Rankin-Bass’s claymation adaptation takes this concept further, spending the majority of its running time focused on the fantastic and keeping the depictions of the cruelty inflicted on children to a minimum for its mid-1980s television audience. Meanwhile, his story’s fantastic settings and characters soften the delivery of this information to its young audience. Much like Oz makes allusions to the American depression of the late 1890s, Baum’s The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus depicts the suffering of children throughout the world-those who are victims of poverty, abuse, and neglect-as reason for Claus’s need to make and deliver toys.
Baum, author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz which gave rise to The Wizard of Oz (1939), utilized his life experiences and turned them into fantasy in order tell his stories unflinchingly yet keep them child-appropriate. Frank Baum’s 1902 children’s book of the same name. Unlike other Rankin-Bass specials that took their inspiration from popular Christmas songs and built stories around them, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus is an adaptation of L.
The resemblance is due to its source material. With its nymphs, knooks, and ryls inhabiting the Forest of Burzee, a land untouched by mortal hands until the arrival of the infant Claus, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus seems more Lord of the Rings than typical Christmas story (specifically with its haunting chant “Ora e Sempre” and its battle sequence of good Immortals versus the evil and monstrous Awgwas). The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus takes that combination and situates Claus as a mythical hero who endures trials and is ultimately rewarded with god-like immortality for his efforts. The most common element present in Rankin-Bass Christmas specials that feature Santa Claus is the pairing of real-world hardships with the need for a figure who brings hope and joy to people around the world. While it does not take long to find uses of the fantastic in the catalog of TV holiday specials produced by Rankin-Bass, such as the Bumble in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964) and the Winter Warlock in Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town (1970), what sets The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1985) apart is its complete departure from and reintegration of reality in order to explain the origins of Santa Claus to its viewers.
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