The Spirit of Christmas
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- This is about the animated shorts by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. See Spirit of Christmas for the series of Christmas albums in Australia, , The Spirit of Christmas (TV program) for the television special from the 1950s, Christmas Spirit (album) for the Donna Summer album, and The Christmas Spirit for the Johnny Cash album.
The Spirit of Christmas is the name of two different animated short films made by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. The two shorts are notable for being precursors to the South Park animated series. To differentiate the two, they are often referred to as Jesus vs. Frosty (1992) and Jesus vs. Santa (1995).
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[edit] Jesus vs. Frosty
In 1992, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, then students at the University of Colorado, made Jesus vs. Frosty, under the "Avenging Conscience Films" moniker. Parker and Stone animated the film using only construction paper, glue, and a very old 8 mm film camera, and premiered the film at the December 1992 student film screening. The movie features four kids who are very similar to the four main characters of South Park, including a character resembling Cartman but called 'Kenny', a hooded boy resembling Kenny, and two other nameless boys similar to Stan and Kyle.
The story depicts the four kids building a snowman and, in the vein of Frosty the Snowman, putting a magic hat on it to make it come to life. Unfortunately Frosty turns out to be evil and deranged, sprouting huge tentacles and killing the Cartman-resembling boy by throwing him. This leads one of the boys to be the first to utter the famous line: "Oh my God! Frosty killed Kenny!", though it is missing the "You bastard(s)!" response. The boys go to Santa for help, but it's Frosty in disguise when Santa makes a scary face, and he kills the Kenny-resembling boy by throwing him. The two remaining kids run away, and then find a nativity scene with a baby Jesus, who flies to the evil snowman and kills it by slicing off the magic hat by throwing his halo. After seeing this, one of the two says another well-known line: "You know, I learned something today." The two kids realize the true meaning of Christmas: presents. So, as a deer nibbles on the Cartman-resembling boy, they go to their homes to find the presents hidden by their parents.
[edit] Jesus vs. Santa
In 1995, Fox executive Brian Graden saw the film and paid Stone and Parker $2,000 to make another animated short as a video Christmas card he could send to friends. In turn, the duo created Jesus vs. Santa. This version of The Spirit of Christmas featured an animation style very similar to the eventual South Park series, as well as more developed versions of Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny (each referred to by name) living in South Park. Wendy Testaburger also makes an unnamed and non-speaking cameo as the child sitting on Santa's lap when he is confronted by Jesus at the mall. It largely established the characters as they would be used in South Park. The movie also contains elements which would recur in the series, such as Kyle being Jewish, and rats eating Kenny's corpse. The film reportedly had a budget of $750, with Parker and Stone keeping the rest of their commission.
The story differs significantly from Jesus vs. Frosty. It opens with the 4 boys singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas", when Stan interrupts to tell Kyle he should sing Hanukkah songs, since "Jewish people don't celebrate Christmas!" Cartman insults the song Kyle starts singing ("I Have a Little Dreidel"), and they start arguing. They are only interrupted when Jesus suddenly appears, asking them to take him to a place where he can see Santa (the Mall is the obvious answer). It turns out that Jesus is angered with "Kringle", because, according to Jesus, Santa diminishes the memory of Jesus' birthday with his presents. Santa, insistent that Christmas is a time for giving, and not merely to remember Jesus' birthday, claims that "this time" they will "finish it", and that "there can be only one". They fight in a manner reminiscent of martial arts video games like Mortal Kombat (they actually borrowed the title screen and Subway stage music from Mortal Kombat 3), accidentally killing various bystanders in the process. Jesus pins Santa down, and they each ask the boys to help them. Stan hesitates, and wonders: "What Would Brian Boitano do?" (This joke would later be referenced in the feature film South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut via the song "What Would Brian Boitano Do?".) The figure skater miraculously appears and delivers a speech about how Christmas should be about being good to each other. The boys transmit the message to the ashamed fighters, and both Jesus and Santa, seeing that the boys have a point, apologize to each other. They thank the boys for helping and decide to bury the hatchet over an orange smoothie. As in Jesus vs. Frosty, the boys again realize the true meaning of Christmas: presents. Kyle remarks that if you're Jewish, you get presents for eight days. The others decide to become Jewish too and, while rats are eating Kenny's corpse, leave the scene singing the Dreidel song.
Graden initially distributed the video to 80 friends in December 1995, one of the friends rumored to be George Clooney. Brian Boitano ended up getting ahold of the tape, and was apparently flattered by his depiction. After months of being passed around on bootleg video and the Internet, the film caught the attention of cable network Comedy Central. The network hired the pair to develop South Park, which premiered in the USA on August 13, 1997.
In 1997, Jesus vs. Santa received a Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for best animation.
Spirit of Christmas: Jesus vs. Santa can be found on the South Park The Hits: Volume 1 DVD. A short clip is visible in a drive-in movie screen in some openers of South Park.
Jesus vs. Santa was also included in AVI format on Tiger Woods '99 for PlayStation. The video was accessible from the game disc by PC. The game was recalled in January 1999 by Electronic Arts. [1]
[edit] Kenny's deaths
- In Jesus vs. Frosty: The boy resembling Cartman gets grabbed by one of Frosty's tentacles and is thrown at a distance. He gets slammed into the ground and quickly bleeds to death, leading the Kyle-like character to proclaim their famous statement that "Kenny" has been killed. The hooded boy resembling Kenny later gets grabbed by the throat by Frosty disguised as Santa then tossed to the ground where his head is knocked off; however, the boys do not make comment on his name.
- In Jesus vs. Santa: Kenny gets decapitated by Santa, causing his head to fly off and hit a statue (of Orgazmo) which topples over, crushing some children. Kyle then proclaims the famous statement. At the end of the film, a bunch of rats eat his corpse.
[edit] References in the series
[edit] Jesus vs. Frosty
- A clip of the show can be seen during the earlier opening credit sequences.
- In "Damien", the lines "Go, Jesus!" and "Our Savior!" are used similarly.
- In "Simpsons Already Did It", when Tweek says "What if I put the nose on and the snowman comes to life and tries to kill me?", Stan replies "Tweek, when has that ever happened? Except for that one time."
- In "Red Sleigh Down", after Santa is shot down, Stan and Cartman have a conversation similar to the one the original Stan and Kyle after Frosty kills the Kenny prototype
[edit] Jesus vs. Santa
- A short clip from Jesus vs. Santa is visible on a large TV in the background on some openings of the episode as the bus drives past, when the guitar playing man (Les Claypool) says "Heading' on up to South Park, Gonna see if I can't unwind".
- The boys try make the short as an "Animated Christmas Card" for the town in a parody of how Parker and Stone made the short in the episode "A Very Crappy Christmas". Kyle and Cartman also used some of the lines from the short when they were arguing in the recording studio. The lines weren't originally in the script they made but the recordist told them to add them in to make it funny.
- The reference to orange smoothies would later be used in several episodes, most notably in "Something You Can Do with Your Finger".
[edit] External links
- South Park Studios: Creator Bios
- Script of Jesus vs. Frosty
- Script of Jesus vs. Santa
- South Park Timeline
- South Park Studios: Behind the Scenes: How it all began
- The Spirit of Christmas: Jesus vs. Frosty at the Internet Movie Database
- The Spirit of Christmas: Jesus vs. Santa at the Internet Movie Database
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