Christmas Specials/Episodes

The best "Christmas Special" thread I could find was from 2011, and it felt wrong to bump it.

So... It's almost December. That means Christmas specials time. Let's talk Christmas specials. The good, the bad, and the obscure.

I haven't watched many Christmas specials these last several years. I presume all my favorite childhood specials don't get aired anymore... Surprisingly, they still give Johnny Bravo's Christmas special (or at least they did three years ago) despite the fact the target audience doesn't watch the show anymore.

The Pinky and the Brain Christmas Episode is one of my favorites!

Santa Claus Is Comin To Town and The Year Without A Santa Claus are the real gems in the Rankin Bass canon.

Here's an obscure one I like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpkAtfIkgic

A guilty pleasure of mine is The Night B 4 Christmas because of how goofy the set-up is. I also think my favorite recent specials are Happiness is a warm blanket, Charlie Brown and a Meiser Bros. Christmas.

My favorite Christmas specials are Twas the Fight Before Christmas and Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer. Those two hold a special place in my heart.

The Dexter's Laboratory and the Ed, Edd n Eddy ones, however are the only Christmas specials I abhor with a passion.

I always get a hoot out of anime episodes about Christmas that aren't released anywhere around the holidays! :)

There was a sequel to The Year Without A Santa Claus called The Miser Brothers Christmas. The actors who played Santa and Heat-Miser both came back to reprise the roles. They both died a few years later.

I like the classic Rudolph and Frosty stuff, as well as both versions of How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the original because it's so dang good, the new one because the Grinch was a perfect role for Jim Carrey).

The original Grinch will always be my fave. The Whos singing "without any presents at all" still gets me.

I also love Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Santa Claus is Comin' to Town.

Christmas Specials I can think of off the top of my head from current-gen cartoons that I consider good...:

- Penn Zero Part Time Hero w/ "North Pole Down", for an obvious example of something unpopular, but awesome, IMHO.

- Harvey Beaks w/ "It's Christmas, you Dorks!", applies to my same ideologies above.

- The Loud House definitely had a memorable Christmas episode for itself and I'll fight anyone who disagrees, honestly (not fight anyone, just humbly argue back, of course.).

- Adventure Time had a good thing going with its reveal on Ice King as an ultimately troubled character and whatnot.

- The Amazing Worldof Gumball and its parody of the holidays was also hilarious as fuck (Happy Skuzzletag - yeah, that's it.).

Those are my most obvious choices, overall.

edited 15th Nov '17 12:46:45 PM by Shokew

The Christmas Episode has this power to somehow elevate a show to being better than it is. The power is so strong, it can be a good luck charm. The Simpsons, South Park, and the first Charlie Brown animated cartoon all started with a Christmas episode. Penn Zero's Christmas episode was the first one to air in the show.

Full disclosure: this post is not really about a Christmas special or episode.

It's about a Christmas movie.

So there's an animator. His name is Sergio Pablos, probably better known for being the co-creator of Despicable Me.

He's making an animated movie called Klaus, a story about how a desperate postman invented the myth of Santa Claus. You might be thinking "so what?" But what makes Klaus special is how it is going to be a totally hand-drawn animated film that would feature a best-of-both-worlds approach and combine the organic sweetness of hand-drawn animation with the volumetric lighting and texturing most would expect from CG-animated films.

Back in 2015, there was an animation test that caused a commotion in the animation community.

And now you're thinking, "Joe, where are you going with all this?"

What I'm getting at is that as of today at 4:07 pm, Netflix will be producing this innovative feature and it should see the light of day on Chirstmas 2019, fittingly enough.

(I would've posted this on the Chatterbox thread, but I recall someone saying that thread doesn't get a lot of buzz, so I'm hoping that posting this news here in a more recent thread will get more people to notice Klaus. And after seeing the animation test, it deserves that attention.)

Sergio appears to think no other animated film or special told an origin story of Santa. ..... uuuuhhh....

To me, the previously mentioned Santa Claus is Coming to town is pretty much the definitive Santa Claus origin.

