Monk's Christmas goes downhill fast when he gets into a struggle with and ultimately shoots a man in a Santa Claus costume. He quickly becomes one of the most hated men in San Francisco after the story hits the news, but the detective's investigations prove clearly that the man in the red suit is not as nice as he appears.
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Accidental Public Confession: Brandy, her cameraman, and a whole crowd of bystanders are present as Kenworthy viciously pummels Monk, pulls a wicked-looking switch-blade, and yells, "you stopped me once, you ain't stopping me again!" His Santa costume fails to soften the malevolence in his voice and actions.
- Amoral Attorney: Garrett Price is willing to do anything to get his client off, including trying to doctor his testimony to appeal to a jury. He tries to convince Monk to say he thought the Santa he shot had a bomb, because people will be likelier to sympathize with Monk if he had a bomb. When Monk refuses to do so, Price announces into the tape recorder that they cannot confirm or deny the possibility of a bomb.
- Bad Santa: It's even in the episode. Monk shoots a man dressed as Santa Claus — he claims self-defense, but he becomes a public pariah. As it turns out, the man in the Santa suit was acting as a diversion for a diamond heist. At the end of the episode, Monk refers to him several times as a "bad Santa."
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Brandy plays up Michael Kenworthy's lovable qualities as a grandfather, a parole officer with a distinguished record, and a man who spontaneously decided to dress up as Santa and donate toys to a San Francisco crowd. He also masterminded a diamond heist with a crew of hardened criminals and bludgeoned a sweet old lady to death with his charity bell.
- Bludgeoned to Death: Alice DuBois, the old lady who works at the museum's gift shop.
- Christmas Episode: The third in the series, after "Mr. Monk and the Secret Santa" and "Mr. Monk Meets His Dad".
- Comically Missing the Point:
- When Brandy Barber holds up a t-shirt with a mock "Wanted" poster of Monk's face, he only notices one detail:Monk: I don't think "Santacide" is a real word...
- While Monk is chasing Kenworthy after the diamond heist:Monk: Stop him! Stop that man! That guy's not really Santa Claus!
Mother: Well, of course he isn't. How old are you?
- When Brandy Barber holds up a t-shirt with a mock "Wanted" poster of Monk's face, he only notices one detail:
- Continuity Nod:
- The truck used to block the intersection belongs to Belham Brothers Quarry from "Mr. Monk and the Buried Treasure".
- Natalie asks a store clerk if he can find a shirt inspected by Inspector #8, established in "Mr. Monk Goes to a Fashion Show" to be his favorite.
- When Stottlemeyer finds out about the shooting, he calls in Garrett Price, the lawyer he met in "Mr. Monk Gets Stuck in Traffic", to represent Monk. Price later appears in the scene where Stottlemeyer asks Monk for his side of the story.
- Towards the end of the episode Randy is seen wearing the same ugly Walmart Christmas sweater from Mr. Monk and the Secret Santa.
- Convenience Store Gift Shopping: Monk mentions that this trope was partially the reason why all of his Christmases were the worst barring those spent with Trudy, as in 1964, he received only one walkie-talkie from his father, to which his father knew was useless, but still gave it to him because Monk didn't have any friends to play with anyway. Ironically, that memory is also what leads to Monk solving the case about what the Santa was doing the day he was forced to shoot him in self-defense.
- Deadly Ringer: In order to ensure that one of the inside guys at the museum is on shift on a certain day, one of the gang tries to kill the employee who has that shift, Alice Dubois. When she fends him off with pepper spray, Michael (in his Santa outfit to look like he's collecting for charity) bludgeons her to death with his bell.
- Do Not Go Gentle: Invoked by Stottlemeyer, at the scene of Alice Dubois's murder, finding an empty can of pepper spray near her body.Stottlemeyer: So apparently she did not go gentle into that good night.
- Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: One of the heisters cracks a sick joke about the woman they murdered, saying that she won't be at work tomorrow because she had a death in the family. The others chuckle.
- Formula-Breaking Episode: There is no "here's what happened" Flash Back at the climax of the episode; instead, Monk delivers his version of events near the beginning, and is not proven right until the very brief Summation near the end, and said summation is only accompanied by a very brief flashback of Disher going through "Santa"'s toy bag.
- Gilligan Cut: Stottlemeyer tells Brandy Barber to lay off of Monk. She crosses her arms indignantly, saying she's a professional journalist and "not here to rip anybody apart." Cut immediately to her Kent Brockman News report, painting a large target on a caricature of Santa Claus, and playing up Monk's history of mental illness.
- Gory Discretion Shot: Brian, the crime scene tech, lifts the sheet so Monk and Natalie can see Alice Dubois's face, which was smashed in with a brass bell. Natalie averts her eyes, but the audience can see nothing, which is probably a blessing.
- Hated by All: Monk gets this after he shoots a guy dressed as Santa due to Brandy Barber running a biased story making him out to be a Grinch when he really shot the guy in self-defense.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: Monk doesn't exactly make himself popular when he shoots a man dressed as Santa in self-defense.
- Hilariously Abusive Childhood: Dr. Kroger wishes he hadn't asked what Christmas was like in the Monk household:Monk: Pick a year.
Dr. Kroger: Uh... 1964?
Monk: '64, good choice. 1964: Mom was sick. Dad was... Dad was Dad. Ambrose locked himself in the basement, he's no fool... - Hollywood Law: Monk and the team are trying to investigate a crime scene while a crowd is jeering at Monk for his shooting and wounding of a man dressed in a Santa suit a few days earlier. At one point, someone throws an egg that hits Natalie. Stottlemeyer appropriately does get angry at the crowd and immediately has Monk and Natalie escorted away by officers for their protection. However, given the egging happened while Natalie was inside the crime scene perimeter, Stottlemeyer should also legally have had the authority to have the entire crowd arrested for interfering with a police investigation and possibly contaminating evidence. Perhaps he figured this was impractical given the bad PR surrounding Monk, but the episode never raises that as a potential solution.
