Toy Tinkers

After seeing him chop down a Christmas tree in the woods, Chip 'n' Dale follow Donald Duck home. When Donald catches Chip 'n' Dale stealing his Christmas treats, a full-on battle breaks out. As for who comes out victorious, it should come as no surprise. Released in the late 1940s, Toy Tinkers is a classic Disney animated short. 

Rating: Toy Guns%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Fa La La La Laagghh!

After finding out about a neighborhood lighting display contest, Carl tricks Steve into helping him deck out the Winslow's roof. Meanwhile, Harriette starts to feel the Christmas Blues after Eddie and Laura are too busy to help her decorate the Christmas tree. Thankfully, Estelle is there to teach everyone a valuable lesson about the true meaning of Christmas. Despite being in the opening credits, Richie does not appear in the episode, nor is he mentioned. Similarly, the great Waldo Geraldo Faldo is also, unfortunately, absent from this episode.

 

Rating: Roller Blades%

The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus

The Great Ak calls the leaders of the Immortals to the Forest of Burzee for a council meeting. His request, bestowing immortality to the mortal known as Santa Claus. To convince the other Immortals, the Great Ak tells them the story of Santa Claus's life and adventures. An adaptation of the book by L. Frank Baum, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus was Rankin/Bass's final Christmas Special done with stop motion animation. Much like Pinocchio's Christmas and The Leprechaun's Christmas Gold, the animation in The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus is top notch. The character designs are pretty impressive too, especially the evil Awgwas. The plot of the special is complete nonsense, but I wouldn't have expected anything else from Rankin/Bass. 

Rating: Immortality%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Chill Zone

Lawrence Limburger, an evil alien disguised as a rich industrialist, unleashes a horde of snow sucking robots to steal all of the ice in Chicago. And he might have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for those pesky Biker Mice from Mars. Watching this episode of Biker Mice from Mars, I was stuck by two things: (1) the show's theme song sucks. It's just wailing cock rock, there's no cool lyrics about the origins of the Biker Mice. And (2) the writing on Biker Mice from Mars is terrible. It's all alliteration and bad puns. There was even a subtle knock against the Ninja Turtles at one point. But, let's face it, there wouldn't have been a Biker Mice from Mars show without the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The Turtles walked so that the Biker Mice from Mars could, I don't know, pop a wheelie or something.

 

Rating: A New Orphanage%

Home Alone 3

While stuck at home with the chicken pox, Alex Pruitt begins to notice some suspicious new people in his neighborhood. Little does he know, at first, that they're actually a group of international thieves who are trying to recover some stolen military tech that had accidentally been picked up by Alex's neighbor, Mrs. Hess. Once the thieves realize that their cover has been blown, they launch an all out assault on Alex's home. You can imagine how that goes. I was sixteen by the time that Home Alone 3 came out, twice the age of the lead character, and the series didn't have the same appeal to me anymore. I might have had more interest in seeing the movie if Macaulay Culkin had been in it but I can't really blame him for turning it down.

Rating: 52%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Fun Fact: Haviland Morris, who played Alex's mother, also played Marla Bloodstone in Gremlins 2: The New Batch.

Max Headroom's Giant Christmas Turkey

I'm old enough to remember Max Headroom and yet I'm not sure that I can properly explain Max Headroom. The short version is that he's a talking (stuttering) head inside a TV who alternates between hosting shows and selling New Coke. What's New Coke? You know what, let's not get into that here. This is supposed to be a review for Max Headroom's Giant Christmas Turkey, a deeply strange and cynical Christmas special that aired in 1986. It has everything you'd expect to see in a Christmas special. It has songs and celebrity guests, like Bob Geldof, Robin Williams and Tina Turner. It has choirs and smiling children. It has gay jokes and Cold War politics. And, I don't know if I mentioned this, it's hosted by a stuttering digital torso inside a television.

 

Rating: Golf Clubs%

Home for Christmas

While on Christmas vacation, Zack Morris bumps into Laura Benton at the mall. Zack tries to impress Laura with some of his trademark charm, but Laura seems reluctant to spend time with Zack or tell him anything about herself. It's only after the gang goes to the hospital to visit a man who collapsed at the mall that they learn the truth, the man is Laura's father and they're both homeless. Saved by the Bell, typically a fairly featherlight show, would occasionally take a stab at tackling serious issues, often with mixed results. "Home for Christmas" handles the issue fairly well, both by acknowledging the main characters' privilege and also their ignorance, with Zack really stepping in it in front of Laura when he suggests that some homeless people are just winos or worse. And while things end up fairly well for Laura and her father, those characters are never seen or mentioned again.

 

Rating: A Sport Coat%

Olive, the Other Reindeer

With Blitzen injured, Christmas is on the verge of being cancelled. But Olive, inspired by mishearing something said by Santa, sets off on an adventure to reach the North Pole and save Christmas. Along the way, Olive teaches everyone she meets a little something about the Christmas Spirit. Olive, the Other Reindeer isn't just an old Dad joke, it's also a children's book and a crudely animated TV special. The animation style is somewhere between Reboot and early South Park. It looks like something an ambitious child might have made. The voice cast features Drew Barrymore, Joe Pantoliano and Ed Asner alongside Dan Castellaneta, Tress MacNeille, Billy West, Tim Meadows and Michael Stipe. Yes, that Michael Stipe. 

Rating: Slippers%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Dickens of a Christmas

In an effort to beat the Summer heat, Doc Brown takes his family and Marty McFly to Victorian England to celebrate a Dickensian Christmas. Doc's sons, Jules and Verne, are forced to become pickpockets after the keys to the DeLorean get stolen. Clara Brown gets thrown into prison for spurning the advances of Ebiffnezer Tannen. And, while Doc searches for his sons, Marty gives Ebiffnezer the full Scrooge treatment. The Back to the Future animated series, which more or less takes place after the events of Back to the Future Part III, is a little odd. It's cool that Mary Steenburgen and Thomas F. Wilson reprise their roles as Clara Clayton Brown and the various members of the Tannen family but it's weird that Christopher Lloyd plays Doc Brown in live-action wraparound segments while Dan Castellaneta does the voice for Doc in the animated portions of the show. Also, I'm just going to assume that the educational segments at the end of the episode featuring Bill Nye the Science Guy were necessitated by some sort of broadcasting regulation.

 

Rating: Wind Up Frankenstein%

(Image from Amazon)

Charlie Brown's Christmas Tales

The original A Charlie Brown Christmas was shown on broadcast television annually from 1965 through 2019. Over the years, as the average length of commercial breaks increased, the special had to be edited down to fit into a thirty minute timeslot. A lot of people weren't too happy about that. So, after ABC acquired the rights to broadcast A Charlie Brown Christmas in the early 2000s, Charlie Brown's Christmas Tales was created as a companion piece that could be aired after the original special in a one hour block of programming. Much like It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown, there's no overarching story. Christmas Tales is just another series of holiday themed vignettes.

Rating: Dog Sweater%

(Image from Wikipedia)

A Christmas Story

While the Martins are in Capital City shopping for Christmas presents, Lassie pushes a little girl out of the path of an oncoming truck. The girl is saved but Lassie sustains some serious injuries. Dr. Weaver, reluctant to perform the necessary operation himself, suggests that only one man might be able to save Lassie. But the specialist, Dr. Watkins, cannot be reached. With Lassie injured, this particular episode of Lassie focuses mainly on Timmy and the rest of the Martin family. If you're a dog lover or an old softy like me, this episode will definitely tug at the heart strings. But don't worry folks, this isn't Dragnet, Lassie survives.

Rating: Gingerbread Santy Clauses%