Production
The episode carries production number 75013 and was recorded on July 25, 1986.2 It is the show's official Christmas episode and the last of season one. On the introduction recorded for the home-video collection, J. Michael Straczynski said he was a fan of Charles Dickens and named this his favorite of the episodes he wrote.
Voice work came from the season-one regular cast: Lorenzo Music as Peter, Frank Welker as Ray and Slimer, Maurice LaMarche as Egon, Arsenio Hall as Winston, and Laura Summer as Janine. Guest voices included Marilyn Lightstone, Mona Marshall, and Peter Renaday. Like the rest of the first season, the episode draws on the show's library music, using the song "Party On His Mind" in one stretch.
Storyboards for the episode differ from the finished product in a number of places. In the storyboards Ecto-1 and Ecto-2 are also sucked into the time slip on the return trip, and Peter, Ray, and Winston drive through the city scaring onlookers before reaching the firehouse; in the finished episode only the three Ghostbusters and their gear are pulled through. The storyboards show Egon using jet boots to escape the Containment Unit, while the finished episode has Janine using a winch to haul him out. The storyboards also include a moment where a demon hand reaches through the Containment Unit slot and Janine blasts it with a Proton Pack; in the broadcast version Egon simply closes the slot. At the party ending, the storyboards show everyone drinking from a bowl of eggnog; the finished episode replaces this with a blue-colored punch.
Plot
Driving home on Christmas Eve from a bust in upstate New York, the Ghostbusters get lost in a snowstorm, miss the turnpike, and stall out Ecto-1 on a mountain road. Setting out on foot, they pass through a rip in the space-time continuum and find themselves in Victorian England during the Christmas season. Peter reveals that his own Christmas memories are soured by his father Jim, who was always away on business during the holidays. Bob Cratchit and Tiny Tim are collecting their meager dinner from the butcher when the P.K.E. Meter picks up Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of Christmas. The team follows the readings into Scrooge's house and traps the very spirits meant to reform him. When Peter presents the bill, Scrooge tries to weasel out of paying, hands over a mint 1837 coin only after they threaten to release the ghosts, and once they leave declares war on Christmas.
Back in the present, Ray gets Ecto-1 running and the team heads to the firehouse. Egon takes the captured ghosts down to the Containment Unit while the others go looking for a Christmas tree. Janine and Slimer both react to the idea of Christmas with a sour "Bah!" On Fifth Avenue, Peter, Ray, and Winston find the city plastered with Scrooge advertisements and a book by Scrooge titled "A Christmas Humbug." Ray works out that the mountain road was a time slip, a door to the past. A passerby confirms that in 1837 Scrooge defeated the Ghosts of Christmas single-handedly and the holiday has been gone ever since. By trapping the spirits, the team rewrote history into a world of stingy, Christmas-hating Scrooges.
They rush back to the firehouse, but Egon has already filed the ghosts into the Containment Unit. With only until the end of Christmas Eve to fix things, he plans to open a hairline fracture in the Unit and pull the three Ghosts of Christmas back out, while Peter, Ray, and Winston return to Scrooge's time and impersonate the spirits. Slimer asks to come along, but Ray tells him he would not be convincing enough. If Egon fails, the three will have to stay behind permanently to take the ghosts' place. Peter plays the Ghost of Christmas Past, using a View-Master toy to show Scrooge his "past." Winston, as the Ghost of Christmas Present, swings around town showing Scrooge the poor in their misery. Ray, as the silent Ghost of Christmas Future, resorts to charades.
Inside the Containment Unit, wearing the Molecular Destabilizing Suit and with Janine monitoring from a protected station in the basement via the Containment Unit Monitor, Egon locates the three ghosts but is attacked by the other entities held there. Slimer tends to the Ion Generator topside, using his own ectoplasm and then water in place of a fire extinguisher. Egon gets the spirits into a Trap, escapes through the fracture, and races to the time slip on Ecto-2. Posing as Jacob Marley, he hands the Ghosts of Christmas back their job in time for them to finish reforming Scrooge. Once Peter admits he has learned his lesson about Christmas, the Ghost of Christmas Present sends the team home by having them grab his robe, returning them to the firehouse kitchen with history restored. The episode ends with a Christmas party and an offscreen Santa Claus wishing everyone a good night, confirming that Santa Claus exists within the Ghostbusters universe.
Ghosts of Christmas
The three spirits adapted from Dickens are the central one-off entities of the episode. In their proper forms they are ancient and powerful beings whose sole purpose is the reformation of Ebenezer Scrooge.
Ghost of Christmas Past appears as an older female spirit charged with showing Scrooge memories of his earlier life. When the Ghostbusters accidentally capture her alongside the other two, the entire chain of events that was meant to redeem Scrooge is broken. Peter impersonates her using a View-Master toy to project images he claims are Scrooge's past.
Ghost of Christmas Present is a large, jovial spirit who takes Scrooge through the city to witness the hardship of those living in poverty around him. Winston impersonates him. At the episode's conclusion, the real Ghost of Christmas Present uses his powers to return the entire team to the firehouse by having them grab the hem of his robe.
Ghost of Christmas Future is the traditional silent, hooded specter who points wordlessly toward Scrooge's fate. Ray impersonates him and improvises by playing charades, sticking to the rule that the ghost does not speak.
Jacob Marley appears briefly as the chain-draped spirit who is supposed to precede the three Ghosts of Christmas. Egon impersonates Marley at the end to tell Scrooge to expect another visitation, allowing the genuine spirits to resume their interrupted task.
Connections to other episodes
The other inhabitants of the Containment Unit make a cameo when Egon goes inside. The entities visible during his rescue include Samhain (from "When Halloween Was Forever"), the Sandman, Slug, Snarg, and Zonk (all from the series premiere "Ghosts R Us"), Killerwatt (from the episode of the same name), the Winged Puma (from "Look Homeward, Ray"), and several others including Watt, Ghash, and what appear to be the Pallo Mansion ghosts and a sleeping ghost. Together they constitute a visual summary of the team's season-one catches and give the Containment Unit its first on-screen sense of scale and danger.
Egon's harrowing trip into the Containment Unit became a recurring point of continuity. He refers back to it years later in the Extreme Ghostbusters episode "Slimer's Sacrifice," telling Roland Jackson that he has done it before.
Broadcast history
"Xmas Marks the Spot" was re-aired on its own as a Saturday-morning special, first on ABC on December 24, 1994,3 and later on CBS on December 9, 1995.4 Both were one-off airings with slightly altered intro credits. The 1994 ABC broadcast was part of a Christmas morning block and was promoted with a ten-second spot that also advertised the other series airing that day; immediately preceding it in the block was a re-airing of the DiC special "Inspector Gadget Saves Christmas."
References
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Eatock, James and Mangels, Andy (2008). The Real Ghostbusters Complete Collection booklet, p. 6. CPT Holdings, Inc.
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Marsha Goodman (1986). Episode Call Sheet and SAG Report, "Xmas Marks the Spot" (1986).
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Toledo Blade, December 24, 1994 (television listings, via Google News newspaper archive).
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The Telegraph-Herald, December 8, 1995 (television listings, via Google News newspaper archive).
