear the regular one instead.
Full disclosure: Disney+ decided it hated my PC when I went to get screens so they’re going to suck for this entry.
Anyway, this one begins with the regular intro with nothing added for Christmas, so that’s both a good and a bad thing. It does have a nice, wintery, title card which dissolves into a snowy scene. Our first location is a mall and it’s quite close to Christmas, by the looks of things. The holiday shoppers are practically ravenous and one guy even gets bit by a little pig girl (I’m not making fun, she is a literal pig). One person out and about today is none other than Bushroot (Tino Insana, who sounds remarkably like Dom DeLuise), the plant-focused villain who is the Poison Ivy stand-in for Darkwing Duck, minus the sexual tension. He’s not exactly happy to be at the mall so close to Christmas, but he put his shopping off until the end. He’s able to avoid the mob by ducking into a plant-focused store. There it’s much quiet, and as he goes over his list of individuals to buy gifts for (they’re all plant-centric names so I don’t think these are people, or ducks, that he’s buying for) he happens upon a display of watering cans. Feeling that will make a suitable gift for someone, Bushroot goes to retrieve one only for the mob to attack the display leaving him with nothing left but a dented watering can.
Bushroot is not your typical villain. He’s pretty easy going and he even takes this in stride, until some yokel (Jim Cummings) yanks it from his hands. Bushroot rather meekly tries to explain that he had the item first, but the guy just whacks him what appears to be a purse (interesting) and sends Bushroot soaring through the air (and out of his trench coat) to land in a barrel. With just his tuft of purple-pink hair sticking out, the young pig girl from earlier mistakes him for a plant and plucks some hair out of his skull. Bushroot objects, though fairly politely, and then the girl (Dana Hill) screams. Her mother (Susan Tolsky) sees Bushroot and does the same crying out that there’s a plant monster in there. Bushroot asks “Where?!” oblivious to the fact that she means him and then he’s forced to retreat as she blasts him repeatedly with a rake. He’s able to avoid the mob that ensues by hiding in a present at an outdoor Christmas tree display. When everyone is gone, he goes into villain mode basically blaming Christmas for his misfortune and deciding that the city of St. Canard shall rue the Christmas it decided to mess with Bushroot!
Gosalyn is your typical excitable kid at Christmas.
At the home of Drake Mallard, we find out hero getting ready to decorate the tree. To do so, Drake (Jim Cummings) offers up a variation on his catchphrase with “Let’s get decorative,” before he aggressively covers the tree with lights. There’s just one problem – Launchpad. Drake’s buddy, sidekick, secret lover?, ended up tied to the tree in the aftermath apparently unable to avoid the speedy Mallard. Once freed, Drake is able to bask in the glory of the season remarking on how peaceful it is, which is just the cue for daughter Gosalyn (Christine Cavanaugh) to come flying down the stairs Kevin McCallister-style on a sleigh. She takes out the tree and most of the family’s living room, but blames it on her excitement at finding the sleigh upstairs. Drake remarks it’s his sled and takes it from her only for it to crumble into dust. Gosalyn is not deterred though as she refers to her rather large Christmas list to confirm she requested a sled this year and assumes there must be one in the mountain of presents before her. Drake has to pry her off the pile to remind her they don’t open gifts until Christmas only for Gosalyn to whine that it’s too far away. Drake tells her it’s tomorrow and she mostly calms down agreeing to wait. Oh, wait, she’s lying as she adds in a “Not!” afterwards! Oh, those plucky 90s kids.
We transition to a new living room scene where apparently everything has been tidied up. Even the tree now stands again with Gosalyn eyeing it from behind the couch via binoculars. She’s joined by Honker Muddlefoot (Katie Leigh) and the two are sporting military-styled helmets as they make their way for the tree. Declaring herself the terror that unwraps in the night, Gosalyn goes to open a gift only for an alarm to sound from the tree. Drake calls from the other room to make sure she’s not peeking and Gosalyn calls back that she was just replacing an ornament. A good save, especially if they have a cat. She’s not giving up though as she stalks over to a present conspicuously far from the tree, only to find her dad hiding inside it (he’s good). She snidely refers to him as a Christmas cop as the scene ends with an iris out in the shape of a star. Interesting choice.
