Mainlining Christmas

It’s rarely so clear to me that Erin has no fundamental appreciation for children’s media that’s actually aimed at children. Because I really enjoyed watching this. Okay, a lot of it was laughing at bits that weren’t necessarily meant to be funny, and some of it was laughing at Erin, but that is enjoyment nonetheless. You know what? I am actually completely okay with variations on Winnie the Pooh. This is a franchise in which I would be a major hypocrite if I tried to pretend to be a purist. After all, I was raised on Welcome to Pooh Corner (“Be Too Smart for Strangers!”) and I loved The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (“He’s round and he’s fuzzy, I love him because he’s just Pooh Bear! Winnie the Pooh Bear!...) and I was in a stage production loosely based on the stories when I was about... nine, I think? (I was the bee who pointed out to the other bees that Pooh was hiding behind the piano.) So, I’m fine with Darby, and I’m fine with trying out different sorts of plots. A

I think Lindsay's reviewing this as well, since we had very different impressions of this made-for-DVD movie. She enjoyed it, while I consider its existence an affront to all that's good in the Universe. Here's the thing: I'm a pretty big fan of the Bear with Very Little Brain, and I've got some rather strong feelings regarding how Pooh and his friends should be adapted. The makers of this thing apparently feel differently. For example, I believe that Pooh and Tigger should NOT be part of a team that's sort of a combination of Mystery Inc. and a bunch of superheroes, as that represents a profound and disturbing lack of understanding of the world of Winnie the Pooh. Here are a few other points I differ with the makers of "My Friends Tigger & Pooh": Modern clothes and technology should not exist in Pooh's world. And expedition to the North Pole should not end at the literal North Pole. The characters should not be famous. New characte

This special is one of four Dreamworks Christmas collected on Netflix under the title, "Dreamworks Holiday Classics." While it's not awful, it is an utter waste of time and effort. To be fair, I wasn't a big fan of the movie this was spun off of, though, so your mileage may vary. The story takes place at Snoggletog, a stand-in for Christmas. Everyone's getting ready for the holiday, and they're all excited, since it'll be the first since they enslaved   made peace with the dragons. Without warning, all the dragons suddenly take off, leaving the Vikings confused and terrified for no discernible reason. Did I say all  the dragons? I meant all but two: Toothless is stuck because he needs Hiccup's help to fly, and Meatlug is stuck, because his owner friend  secretly locks him up. Hiccup feels bad that his dragon isn't free, so he makes him an improved tail. Toothless then predictably takes off. Eventually Meatlug is accidentally freed b

DCU Holiday Bash (1997) Dennis O’Neil, Walter Simonson, Sal Buscema, Jim Aparo, et. al. This is a pretty fun assortment of stories. First Lois tells a story about Superman’s early attempts at being a hero to a lonely guy on Christmas Eve. I thought the story about Highfather and Orion filling in for a department store Santa was surprisingly awesome. Denny O’Neil’s contribution is a little noir tale about Catwoman rescuing a woman and child who were targeted by mobsters. There’s a humor piece starring Etrigan, and a maybe-too-preachy piece about Green Lantern going after some punks who desecrated a synagogue. Flash shops for a gift for his girlfriend (Reprinted in DC Universe Christmas) and Alfred closes out the issue with a little wordless piece called “Just Another Night”. This is a really solid assortment, and a very enjoyable read. DC Universe Holiday Special (2010) Joey Cavalieri, Tony Bedard, Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, et. al. This was much less interesting an iss

Hope you're in the mood for a little magical realism, because that's what I've got today. For those of you who haven't been following along, every day from December 1st through the 25th I'm providing a new piece of short genre fiction about Christmas Eve. By: Erin L. Snyder The weeks leading up to the last day I ever saw Walter were bizarre to begin with. Come to think of it, the decade leading up to that Christmas Eve was pretty bizarre. Walter has always been... odd. Hell, I started hanging out with him because I felt sorry for the guy. That was... eighth grade, I guess. I mean, I was never what you’d call ‘one of the cool kids,’ but people seemed to like me. I had friends back then, groups I belonged to; hell, even a girlfriend. Walter didn’t really have any of that. I mean, there were people he ate with at lunch, people he hung out with and all that, but he never really seemed to care about any of them. There wasn’t a lot he did care about. Certainly no

