Season 1 Overview

Air date: 12/19/1984

Even though Yet another song for Christmas would be more like it.

So, it’s that time—it’s the Christmas special. It couldn’t possibly be a Christian TV series without one, could it? Or, better: it couldn’t possibly be an 80s tv show without one. Except the second season of this show doesn’t have one, for some reason. Also, this episode aired the same week as the Little House on the Prairie Christmas special—ten months after the supposedly conclusive episode of that series. It was odd, but at least the audience got the chance to experience A Very Landon Christmas week. Actually, Landon didn’t appear on the Christmas special of Little House, but it applies all the same.

If the story feels familiar, that’s because it’s a new, modern version of A Christmas Carol—as though there weren’t enough already. I mean, this and Pinocchio and Cinderella must be the most revisited stories of ‘em all. Plus, Landon must have had some personal issues to this story—maybe school-related or something — because he’s going to make references to it multiple times. Either way, this wasn’t even the first time he’s tackled this all-time classic: there was an episode on Little House about that too.

And if you don’t remember that, don’t worry—it was in the second season, the one nobody watched— but just to refresh your memory: that’s when they introduced Ebenezer Sprague. If it still doesn’t ring any bell — well, that character lasted two seasons. And, of course, he was fictionally created for that series — he wasn’t even featured in any book, for that matter.

Glossary

Some of the following points are unprecedented entries in the glossary — and some updates to existing ones.

• Little House Actor: the main character in the assignment is Geoffrey Lewis.

Longtime viewers will recognize him for his western productions, but also from Little House, where he appeared twice, playing a different character each time: one appearance is in season three, as a bully who just moves in to town with his two bothers.

Then, he returned again in season nine, playing a clumsy outlaw. It was a comic episode — and a remake of a Bonanza one— so that’s why he looked silly there.

Coincidentally, both times on Little House he was directed by French instead of Landon or somebody else. However, now for Highway, he’s being directed by Landon, the first time in his career.

And another coincidence: both times in his prior appearances on Little House he had played the antagonist — a cheeky bully and a run-down outlaw respectively. Apparently, they think he’s good at being unsympathetic, as he will be playing a selfish, obnoxious doozy again in here. Though, of course, now he will have the chance to make it up.

• Exposition to prove the point

In the episode, Lewis plays a character that is just bad for no apparent reason, though they wanted to justify it with “He was an indigent orphan, so he’s not bad, just lost sight of the values”. Still, they are going to have three scenes just to show that. And, at the end, when he has come good thanks to Jonathan and Mark, there is going to be a payoff where he becomes overly generous, just because.

• Reckless spending

When Lewis becomes good, he will spend his money recklessly without apparent reason (compare to The Banker And The Bum).

• Notable early appearance.

In the episode, there is an early appearance of Matt Shakman, former child actor and now an impressive director, though he started his career as an actor.

• Highway Actors

The role of Eddy’s butler is played by Ivor Berry, who is going to come back in the series later on, including one appearance in this very same season. Curiously, on that second time (in “The Banker And The Bum“) he’ll be playing a similar role: a butler who works for a corrupted employer that Jonathan and Mark will be helping out. Although it’s unclear whether it were a reference to this episode or just a coincidence, there are going to be very few actors to play multiple characters in the series. And he’s one of the two actors to appear twice in the first season, excluding Jonathan and Mark (the second one is Scotty); although he’s supposedly the only actor playing two roles in two episodes of the season. Again, it’s unclear whether they re the same character or not, and to complicate matter further his character here doesn’t have a name, while on that second episode he’s only known with a surname. So, it could be they are the same character, he realized Eddy must have some problems if one day he’s mean to anyone and the next he becomes the nicest person ever, so he quit and went to work for another, even meaner employer then. Or maybe he confirms the idea people in this series are all enslaved, just like in the Pilot, and they like it that way.

• Carol Of The Bells

It’s the song that Jonathan and Mark are listening to at the beginning, while they are driving somewhere before they receive the assignment (the scene was removed when the episode went to syndication, but it remained in the DVD version). Every Christmas Special episode of the series will begin the same way, with the same song used in different context (usually combined with a random Christmas tree).

• Classic story

The whole episode takes inspiration from the book Christmas Carol, which was already part of a Little House episode. Moreover, it will be part of a third season episode as well (compare to Gift of Life). It’s not the first time in the series Landon takes inspiration from a classic novel for his show: Hotel of Dreams partly used Cinderella for instance. And that same story will be a part of a second season episode, too.

