Wednesday, December 12, 2012

My Top 5 Holiday Cartoons

When my parents first got a VCR in the 1980s, my mom recorded all the Christmas animated specials, with the commercials taken out, onto one VHS tape. I would watch it every year during the holidays until a certain age when I lost interest in cartoons. As an adult, I attempted to watch these classics on basic television, but I was disappointed that some of my favorite scenes were deleted in exchange for advertisement. Over the years I have bought most of these childhood classics on DVD.

Honorable mentions that didn't make the list are: How a Grinch Stole Christmas, Bah, HumDuck!: A Looney Tunes Christmas, Pluto's Christmas Tree, and Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. 


  • 5. A Charlie Brown Christmas - This is one of the few Christmas specials that is still aired every year and is one that drove my mom crazy when I was young because she found Charlie Brown to be annoying. After forty-seven-years since it debuted, it still receives millions of viewers. It is one of the few cartoons that gives kids the real meaning of Christmas.



  • 4. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer -Yes, it is still aired every year like A Charlie Brown Christmas, but it  is still one of the best animated holiday specials. I have fond memories watching it as a child, but it has been cut down by several minutes by CBS so they can make a few extra bucks. I prefer to watch it on DVD at Christmastime.


  • 3. A Garfield Christmas - I've always been a big Garfield fan and so was a lot of other people of all ages. A Garfield Christmas special aired in 1987 when I was a six-year-old. The plot involved Jon dragging Garfield and Odie to his family's farm for Christmas, where Garfield learns the true meaning of giving. It aired annually on CBS for many years, but has now disappeared from television. Thankfully, all of the Garfield specials have been released to DVD for old and new fans to watch again and again.


  • 2. Frosty the Snowman - Frosty is one of my favorite Christmas cartoons and is one of the few that is still aired today at Christmastime, typically back-to-back with the dreadful and unrelated Frosty Returns. Just like other older animated specials, Frosty the Snowman has lost several minutes over the years due to commercials. The DVD version is longer, but June Foray, who voiced Karen, has been edited and dubbed by someone else for some mysterious (probably due to copyright) reason.


  • 1. A Mickey's Christmas Carol - It premiered with the re-issue of Disney's  The Rescuers on December 16, 1983. Normally it was paired with other Disney shorts, Donald's Snow Fight, Pluto's Christmas, and The Art of Skiing. It aired on NBC during Christmastime in 1984-1990, on CBS in 1991-1998, on ABC for 2000 and 2003, on the Disney Channel in 1986-1999; 2002-2006, and now airs on ABC Family. Just like other animated specials, a few minutes have been edited out for commercials. I have fond memories of watching it when I was a kid and I even still enjoy watching it on DVD as an adult.

1 comment:

  1. I love revisiting all of my favorite cartoon classics from when I was kid! Last year it was such a hassle to watch my favorites since my old DVR had limited memory, and I can’t stomach commercials of live TV. Earlier this year I finally got a DISH Hopper after so many of my coworkers at DISH were raving about its recording capacity. It’s been wonderful this time of year because I’ve been saving all of the classics that have been playing on TV to a special folder I created on my DVR hard drive. The folder is kind of like a technologically advanced version of your old VHS tape that I’m sure I’ll sift through every December to get me into the spirit of Christmas!

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