History Main / MallSanta

* ''Series/TheFlash2014'': The season 2 ChristmasEpisode "Running To Stand Still" has a dark twist on this trope when The Trickster dresses up as a Mall Santa so he can give the children visiting him a present with a bomb, which he then threatens to detonate if Flash doesn't allow Weather Wizard to beat him in a fight.

* ''Series/{{Roseanne}}'' convinces her boss to let her play Santa ''herself,'' and the kids fall for it even though she doesn't remotely sound like a man. Jackie plays Mrs. Claus...as a drill sergeant photographer.

** An early fake commercial for "Santi-Wrap," a plastic sheet similar to disposable toilet seat covers, featured John Belushi as a slovenly, drunken mall Santa, thereby illustrating why such a product is necessary.

* Music/TheBeachBoys' song "Santa's Beard," from their 1964 Christmas album, is from the perspective of someone taking his 5-year-old brother to see Santa at the mall. The younger brother sits on Santa's lap and pulls his beard off, realizes he's fake, and feels betrayed. Thinking fast, the singer replies that the mall Santa is one of Santa's helpers outside of the North Pole.

** In an often-reprinted strip, Linus tells Lucy that he wished the store Santa a Happy Hanukkah and discussed "Judas Maccabeus and the cleansing of the Temple" with him. "It's not often you find a Santa Claus interested in religion," he says...
** It also occurred in a later series of strips which involved Sally Brown expressing her concern that Santa could, "have a coronary in some kid's living room," and visiting a department store to tell the Santa there to watch out for his cholesterol and try to, "check for a crease in his ear lobes." [[spoiler: She gets chucked out of the place and arrives home to hear news that a department store Santa had a heart attack and had to be rushed to hospital after a little girl caused a disturbance earlier on.]]

* ''WebVideo/DragonBallZAbridged'': In "Christmas Tree of Might," one of Turles' mooks had this job, and he was particularly nasty about it, dropping a fire truck on one kid's house and killing another because he asked him to [[ExactWords get rid of]] his cancer.

* In {{WesternAnimation/Beetlejuice}}, the episode "Keeping Up With the Boneses" sees Beetlejuice forced to work off his credit card debt by becoming a badly-costumed Mall Santa (a pillow he's using as stuffing is visible), with Lydia playing his elf. Beetlejuice, of course, is less than happy about all of this.

* [[WesternAnimation/InvaderZim Zim]] abducts a mall Santa to gain information about how to use the image of Santa Claus to TakeOverTheWorld

* [[WesternAnimation/{{Metalocalypse}} Dr Rockzo, the Rock & Roll Clown who does Cocaine,]] got a job as a Mall Santa after he was given a GetOutofJailFreeCard. [[ManChild Toki,]] who apparently believes in Santa Claus, ran into him.
** "Thats don'ts makes sense!"

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* Joey dresses as Santa's Elf in a season one episode of ''Series/{{Friends}}''. A later season gets Chandler dressed as the man himself (and Monica asks if he can keep the suit for later that night).

* [[Fanfic/UltimateSpiderWoman Mary Jane Watson]] gets a job as one of Santa's helpers in the Christmas display at Macy's Department Store. She feels more than a little silly in her ChristmasElves outfit, but she turns out to actually be pretty good at the job.
** The next year, Mary Jane plays the main role herself when the men who play Santa aren't available. She dresses up as MrsClaus and invites the kids to sit on her lap, explaining that Santa had a bad cold and he didn't want anyone to get sick, so she's filling in for him.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'' episode, "[[Recap/RugratsS2E14TheSantaExperience The Santa Experience]]", Angelica cuts in line to see the Mall Santa, and after she tells him the large amount of presents she wants, he tells her he isn't sure he can get them for her. Angelica then rips off his beard and runs through the mall, screaming, "Santa Claus is a fake! Run for your lives!"

* A ChristmasEpisode of ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'', "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS2E47TheNightOfTheMeek The Night of the Meek]]", stars Art Carney as an alcoholic department store Santa who despairs over not being able to help the poor people in his slum neighborhood -- [[spoiler:but in the spirit of the show, he finds a sack that magically produces presents on demand... then at shows' end he gets his own wish and becomes Santa for real]]. This episode also showed up in the [[Series/TheTwilightZone1985 1985 revival series]], with [[Series/{{Soap}} Richard Mulligan]] in Art Carney's role and [[Film/Ghostbusters1984 William Atherton]] as the department store boss.

* Joey dresses as Santa's Elf in a season one episode of ''Series/{{Friends}}''.