An army of trees – are we scared?
We find Bushroot has descended upon a tree farm. Armed with a star-shaped megaphone of some kind, he puts out the APB “Calling all trees,” which brings the trees to life. I don’t know how his powers work, but I’m guessing he just has an innate ability to command plants. Though these trees were probably already cut so I’m not sure how that works since they should be dead, but it is a cartoon and I probably shouldn’t think about it that much. Bushroot leads the trees out in a marching formation and returns to the mall. There he does the same thing to bring the Christmas trees in the mall under his command. They’re apparently a cheeky lot as one grabs a Darkwing Duck toy from the little pig girl and tosses it into the bag of another shopper. The pig girl cries out to get her mother’s attention who thinks the guy stole it from her (given the behavior of the shoppers we saw earlier, this checks out). She wails on him, and he doesn’t fight back, much to the delight of the little pig girl.
More trees are up to funny business as we find a Santa working a collection pot elsewhere in the mall. As he swings a handheld bell, the Christmas tree behind him snatches it and wallops him over the head with it. Terrible, just terrible. The tree then does like the other one and places the bell in the hand of some old, dog, guy walking the mall. Santa sees it, angrily grabs it, then wallops him with it! Bushroot looks on with satisfaction as we can also see the pig lady is still beating up the other guy too. He remarks it’s time for phase two of his operation. Just what is phase two? It takes place at the Santa’s Workshop location of the mall. A different Santa from before is working this one, but when a kid vacates his lap the trees alongside him basically smother him. It looks like murder, and when the trees pull back we see that Bushroot has taken Santa’s place. Phase Two is apparently all about making Santa look bad as the first kid to sit on his lap asks for a drum for Christmas, so Bushroot tells him to “Beat it,” and boots him away. Time passes and the little pig girl comes running in excitedly waving the Darkwing doll she apparently got back. Bushroot tells her he’s all out of toys and needs her doll for next year. This causes her to run off crying, but it’s revealed that Tank Muddlefoot (Hill) was watching. He’s kind of like the bully character of the show, and he bullies Bushroot by telling him he’s not Santa and yanks on his fake beard, which hurts Bushroot for some reason. The trees give him the boot and we see him soar past his parents, Herb (Cummings) and Binkie (Tolsky).
Herb is a little more than Bushroot expected.
Herb, being a big kid basically, gets all excited at the sight of Santa Claus and practically leaps onto Bushroot’s lap. He is a duck of generous proportions so Bushroot is not exactly appreciative of this display of affection. With Herb inadvertently pinning him down, the angry pig mom storms in to do what she does best and beat up old Santa Root. Bushroot is forced to retreat as a mob forms to start chasing him. He takes refuge underneath a tree only popping his head out after the mob runs past him to deliver a sinister “Ho ho ho,” as he removes his beard. It would seem that sabotaging the good name of Santa Claus was worth the punishment.
Elsewhere, Drake and Launchpad (who he calls D.W. whether Drake is in costume or not, apparently) are doing some last minute shopping of their own. Launchpad has presents piled up in his arms with Drake standing on top of them. When he questions if they’ve gone a little overboard, Drake insists they have not for it is Christmas and it’s the season of giving. Or something. The pair then take notice of the havoc going on around him as many mall-goers complain of stolen items. “This looks like a job for…” is the expected line, only when Drake reemerges he’s dressed as Santa Claus. He seems surprised to not be in his Darkwing attire, but then tries to play it off like he did this on purpose surmising that disguising himself as Santa will help him get the drop on the holiday thief. Only it actually makes him a target as the angry mob looking for Bushroot sees Drake as Santa and immediately goes on the attack!
You gotta get with the season, D.W.
