Mainlining Christmas

Remember a few years ago, when Marvel animation was at its peak? In a relatively short period of time, we got Spectacular Spider-Man, Wolverine and the X-Men, and Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, all great shows. Then something went wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong. Overall, the Disney acquisition of Marvel was a plus. It gave them more money to produce movies and live-action TV series, and the comics actually seem to have benefited. But the quality of their animated programs plummeted. Guess that's the price we have to pay. This, Ultimate Spider-Man, and Avengers Assemble all appear to be in continuity with each other. And, from what I've seen so far, all of these shows suck. To be fair, I've only seen two episodes of Agents of S.M.A.S.H., and one was the pilot. But the premise was misguided to begin with, and nothing I've seen suggests they're able to salvage the show. This episode is, of course, the Christmas one. It opens on Christmas Eve, when t

Have you visited your friendly local comic shop this week? You might want to make the trip, some super-fun holiday specials just came out! Kate's annoyed face is my favorite Gwenpool Special #1 Writers: Charles Soule, Margaret Stohl, Gerry Dugan, Christopher Hastings Art: Langdon Foss, Juan Gedeon, Danilo S. Beyruth, Gurihiru I know, I know, Gwenpool? Just go with it and trust me on this one. This hefty issue tells four interlocking stories featuring some of the recent stars of the Marvel U. The overarching tale follows She-Hulk, as she throws the biggest party of the year to defeat some evil magic. Meanwhile, Ms. Marvel takes out her frustrations with the ubiquity of Christmas on an evil Santa. Hawkeye and Hawkeye team up with Deadpool to catch a holiday pickpocket as a favor to one of Clint’s friends. Gwenpool goes up against a giant sword-snake-thing and enjoys her visit to the main Marvel Universe. Drunk monkeys! YouTube sword tutorials! Holiday gifts! It’s repeat

Okay, we already watched the Christmas episode in season three . Here's the rest of them.   A Girl and Her Cat (1996) First we have to backtrack to episodes in seasons one and two. In this episode Salem throws a hissy fit (pun intended), stays out to make the family worried, and ends up catnapped by a little boy who wants a pet. There's a painfully obnoxious montage in this one as well, as Sabrina and her aunts (Hilda and Zelda) search for Salem. The highlights are references to Salem's backstory (he was originally human, but turned into a cat for trying to take over the world), and a scene where Sabrina steals Salem back by dressing as Santa and teleporting into the kid's closet, knowing no one will believe him. Also, Coolio has a cameo as a poster brought briefly to life. Oh, if you've never seen this show, you might not know that Salem is played at times by a truly ugly puppet cat and at times by a real cat. It's very strange. Sabrina Claus (1997)

I watched this show back when it aired, and I remember enjoying it. So, it's true, you can never go home again. This incredibly long-feeling half hour had a unnecessarily complicated plot. I'm going to sum up. Sabrina, being a teenager, isn't feeling the whole happy-family Christmas vibe Her aunts decide to double down on cheesy Christmas activities Cue montage that starts funny and goes on too long Sabrina is invited to a Christmas Eve party in the magical realm She goes, only to find out that it's an anti-Christmas party about mocking the holiday (The fact that she doesn't seem to know anyone there doesn't make much sense either.) She stops them from spying on and mocking people celebrating on Earth and storms out Only to discover that she has inadvertently deleted the holiday entirely She tries to convince people to remember Christmas Cue montage that doesn't start funny, only goes on too long She finally visits Santa/Father Christmas,

Lindsay unearthed three Rankin/Bass stop-motion Christmas specials we'd never reviewed (or heard of, for that matter), all of which were available on a single DVD. Naturally, we ordered the damn thing. Not surprisingly, there's a reason we've never heard of it. Pinocchio's Christmas is a bizarrely warped mashup of several early scenes from the Adventures of Pinocchio and the usual Rankin/Bass Christmas tropes. The story starts out with Pinocchio learning about Christmas from Geppetto, who sells his boots to buy his son a math book. Pinocchio promptly sells the math book, planning to use the money partly on himself and partly to buy his dad a Christmas present. But first he comes across the Fox and the Cat, who convince him the coins will grow into a tree of gold if he buries them. Naturally, he falls for this, and they steal the money. With the exception of the Christmas elements, this section is actually pretty accurate to the original, at least accor

As a rule of thumb, when there's an episode we're recommending that's embedded in the middle of a series, we advise watching it in context to get the needed background. This is different. We watched the first three episodes of The Librarians, and we think you're better off skipping to the Christmas episode. It's not that the earlier episodes were bad; it's more that they are generic as hell. They feel like an uninspired fusion of Doctor Who, Leverage, Warehouse 13, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the X-Files... hell, basically every genre show of the past two decades shoved into a blender. The result comes off as mediocre in every possible way. Then along comes the Christmas episode, guest starring Bruce Campbell as Santa Claus, and the quality spikes. Story-wise, it's pretty generic Christmas fantasy stuff. The episode opens with Santa abducted by the Serpent Brotherhood (I promise, you're better off not having seen their first episode), a secret

There are plenty of lists out there trying to pick the best and worst Christmas movies of all time (most of those lists are full of crap, but that's not relevant). Lindsay and I spend a lot of time going through those lists looking for anything we've missed, and this often leads to an existential quandary. What the hell is a Christmas movie? Sometimes, it's easy. Elf , for example, is a movie set at, about, and concerned with the holidays. I've never heard anyone claim otherwise. Pull out the holiday elements, and you're literally left with nothing. At least, all of that's true under my definition of Christmas. If you're preoccupied with the idea that Jesus is the reason for the Black Friday rush, then you likely have very different thoughts on whether Elf has anything at all to do with Christmas. Also, you need a goddamn history lesson. But for the rest of the world, it's a Christmas movie. Almost as much so as Miracle on 34th Street , which