Watch as many holiday-themed TV episodes as I do and you’re bound to
start noticing some recurring themes.
When I started to actually keep track and notate my holiday viewing, I
created my trope tracker, identifying the shared plot points that crop up from
show to show. You could view these
tropes as sheer laziness on the part of TV writers, but I’ve always found them
rather comforting, lending a sense of continuity and familiarity to decades
worth of TV programming. Rather than
just update the blog’s trademark trope tracker as I always do, this Christmas
season I’ve decided to spotlight and more closely examine a few of the biggest
Christmas TV tropes.
Definitely in the top 25 Christmas TV Tropes list is the “Gotta Have It
Toy.” This plot point is simple
and well-trod (because duh = trope): a child desires the season’s hottest
fictional toy, leading their parent/guardian/aunt/uncle/whoever to go to great
lengths (usually at the last minute, on Christmas Eve) to acquire it. This is a trope that springs from real
life; in the recent past Cabbage Patch dolls and Tickle Me Elmos have inspired
toy store stampedes and countless news stories both decrying and feeding into the
idea of an annual must-have Christmas toy.
Perhaps the most infamous example of this type of holiday story is the
1996 Arnold Schwarzenegger film Jingle
All the Way. Jingle All the
Way is by no means a good Christmas movie, but it’s not the worst way to spend
1 hour and 35 minutes this December, either. The story is one improbable slapstick scenario after
another, as Arnold attempts to get his hands on a Turbo Man action figure for
his son (played by notoriously terrible child actor Jake Lloyd, of Anakin
Skywalker fame). At the time of
its release the filmmakers were criticized for releasing a real-life Turbo Man tie-in toy, the sort of cheap commercialization that the movie was meant to be
spoofing.
Over the year many TV shows have also embraced the Gotta Have It Toy storyline, some
more successfully than others. I’m always especially interested in seeing what
toy sitcom writers come up with to be the star of the season. In the
short-lived Gene Wilder sitcom Something
Wilder, it’s a “Mr. Monster” doll that’s in demand. For Family
Matters it’s a “Freddy Teddy”—apparently the most popular toys are also the
most alliterative.
Just Shoot Me! offered up “How the Finch Stole Christmas,” a fabulous episode with
just about every tried and true Christmas storyline, including a battle over a
“Sneezing Charlie” doll. Mya wants
one of the hard-to-get dolls for a poor child she mentors, but her rich dad has
bought them all up for his equally rich clients. Mya gets her revenge by rigging up a hidden microphone and
convincing her dad the talking dolls are possessed and angered by his lack of
Christmas spirit, leading him to hand them over to needy kids (except for one,
which he has disassembled and buried in the desert).
In the Frasier episode “Frasier Grinch,” the titular Frasier Crane jumps
through hoops on Christmas Eve to buy educational toys for his visiting son,
only to learn at the last minute that what Frederick most desires is the season’s
hottest item, the Outlaw Laser Robo Geek (which Frasier was snobbishly
dismissive of earlier in the episode).
All seems lost until Frasier opens his own present from his prescient
father, Martin, which is an Outlaw Laser Robo Geek for him to gift to
Frederick.
“Moroccan Christmas,” a Season 5 episode of The Office, is not a particular favorite of mine, but it does put a
nice O. Henry twist on the Gotta Have It Toy trope. The episode’s B-story involves Dwight buying a stockpile of
that year’s top toy and then re-selling it to desperate dads for outrageous
prices at the office Christmas party.
The toy in question is “Princess Unicorn,” a Barbie-esque princess with
an ungainly unicorn horn protruding from her forehead (and yes, this is one
Gotta Have It Toy that I fully see the appeal of!).
Sad-sack office worker Toby plans on buying one of the dolls from Dwight
for his daughter, but by the time he tries Dwight has just sold his last one to
warehouse worker Darryl. In a
slightly uncomfortable scene rife with genuine emotion, a desperate, despondent
Toby begs Darryl to let him have the doll. Darryl happily sells it (at an even greater mark-up,
naturally), only for Toby to discover that the doll he purchased is the African-American version. It’s a great moment in
which Toby struggles to keep his disappointment from registering lest he offend Darryl, and another hollow victory for the very Charlie
Brownish character of Toby.
As you can see, TV shows have long utilized the Gotta Have It Toy trope to
provide fodder for their Christmas episodes. As tropes go it’s generally a successful one, as who among
us hasn’t at one point in our lives longed for that one special toy upon which
an entire Christmas’ success rests?
For me it was the Mighty Max Skull Mountain playset, which I coveted more
than anything one Christmas. I can still summon up that “all is well in the
world” feeling expressed by Ralphie in A
Christmas Story when he finally lays hands on his Red Ryder BB Gun, a
mixture of relief and joy I too felt upon ripping off the wrapping paper of my
very own Skull Mountain.
