Happy Night Before the Night Before Christmas! I know this holiday season is probably very different, but as if to make up for the whole... everything else, 2020 brought us a wealth of reasonably good to excellent new holiday movies and specials. And I caught up on a few specials that are new to me. And so, some (mostly) jolly thoughts:
"Mariah Carey's Magical Christmas" - Whatever you're imagining from a Mariah Carey Christmas Special, I can assure you this isn't going to have any shocking surprises.
But I liked it! The Peanuts animation in the middle is so cute and the songs are, of course, terrific. I'm just surprised that this didn't happen back in the 90's.
"My Gift: A Christmas Special from Carrie Underwood" - Carrie sings a bunch of Christmas songs and, well, that's about it. Singing kids, sparkles, and a general "We're trying to make the best of what we can control" feeling. It's nice.
"A Holly Dolly Christmas" - Dolly Parton sings and tells stories and generally is awesome both here and in real life. We respect a Queen.
"Jingle Jangle" - I love this so much! The colorful steampunk aesthetic, the music, the magic; so far this is my favorite live-action Netflix Christmas movie.
It's also a movie where a guy creates a self-aware A.I. and immediately starts planning on making more to sell as toys for children. For some reason, they don't really dwell on that part.
"Happiest Season" - I know there is a lot of Discourse over this one but I'm not going to go too crazy here. It is a romantic comedy -a Christmas romantic comedy no less- and I enjoyed it! If you know me at all, you know this is huge.
"It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie" - "Oh hey," I thought, "I haven't seen this Muppet holiday special! I wonder why Freeform aired it only two times very early in the morning in between their mandated '700 Club' broadcasts?"
And then, dear readers, I watched it.
"Oh. Oh no... 😰
"This is, at least the second-strangest movie I've ever seen where a supernatural being played by Woopie Goldberg helps a little guy get their life in order. That club scene though, yiiiiikes..."
"Anna and the Apocalypse" - Like many zombie comedies, this is a lot of fun until it isn't. It's also a holiday musical, and I kind of want to add some of the songs to my Weird Christmas Playlist. Kind of. Seems a little on the nose for this year.
"Hilda" - The brand new second season has an episode about the Yule Lads, so it counts. Plus the whole series is basically Weird And/Or Obscure Nordic Folklore and is so beautiful and lovely and cozy! I don't think we've had a good cozy animated series since "David the Gnome" back in the day. It is, I believe the term is, Hygge as heck.
(But darn the cliffhanger ending... )
"Ziggy's Gift" - You can find this in the good old Thief Archive, which is appropriate because it is very obviously a Richard Williams joint. It's nice; worth watching for the scene with the turkeys.
"Pee-Wee's Playhouse Christmas Special" - Maybe this is a bold proclamation but this is, I think, the best live-action Christmas special of my generation that does not contain Fraggles or John Legend. Halfway through this rewatch I was ten times happier than I was when I started it. (Not sure why Netflix is dropping it right before Christmas though.)
"Twelve-Hundred Ghosts" - You ever notice how many "Christmas Carol" parodies and straight adaptations there are? It was almost inevitable that some mad genius would edit every one they could find into one coherent "megamix". That genius is Heath Waterman and if you only have time for one Christmas movie off this list, make it this one. On the one hand, it's genuinely moving. On the other, it's hilarious (I'll never get over Mystical Buffalo Marley).
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Art of the Day! Happy Holidays everyone!
