3 Christmas Specials To Watch

It's that time of year again, and technically it has been since Black Friday. Since then we've been bombarded by Christmas...I can barely stand to go to the grocery store anymore in the fear of hearing more terrible country versions of classic Christmas songs.

The decorations go up, the wish lists start, the bell ringers make their collections...and of course, holiday TV specials come on. There are more and more of them every year-you have your Christmas episodes of comedies like 30 Rock, your classic staples, and who can forgot...those poorly put-together made-for-TV movies that air on the likes of Lifetime and ABC Family. But fear not, dear reader...I have 3 specials to suggest that are some of the best.

Read on to check them out...more after the jump!

A Charlie Brown Christmas

I'll start out with a classic and a staple of Christmas TV. I hope you've seen this already, but maybe some of you haven't or maybe you need a refresher. Charles Schulz's "Peanuts" is undoubtedly one of the most celebrated Sunday comics ever-they were great little pieces about kids who always seemed smarter than the adults (who were never even seen). The main character, Charlie Brown, was a thin haired, sweater-wearing, philosophizing loner who was always trying to figure out the real meaning of something.

And such is the case with "A Charlie Brown Christmas", a special that first aired in 1965 but has since been shown every year for the past 45 years-it's one of those shows every one sees as a kid but can still appreciate as an adult. As Christmas approaches, Charlie Brown has his usual philosophical conundrum of trying to figure out what Christmas is really all about. He decides to take part in his local nativity play, but the other kids want to make it lively while Charlie wants to keep it as the classic it is. He decides what the show really needs is a Christmas tree, so he sets off to find the perfect one, which in the end helps him discover the real meaning of Christmas. For it's view of what Christmas is really about, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" will always be a classic and a staple of Christmas specials.

A Very Sunny Christmas

"It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia" is the funniest show on TV right now (I wrote an article on why you should be watching it if you haven't yet). The brilliant writers/creators/cast have made their own Christmas special, and as expected, it's chock full of ridiculous, sometimes offense humor they're known so well for-but it also has a lot of heart and nostalgia for what Christmas was like as a kid.

Dennis and Dee are fed up with Frank. Every year for Christmas, he buys them the best gifts ever...and then he takes them back for himself. For this Christmas, he buys Dennis a Lamborghini, telling him it really is all his...but both Dennis and Dee don't trust him. They decide to find an old business associates of Frank's to teach him the true meaning of Christmas. Of course in true Sunny fashion, their schemes are quite ridiculous-they tell his old associate to act like a ghost, scaring Frank a la Jacob Marley in Dicken's classic "A Christmas Carol".

Meanwhile, Charlie and Mac reflect on how they spent Christmas as kids. Mac would always get the best presents and Charlie would have personal visits from Santa Clause every year who would make him and his mother feel happier during the holidays when Charlie didn't have a father. But looking back, they start to realize what was really going on, and it's not so merry...

What ties the whole special together is the fact that it's raunchy and hilarious, but it's also about the nostalgia of Christmas and what it meant to us as kids-and how we can still hold on to it.

The special was first released on DVD last year, and you can rent it online here.

The Office (BBC) Christmas Special

This is bar none my favorite Christmas special ever. It's already set up to be awesome because it involves what I think is one of the best comedy series to ever grace TV, and it's a great Christmas special, especially because the holiday is a set up more than a focus.

The two part series takes place 3 years after the ending of the original series and follows the staff as we catch up with them and see what they're doing with their lives, in the same documentary style. Tim is still working at Wernham-Hogg paper company, working miserably under Gareth, who is his boss after David Brent was made redundant. He has to work there without Dawn, who is living in Florida with her fiancé Lee, clearly unhappy with her life. And finally, there's David Brent-he's now a traveling salesman after being released from his old company. He's spent his money on recording a cover of "If You Don't Know Me By Now" as a single (you can watch the hilarious video here) and is still hanging on to his last threads of fame for appearing in the original documentary series, making appearances at night clubs for people that really have no interest in seeing him.

The documentary crew decides to have a reunion at Wernahm Hogg's Christmas party, and make the offer to both Dawn and Brent (who actually visits the office often) to return and see everyone again. They both agree, and the gang is re-united. What follows is probably the most earnest, heart-felt, and satisfying Christmas special AND reunion on TV. David Brent gets to see what he considered for a long time to be his best friends and tell off his bully of a friend, and Tim and Dawn get a shot at the second chance they've always wanted.

I feel like the best Christmas specials are about bringing people together and the relationships between them, which is why the The Office Christmas Special really succeeds-it's less about the holidays and more about the people.

So there it is...3 of my favorite Christmas Specials that are very worth your time and money. So what are you waiting for? Get to it!

Happy Holidays Everyone!