This is not one the best episodes of Bonkers, but it has moments of amusement. But then again, I liked Bonkers, and plenty of people just plain did not. I get it, it was a farcical comedy for the most part, and it was loosely based on the world of Who Framed Roger Rabbit while being entirely animated. But hey, I thought the show (about a toon who joins the human police force to help them deal with toon crimes) was cute and had promise. I’ll admit this Christmas episode was pretty weak, though. Santa has a malfunction testing a new sleigh, and ends up at Fall-Apart Rabbit’s home with some amnesia. Fall-Apart takes his new friend “Jim” on some unseasonal adventures, which mostly seemed there to kill time with bad jokes. Meanwhile, some elves show up at the police station to enlist their help in tracking down the missing Santa. Bonkers takes on the case (though he doesn’t seem to get very far), while the elves try to get his partner, Lucky, to train to be a Santa stand-in in case they

The Madagascar Penguins In A Christmas Caper (2005) I didn’t hate this. It wasn’t amazing (and seems to have mixed up the Central Park Zoo and the Bronx Zoo) but I laughed a few times. The dimmest little penguin decides to go out after a last minute gift for a lonely polar bear, and the others have to mobilize to rescue him from an elderly lady who’s mistaken him for a plush toy. The woman is a bit of a hideous stereotype, with her vicious yippy dog and her unrelenting grumpiness and her claustrophobic Manhattan apartment. However, I thought the action was amusing, and it wasn’t long enough to really overstay its welcome. Your mileage may vary. Erin thought Merry Madagascar was better than this one, and I very much disagree. Either way, though, I think you can safely skip it. Shrek: Donkey's Caroling Christmas-tacular (2010) Apparently this started life as a DVD extra, but has since been repackaged to round out the collection of Dreamworks specials appearing on Netflix

Christmas in Tattertown is a rather bizarre piece. Originally intended as a pilot for an animated series, it's basically a love letter from Ralph Bakshi to the largely forgotten animated works of the early 1900's. It's got a lot of issues, but it's a fascinating piece on its own. In my opinion, it's a shame it was never picked up. The special is intentionally light on plot, but what's present follows a human teleported into a world inhabited by thrown out toys and other discarded objects. She sets out to teach the denizens of this new world about Christmas and eventually to celebrate. Meanwhile, the primary villain (the main character's doll), quickly assembles a criminal empire and attempts to take over Tattertown. I like that, by and large, characters don't play to type: in other words, a Christmas wreath is as likely to be a conman as anything else. It leads to some entertaining interactions, while adding depth to what could easily have been a t

Holy crud-muffins. I thought I vaguely remembered this show, and a lot more came back to me as I watched, but I had forgotten just how utterly insane it is. If you were not a Nicktoons watcher in the 90’s, you might have missed this one. It’s about Rocko, a wallaby who moves to the city with his dog Spunky, and his friends (a neurotic turtle-thing and a big dumb cow raised by wolves) and his enemies (the catfish-thing that lives down the street). It’s sometimes satirical, often subtly adult, and sometimes just gross-out. It wasn’t as biting or as gross as something like Ren and Stimpy, though. In this episode, Rocko’s feeling down about being on his own for the holidays, so he invites his friends over. A game of telephone later, and the whole town’s invited to a party, along with some magic Christmas elves that moved in across the street. Of course, professional jerkass Mr. Bighead gets involved, and it looks like Rocko will be alone for Christmas after all, until his new friend th

