< The Nightmare Before Christmas

The Nightmare Before Christmas/YMMV


"I've never felt so good before
This empty place inside of me is filling up!
I simply cannot get enough!
I want it, oh, I want it
Oh, I want it for my own!"

    • "In here they've got a little tree! How queer!"
    • It gets worse during "Making Christmas". Jack seems to get a little too excited. The lyrics make it worse:

I can't believe what's happening to me. My hopes, my dreams, my fantasies! *giddy, high-pitched laughter*

  • Alternative Character Interpretation: Dr. Finklestein, Bigtime. Did he create Sally to be his daughter? His Sex Slave? An emotional companion? A servant? All of the above? Who knows!
    • And what of the mother-like figure he's with at the end?
    • Someone has said that he doesn't consider Oogie Boogie evil. That person? Tim Burton.
    • Sally herself seems solidly in the Only Sane Man camp, the only person in Halloweentown to act selflessly and with reason. But if one actually listens to "Sally's Song", one notes that every time she starts discussing the possible negative repercussions of taking over Christmas, she quickly derails into talking about whether she and Jack will hook up instead. With that in mind, it becomes a lot easier to view all her supposedly reasonable and selfless actions as simply cries for Jack's attention.
  • Awesome Music: The entire soundtrack, really. The movie WAS composed by Danny Elfman, after all.
  • Director Displacement: The film is mostly known as Tim Burton's work, and it is, but it was directed by Henry Selick.
    • This is probably why the promotional material for Coraline only said it was "by the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas", without specifying who said director was and inevitably leading people to assume it was Tim Burton.
  • Draco in Leather Pants: Oogie Boogie tend to get this a lot, often making Jack into a bully to do so. Also, Jack is probably one of the rare heroes (if not the only one) who gets this. Fans bash the military for shooting Jack down, despite the fact that they were justified in doing so.
    • Dr. Finkelstein gets the opposite of this. Yes, he has a rather . . . questionable and dysfuntional relationship with Sally, but this does not excuse the Fanfic writers for writing him into a freaking rapist.
  • Ear Worm: Pretty much any song, but especially "This Is Halloween", "What's This?" and "Oogie Boogie's Song".
    • And "Kidnap The Sandy Claws".
  • Family-Unfriendly Aesop: Going against your nature/set place in life will result to destruction, though considering Jack does this by kidnapping other people and giving kids dangerous presents, this is probably an unintentional Family-Unfriendly Aesop. (Though the movie does have an Ambition Is Evil vibe to it.) [1]
    • Lost Aesop: Maybe? Consider these lines from "Poor Jack":

Well, what the heck, I went and did my best
 And, by God, I really tasted something swell
And for a moment, why, I even touched the sky
And at least I left some stories they can tell, I did
And for the first time since I don't remember when
I felt just like my old bony self again

which suggest the moral "Break out of your comfort zone once in a while; even if it doesn't work it may give you a fresh perspective!" (Still a bit warped considering he nearly causes a major disaster...)
  • Faux Symbolism: A skeletal creature trying to supplant a ruler of his crown, being shot down and falling, Wreathed in Flames, into the arms of a stone angel? There's got to be something to that.
  • Foe Yay: Come on, there's really no reason why, when he decided to show, Jack had to announce his presence to Oogie Boogie looking like he's trying to seduce him.
    • Then there's Oogie's Shout-Out comment to Santa, sounding like Oogie's going to rape him.
    • The Show Some Leg scene! Seriously, that's probably the reason for the Oogie/Sally ship!
  • Funny Aneurysm Moment: The Mayor ends up falling down the stairs of Jack's house trying to get Jack. This is hilarious until you realize that the Mayor's voice actor Glenn Shadix died because of blunt trauma to the head following a fall at his Birmingham condo.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The Halloween Towners LOVE the idea of Christmas Town. Too bad they don't have a clue.
    • Also, Nightmare is Big in Japan, which explains why Halloween Town is featured throughout the Kingdom Hearts series.
      • It's also very well-known and popular in the America's, despite being a Cult Classic in other parts of the world.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: One of the toys made is a rolling duck (duckroll) the predecessor to Rickroll.
  • Ho Yay: Of all the citizens of Halloweentown, the Mayor appears to be the most worried for Jack when he goes missing—and it doesn't look like just as a professional and/or as a friend, either.
    • In his defense, there are only 365 more days until NEXT Halloween.
      • Three-Sixty-FOUR!
  • It's Popular, Now It Sucks: Some fans feel this way because of the Cash Cow Franchise. Luckily, this is a Vocal Minority.
    • Hype Backlash/Hate Dumb: And this is another reason.
    • As for Tim Burton not wanting to do sequels, it's a little late for that.
  • Love to Hate: Oogie Boogie.
  • Minion Shipping/Toy Ship: Lock and Shock.
  • Nightmare Fuel: And how.
    • Especially now that Jack Skellington's head is the icon for Nightmare Fuel on the top-of-page linky things, because High Octane Nightmare Fuel trope is renamed as "Nightmare Fuel", and people are still working on the issues.
    • It's less that specific parts of the movie are Nightmare Fuel, and more that the entire movie is scary to varying degrees.
  • Nightmare Retardant: Lock, Stock, and Barrel's Villain Song where they discuss with glee all the diabolical things they could do to Santa is pretty creepy; however, any chance they had of being truly nightmarish is ruined in the next scene, when they mess up and kidnap the Easter Bunny by mistake.
  • Periphery Demographic: Amongst the most cited favorites of young Perky Goths everywhere.
  • The Problem with Licensed Games: Averted, mostly. As Halloween Town has made most of its appearances in Kingdom Hearts, it's been pretty good. As for the PlayStation 2 game...decent, but it would have made a better movie sequel than a game.

