So when did the Clauses have all those kids?

Where to trends in fiction come from?

Sometimes it’s obvious: We see a whole bunch of urban fantasies about ghost/demon/vampire-hunting women because earlier series on those lines have sold.

Sometimes it’s not. Over the past 20 years, I’ve seen more and more films and TV shows in which authors are living their own stories — H.G. Wells building the time machine instead of just writing about it in Time After Time, The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne — and I seriously doubt they’re all imitating each other. The Verne series might be influenced by Time After Time, but there was also a TV series showing Arthur Conan Doyle in a Sherlock Holmes-style adventure, and multiple plays showing L. Frank Baum tied in with Oz. I can’t imagine anyone saw Malcolm McDowell’s Wells and thought “Wow, wouldn’t it be great to write Baum into an Oz story!”

And then we have the trend of writing stories about Santa Claus’s children. The first time I saw one, it was a Marvel Comics Christmas story, “Son of Santa,” in which Santa’s abandoned son (grief over Mrs. Claus dying in childbirth, IIRC) has to step into Dad’s shoes after Santa is murdered by the diabolical AntiClaus.

Then, in 1998, we got the TV movie, Like Father, Like Santa, in which Santa-son Harry Hamlin, who always felt Dad neglected him in favor of his work, is building a toy company he dreams will someday dwarf Santa’s operation, and using information from the naughty list to blackmail his competitors.

Since then we’ve had Kelsey Grammer in Mr. St. Nick, Kathy Ireland in Once Upon a Christmas and Jenny McCarthy in Santa Baby (the latter two have sequels), and maybe one or two I’ve missed. I wouldn’t bet we’ve seen the last of them, either.

Are they all following in the Hamlin film’s tracks? Or does it reflect that as the Baby Boomers grow older, the thought of passing the reins to their kids becomes more of interest? Or something else? Is it significant that Kathy Ireland is the only one of Santa’s kids who’s not estranged, and is actively devoted to the family business?

I don’t know. So anyone have any thoughts?