A little over a quarter-century after the movie’s premiere, only one thing still bugs me about The Nightmare Before Christmas. It’s not the idea of Jack Skellington appropriating Christmas, or his not listening to Sally’s advice, or even the lunacy of his entrusting Santa Claus’s care to Lock, Shock, and Barrel. It comes from the movie’s resolution: you’re trying to tell me that in all of the world, there wasn’t ONE kid refusing to give back Jack’s presents? Not ONE CHILD anywhere who would have guarded that bat puppet or haunted wreath with his or her life, and anyone trying to take it back would pull back fewer fingers than they started out with? Or one adult who grew up with Aurora movie monster models and Alien action figures who wouldn’t be asking Santa “You know, if they don’t want their toys, could I have them?”
In a roundabout way, this helps explain why the Triffid Ranch will be open on Christmas Eve from 6:00 to 9:00, and not just for those last-minute shoppers who aren’t going to find carnivorous plant satisfaction at the local home improvement superstore. This is also for us who would have left coffin-shaped cookies for Jack Skellington if we could. Come on out, grab a Vernor’s ginger ale, and take home a plant, in the only place in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex where you can do so, because it’s nothing but us weirdos all the way down.