It's Christmas Eve, and the miserly Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his former business partner, Jacob Marley. Marley warns Scrooge that he will be visited by three spirits who will show him the error of his ways and the consequences of his greed and selfishness. The first spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Past, takes Scrooge on a journey through his childhood and early adulthood, showing him the people and events that shaped his life and led him to become the bitter and lonely man he is now.