Dan believes that a new mall Santa Claus doesn’t possess the Christmas spirit.
This episode provides examples of the following Tropes:
- Christmas Episode
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: Dan's resume provides some funny ones, like how he worked at an office supply store from 8/3/01 to 9/11/01 and "partied like it was still 1999 until several angry people told me to turn on the TV."
- Freudian Excuse: The titular Mall Santa has a pretty long story regarding why he dislikes Christmas: he never got the Sgt. Saskatchewan he wanted.
- The Grinch: the titular Mall Santa hates Christmas, which is one of the reasons Dan doesn't like him.
- Mall Santa: A curmudgeonly one who doesn't celebrate Christmas is Dan's revenge target for the episode. Dan and Chris get jobs at the mall's christmas display with him, dressing as a respective elf and snowman as an elf, and a matter of opinion (and his Jerkass attitude) leads him to go to war with the faux Kringle. In the end, Dan ends up getting him fired for beating him up in front of a crowd of children, and he takes his place as the new Santa.
- Mistaken for Murderer: Elise is told by her spy agency an assassin going by the alias "The Snowman" is out to get her. She goes to the mall to try and find them, and she mistakes Chris (who is hidden in a snowman costume for his Mall job) as the culprit.
- Mrs. Claus: According to the story Dan reads Mr. Mumbles, she and Santa are divorced.
- Present Peeking: Chris takes the opportunity of being in a snowman costume to try and spy on Elise to see what she might be getting him for Christmas.
- Santa's Existence Clause: Surprisingly averted. Dan and the Mall Santa disagree over the whole debate, but we never actually see a real Santa show up at any point, leaving the rules in this world ambiguous.
- Solid Cartoon Facial Stubble: The Mall Santa has one.