- Hypocritical Humor: Monk notices a stack of children's toys in the corner of Dr. Kroger's office, and Kroger admits that he's been doing damage control on a lot of children, after Monk said on TV that there is no Santa Claus. He tells Monk not to worry, the children are fine, they're very resilient:Dr. Kroger: Although I might ask you to leave by the side door today...
Monk: I understand. - I Need a Freaking Drink: Brandy, after finishing her news report lionizing Monk as a great American hero.Brandy: Come on, Jerry, I'll buy you an eggnog.
- Immoral Journalist: Stottlemeyer describes Brandy Barber as "a vampire with a press pass." She more than lives up to this description, making the children cry for the camera by raising the possibility that Santa could die and purposely skewing Monk's explanatory interview to make him look even worse. She's seemingly disappointed when she has to change her coverage to something complimentary after he proves his innocence.
- Improvised Weapon: Monk knocks Santa unconscious with an oversized novelty candy cane.
- Innocently Insensitive: Natalie is caught in the crossfire when the entire city of San Francisco turns against Monk, but Monk has trouble noticing.
- At the scene of Alice DuBois's murder, someone throws an egg that misses Monk but splatters Natalie's coat. He cringes because a small scrap of shell landed in his hair and immediately pushes her in front of him as a Human Shield. Her expression suggests she's counting to five in her head to keep from exploding. While she is cleaning herself up:
- And of course, Monk's defense on live TV, that he didn't shoot Santa Claus because "there's no such thing as Santa Claus."
- Inside Job: One member of Kenworthy's gang works at the MacMillan Museum and helps the others in to steal the diamond.
- Kent Brockman News: Most of Brandy Barber's reports are emotionally charged rather than done rationally, and often have her skewing the story to humiliate the interviewee. Her story about Monk's shooting of a Bad Santa with his own weapon in self-defense is conducted in a way that portrays the incident as occurring without good reason rather than in self-defense. As a result, Monk and Natalie get harassed everywhere they go, but the city takes a Heel–Face Turn once Monk stops the diamond heist said Bad Santa was trying to commit. It seems that pretty much everyone - except the police officers in the San Francisco Police Department - believes Barber's reports.
- Never Trust a Title: A more accurate title would have been "Mr. Monk IS The Man Who Shot Santa Claus".
- Never Trust a Trailer: The promotional spots for the episode teased that Monk would discover additional clues about Trudy's murder, but this didn't happen. At most, both Stottlemeyer and Dr. Kroger tell Monk that they know it's the ten-year anniversary of her death.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Monk decides to take the bull by the horns and give a televised interview to Brandy Barber, to share his side of the story. The results are predictable to everyone but him.
- Playing the Victim Card: Kenworthy willingly takes advantage of how bad the situation looks, decrying Monk for attacking him when he was just trying to spread a little Christmas cheer...and leaving out the fact that he had a gun, attacked Monk, and was serving as the lookout for a diamond heist.
- Skewed Priorities: While fleeing Monk, Kenworthy knocks an ornament off a Christmas tree in the park. Monk pauses long enough to replace it, before running after Kenworthy again.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: After Monk figures out the scheme and sees Kenworthy trying to escape with the diamond, they have an all-out brawl set against the backdrop of a children's choir singing Christmas carols.
- Still Believes in Santa: During his explanatory interview, Monk tells everyone that Santa doesn't actually exist. Stottlemeyer deadpans that this isn't going to go well and then notices that Randy is staring unresponsively and asks him to confirm that he already knew that Santa wasn't real.
- Stock Footage: The diamond heist reuses footage shot for "Mr. Monk and the Big Reward".
- Suddenly Always Knew That: In previous episodes Monk is portrayed as being (at worst) fairly inept at fighting and (at best) able to hold his own in moments of desperation, typically just holding out long enough for backup to arrive. Here he soundly delivers a beatdown to the much larger Kenworthy, even when the latter pulls out a knife.
- This Is Gonna Suck: Natalie cries openly when Monk deduces that "Santa Claus" (Kenworthy) is responsible for killing Alice Dubois, meaning Monk is going after Santa again, even while the whole city is cursing his name for shooting Santa during their first encounter.
- Twisted Christmas:
- Two separate attempts to steal the Star of Bethlehem, the murder of Alice Dubois, Monk shooting "Santa" in self defense...
- According to Monk, Christmas was always horrible for him until he met Trudy.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The heisters originally planned the robbery for a day when their Inside Man was on duty, but Monk interrupted them, forcing them to move their target date and kill the woman who would normally be on duty, to let the inside man take her place.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Kenworthy quickly becomes a martyr after Monk shoots him out of self-defense. He later loses his good publicity when he takes out a knife during a stand-off with Monk.
- Worse with Context: While talking about Christmas with Dr. Kroger, Monk says all of them were miserable before he met Trudy. As an example, he recounts one Christmas in which his mother and Ambrose spent most of the time shut away, and his father gave him a walkie-talkie. When Dr. Kroger says walkie-talkies can be fun and comments that he had a pair, Monk tells him that his father just gave him one walkie-talkie, because "Dad said I had no friends to talk to."
- We Need a Distraction: Kenworthy's original plan for the heist was to stand on a roof throwing down toys to the people below, jamming up the streets and preventing the cops from reaching the museum in time to catch the thieves. When it comes time to try it again, they leave a large truck in the streets as if it has broken down.
