Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo classic Christmas specials with their own irreverent "South Park" twist, and so they watched the famous 1965 "Peanuts" special, "A Charlie Brown Christmas", repeatedly during the production process. Parker said, "At this point, we just sort of wanted to do a Charlie Brown Christmas "South Park" version. That [special] was definitely a huge part of my life growing up." The episode was considered the first "South Park" musical episode, and included such songs as "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo", "A Lonely Jew on Christmas" and "Kyle's Mom is a Big Fat Bitch". Parker and Stone were initially concerned about making
'Twas the Night Before Christmas (1974 TV special) Kyle to Stan and Kenny during a seemingly hopeless situation. At one point, Joshua Trundle's face is even superimposed over Kyle's face. Like many of Rankin-Bass' other animated TV specials, this special was animated in Japan by the animation studio Topcraft, which was rolled into Studio Ghibli in 1985. The special was originally first issued on VHS by ABC Video Enterprises and Golden Book Video in 1987. Then as courtesy of Warner Home Video, the special was re-released on VHS in 1990, and on DVD in 2004, paired with the 1976 special "Frosty's Winter Wonderland". A Blu-ray was released on