To start, let's watch "The Mouse On the Mayflower"!
On second thought, let's not. Because I just watched it for the first time in ages and it's the *specific* kind of awful holiday special that could ruin the holiday in question.
But if you do decide to watch it, here are things to look for:
* - I really should not have watched this special in the immediate wake of watching this.
* - That opening song...
* - Scratch that. ALL the songs...
* - The only reason I know this 1968 Rankin-Bass oddity exists is because of the one time my aunt confused it's box at the video store for that of "An American Tail". See if you can guess where "Mouse on the Mayflower" lost us.
* - I also had "Mouse on the Mayflower" confused with "Night Before Christmas" for years. It doesn't have the distinctive Paul Coker Jr. character designs of the latter special, but the mice look similar enough.
* - If you watched "American Tail" as a kid and thought, "They really are not paying enough attention to the humans on this boat," boy have I ever got a movie for you.
* - If you watched "American Tail" or "Night Before Christmas" or anything really as a kid and thought, "This needs more staggeringly clueless and offensive depictions of Native Americans," boy have I EVER got a movie for you.
* - This romantic subplot...
* - They just won't stop *singing*!
* - Even ignoring the talking animals, this account of the first Thanksgiving doesn't strike me as very accurate. (This will, needless to say, be true for all the specials we watch this year. Because when you are spending the amount of time you have to in order to make an animated short, it is way hard to carve out a few hours in pre-production to do the research you guys. Even for more recent specials. Especially for more recent specials.)
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