When the kids kick a guy out of a massage chair who turns out to be a mall Santa, Louise fears she and her siblings will end up on the naughty list and tries to win him over with an ice show.
Trope-scapades:
- Androcles' Lion: Referenced by Gene when he tells Tina that one day the horseshoe crab she flipped back over will come back to help her.
- Big "NO!": Louise’s reaction when she sees that the mall Santa isn’t there to watch their show.
- Blatant Lies: The Nice-Capades really put the spin on some minor nice things the kids did. Played with in that Tina and Gene sing about stuff they actually did that are gussied up to sound more altruistic, while Louise spouts nonsense that never happened to sound like an angel.Louise: Screw the truth!
- Brick Joke: Bob asks Santa what his nephew is into, listing calendars as one of the options which Santa finds ridiculous. However, the calendar store ends up being the only one still open with all the rest closing early for Christmas Eve.
- Catapult Nightmare: Louise has a nightmare in which the kids get coal for Christmas.
- Christmas Episode: The Belcher kids spend Christmas Eve putting on an ice show for the mall Santa to get back into his good graces.
- Continuity Nod: When the Belchers talk about Louise's good deeds to raise her spirits, Bob talks about how she watches TV with him.
- Delicious Distraction: Linda gets distracted by fudge when she and Bob are looking for Santa.
- Department of Redundancy Department:Linda: Oh not a little show, a big show with singing and dancing and skating and lights and skating!
- Despair Event Horizon: Louise crosses it when she's forced to look at her reflection while spinning all those lies about her "Good" behavior, fearing she genuinely is a bad person and doesn't deserve presents.
- Double Entendre: Mr. Fischoeder says he named the Rinky Dink after his “dink…it’s very rinky”. Bob just grunts in response.
- Dramatic Irony: Bob tells Louise that he knows better than anyone she's still getting presents this year. Because Louise Still Believes in Santa, his reassurances fall on deaf ears.
- Exposition Cut: The scene cuts back to the kids at the ice rink while Bob and Linda are explaining to the mall Santa why they need him back at his post.
- Fan Disservice: For the ice show, Felix dances while wearing an open-chested see-through shirt. Because he's rather out of shape, this isn't so much appealing as it is an affront to the eyes.
- Food as Bribe: The kids try to bribe Santa by bringing him milk and cookies, but it doesn’t work and Tina and Gene end up spilling the food all over his lap.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: Some of the names of the stores seen in the mall are: “Jean on Me”, “The Flannel Islands”, “The Fudge-itive”, “Shorts Illustrated”, “Crop Tops for Pops”, “Shirts That Say Stuff”, “Ornamentary People” and “Family Jewels”.
- Friend to All Living Things: Zigzagged. Tina's good deed was helping out a horseshoe crab. However, she was rather rough in handling it to the point that its leg came off.
- Funny Photo Phrase: The helper elf has the kids pose with Santa for a picture and say “Cheese log!”
- Gift-Giving Gaffe: Mr. Fischoeder gives Bob a box of envelopes for Christmas because he thinks that’s why it takes them so long to send in their rent checks.Bob: No, it’s the stuff that goes in them.
- I Never Told You My Name: Inverted. Louise says that the Mall Santa doesn't know their names, so his threats of reporting to Santa are meaningless. Gene promptly tells him their last name.
- Informed Judaism: Subverted. Teddy mentions being part of a Jewish hockey team, which is the first hint that he's Jewish and also seemingly contradictory, given the previous Christmas episode stated he was going to attend Mass. Then he whispers to Bob and asks him not to tell the team he's not actually Jewish.
- Jerkass Ball: The kids hold onto it a lot in the first half. Even before finding out he's a Mall Santa, the kids harass an old man out of a massage chair. He even points out that they shouldn't be this naughty so close to Christmas.
- Jerkass Realization: Louise stops her song in the ice show short after realizing she can't go through with lying to try and get herself and her siblings on the Nice list.
- Kick the Dog: The Cranwinkles make Bob pay extra for the supplies he needs to make costumes for the Nice-Capades.
- Literal Metaphor: Mr. Fischoeder says he'll help the kids for a song... by which he means he wants to perform a song in their ice show.
- Mall Santa: The kids get on the wrong side of one (voiced by Henry Winkler). They know he's not the real deal, but he claims that he submits reports to the North Pole on good and bad behavior, so they're nonetheless worried about getting on the big man's bad side.
- Never My Fault: Louise initially refuses to admit she did anything wrong and accuses the mall Santa of having "thrown some major attitude" when the kids try to butter him up the next day.
- Ode to Intoxication: Mr. Fischoeder's song in the ice show is about all kinds of alcohol, most prominently bourbon.Fischoeder: Oh, bourbon...
- Oh, Crap!: The kids freak out when they realize the old man they kicked off the massage chair is a Mall Santa.
- Overly Long Gag: Mr. Fischoeder sings his song again in the credits... well, by "song", he really just sings "Oh, bourbon" for half a minute.
- Pun-Based Title: A play on the traveling ice skating show, Ice Capades.
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!:Louise: We. Need. Him. Now!Elf: He! Will! Be! Baaaack!
- Shout-Out: Teddy's Jewish hockey team the Mighty Shmucks is named after the fictional hockey team and film franchise The Mighty Ducks.
- Stealth Insult: Mr. Fischoeder remarks that anyone can make Felix's routine look easy, but Felix makes it look hard. The way he says it makes it seem like a compliment, and Felix doesn't seem to pick up on it.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial: When Bob hands Santa the gift for his nephew that’s clearly in a bag that says “Accurate Calendars” on it, he tells him to not look inside and that there’s not calendars inside, but if there were they’d be very nice calendars.
- Tina’s song also applies, in which she repeats several times that she didn’t kick the horseshoe crab and that it had all its legs when it went back into the sea.
- Title Drop: The kids use "Nice-Capades" as the name of their ice show.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: When Louise realizes how awful she was being to try to trick Santa in order to get presents, she stops the show and says she doesn’t belong on the Nice List. However, the rest of her family, and even the mall Santa himself, steps in to reassure her that she is a good person who deserves good things to happen to her.
- Your Mom: Felix’s version of crowd work is telling a “your mom” joke.Felix: You! Where’d you get that hat? Your mom?