Darkwing, now in his regular attire, and Launchpad are able to give the mob the slip fairly easily setting up for some monologuing. Darkwing speculates that a sinister force is behind all of this, but Bushroot sticks his head out from behind a Christmas tree to correct him that he’s not sinister, just misunderstood. Darkwing immediately seizes upon the moment to declare he should have known Bushroot was behind this! After a few plant-based puns and some alliteration from Darkwing, Bushroot summons his “boys.” A trio of bushy trees back him up which is just too much for Darkwing. He is positively disgusted that Bushroot would use Christmas trees to attack Christmas. It’s a new low. Bushroot isn’t exactly phased by this as he leaves arm and…limb…with a pair of trees leaving three behind to take care of Darkwing and Launchpad. I’m not really sure how this is supposed to work, but Darkwing and Launchpad are certainly playing it up like they’re scared. Darkwing whips out his gas gun and fires unleashing a burst of ornaments and tinsel at the unsuspecting tree. It’s now fully decorated, much to Darkwing’s surprise, and someone even whistles at it like they find it sexy. I don’t know if that came from one of the heroes, or one of the trees. It’s enough of a distraction for Darkwing and Launchpad to beat it forcing the trees to give chase. Once again, Christmas decorations are used as cover as Darkwing and Launchpad hide in some gifts until the trees pass. Once they’re in the clear, Darkwing ponders how they can track Bushroot down while Launchpad helpfully suggests they just follow the pine needles. Is Launchpad the smart one in this relationship? It’s been awhile since I’ve watched this show.
Bushroot is now onto phase three of his plan, Operation Bah Humbug, which involves a flatbed truck and his little intercom/wand thingy. He’s doing his calling all trees bit while driving through a neighborhood and as he does so the trees in the homes come to life. Their objective? Steal all the presents! Bushroot soon sees that he missed a tree so apparently the trees only come to life if they have the star on top of them. I probably should have picked up on that earlier, but I just thought they were decorations. The tree with the missing star is of course Darkwing’s and when Bushroot activates it he also sets off the tree alarm that had been installed to keep Gosalyn at bay. She and Honker come storming in to find the tree snatching gifts, which she naturally does not take kindly to. The tree shoves a wreath around the pair to subdue them, then runs off which only further enrages the small duck.
You better not be messing with presents on Christmas, tree.
The trees all emerge from the various homes with limbs full of presents. As they make for Bushroot’s truck, the plant-duck basks in a plan well-executed. That is, until he spies Darkwing Duck speeding up from behind him! Apparently, Darkwing’s motorcycle can also become something akin to a snowmobile as it has a big ski on the front instead of a tire. He rides up along side Bushroot’s truck and decides to spring into action…right in front of the truck. I’m not sure what the thinking was here, but the predictable happens which is Darkwing gets run over. He gets to mug for the camera with a busted smile singing “All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth,” clearly concussed. Gosalyn hops over to him, still wrapped up in the wreath with Honker, to inform her dad about the obvious. Launchpad pulls up in the bike to check on his buddy, who is now fine because he’s surprisingly resilient. The three hop onto the bike and Darkwing declares, while brandishing a massive axe, that it’s time to do some Christmas tree chopping!
It’s also time to kill a little time with a chase scene. Well, kill some time for the writers, the animators have to do some heavy lifting here as they chase after Bushroot’s truck which is now loaded with trees. Everyone is safely wearing helmets on the bike, but apparently not seatbelts. Yeah, I know, motorcycles don’t typically include such, but you would think the sidecar might? Regardless, a big hill tosses Darkwing and Launchpad from the bike leaving just the kids behind. No problem for apparently Gosalyn is pretty good with this thing. Darkwing and Launchpad have, painfully, landed on a Santa decoration of Santa in his sleigh with two reindeer leading his team. Gosalyn, in a bid to be helpful, lassos the sleigh and proceeds to pull her father and…uncle?…all through downtown St. Canard in pursuit of Bushroot. Darkwing and Launchpad obviously get the worst of it, and are soon shot into the sky where they pass before the full moon giving us a different take on the whole Santa moon shot thing.
That’s a weird looking Santa.
It sure seemed like they were going to soar right out of the city, but apparently not. Bushroot comes to a stop outside a tree farm, possibly the one from earlier, and remarks how he was finally able to rid himself of Darkwing Duck. Which, in cartoon speak, means he absolutely has not. Darkwing and Launchpad come soaring in and crash into Bushroot’s vacated truck. That is apparently the least of their problems as soon Gosalyn comes racing in on the bike declaring she doesn’t know how to stop. Understandable considering she’s…what? Eight? She crashes into her dad, but everyone seems more or less fine. Plus they’re surrounded by stolen presents which Gosalyn is eager to open, but her father stops her. He tosses the trio (is Honker actually going to speak in this episode?) some Santa beards and informs them that they’re going to return all the presents while he goes after Bushroot. Since he brandished an axe before, now he’s sporting some sinister looking hedge clippers because we have to keep the puns coming.