* A ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone1959 Twilight Zone]]'' Christmas episode, "Night of the Meek", stars Art Carney as an alcoholic department store Santa who despairs over not being able to help the poor people in his slum neighborhood - [[spoiler: but in the spirit of the show, he finds a sack that magically produces presents on demand... then at shows' end he gets his own wish and becomes Santa for real.]] This episode also showed up in the [[Series/TheTwilightZone1985 1985 revival series]], with [[Series/{{Soap}} Richard Mulligan]] in Art Carney's role and [[Film/Ghostbusters1984 William Atherton]] as the department store boss.

* In an early ''Series/{{MadTV}}'' ChristmasEpisode, Creator/NicoleSullivan's Vancome Lady character serves as a gatekeeper to one of these. She turns away one kid for being fat, another for being homeless (she isn't), and another for being Jewish, all with her trademark phrase "Tcha, you know what? Uh uh!" She is, of course, fired, but as a parting shot reveals a bit of the mall Santa's indiscretions with her and then tears off his fake beard.

-->'''Renee Montaya:''' ''([[DopeSlap Dope Slaps]] him)''.

->''"If you're Santa Claus, [[TheSnarkKnight why are there so many Santa Clauses at other malls?]]"''

%%mage selected per Image Pickin' thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16734751560.11429400

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mallsanta_9838.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350: The most wonderful time of the year?]]

* In ''Film/AChristmasStory'' Ralphie goes to the Department Store to ask Santa for his Red Ryder BB Gun. This Santa is a particularly nasty, arrogant, and impatient one as are his two elves. He becomes just the latest character to mention to Ralphie that "You'll shoot your eye out!" right before he boots him down the slide.

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* A mall Santa appears in Week 5 of ''VideoGame/FridayNightFunkin'', being held at gunpoint by Mom and Dad as they have a rap battle with Boyfriend. After their songs end, the mall is ravaged and emptied off-screen and the Monster appears wearing the Santa's bloodied hat, implying that he killed him.

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* In ''Film/HomeAlone'', Kevin runs to find a Santa in time on Christmas Eve. He finds one getting into his car after quiting time. He quickly puts his beard back on and does his best Jolly Old St. Nick, but Kevin tells him not to bother. He already knows he's not the real Santa, but he knows he does work for him. The Santa [[SureLetsGoWithThat just goes with it]]. Kevin then asks him to relay the message that he wants his family back.

->''"If you're Santa Claus, why are there so many Santa Clauses at other malls?"''

* ''Machinima/HalfLifeButTheAIIsSelfAware'' has Creator/VinDiesel serving as a ''[[spoiler:Birthday]]'' Santa during [[spoiler:Tommy's birthday party]].

* In issue #378 of ''ComicBook/IncredibleHulk'' (by Creator/PeterDavid), Rhino (a supervillain) becomes a Mall Santa. He gives this advice to kids: "Give! Give! Give! You want everything handed to you! Why not do what I do? Take stuff! See it? Want it? Take it!"

* The eponymous [[WebVideo/TheTourettesGuy Tourettes Guy]] aptly describes his dad as one. [[BerserkButton Big mistake]].

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* ''Film/{{Elf}}'' - Buddy, who knows the real Santa, is incensed when an impostor shows up at the department store he works in. He accuses the fake of smelling "like beef and cheese!" and gets into a fistfight with him. After that, the store gets a different Santa- who is ''black''.

* Discussed in ''WesternAnimation/ThePolarExpress'' where the ticket conductor notes that the boy didn't get his photo taken with a department store Santa.

* [[WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy Stewie Griffin]] once got the short end of the stick with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drI3hIeczyQ an Asian Santa.]]

* In the ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'' episode, "Nice-Capades", the Belcher kids harass a man out of a store's massage chair, only to learn that he was a Mall Santa on his break. Worried that he'll tell the real Santa about their bad behavior, Louise schemes with her siblings to put on an ice show to show just how nice they were all year.

* A ''[[Series/TheTwilightZone Twilight Zone]]'' Christmas episode, "Night of the Meek", stars Art Carney as an alcoholic department store Santa who despairs over not being able to help the poor people in his slum neighborhood - [[spoiler: but in the spirit of the show, he finds a sack that magically produces presents on demand... then at shows' end he gets his own wish and becomes Santa for real.]] This episode also showed up in the [[Series/TheTwilightZone1985 1985 revival series]], with [[Series/{{Soap}} Richard Mulligan]] in Art Carney's role and [[Film/Ghostbusters1984 William Atherton]] as the department store boss.

* ''Series/TheFlash'': The season 2 ChristmasEpisode "Running To Stand Still" has a dark twist on this trope when The Trickster dresses up as a Mall Santa so he can give the children visiting him a present with a bomb, which he then threatens to detonate if Flash doesn't allow Weather Wizard to beat him in a fight.