• Joey Chitwood

At the beginning, Jonathan and Mark are driving when Jonathan tells Mark to stop the car and turn to the city, as they’ve just received an assignment. When Mark complains that it’s almost Christmas and he’d like some holidays, Jonathan uses the stuff on the car. This scene was in the original script, and in the 1984 episode, but it was cut out from the syndicated one, for some reason. Also, it’s in the screenplay of this episode they use the “Joey Chitwood move” to describe this early moment.

• New “Stuff” powers

In this episode, Jonathan and Mark will use the “Stuff” to enter into the dream of somebody else.

Also, they will use the “Stuff” to move quickly from one place to another — still, they’ll only do that in the dream.

Finally, Mark seems unaware of such power — but he gets along all the same.

Assignment: Jonathan and Mark are assigned to help a corrupt car salesman repent for his actions during Christmastime.

First, there’s a Christmas tree—just to make things clear in case someone in the audience hadn’t noticed the decorations outside their homes. And the Christmas special from the third season randomly opens with a Christmas tree as well.

Now, the original A Christmas Carol book appears on a table below the tree—again, just to stress even more the subject of this episode. And to give desperate parents an idea of a Christmas gift for their kids.

Then, it’s a a car dealership office. Two elderly people come in to buy the car of their dreams but are taken aback by the price. Enter the owner Eddy: he’s Geoffrey Lewis, the western guest-star from Little House and the main assignment here.

So, Eddy sells a wrecked car that has already been bought multiple times to the unsuspecting elderly couple, teaching his colleague some tricks.

Then, Eddy proceeds to threaten Dave, one of his employees, into tampering with a car’s odometer.

As though it were David’s fault if it’s a federal crime.

Finally, he’s stopped by a man in the lot.

If it wasn’t already obvious, Eddy is bad. Just bad. And intolerant toward virtually everyone. But that’s what an angel is for, isn’t it. Well, a probationary one, with his friend too.

Also, one question: considering how he treats his employees, it’s hard to imagine he allows leisure time at work—so what was an innocent, worn-out Christmas novel doing lying around the office? One of the many unexplained mysteries of the series.

Anyway, speaking of the angel, Jonathan and Mark arrive pretending they want to buy a car.

Eddy doesn’t like being contradicted.

One minute, what the heck was Jonathan trying to accomplish now: I mean, he had no evidence to back up his accusations—unless he wanted to reveal to be an angel and have divine knowledge—so, exactly, what was his plan by just appearing and randomly accusing a guy of trying to cheat on him?

Anyway, Jonathan and Mark walk back to the motel and meet Santa along the way.

They still hadn’t planned to feature him again in the fourth season.

Then, Jonathan gives Mark a book to read (no need to say which one). Mark casually mentions he read it as a kid, and opens it.

And he soundly yawns after the first page.

He must like it.

Meanwhile, Eddy is also asleep in his bed—fully clothed, TV on.

Suddenly, Jonathan appears ominously on the TV, scolding Eddy the way a parent scolds a kid who wanted to skip the queue behind the slide at the park (which kind of reminds of a previous episode). And he even preaches something odd: “All you think about is the almighty dollar, that’s all you care about, just yourself“. I mean, he either cares about the money or just himself, it sounds oddly phrased here.

Eddy wakes up and shuts off the TV, but Jonathan materializes in the room and tells him he’s here to guide him on a journey across space and time. Very original, isn’t it.

He points Eddy to the bedroom door, which now opens into Eddy’s childhood home.

That might not seem odd now, but in later episodes, whenever Jonathan and Mark enter someone’s dream, they always have the person open a random door in their bedroom that supposedly leads to an adjacent room but actually leads somewhere else (the most imminent future instance is here). Apparently, people only dream about doors in their house that lead them wherever they want to.

Anyway, the journey begins now. Eddy sees how happy he was as an indigent child — and it’s just the same old story from the book. Nothing new under the sun, so let’s move on.

Except, there’s a girl that vaguely resembles Laura from Little House — the Melissa Gilbert version, of course.

Or maybe it’s just the braids.

Anyway, it’s time to make an introduction here: in this episode, for the first time, Jonathan uses his powers to mysteriously evaporate in full ‘80s fashion.

This effect becomes very, like very recurring thing throughout the series. As if the producer just found out how to make it possible and wanted to randomly put it any single moment. You know, like a kid who learns a new word for the first time and forcibly put it in every sentence he make until about two days later when he forgets it.

Then Eddy wakes up in a car with Mark, who’s just staring at him ominously. Very weird Mark.

Mark is mysterious.