We catch up with Darkwing as he prowls rooftops with an elaborate looking magnifying glass narrating his search for Bushroot. Unbeknownst to him, Bushroot is well aware and lurking about. He lassos Darkwing’s beak with a string of Christmas lights and pulls him close. At first, it seems like a bad play as he doesn’t have a weapon or anything to face Darkwing with who quickly pulls out his gas gun. He then informs the heroic waterfowl that he best put the weapon away unless he wishes to invoke the wrath of his good pal Douglas. Darkwing naturally asks who Douglas is and he soon meets him. Douglas Fir is Bushroot’s new best friend – a massive Christmas tree one might find in a town square. Darkwing is swatted away, which happens a lot in this show, and lands behind a fire hydrant. Viewing it as some sort of saviour, he actually makes the very poor decision to kiss it. Do duck beaks stick to metal in cold temperatures? Apparently so, for Darkwing is stuck as Bushroot calls in more trees and orders them to “Deck the duck with everything you’ve got!” It’s a lovely little number, but the trees are still only armed with Christmas ornaments and other fixings so it doesn’t seem as bad as Darkwing makes it out to be. Still, he can’t get unstuck as he frantically pulls at his own beak eventually ripping the hydrant from its moorings.
Meet Douglas.
Once again, we find our hero in a pile of snow this time duck butt up. There’s also a snowman beside him so you know that’s going to play a role soon. Darkwing emerges from the snow with the hydrant still attached to his head. It’s an odd piece of animation as he appears to be wearing it like a helmet, but his face is drawn on it. I think something might have been lost in translation here. He removes it and soon finds himself under assault again from the trees. He ducks (heh) behind the snowman for cover. He then basically wears the snowman like armor as he withstands the pummeling from the trees which seems to enrage Bushroot. The snow falls away, but Darkwing is left holding a large snow shovel which the snowman had been posed with. He runs over to the water main which is gushing thanks to the damage done to the hydrant and uses the shovel to direct the spray at the trees. The water basically freezes on contact and Bushroot is soon forced to make a hasty retreat. Only he can’t outrun Darkwing and his directional water and he too becomes a frozen vegetable. Darkwing slaps some cuffs on the now inanimate Bushroot and declares this another sinister plot that’s been nipped in the bud. Clever.
Bushroot is put on ice and we still have several minutes left of this one.
Darkwing returns to the neighborhood and finds Launchpad, Gosalyn, and Honker seated on the flatbed looking rather glum. Darkwing is surprised to see such long faces, but Launchpad informs him they returned all of the presents, but the gifts for Honker’s family were no where to be found. There’s a massive mountain of gifts on the flatbed, but apparently they’re all for Gosalyn. Damn, she’s spoiled. Darkwing doesn’t really know what to do and apologizes to Honker who says “It’s okay,” (he speaks!) and then suggests that the real Santa Claus will surely bring his family something. As he heads into his house, Darkwing remarks, “Poor little guy,” but Gosalyn corrects him to say you can’t be poor when you have friends and she thrusts one of her gifts into his hands with a smile. I see where this is going.
Inside the Muddlefoot residence, the family is sound asleep until the sound of sleigh bells awaken them! Tank is the first downstairs for he has a trap for Santa – a bear trap! It’s in the fireplace so he’s pretty annoyed when Santa enters through the window. He runs over to admonish Santa for this untraditional entrance, but when Santa spins around he accidentally whacks him with his sack full of gifts. Tank ends up landing on his own trap the pain of which causes him to shoot up and get lodged in the top of the chimney. The rest of the Muddlefoots enter the room and Santa, who is obviously Darkwing, dispenses with the gifts. Honker gives him a big hug in return which seems to touch old D.W.
Santa always comes through.