There are five that comes to mind for Nostalgic Christmas Specials:

• The Town Santa Forgot: Always watched this on Cartoon Network every year. Its does a great job in presenting its moral and I can relate with the main character thus making the message meaningful.
• Twelve Tiny Christmas Tales: This one was good for basically being an anthology film. I like the animation which reminds of the childrens book The Snowman and the overall weird nature of said stories. Its a very unorthodox special. Speaking of unorthodox and Snowman. . .
• Santa vs The Snowman: Man the early days of 3D animations were weird, but this one I remembered the most. Basically this Snowman is jelous of Santa and decided to wage an all out war on the North Pole ala the Hoth Battle from Empire Strikes back. Made by the creator of Jimmy Neutron and has Johnathan Winters as Santa Claus.
• How The Toys Save Christmas: A really good Italian Christmas movie that would air on Cartoon Network from time to time. Nuff said.
• The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus: Of all the versions of this L. Frank Baum story, I have nostalgic connection towards the 2D animated one made in the 2000s than the Rakin Bass one. I really like its animation, songs, and voice acting which saw Jim “Best Voice Actor Ever” Cummings voicing Santa Claus (ironic considering he voiced Bad Mr. Frosty).

edited 18th Nov '17 2:29:02 AM by BigK1337

, : Well, I'd like to believe Sergio Pablos' statement isn't him being ignorant and more about how there aren't a lot of Santa origin stories like Klaus.

By that, I mean in a lot of Santa origin stories (like Santa Claus is Coming to Town or Santa Claus: The Movie), it'd be about Santa Claus the person.

But Klaus focuses on Santa Claus the myth.

In a nutshell, a man (Klaus) is sent to try and establish a post office in a far-off village that has none. However, the village people have no interest in such a thing as the postal service. But what if the village people had a reason to send letters and other forms of written correspondence? Like, say, if they've been good throughout the year and write to someone specifically, they could get gifts of sorts from that specific someone during the winter season?

The Rankin Bass version, if you're a Baum fan, is a hell of a lot more in tune with the spirit of his work.

And besides, it's a Rankin Bass Christmas special unlike the norm; more The Last Unicorn than Rudolph.

Yeah I saw the Rakin/Bass version of the story before on ABC Family. I’m stating that I prefer the Mike Young Production version in my comment.

My favorite Christmas specials are Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer A Charlie Brown Christmas How the Grinch Stole Christmas! and Frosty the Snowman

I loved Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer: The Movie as a child. I was surprised to find out it's made by a company that seems to have done nothing but wannabe Disney trash. I guess Rudolph was it's one good film.

I didn't watch the Rankin/Bass special until near adulthood, and honestly I don't like it. It's probably one of those things you must have seen as kids to like. I don't like any of their specials tbqh.

edited 21st Nov '17 10:08:07 AM by Pichu-kun

Anyone seen the 1940s Rudolph short? It was apparently sometimes issued in Disney stuff since it was public domain and I can see why, it could easily be mistaken for a Silly Symphony:

edited 21st Nov '17 10:18:28 AM by Psi001

The Fleischer short is my second favorite adaptation of Rudolph. It's just so cute. I think I had it on VHS as a kid (either that or I saw it on Toonheads).

We have a two VHS set that has that short along with the short that is about a snowman who wanted to see what summer was like so he hides in a freezer until then. He goes out and enjoys himself but also melts and dies. I read on cracked.com that that short was made by Nazis, which is too bad. The other two shorts from the VH Ss are also on the strange side. One is about creepily looking/sounding children learning to share a home after one of their parents adopts the other one. One which makes an adult or teen doll character sing a song to a lady doll about how much he loves her (having just seen her for the first time in a motionless state) and the twist is that she is a baby doll that can barly talk, but that doesn't stop their relationship from forming anyway.

You mean this short?

This was made in 1944 by Hans Fischerkoesen, one of the great men of German animation. He was officially working under the Nazis, but his stuff was thoroughly apolitical - with some subversive stuff in there if you look closely...

Neat.