THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS (1992)
Our South Park friends just built a snowman and put a magic hat on his head. The Snowman came to life and danced and sang with our friends from South Park....YEAH RIGHT. It actually looks monstrous and wants to kill them. Without the help of Santa there is only one person who can fight off this monster and that person is Baby Jesus.
When I first saw this video I thought it was made by a person who clearly just saw the characters on a DVD box, knows the line "Oh my God, He Killed Kenny.", and doesn't know anything about South Park except that the kids curse. Just look at the animation it looks so armature; it looks like a flash cartoon; and looks like an elementary School student just drew the characters and cut them out. I researched this cartoon to find out if I was watching the real first episode and to my surprise it is. Why does it look so poorly done? The Answer to that is Trey Parker and Matt Stone actually made this at the "University of Colorado" as a school project for a flash cartoon. To create this, they used Construction Paper; a Glue Stick; and a 8mm film camera.
The characters in this cartoon you may recognize from the show, but believe it or not they have no names and look a little different from the characters on the show. The only character that has a name is Kenny who we assume is the kid in the hood, surprisingly that's not Kenny. Kenny is actually the kid who looks like Cartman. How do we know? When the kid that looks like Cartman gets killed by the snowman; one of the kids shout out "Oh My God, he Killed Kenny". Speaking of Kenny, the kid in the Hood actually talks instead of hearing the muffled voice. He also gets killed by the Snowman too, but no one shouts out his name. Another surprising thing about the kids is most of them act like Cartman. As I said before, none of the kids have names (With the exception of Kenny) so I can't defiantly say who is who, nor do I think Trey Parker and Matt Stone entitled to give them names or their own personality, they're just foul mouth little boys.
The main concern for most of us is, is it funny? My answer to that is it's funny from beginning to end. When the film begins it makes fun of the Rankin/Bass opening Christmas credits. When we first meet the kids they're all singing "Frosty the Snowman" with Christmas cheer and as they are building a snowman. At first you think it's a short innocent animated Christmas short film, but once they talk they're cursing up a storm, for those that know South Park it's not a surprise but remember this is before South Park. Once they put the magic hat on the Snowman’s head it's all non-stop laughter. I think the idea of having a killer monster Snowman is a funny twist to the traditional happy snowman that comes to life. When the kids pray in front of a model of The Nativity scene for Jesus to help them, he comes as a super baby with the Jesus face we are all familiar with. A laugh out moment for me is when the kids ask Santa to help them, but I won't spoil the joke for you. In the end, just when you think that have a special moral of Christmas, they come up with a moral a 3 year old would think what Christmas is about.
The Animation is cheap, the characters are all alike, but this was only a college project. It's not like the creators knew they were going to make a hit TV Show in the future. If you erase the connections to the TV show it's really hilarious and stands on its own as a short film. It may be a school project, but it's still the beginning of South Park.
Instead of giving it my 1 to 5 rating, I'm going to grade since it was a school project.
GRADE ON THE FILM
B+
A few years later the executives of Fox saw the film and asked Trey Parker and Matt Stone to do another one, so they can send it out to celebrities as a Christmas Card. Trey Parker and Matt Stone agreed and they're next project that was related to their school project is...
THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS (1995)
Our Friends from South Park are celebrating Christmas. Everything goes fine when all of a sudden a special person arrives. Jesus is looking for Santa so he can kill him for making Christmas all about Santa instead of being all about Jesus's birth. The two of them get into a fight and the kids don't know who to help.
The animation is a lot better than the first one (probably because the first one was a college project and this is a project for TV and was done on a higher budget comparing it to the first one) but it still has its flaws. The animation is a little bit crappy looking, but it's still neat and adds to the comedy of this short film. The characters now have their own personality instead of being all alike and they're the same characters who we all know and love from the show.
The short film is just as funny as their first short film only it has a better story and is twice as funny. The film opens the same way the original did. It makes fun of the Rankin/Bass opening Christmas credits calling it a "Krankin/Blass Production" and starts out with our South Park friends singing Christmas Carlos and then cursing up a storm. The fight between Santa and Jesus is funny as hell! While they fight you hear music from the game "Mortal Kombat 3"; see them accidentally kill kids (Including Kenny) as they fight; and Santa yells "There Can Be Only One!" as a reference to the movie "Highlander". Also during the fight Jesus is thrown next a Snowman with a magic hat on as a reference to the first "Spirit of Christmas". If you look carefully at the kids waiting for Santa you'll see Stan's girlfriend Wendy make a cameo in this film. I also liked the random appearance of Brian Boitano. At the end of the special you also see the running gag in the TV series of Rats feasting on Kenny’s dead body.
The dialogue is both funny and meaningful. Almost every 17 seconds they shout an F bomb; they tell Kyle how much it sucks to be Jewish; and saying famous quotes that will later be used in the TV show. What really brought out the Christmas Spirit in the dialogue is why Santa and Jesus are important for the Holiday and give the same moral of what Christmas is about ending with kids wanting to be Jewish because of that one reason.
The cartoon is funny, full of Christmas Spirit and took the college project to a new direction.
RATING 4/5
THE AFTERMATHS
When Fox executive Brain Graden saw the content he realized he couldn't send it out to all of his friends. The people that got it sent it around the Internet, becoming one of the first viral videos to be widely circulated around the Internet. It became so popular that Comedy Central wanted Trey Parker and Matt Stone to make a TV series based off this short Cartoon. The two made their Pilot for the TV Show "Cartman Gets An Anal Prob" and South Park was born.
The Two short Films are not forgotten and is referred to many times in the show. Clips from both of them can be found in some of the Intros to the show. In the episode "The Simpson's Already Did It" Tweak is afraid the snowman that the kids are building may come to life and kill him; and Stan replies "Dude, When has that ever happened to us, except that one time?". In the Christmas Special "A Very Crappy Christmas" the kids are making a short Christmas film which is the same exact film as the second short film, which shows clips from the short film and makes fun of the animation.
"The Spirit Of Christmas" was the beginning of South Park and will go down forever in South Park History.
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