Folklore Funko Pop: Belsnickel is NIGH!

Like many television viewers in the mid-Aughts, NBC's The Office was must-see viewing. I, however checked out of regular viewing shortly after Micheal Scott (Steve Carrell) left the show in 2011, which is when it apparently got weird. Really weird.

With Carrell's character out of the picture, the show's focus shifted to other Dunder-Mifflen employees, most notably Dwight Schrute. I recall reading somewhere that producers were hoping to successfully spin the character into his on show, set on the Schrute family beet farm. If only that had happened, who knows what kind of wacky Pennsylvania Dutch/German folklore, real and imagined, could have found its way onto our televisions! As it stands, at least we have Belsnickel who made his The Office debut in the 185th episode, "Dwight Christmas", which aired in December 2012.

Fast Forward to 2019 when Netflix and other streaming services have allowed "old" (or in the case of classic comedies such as The Office, timeless) shows find new audiences. While in one English class last week, I mentioned in passing that I had recently come across the Funko Pop! TV: The Office - Dwight As Belsnickel pop at a local Target. I shared that though I was unfamiliar with who Belsnickel was in the context of the television show, a quick check on the cell revealed him to be a holiday folk character so, naturally, I bought it. Simply mentioning "Belsnickel" to my students prompted a few to go into the character's back story as a result of their having seen The Office episode in which he had appeared. Cool!

Because my students were more much knowledgeable than I about such things, I, like Oscar in the clip above, needed to return to the internet for more info. One online article, "Yes, Belsnickel is a Real Thing, and No, it's Not Just from 'The Office'" by Helen Ehrlich, is especially illuminating, though brief, and offers some additional background information on the folk character. Given Belsnickel's renaissance in recent popular culture (apparently "Dwight Christmas" is among the series most popular), along with that of current holiday darling Krampus, perhaps a return to the old ways is not really that far off. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, after all, first appeared in 1939, so Belsnickel and his cadre of creepy holiday tricksters have a significant head start!