Santa Claus is Comin' to Town: Difference between revisions

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As narrated by polar postman S.D. ("Special Delivery") Kluger ([[Fred Astaire]]), a family of toy-making elves adopts a foundling baby and decides to call him Kris Kringle. When Kris grows into a young man (Mickey Rooney), he offers to take the toys the elves have made past the mountain of the evil Winter Warlock (Keenan Wynn, Ed Wynn's son) to the children of Sombertown. Unfortunately for Kris, the leader of the town, Burgermeister Meisterburger (Rankin-Bass favorite Paul Frees), injured himself shortly before by tripping over a toy left by a child and subsequently banned all toys from the town. The story details how Kris outwits the Burgermeister, but is eventually forced to run from his soldiers to the safety of the North Pole.

 

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=== This [[Christmas Special]] provides examples of: ===

* [[Added Alliterative Appeal]]: Apart from the obvious Kris Kringle, there's also the Winter Warlock and his tree monsters, Willy Willow and Peter Pine.

* [[Amusing Injuries]]: Happens to Burgermeister Meisterburger at least twice, including once in the form of an [[Ass Shove]].

* [[Applied Phlebotinum]]: Magic feed corn that makes reindeer fly!

** and apparently, the effect is permanent.

* [[Bond Villain Stupidity]]: Burgermeister Meisterburger doesn't figure out that the only way to stop Kris Kringle's toy delivery service was striking at its heart until ''after'' Kris devises the "toys in the stockings" gambit to conceal the toys. His own soldiers are just as dumb, overlooking the stockings when searching the houses as well as Winter's magic corn when arresting him and the Kringles.

* [[Captain Obvious]]: Kris's observation to Tanta Kringle that "I'm a man now!" Double points for having this declaration immediately follow the [[Narrator]]'s announcement that Kris was now a man.

* [[Christmas Elves]]: The Kringles (well, the males in the family) appear to be little old men with beards.

* [[Christmas Special]]

* [[Door Step Baby]]: Kris himself.

** Unique in that the person who owned the doorstep Kris was left on (Burgermeister Meisterburger!) had no interest in raising a child, and had the baby sent to an orphan asylum. It's only due to the forces of nature and some friendly animals that Baby Claus ended up with the Kringles.

* [[Everything's Better With Penguins]]: Topper.

* [[Evil Laugh]]: Burgermeister Meisterburger delivers one after announcing his intention to initiate a worldwide manhunt for Kris. It's the last thing we ever hear him utter while he's onscreen (his reading of the WANTED poster shortly afterward doesn't count).

* [[Friend to All Living Things]]: Kris.

* [[Gallows Humor]]: Kris actually makes a light-hearted joke about the Sombertown-wide toy ban he had just learned about after giving Jessica the dolly she had always wanted: "Watch out for that dolly. She's a hardened criminal, I hear."

* [[Happily Adopted]]: Kris, by the Kringles.

* [[Hair of Gold]]: Jessica.

{{quote| '''[[My Name Is Not Durwood|Please, call me 'Winter.' ]]'''}}

* [[Hero of Another Story]]: Rudolph.

* [[Hot Librarian]]: Jessica, the schoolteacher of Sombertown.

* [[I Have Your Wife|I Have Your Penguin]]: The Burgermeister finally lays a trap for Kris and catches him coming out of a chimney. Kris surrenders when he realizes they've already captured Topper.

* [[Ill Girl]]: One of these was what led to Kris discovering that he could use chimneys to enter locked houses. "Susie, a tiny little girl who was very, very sick, had asked Kris for a toy Noah's ark. Kris just couldn't disappoint her." It's left ambigious just what the extent of her illness is..."very, very sick" could very well be a stand-in for "dying".

* [[Important Haircut]]: Kris's beard.

* [[Ink Suit Actor]]: Kris (Mickey Rooney) and the narrator, S.D. Kluger (Fred Astaire).

* [[Letting Her Hair Down]]: Jessica, during her song sequence.

* [[Misplaced Wildlife]]: Topper. Justified, as he was looking for the ''South'' Pole and ended up in the Arctic Circle by mistake.

* [[Narrator]]: Fred Astaire's Arctic mailman, S.D. Kluger.

'''Meisterburger soldier''': ''To the dungeon!'' }}

* [[Only Six Faces]]: The King in Tanta Kringle's song "First Toymakers to the King" has the same character design (at least facially) as the Doctor who attends the Burgermeister ''and'' the father of the children who find toys in their stockings.

* [[Post Kiss Catatonia|Post Kiss Goofiness]]: A kiss on the cheek from Jessica causes Kris's eyeballs to roll in his head, and he says "Gol''ly''!" like some country bumpkin.

* [[Rhymes On a Dime]]: All of the male Kringles -- other than Kris -- have first names that rhyme with Kringle, such as Wingle and Dingle.

* [[Santa Claus]]

* [[Single Palette Town]]: Sombertown is gray, which makes Kris' red coat stand out all the more.

* [[The Smurfette Principle]]: There is apparently only ''one'' female Kringle. Then again, she ''is'' explicitly called "the elf queen", and is twice the size of the males; maybe they have a biology similar to bees...

* [[Title Drop]]: When the [[Title Theme Tune]] is sung at the beginning and at the end, and very nearly when Kris [[Waxing Lyrical|Waxes Lyrical]] to the kids of Sombertown ''(See below)''.

* [[Ultimate Authority Mayor]]: Burgermeister Meisterburger, who has the power to ban toys "throughout the land, from sea to sea."

* [[Wanted Poster]]

* [[Waxing Lyrical]]

'''Children:''' Why?<br />

'''Kris Kringle:''' I'm ''telling'' you why! Because ''I'' came to town. }}

* [[Yes Man]]: The ludicrously underrated character Grimsley, who tends to steal every scene he's in. If you don't know who he is, he's the one with the ''[[Imperial Germany|Pickelhaube]]'' (Prussian spiked helmet) and the little moustache, who sounds kinda British. And is ''adorable''.