The holidays are truly a magical time of year. Trees are decorated, lights are twinkling, children are smiling, and television writers are taking a nice big break from creating new material. Yes, we’ve all noticed that quite a few recycled story lines float around in December.
In fact, a recent scientific study at some highly reputable university or other has determined that there are only ten possible Christmas episode plot lines. See if you can find all ten this season.
10. The crazy last-minute gift adventure. TV was doing this long before Jingle All The Way hit the big screen. Homer Simpson, king of the last-minute gifts, had an adventure in The Simpsons' very first episode. When he didn’t have enough money for presents, Homer tried to win big at the dog track, only to end up flat broke. But he adopted an abandoned racing dog named Santa’s Little Helper, and wound up scoring a gift that the whole family loved. Awwww.
9. The “Is it the real Santa or just a creepy old guy” episode. It’s kind of a Miracle On 34th Street thing. Night Court did this quite well in 1984, when a man claiming to be Santa got booked for trespassing and appeared before Judge Harry, restoring everyone’s faith in the magic of Christmas along the way. Best line: Santa (to Selma, the grouchy old bailiff): “Hi. I’m Santa Claus.” Selma: “I’m the Easter Bunny. We’ll have lunch.”
8. Christmas tree hijinx. Christmas trees make for great comedic props. Example: Red gave Eric 40 bucks to buy a tree on That '70s Show. Eric ended up chopping down a tree near the Interstate and spending the money on beer. Nothing says "Season’s greetings" like tree-related humor.
7. The “Christmas isn’t about presents” episode. Every year, you hear all this malarkey about “the true meaning of Christmas.” It’s not about presents, it’s about giving and family and friends and all that crap. (Don’t tell that to anyone in the retail business.) Family Matters may have summed it up perfectly when Urkel convinced Carl and a carful of stranded subway passengers on Christmas Eve that Christmas isn’t about where you are — it's who you’re with that counts.
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