Genesis: Chapter 4

The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3-D!

(Originally written 10/28/2007)

So I took my girlfriend and her little brother to see the 3-D version of the Nightmare Before Christmas. This is one of their favorite movies and I was surprised to see that is was playing here in New Jersey.

Needless to say, the 3-D effects were fantastic. I was not expecting it to look nearly as good as it did. I guess I thought it would be like the last 3-D movie that I saw in the theaters, which was Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare. It was nothing like that. No red and blue glasses here.
But the cool effects are not the purpose behind this post. I am really writing this to explain what I noticed about the film, a concept that I didn't pick up on when I saw it in the past.
I am talking about the irony of Jack's character.

Jack Skellington, the Pumpkin King, seems like a decent "guy" throughout the beginning of the film. Then he seems to have an identity crisis, not wanting to do the same things day in day out. He stumbles upon Christmastown and his prayers are answered.

This is where Jack goes from protagonist to antagonist.

Jack's actions after he decides he wants Christmas makes him the bad guy. He suffers from delusions of grandeur and does his best to implement this plan, going so far as to recruit a group of nasty kids to kidnap Santa Claus, all so that he can run Christmas. Granted, he tells to kids not to harm Santa in anyway, but what if the reason behind this was so he could ransom him off if the Christmas thing didn't pay off for him? It's possible.

Then, Jack takes another turn, but only after he takes a cannon shell in his sled after wrecking havoc on innocent lives. Pretty severe. He then rushes back to Halloweentown to help Santa, only to find him in the clutches of Oogie Boogie. Now, most people will probably say that Oogie is the bad guy in the movie, but he is just a degenerate gambler who took advantage of a fortunate event. Oogie Boogie is who he is, but, from what we witness in the film, he never resorted to kidnap. Sure, he played with Santa's and Sally's lives, but that situation never would have arisen if it weren't for Jack's actions earlier in the film.

I admit, the Nightmare Before Christmas is a damn good movie. However, people need to realize that it is not how the may have realized. Jack Skellington is evil, pure and simple. I wouldn't trust him.

(Edit: I had some stuff here about an auction I posted to eBay. Since that auction is no longer active, I removed this portion due to irrelevance.)