Oogie's Revenge WAS going to be a movie sequel, but Tim Burton convinced Disney otherwise (see Cash Cow Franchise in the Main tab for the reason why). Considering that the sequel was going to be in CGI rather then in Stop Motion, that gives you an idea on what the quality of the sequel might have been.

  • Tear Jerker: The part following Jack being shot down, where we see all the kids crying as the police announce that they've yet to find the actual Santa Claus and Christmas will most likely be cancelled.
    • As well Jack's song after he's been shot down and landed in the graveyard... well, until he decides to fix things and not mope around feeling sorry for himself, realizing that his holiday is Halloween, not Christmas, and that even though he failed he did his best and he's ready to give his all for the next Halloween.
    • Also, Sally's Song segment.
  • Ugly Cute: Pretty much everyone in Halloweentown.
  • Uncanny Valley: Usually the ones quoted for this trope in the Halloweentown citizens, but a lot of the fans think the elves are creepier. They're too cheerful, dammit!
    • The human children are creepier than most things hanging around Halloween Town.
    • Have you ever seen fanart of Jack drawn realistically? Dear Lord, there's a reason why Jack is a cartoony skeleton!
  • Vindicated by History: It was a modest hit in 1993, and well-received by critics, but it wasn't near as big as Disney's in-house fare at the time (Aladdin arrived the previous year, The Lion King the next). This was partially because Disney was nervous about the Nightmare Fuel; they initially released it under their Touchstone Pictures banner (which was reserved for mature films and the edgier Who Framed Roger Rabbit?). But now it's arguably a much more popular film than any of Disney's post-Lion King animated efforts, and they've since allowed it to be released under the Disney banner itself.
  • What an Idiot!: No amount of naiveness can excuse Jack from actually trusting Lock, Shock, and Barrel to take care of Sandy and not hand him over to Oogie.
  • What Do You Mean It's for Kids?: Several parents won't let their little children watch it because it looks too scary, while the actual film, outside of the kooky visuals and character designs, doesn't actually contain a lot which is unsuitable for a younger audience.
    • Two words. Oogie Boogie.
    • It doesn't help that Disney deliberately moved Nightmare under its Touchstone label for the Nightmare Fuel, despite the fact that Disney has plenty of its own.
  • The Woobie: All those who feel sorry for Henry Selick because he never gets credit for this film, raise your hand.
    • Sally is one too. All the things she does for someone who doesn't reciprocate her feelings (at first) is heartbreaking.[2]
    • Jack might be considered one too. A guy who gets tired of his job might sound whiny, but not when you consider that he lives in a town where it's all about said job. Put that on top of the fact that a lot of the responsibility for Halloween is on his shoulders, and all you have to say is "That's rough, buddy."
  1. ↑ The soundtrack has a brief Santa-narrated coda not found in the film, where years later Santa drops by Jack's place for a visit and bluntly asks Jack if he'd do it all over again, knowing then what he knows now. Jack's gleeful reply? "Wouldn't you?" So it seems to not be "Ambition is Evil" so much as "Jack's idea of fun is not the World's idea of fun."
  2. ↑ Though note that "not-reciprocate-Sally's-feelings" does NOT equal "hardly-notices-her".
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