The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause - Plot

Plot

Scott Calvin/Santa Claus (Tim Allen), and his wife, Carol (Elizabeth Mitchell), are expecting their first child as Christmas Eve approaches. Carol is missing her family, so Scott invites his in-laws, Silvia and Bud Newman (Ann-Margret and Alan Arkin), up to the North Pole, along with his ex-wife, Laura (Wendy Crewson), her husband, Neil (Judge Reinhold), and their daughter, Lucy (Liliana Mumy), to keep Mrs. Claus company. Meanwhile, he is summoned to a meeting of the Council of Legendary Figures consisting of Mother Nature (Aisha Tyler), Father Time (Peter Boyle), the Easter Bunny (Jay Thomas), Cupid (Kevin Pollak), the Tooth Fairy (Art LaFleur), and the Sandman (Michael Dorn). Jack Frost (Martin Short) also arrives and is in trouble. He is jealous that he has no holiday or special occasion in his honor, and has been promoting himself during the Christmas season. Mother Nature accuses him of attempting to upstage Santa, and suggests sanctions against him. When Santa says that he is dealing with how to get the in-laws to come without revealing that he is Santa, Frost manages to negotiate a light sentence of community service at the North Pole, helping Santa and the elves put up various Canadian-themed paraphernalia, as Carol's parents believe Scott is a toymaker in Canada. However, Frost's ultimate goal is to trick Santa into renouncing his position, and he sneaks into Santa's hall of snow globes (which contain images of all the Santas throughout world history) and steals the one containing Scott that will invoke the escape clause, in which Santa must hold the globe and say "I wish I'd never been Santa at all" thus sending him back in time and undoing his career as Santa. When Lucy discovers this crime Jack Frost blackmails her by freezing her parents to force her to remain silent. Jack Frost causes trouble for the family that makes Scott think that he must resign to make things better.

Jack tricks Scott into invoking the escape clause and are both sent back in time to 1994. Jack grabs the original Santa's fallen coat first thus making him top man; Santa. Frost in his Santa job has both shamelessly promoted himself and taken the commercialization of Christmas to an extreme. Scott is sent back to the present, where he has been the CEO for his old company for the last twelve years and works even on Christmas Eve. His non-Santa life is a disappointment, with his business taking priority over everything and his son loathing him for his lack of attention over the years. This has had effects on other people too, as Scott never married Carol; and Laura was miserable in her remarriage to Neil, resulting in their divorce. Scott promises to set things right and so wanting his Santa job back he flies to the North Pole and sees the offensive North Pole, which reminds him of a Las Vegas lounge, whereupon cheesy songs are sung about "Frostmas", and parents pay to have their children put on the nice list (or poorer families can at least get a toy made for undeserving brats). Scott also sees how miserable the elves are, unlike the productive workers they were when he was Santa.

He confronts Jack Frost as Santa, who is still aware of his trickery on Scott and realizing he cannot reform Frost, Scott tricks Jack Frost into putting his voice of the escape clause on a microphone like pen and then has Lucy, who is attending the carnival, go steal Jack's snow globe and bring it to him; Jack Frost finds out and takes the globe but Scott then plays the recording of Jack saying "I wish I'd never been Santa at all" thus invoking the escape clause and causing him and Jack to be sent back once again to 1994. Scott restrains Jack enough to let the Scott of '94 get the coat thus making him Santa again and taking him back to the North Pole and the family where no time has passed since.

Scott back as Santa, when entering the toy factory reconciles with his family and is happier until he sees Lucy finally get the courage to inform Scott what Frost did to her parents; Jack is arrested by elf police officers and he reveals that he cannot unfreeze his victims unless he is unfrozen himself; Scott and Lucy then use a gift Scott gave her; a snow globe of her warmly hugging a snowman, to unfreeze Frost and reform him to thus resolve the conflicts in the movie; the "Canada" ruse is dropped and Carol tells her parents she is Mrs. Claus, and Scott sees his new baby boy, named Buddy Claus, who is born just 3 hours before he must deliver Christmas gifts.