What did I just watch?
Author: Dan Stalcup
Categories
A Christmas Carol / Scrooge (1951)
In all the adaptations of A Christmas Carol that I’ve seen, Ebenezer Scrooge is almost always depicted as a ghoul at the start who is gradually humanized.
Read the full review here.
Mickey’s Christmas Carol makes an excellent way to introduce younger kids to the Christmas Carol story, but it’s honestly appealing to all ages.
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The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
It’s an obvious point, but worth repeating: With so many bad franchise sequels in film history, Empire Strikes Back is kind of a miracle.
I’m surprised that this is listed as a film in some databases. I always figured the line for “short film” was drawn somewhere before “YouTube video.”
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Language Lessons (2021)
There are two kinds of people: Those who love Natalie Morales and those who are not yet familiar with Natalie Morales. I’m in the former group, so it was an easy sell for me to track down Language Lessons.
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Jim Henson’s Turkey Hollow (2015)
I rounded out Thanksgiving weekend with an oddball I recently read about that I’d never previously heard of, let alone seen — a made-for-TV, Thanksgiving-themed, Henson Company-produced fantasy family special.
Let the season of Christmas specials begin!
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Olaf Presents (2021)
My kids smiled, but at what cost?
This is among the lowest forms of cross-promotional entertainment, an annoying side character from one Disney movie giving annoying recaps of beloved Disney movies that inch just enough towards parody/deconstruction to act like it’s clever without actually being clever. (It’s a miniseries based on that one unnecessary but mildly amusing segment of Frozen 2 where Olaf reenacts Frozen 1.)
No interesting animation, no stabs at extended storytelling or creativity, just quickly presented and abandoned story points and musical lyrics from five movies you’ve seen.
Do you like Josh Gad singing intentionally badly? I sure hope so because you’ll be getting a heavy dosage of it here.
The only, tiniest saving graces in its favor are that I love seeing my daughters’ smiles, and the Marshmallow monster is charming.
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Once Upon a Snowman (2020)
Filling the tiniest of cracks of Frozen lore: What happened in the time between “Let It Go” and Anna/Kristoff bumping into Olaf in Frozen? What caused him to latch onto the notion of summer and warm hugs? Did he try to get a nose before Anna/Kristoff gave him a carrot?