With that task done, the Mallard clan makes the short walk home. Darkwing tells Gosalyn how proud of her he is for giving her gifts to the Muddlefoots and gives her an affectionate noogie to punctuate it. She seems unphased, but is soon delighted when she finds her Christmas present on the stoop of their house: a new sleigh. It has a tag reading “To Gosalyn, From Santa,” which Launchpad reads aloud for our benefit. She grabs the sleigh and dives into the snow leaving Launchpad to ask Darkwing when he found time to get her that. He indicates he thought Launchpad did, and they go into a whole routine you’ve probably seen before until there’s only one solution. Darkwing remarks that “He is a Christmas tradition,” as the pair look up to the sky and we see the real guy fly by with a proper moon shot to boot. Tank, still stuck in the chimney, cries out to Santa for help and promises to be good from now on, but his cries fall on deaf ears as the camera zooms out on a snowy St. Canard to end it.
“It’s a Wonderful Leaf” is far from a bad episode of Darkwing Duck. It has a decent premise with the plant-based Bushroot using Christmas trees to wage ware on the holiday. It also tosses in a materialistic Gosalyn subplot in which she’s forced to do something selfless, it’s just that neither plot really lands beyond that. Bushroot is more annoying than truly disruptive and an army of marching trees isn’t particularly threatening. There are puns galore, as the show often deals in, but few are truly clever. Some of that is by design as Darkwing is like an amateur poet, but the only one I really liked was Bushroot ordering the trees to deck the duck.
When are they going to get him down?
Gosalyn and her plotline just isn’t really given enough time to land. It’s not the best plot anyway as the audience rarely feels anything extensive for a character that has to give up material goods. We don’t see her longing for some specific item that she then in turn gifts to Honker, all of the gifts just exist in the abstract. I feel like the episode wants the ending to land with more of a thump, but it’s a whimper at best. It was a nice attempt at invoking some Christmas feels, but not enough. I also am slightly annoyed with the dismissal of Santa Claus throughout the episode. All of these people just put the gifts under the tree already? They’re just a bit too casual in their disbelief right up until the end. This is a show for kids, and sort of like my feelings on other Disney Afternoon Christmas specials (Bonkers, TaleSpin) they’re too eager to show unbelieving adults. It’s a fantasy world inhabited by talking ducks – can’t Santa just exist? Admittedly, that’s more of a pet peeve I have where I prefer shows aimed at children to not put doubt in the minds of viewers because I want the Santa myth to last as long as possible with children, even if it’s a losing battle.
Since we did get two moon shots in this one I’ll forgive them for only doing six reindeer.
My conclusion here is that it’s not really funny enough to be a classic episode of Darkwing Duck. The Christmas element isn’t clever enough, and there aren’t enough Christmas feels to produce that lump in one’s throat. It’s just kind of okay at everything which is why I’m ranking it back here behind other Disney Afternoon Christmas episodes. And I probably am penalizing it a touch as I didn’t expect much out the likes of Bonkers so I was pleasantly surprised with that one. With Darkwing, I just expected better. The animation is at least still great for the most part so it’s not like I feel as if I waste my time when I watch this one, but I also start to tune it out about halfway through and struggle to get reinvested come the end. If you like it more than me I won’t say you’re wrong or anything, but maybe you love the idea of a Darkwing Duck Christmas episode more than the reality.
Can’t wait until tomorrow for more Christmas? Check out what we had to say on this day last year and beyond:
Last year, Prep & Landing was given the prestigious slot at The Christmas Spot of Christmas Day. I try to reserve a really good special for the big day each year and Prep & Landing is one of the best. In fact, I have declared it the 9th best Christmas special of all-time. That’s no…
I’ve been known to be a bit critical of Warner Bros. for not creating more Christmas shorts. The most notable one is Gift Wrapped starring Tweety while Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck basically had to wait until after the Golden Era to give Christmas a whirl. And those weren’t really that great. Low key, the…
It was around Labor Day of this year that Will Sloan (@WillSloanEsq) took to Twitter to uncover the origins of an image that had confounded his girlfriend and him for the past five years. It was actually a return plea as he had posted the same image 3 years prior. The image in question was…
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:
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