A reformed alcoholic ex-cop from Oakland?

Apparently.

He introduces himself as the tour guide for the present.

Sure.

Now, hold on: there’s something wrong here. I mean, how could Mark be aware that they are in a dream, and that they are making a reenactment of the book he was reading before soundly falling asleep. Either Jonathan instructed him that they would be playing Christmas Spirits, or Mark is not aware of anything, but Jonathan is manipulating him.

Anyway, before they start it, the car just takes off into the air

Not even their acting can save this.

Just picture Landon directing: “Okay, now whip your head back dramatically, and we’ll add the flying effect later.” Except the special effect doesn’t do the rest, but it’s just a panoramic view of the city. And Eddy in a shrilling voice “I don’t like this!“.

Here, two things to point out: that’s Eddy’s car, not Mark’s Ford in a flying version.

Then, the composition is a recycle which might sound familiar to the Little House audience: it’s the same one played during the episode Bless All The Dear Children, the Christmas Special episode that aired months after that series finale (although it wasn’t supposed to be that way).

Curiously, both that episode of Little House and this Highway one aired the same week. Likely David Rose made this composition for the Little House episode in 1983 (when it was set to air), and then put it on Highway too, believing that people wouldn’t remember that episode one year old. Except that Little House episode would be held back for a year.

So, that’s the second recycle from Little House of this series: the first one is the opening of each episode, which comes from a Little House season 9 show (more details here).

Anyway, Mark and Eddy first visit an orphanage Eddy plans to wipe out in order to expand his dealership. There, some kids running just because it’s Christmas and everybody’s happy.

Then Mark and Eddy vanish in the air.

But wait, what happened to the flying car? Why introduce it at all if they can just teleport like Jonathan?

Anyway, they appear at Dave’s house, where his family is celebrating Christmas.

Sounds familiar

Of course, the mother’s line is exactly the same from Ebenezer Sprague. I mean, these two episodes are both based on the same novel, of course they share a lot of features.

And of course, Dave’s son is in a wheelchair.

Again, it was impossible to tell, especially after showing the book so many times.

But here he is: 9 years old Matt Shakman.

Anyway, Mark anticipates this will be his last Christmas—unless his father can find the money for an expensive operation the family can’t afford right now.

Finally, they disappear once more.

And Eddy finds himself in a graveyard with Jonathan, who shows Eddy what his Christmas future looks like.

Here, one unusual detail: this episode is likely set in 1984, which is the time it aired, and that’s plausible — the pilot is set on spring 1984, roughly the time it was produced. However, from this epigraph, it is revealed Eddy would actually die in 1986, two years later.

It’s as if Landon wanted to closely follow the book, where the main character dies of old age a Christmas after his adventure — yet realized Geoffrey Lewis wasn’t as old as the character in the original, so he just said, “Well, let’s put off his death by a year”.

Or, maybe, even though it was shot during the first season, this might reveal that they actually planned to air this episode for the Christmas of 1985, during the second season of Highway, which mysteriously lacks a Christmas special. I mean, that would be kind of reasonable: the Little House Christmas episode was scheduled to air on the 1984 Christmas holidays, so the producers might have thought two Michael Landon’s Christmas shows the same week was too much. That way, even though this episode was planned in the first season, the producers left it open the possibility it could be aired one year later. And that’s precisely what happened: this episode would air for a second time on Christmas 1985, when they stopped airing for a couple of weeks the new episodes of the second season, for the Christmas Holiday break.

Of course, none of this would have occurred if the Little House episode aired for the Christmas week in 1983 without being inexplicably delayed a year later, after airing the conclusion of the show.

Or maybe it’s nothing like that, and the second season doesn’t have a Christmas Special just because of this episode’s ratings, the second lowest of the season.

Anyway, Eddy tries to see what this dream was all about.

Another character in the third season will use these exact lines as well.

Now, Jonathan leaves Eddy at the funeral, and Eddy immediately wakes up in his bed.

Apparently, it was all a dream—again, nobody saw that coming.

Then, his butler takes him breakfast.

And Eddy is too happy that he won’t eat anything.

So, time for a good Christmas payoff: Eddy scraps his plan to destroy the orphanage and makes a reckless, massive donation to the institution.

Then, he spots the elderly couple he swindled at the beginning and trades his sports car for the wreck he sold them.

What a coincidence they were on his way, isn’t it.

Finally, he buys some toys to bring to Dave’s, but not before paying a random guy that helped him pack them all up just because the guy told him he has two brothers and three sisters.

Possibly a subtle jab to address the modern enslaving environment forcing people to work on Christmas day.

