WWE's 12 Fails Of Christmas
2. Xanta Claus - In Your House 5
A devastating mix of rock bottom WWE creative and the company's tacked-on use of the holiday period, this horribly conceived and executed character lasted exactly as long as it could have done, and that still felt too long.
Unleashed with a vengeance at In Your House 5 in 1995, an evil Father Christmas was probably the punchline of a one-note joke at a booking meeting that gradually gathered legs.
And though fundamentally absurd, a money grabbing heel Santa Claus from the South Pole shouldn't be so ridiculous in a wrestling universe.
The problems stack up fast though, when the selected babyface who has to sell a beating from Xanta (in this case, Savio Vega) has to first acknowledge that Santa Claus is real. Then the commentator does. Then all fans do, regardless of age. Then Ted Dibiase, the benefactor of this dodgy St Nick, does. In a race to the bottom, gradually everybody gets just a little bit stupider.
This is before the problem of the ludicrous character's shelf-life. How can a villainous version of a man that works once a year suddenly be expected to make house show dates in the middle of July?!
All these factors lead to a rather accelerated turnaround on the character. Xanta Claus briefly came to town, but his departure was thankfully just as swift.