Holly Barrier

Holly Barrier is a premium plant in Plants vs. Zombies 2 that is tied to the 2017 Feastivus event. He acts like an Endurian, damaging zombies that attack him, as well as having the same amount of health as an Endurian. Like Banana Launcher and Missile Toe, he can launch one of his small berries to a selected tile on the lawn when interacted with. The berries will damage and knock back zombies in a 3x3 area one tile. Tombstones hit by this blast will be heavily damaged, while zombies will only be lightly damaged. If the berries land on a tile free of obstacles like tombstones, it will leave a spiky barrier leaf on said tile that acts like an Endurian, but with half its health. Unlike Banana Launcher and Missile Toe, however, the berries don't recharge over time. Similar to Chard Guard’s leaves, though, the player can manually plant a Holly Barrier on top of one to restore his berries if they have Wall-nut First Aid.

The barriers count as plants, and add up to a maximum plant total, cannot be planted on water, but can still be launched at Imp Cannons to deal impact damage.

Origins
He is based on both holly, a genus of flowering plants, and a barricade, an object or structure that creates a barrier or obstacle to control, block passage or force the flow of traffic in the desired direction.

His code name, Holly Knight, is a reference to the Christmas carol Silent Night (more specifically, the line "holy night"). It also references how Holly Barrier is both based on holly and is a defensive plant.

Plant Food effect
When given Plant Food, Holly Barrier will regain all lost berries, and will launch four berries on random tiles. If they land on a tile without an obstacle, the spiky leaf will have metallic spikes attached to it, making it do more damage to zombies and giving it more health. And finally, it will heal to full health.

Strategies
Although this plant can target zombies anywhere on the map, do not treat it like a Banana Launcher because it does minuscule amounts of damage and only has three uses (unless you have this plant in front of an Aloe and Holly Barrier is at max level). Instead, use it as you would an Endurian and use it to block zombies. Use the berries to knock back zombies and place a mini Endurian there to slow them down. You can also use Blover in conjunction with the knock back to blow multiple zombies away. In addition, berries that fall on damaged barriers will replace them with ones that have full health, however this will not replace the berries from Holly Barrier's Plant Food ability. It is not a good idea to use this in Big Wave Beach, as the berries will not spawn leaves in the water. Aloe works fairly well with Holly Barrier, as this plant will regain all lost berries upon being healed.

Holly Barrier is a great choice against Excavator Zombie, Turquoise Skull Zombie, Punk Zombie and MC Zom-B as their berries can serve a distraction to them and push them back, which can either disable their abilities or minimizes the damage caused to the plants. However, do not use Holly Barrier only for line of defense against them as they can easily render it useless.

Holly Barrier is an excellent plant to use against Chicken Wrangler Zombie and Weasel Hoarder as they can defend a whole lane of Zombie Chickens and Ice Weasels. Holly Barriers can also be used as a line of defense against Jester Zombie as they will damage him with its spikes.

Never use this plant against Breakdancer Zombie as he can kick the zombies past the berry obstacles or even the plant itself, rendering it useless.

Trivia

 * He is the second holly-based plant in the series, the first being Jolly Holly.
 * He is the fourth plant that can target a tile, the first is Cob Cannon, the second is Banana Launcher, and the third is Missile Toe.
 * Out of the four, he has the cheapest sun cost, and the only one that can't recharge his projectiles.
 * He is the third premium plant released alongside the Feastivus event, the first being Sap-fling and the second being Missile Toe.
 * The barriers cannot be flown over by flying zombies, similar to Tall-nut.
 * His internal name is "hollyknight".
 * Unlike other targeting plants, Holly Barrier can be planted on minecarts. It makes sense since its not as slippery as the other two.