Halloween Town is a fantasy world filled with citizens such as deformed monsters, ghosts, ghouls, goblins, zombies, mummies, vampires, werewolves and witches. Jack Skellington, a skeleton with the title of "Pumpkin King", leads them in organizing the annual Halloween holiday. However, Jack reveals he has grown weary of the same routine year after year, and wants something more. Wandering dejectedly in the woods, he stumbles across seven trees containing doors leading to towns representing various holidays, and accidentally opens a portal to Christmas Town. Impressed by the bright and cheery feeling and style of Christmas, Jack presents his findings and his understanding of Christmas, to the Halloween Town residents. However, they fail to grasp his meaning and compare everything to their ideas of Halloween. Jack is dismayed that no one understands the feeling of Christmas, and obsessively studies the holiday but fails to find any further explanation of it. He ultimately decides that it's unfair for Christmas Town alone to enjoy the feeling and announces that he and the citizens of Halloween Town will take over Christmas this year.
Jack's obsession with Christmas leads him to usurp the role of "Sandy Claus". Every resident is assigned a task, while Sally, a beautiful rag doll woman, falls in love with Jack. However, after a vision of a burning Christmas tree, she alone realizes that his plans to run Christmas will become disastrous, but has no luck convincing him. Jack assigns Lock, Shock and Barrel, a trio of mischievous trick-or-treating children, to abduct Santa and bring him back to Halloween Town. Against Jack's wishes and largely for their amusement, the trio delivers Santa to Oogie Boogie, a gambling-addict bogeyman, who plots to play a game with Santa's life at stake.
Christmas Eve arrives and after Sally's attempts to stop Jack fails, Jack departs in a coffin-like sleigh pulled by skeletal reindeer, guided by Zero. Jack begins to deliver presents to children around the world, but the Halloween-styled gifts only terrify the recipients. Alerted by his presence, Jack is shot down by the military and crash-lands in a cemetery unharmed. Although he is depressed by the failure of his plan, he quickly regains his old spirit, and returns to Halloween Town to rectify his actions.
Meanwhile, Sally attempts to free Santa, but is captured by Oogie. Jack slips into the lair and frees them, then confronts Oogie. Oogie springs several traps on Jack, who manages to dodge them and defeats Oogie before he flees. Jack apologizes to Santa for his actions, and the latter assures him that he can fix things and returns to Christmas Town. The townspeople of Halloween Town celebrate Jack's return, and snow falls over Halloween Town, a sign of reconciliation between Santa and Jack. Atop the graveyard's big hill, Jack admits that he reciprocates Sally's romantic feelings for him, and they declare their love for one another.
Who does Jack admit to love at the end?
Sally