10 Forgotten—And Utterly Strange—Rankin/Bass Christmas Specials
If you are inclined to photograph your favorite Christmas The characters are like stop-motion puppets, you can thank Rankin/Bass. The production company founded by Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass had success turning holiday songs and legends into fully developed television specials in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. The most popular special offers, such as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman, It remains a staple of holiday programming decades after it first aired.
But not every holiday movie released under the Rankin/Bass banner was an instant hit. After adapting the most beloved Christmas stories, the company has expanded its definition of holiday material, with varying degrees of success. Some films were forgettable, others were so bizarre and unsettling that younger viewers forced themselves to forget. Here are some Rankin/Bass specials that may be missing from holiday TV marathons this year.
- Rudolph’s New Year’s Shiny (1976)
- The Little Drummer Boy, Book Two (1976)
- Nestor, the long-eared Christmas donkey (1977)
- The First Christmas: The Story of the Snowfall on the First Christmas (1975)
- Jack Frost (1979)
- Rudolph and Frosty’s birthday is in July (1979)
- Christmas Pinocchio (1980)
- The stingiest man in town (1978)
- gold christmas elf (1981)
- The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1985)
Rudolph’s New Year’s Shiny (1976)
Rudolf deserved a leave of absence after the stressful events of his Christmas 1964. V Rudolph’s New Year’s Shiny (1976), the red-nosed reindeer barely has a day to rest before being sent on his next adventure. When Santa Claus and his reindeer return home to the North Pole after delivering presents for Christmas, they learn that the child’s Happy New Year is missing. It’s up to Rudolph to get him home before midnight on New Year’s Eve or else the calendar will be stuck on December 31st. And because it wouldn’t be a Rankin/Bass cartoon without a terrifying villain, a vulture named Ion the Terrible races to capture Happy first so he can live forever. Fortunately, Rudolph has a caveman, a medieval knight, and Benjamin Franklin on his side.
The Little Drummer Boy, Book Two (1976)
Little drummer boy From 1968 ending with the birth of Jesus Christ, also known as the Christmas events. This meant that the more religious Rankin/Bass Christmas special was not an obvious choice for a follow-up, but the studio still released one in 1976. The Little Drummer Boy, Book Two Inspired by “Silver Bells” – a song whose lyrics have nothing to do with the first Christmas in Bethlehem. In Part Two, drummer Aaron and wise man Melchior team up to protect silver bells made for the baby Jesus from Roman soldiers who plan to steal them.
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Nestor, the long-eared Christmas donkey (1977)
By the late 1970s, it was clear that the Christmas mythos had been exhausted for Rankin/Bass to expand into television specials. Nestor, the long-eared Christmas donkeytheir 1977 stop-motion film, tells the story of an outcast donkey who faces a series of traumatic events during the Roman Empire. After being bullied by other animals, his owner left him to die, and suffering After losing his mother, Nestor becomes a hero by carrying a pregnant Mary to Bethlehem, where she gives birth to Jesus. Needless to say, Nestor, the long-eared donkey It didn’t have the same cultural impact Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
The First Christmas: The Story of the Snowfall on the First Christmas (1975)
It may have a happy ending, however First birthday (1975) is the depressing film on this list. A group of nuns take in an orphan shepherd named Lucas after he is blinded by lightning. When it snows during the monastery’s Christmas festival, Lucas miraculously regains his sight and sees snow for the first time. The story replaces Rankin/Bass’s signature humor and imagination with raw emotion, which may be why it doesn’t fare as well with kids as the company’s other holiday specials. One of the highlights is Angela Lansbury’s vocal performance as the narrator.
Jack Frost (1979)
This film from 1979 is technically an A-lister Groundhog Day Distinctive, but its association with winter means that it is usually combined with the rest of Rankin/Bass’s Christmas programming. A groundhog named Pardon-Me-Pete (voiced by Buddy Hackett) tells a story Jack Frost. After Jack Frost falls in love with an Earth woman, Father Winter agrees to make him human, noting that Jack will turn back into a being if he fails to obtain a house, a horse, a bag of gold, and a wife at the first sign of spring. The special features its own eccentric characters, including a villain with a robotic horse and his henchmen. and-Spoiler alert!—Because Jack doesn’t understand the girl at the end, it is one of the few Rankin/Bass films that does not have a happy ending.
Rudolph and Frosty’s birthday is in July (1979)
In 1979, Rankin/Bass made their own take on two of Christmas’ most iconic characters – Frosty the Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. The studio was very confident in the product Rudolph and Frosty’s birthday is in July So it was brief Theatrical release outside. But the film failed to replace the original specials in the public consciousness — perhaps because seeing snow snakes terrorize Rudolph and watching an evil wizard turn into a tree was too much for younger viewers to handle.
Christmas Pinocchio (1980)
The story of Pinocchio may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Christmas, but that didn’t stop Rankin/Bass from turning the classic Italian fairy tale into a holiday special. Christmas Pinocchio (1980) features many of the same themes and characters as The Adventures of Pinocchio-This version of the tale centers solely around the doll’s first birthday. Santa Claus even makes a cameo appearance.
The stingiest man in town (1978)
Charles Dickens Christmas carol It is one of the most Widely adapted Stories for all time, so of course they appear in the Rankin/Bass filmography. A Bug Called BAH Humbug narrates this musical from 1978, starring Walter Matthau as Ebenezer Scrooge. The stingiest man in town joins Frosty the Snowman As one of the few Rankin/Bass Christmas productions made using traditional 2D animation rather than stop motion.
gold christmas elf (1981)
Rankin/Bass’s streak of blending Christmas with other holidays reached peak weirdness in 1981. That’s when the studio released gold christmas elf– A story that follows a young Irish sailor who helps a clan The perpetrators Protecting their gold from an evil villain called Old Mag the Hag. By trying to create a special that could be broadcast on Christmas and Saint Patrick’s Daythe filmmakers ended up with something that doesn’t make sense at any time of the year.
The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1985)
In 1970, Rankin/Bass discovered how Kris Kringle became Santa Claus Santa Claus is coming to town. Fifteen years later, the studio produced a film offering an alternate origin story for the character, based on L. Frank Baum’s 1902 children’s book of the same name. This second special was not as well received as the first. It begins when an antler-sporting wizard named Great Ak finds an abandoned child in the forest. The child is taken in and raised by wood nymphs, and eventually grows up to be a merry man who delivers toys to children – all while fighting monsters known as Awgwas on the side. It ends with a council of mythical beings granting Santa Claus immortality. What was arguably the most unusual of Rankin/Bass’s Christmas specials was also the last to use stop-motion animation.
A version of this story was originally published in 2019; Updated for 2025.
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