I love the VeggieTales computer-animated video series, and usually when
the latest video comes out, I’m right on top of getting it. But somehow,
last year’s Saint Nicholas: A Story of Joyful Giving fell by the
wayside last year, and it’s only now that I’ve finally seen the third
VeggieTales Christmas release. I am now free to declare It incredibly
entertaining, not to mention educational.
Like The Toy That Saved Christmas, the first Veggie Christmas video, Saint Nicholas
lacks a countertop scene and takes place in a small town where all of
our characters are simply themselves. It’s Christmas Eve, and this
special opens much the same way as that one did – with hyperactive
children eagerly anticipating the stuff they will get when the big day
arrives. Chief among them is Junior Asparagus, who is extra excited
because his grandparents have given him money to buy himself something.
Oh, the decisions! Meanwhile, Laura Carrot is down because her dad, a
deliveryman, has a busted truck, which means he can’t finish his route
before Christmas and can’t get a Christmas tree either. The Christmas
Eve service at the nearby church is about to begin, but before it does,
Bob the Tomato decides that now would be a good time to tell Junior,
Laura and all the other children with Christmas on the brain just what
Santa Claus has to do with Jesus.
Bob and Larry the Cucumber are
more involved narrators here than in most Veggie videos. We see them
inside the story, even occasionally interacting with the characters, and
what’s more, Larry has an endearingly annoying habit of constantly
interrupting Bob in order to “move the story along” – even though he has
no idea where the story is going – and make the setting more
Christmassy. Bob is telling the story of Saint Nicholas, and if he had
the narration to himself, Greece – to which we get a great introduction
in my favorite of the video’s songs – would be appropriately balmy, but
Larry can’t resist adding a little snow, and that’s just one of his
amusing embellishments. While there are many elements to this story that
stray far afield from Nicholas’s established history, the basics are
there, and if Junior and his friends are any indication, that’s still a
lot more than most kids would be familiar with.
A new character,
a burly fellow with a thick accent who looks to be some type of squash,
appears in both the modern portion of the story and the ancient one as
an antagonistic figure. Nicholas is an entirely new character too, as is
his father. The only major characters, aside from the narrating Bob and
Larry, to be incorporated into the story are Petunia as a nun who
teaches Nicholas about the joy of giving and Mr. Lunt – also the star of
the Silly Song (or, rather, Helpful Humanitarian Song) – as Octavius, a
close friend of Nicholas’s family who later helps Nicholas in his
efforts to secretly distribute money to a needy family. Inventing a
local bully intent on preventing such acts of generosity ups the action
factor and the need for secrecy and allows for more intense and humorous
moments. For instance, Nicholas feels the need to disguise himself, so
he and Octavius go out in a series of amusing costumes. Later, as Nick
is making an escape after his last big act of kindness, his sheep-drawn
vehicle stretches across the sky so that they are silhouetted against
the moon and look just like Santa and his reindeer.
Larry is the
voice of all of Christmas’s contemporary trappings throughout the
video. While the kids pipe up with their ideas of what Christmas is all
about, Larry keeps trying to find ways of tying Nicholas more directly
to Santa and of trying to make the setting of his story feel more
festive. That’s how we end up with Christmas lights adorning several
ancient Grecian residences, and it may also account for the parade of
classic Christmas songs that turn up here with new lyrics. Some of
Larry’s speculations are just plain hilarious, and I love the cozy
reindeer sweater that he sports for a large portion of the video. I also
love the way Bob sneaks in one of my favorite lines from The Toy That Saved Christmas.
This is a video that acknowledges that even devout Christian kids tend to get really worked up about Santa Claus. Saint Nicholas
isn’t about trying to excise Santa from Christmas altogether, but it
does make two major points: that Christmas is, first and foremost, about
Christ, and that Saint Nicholas was a model of the sort of generosity
that Christians should feel called to exhibit, and not just at
Christmas. As the video’s loveliest song says, we should give not in an
effort to feel good about ourselves but because we feel happy already
and want to share our blessings with others. One thing I noticed is that
Jesus comes up in this video far more than any other. I’m pretty sure
that even includes An Easter Carol. Most of the Veggie videos
talk about God a fair bit, but few of them mention Jesus. Hence,
although in some ways this is one of the silliest Veggie videos I’ve
seen, it’s also one of the most spiritually grounded.
Saint Nicholas
is a great video that embraces both the serious and fun side of
Christmas. It introduces some terrific new characters and incorporates
several underused characters from videos past, including little Annie, a
soft-spoken, bespectacled leek who, of all the VeggieTales characters,
reminds me most of myself. I’m sure that this is one that I’ll be
pulling out again in Christmasses to come. I’m only sorry it took me
this long to watch it!
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