Meanwhile, there’s Mark asleep.

And Jonathan abruptly wakes him up.

Then, Mark tries to tell him his dream.

Now, that means Mark is actually unaware his dream was real.

This officially reveals that Jonathan has unlocked a new power thanks to the “Stuff”: he can intrude on other people’s dreams—and take others with him.

It’s unclear, though, whether Jonathan can bring anyone into someone else’s mind, or if this was an exception for Mark. Also, judging by Mark’s behavior, he doesn’t seem to be aware that he was in Eddy”s dream, so it’s unclear if he knew what he was doing while inside Eddy’s dream or if he was just being manipulated by Jonathan. I mean, he seemed rather confident about being the ghost of Christmas present.

Anyway, Jonathan dismisses him and tells him it’s Christmas (even though I’d bet they shot this in the middle of summer), and they head outside.

Eventually, they meet Eddy who tells them about the dream.

And Mark realizes it was all true.

Whatever the case, this won’t be the last time Jonathan or Mark messes with your mind.

Even though it could have been just Eddy’s hallucination. I mean, the story of the episode follows pretty closely the one in the book, and Jonathan and Mark even introduce themselves as the “Spirits of Christmas” like in that story. Basically, if Eddy had read the book, maybe he could have just figured out his dream was only a dream (like, when you read something and you make a dream of it), without any angelic interference, and Jonathan and Mark were part of it just because he had met them the previous morning.

But Eddy has probably never even heard of the novel, otherwise he’d already know from that he was being stingy and mean and would have made up for it right away. And he would have spared Jonathan and Mark an assignment.

Now, after telling them about his dream, Eddy offers to pay them $20 if they help him play Santa Claus and bring the presents to Dave’s family.

Vey stingy —he’s blowing through all the money he’s carefully saved his whole life just for one Christmas, yet he’s only willing to pay $20 for a lift. Maybe he realized he couldn’t have kept on playing Santa for long had he not minded how to spend his money better.

Of course, Jonathan refuses the money, and they all go to Dave’s.

Looks familiar, isn’t it.

It’s the pilot of Little House ten years earlier. Somehow, it all comes back there.

Yet this time, they have a lot of gifts.

Then, here comes Eddy.

Eddy gives out the presents and offers to pay for the treatment of Dave’s ill son—on the condition that they accept him as part of the family too.

The kid thinks about it.

No

Bet Eddy didn’t see that coming.

Of course, it didn’t go that way.

But imagine Eddy’s reaction if the kid just said, “No,” right away, and Eddy snatched all the presents back and cursed the whole family.

That would be a real modern take on the book.

And it would have been realistic: I mean, Eddy’s a stranger after all, and Dave had only worked for him for three days, and he got fired the day earlier because Eddy is corrupted and mean. So, Dave and his family have no reason to believe Eddy’s changed from one day to the next.

But again, the kid isn’t concerned and immediately calls him grandpa.

Kid is as fast at Laura at latching onto adults so easily.

Or, maybe the familly has some secret plan and just wants to take advantage of Eddy for his money.

But, maybe that’s not the case: the past is the past, and the family and the kids gladly welcome him and they all celebrate the holiday.

Everybody but Jonathan and Mark, who leave quietly without any explanation. I mean, how rude. Just imagine Jonathan silently punching Mark in the arm, nodding toward the door, and the two of them sneaking out of the room as quietly as possible. Anyway, a quiet quitters instance, second time in the series.

But they all quickly get over that.

And there’s a star.

With a touch of David Rose, of course.

That’s it, for the special. Again, this was not, like, “Another” song for Christmas, as if it were a modern take on the story or something, but more like: (yet) another “Song for Christmas”; because, you know, this was pretty much the same as ever. Eventually, this episode was the last original to air on 1984 before the Christmas break, and just received a bit over 15 rating points, making it the second least-watched episode across the first and second seasons of the series (remember which one was the least). In comparison, the Little House Christmas special and basically finale of that series airing two days earlier got almost 3 points more. Just a matter of taste—I suppose- or maybe there were simply too many Christmas specials that week.

Actually, this episode aired a second time on Christmas day 1985, one year later, and it even improved its ratings. Again, it’s unclear whether it was always meant to air one year later but was moved up for some reasons or whether they had to air one Christmas episode to make up the lack of Special for the second season of Highway so they sent this one on air for a second time. It was a successful move, nonetheless. But most of the merits is of the higher ratings the second season had over the fist one. Or maybe it’s just that the first Christmas it aired there were too many Specials like it.