Sunday, January 15, 2012

Balance Issues Kill The Snoopy Claus Ornament!


The Good: Good sculpt, Reasonable price, Decent coloring
The Bad: Terrible balance issues, Not a terribly interesting ornament
The Basics: The 2011 Snoopy Claus ornament suffers from severe balance issues, which make it impossible to recommend.


Sometimes, I find I have ridiculously little to write about an ornament. In the case of the Snoopy Clause ornament, I found myself very surprised that such an unbalanced ornament was released to the market. The balance issues rob a brightly colored, interesting sculpt of being worth buying. After that, there is hardly anything to say about the ornament.

Basics

The Snoopy Claus ornament features Snoopy from Peanuts wearing a Santa outfit. Snoopy is seated on a throne with Woodstock and his friends waiting in line with their list. The four birds are waiting in front of Snoopy as Santa Clause who has a candy cane to present to Woodstock. As a pretty cool detail, Snoopy also has an obviously fake beard molded onto the front of his face!

Hallmark made a decent effort on Snoopy Claus by molded details like wood grain on the plastic for the throne. Measuring two and three-eighths inches tall, one and three quarters inches wide and two and five-eighths inches deep, the Snoopy Claus ornament is a pretty average-sized Peanuts ornament. At $14.95, it is actually one of the least expensive Peanuts ornaments produced for the 2011 holiday season.

The Hallmark Snoopy Claus ornament is made of a durable plastic and has the characters cast in very bright plastic. The figures look exceptional and are vibrantly colored.

Features

As a Hallmark Keepsake ornament, Snoopy Claus could have a sound or light function, but it does not. This is a very basic ornament intended to be one of the more affordable options without flair. In that regard, it is fine; it does not need a light or sound function.

Balance

As with all ornaments, the intent of the Hallmark Keepsake Snoopy Claus ornament is to be hung on a Christmas Tree. And for those creating the ultimate Peanuts Christmas Tree, the Snoopy Claus ornament could have been great, but the balance kills it. Hallmark has the standard brass hook at the logical point, the top of Snoopy's red cap. The problem with this is that there is so much of the ornament in front of snoopy, that this is basically a seesaw, with Snoopy as the fulcrum. As a result, the ornament pitches downward almost sixty degrees! The poor balance makes this ornament look absolutely ridiculous.

Collectibility

Hallmark Keepsake began delving into the collectibles market in 1991 with Star Trek when it introduced the exceptionally limited edition original U.S.S. Enterprise ornament (click here for that review!). Since then, they have made ornament replicas of virtually everything that has ever had collectibles associated with it (and some that Hallmark has pioneered). The Snoopy Claus ornament had very broad appeal as A Charlie Brown Christmas was almost universally popular from the first time it aired through contemporary times. Unfortunately, the balance issue appears to have been noticed because I can find this exceptionally easily, at severe discounts now. I think that it ought to be a terrible investment, because no matter how inexpensively it is purchased, the balance is still terrible.

Overview

Despite having a decent sculpt with great coloring, the nauseating pitch of the Snoopy Claus ornament makes it impossible to recommend even to Peanuts fans. While it might be fine as a decoration on a flat surface, it makes for a truly poor ornament.

For other Peanuts holiday ornaments, please check out my reviews of:
2011 Ho! Ho! Ho! Tasty Snow!
2010 "Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!"
2009 Just The Right Tree

4.5/10

For other ornament reviews, please visit my index page!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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