Nightmare Fuel / The Christmas Tree

• Some of the facial expressions are really creepy. There's one particular scene where all of the kids do a simultaneous psychotic grin as their pupils dilate. It's obviously meant to be charming and cute, but instead it looks like they're a part of a twisted cult or hive mind.
• One kid's voice is obviously pitch-corrected to sound higher. The result, especially combined with the character design, is surprisingly creepy: making him sound more like an evil alien than a child.
  • While the other kids are voiced by actual children or at the very least were attempted to be made to sound like children, one child literally just has a fully grown woman's voice, which just adds to the uncomfortability.
• Santa’s voice, which is pitch-shifted down, is especially unnerving. It's supposed to be to have it slightly deeper, but it's done too much but simultaneously runs at the same speed. The result sounds positively demonic, especially considering he first appears when he fries Mrs. Mavilda alive with lightning.
• Mrs. Mavilda firing Judy. In a movie where everyone speaks in a dull monotone, Mrs. Mavilda sounds insane, mainly because the sound of her voice breaks the volume levels of the mic:
  Mrs. Mavilda: Pack your things right now! YOU'RE FIRED!! I don't want to see your face another minute-GET OUT!
  • Later, Mavilda makes it very clear that she'd be willing to chainsaw through a wall of people (including the orphans) just to get rid of Mrs. Hopewell.
  • Before that, she angrily yells at the orphans to get back inside "or she'll thrash them one by one". That's right, for merely rushing to the tree's defense, Mrs. Mavilda's threatening to beat the orphans.
• There's at least one cut of the film where the epilogue is cut, meaning that the last time you see or hear of Mrs. Mavilda is when she's struck by lightning. Not that the old witch didn't deserve it, obviously, but still.
  • Which means that in the world of The Christmas Tree, you better be good or Santa Claus will ride in on his sleigh and straight-up kill you with a Bolt of Divine Retribution.
  • In fact, it seems as though the producers were fully convinced that Mavilda's electrocution was going to scare the bejesus out of the children watching this. Note how the closing narration actually tries to reassure us that Mrs. Mavilda is going to be fine. Unconvincingly.
  Narrator: ...and Mrs. Mavilda? Well... Mrs. Mavilda... she's gonna be all right. From what I've heard, she went back to work in the orphanage as Judy's assistant! (Chuckles) Well, don't worry about Mrs. Mavilda. She's good, now.
• When Mrs. Mavilda tells the children she's going to have Mrs. Hopewell chopped down for firewood, she's suddenly drawn and animated in a much more detailed style than the rest of the special.
• The bear attack scene, especially since the bear is attacking Pappy and Lily, who, mind you, are two small children, and the exchange leads to Lily being dropped off the side of a cliff.
  • The bear's roar when it corners Pappy, Lily and Licorice. It's not helped by the unnervingly loud volume of the roar, and the rapid camera shaking.

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