It's the 18th day of 25 Christmas Eves, my attempt to provide you with 25 genre stories about Christmas Eve. Today, you're getting a very short piece called "Slouching." Give it a read: By: Erin L. Snyder “I’ve been saying it, Bob. Been saying it for six years now. Ever since I moved into Elbington.” The ground shakes the tiniest bit, like a trailer’s driving by. But you look down one side of Route 81 and up the other, and there’s not a blessed thing. Not a headlight to your left or a tail light to your right. And you know perfectly well there’s not another road east of Milford can hold a truck with more than two axles. “Told Trev just last week up at Jones’ General Store, when he was all, ‘Merry CHRIST-mas.’ I told Trev he was wasting his breath. That there wouldn’t be a merry anything this go-round.” It’s silent for a second, then you hear the rustling. You step off of Stanley’s porch to have a look around. There’s nothing for a second, but the rustl

Okay, so I had never seen an episode of That’s So Raven, although I had heard of the show. So I had no idea that the main character is psychic. Yeah, she gets flashes of the future. They seem pretty useless, but there’s your premise. Psychic drama queen with misfit friends and a permanent laugh track. This episode follows a stock sitcom plot that is nearly always unpleasant. Character does something slightly dumb (opens her Christmas present early, even after her psychic powers let her know what it is), compounds it with something dumber (wears the expensive necklace to school) and finishes off with completely implausible (necklace gets flung out a window and under a lawnmower). So now that she’s “ruined Christmas”, she and her friends try replacing the necklace before her parents know it’s gone, while avoiding their evil teacher who’s moonlighting as a mall Santa. And they manage it, through slapstick and shenanigans. And there’s a few bits where it’s almost actually funny. But

Bleck, another terrible Disney Channel sitcom. The ludicrously annoying premise of this show runs as follows: precocious scamps live in a fancy hotel because their mom is a...lounge singer? I know it used to be common, but does anyone who works in a hotel get paid in room and board anymore? Anyway, the show follows the misadventures of the kids and all the annoyingly shallow caricatures that work at the hotel. This was really bad. Really, really bad. Groan-worthy, in fact. The characters were so vapid, the stereotypes so hideous, that by the time there was a couple stranded in the hotel by the blizzard even though all the rooms were booked and the woman was very pregnant, I was too exhausted from all the eye-rolling to even be angry. Sure there was another plot about the kids and their divorced parents and one of them has visions of a Parent-Trap-like scenario for a while, but that was dumb too. It doesn’t help that these kids seem to have taken acting lessons from the kids on th

I've certainly heard of this show, but like most people who weren't eleven-year-old girls in 2003, I'd never actually seen an episode. While it was more or less as bad as I'd anticipated, nothing else about it resembled what I'd expected. It's hard to put into words just how bizarre this thing really was. The show was a smorgasbord of surreal sequences, slapstick, parodies, and animated side comments thrown against the wall in the hopes something would stick. It was strange and incoherent. It might actually have been impressive if anything - ANYTHING - they'd done had been remotely funny or amusing. This is one of those things that mistakes weird for clever. The plot is relatively simple: Lizzie is obsessed with winning a holiday parade float competition and expects help from her family and friends. Meanwhile, an old man shows up claiming to be Santa's lead elf. Pretty early on he effectively proves this claim by accurately recalling what Lizzie

DC Universe Christmas Various Writers and Artists Compilation released in 2000, Issues originally copyright 1940-1999 Premise: A collection of holiday-themed stories from across the first six decades of DC comics. Talk about hits and misses! This is a really interesting read, but it’s not always interesting because it’s good. There is a huge array of styles and quality here. It starts really strong, with a Denny O’Neil Batman tale from 1980 about an ex-con turned mall Santa, and a cute piece from the 90's about Flash (Wally West) shopping for a present for his girlfriend. Then we get a Wonder Woman story from 1943. There’s some historical interest here, but mostly it’s all kinds of horrible. Soon after it is a Teen Titans tale from 1968 with a hokey plot-line and a lot of ‘groovy jive-talking’. There’s a Robin story which is corny, but cute, a Legion of Superheroes bit that’s wild and kinda wonderful. I was really intrigued by a Green Lantern/Green Arrow team-up that’s

What is this? Night 17? Anyway, every day between the 1st and 25th this month, I'm giving you a new piece of fiction. It's a little series I like to call "25 Christmas Eves," and today I've got something particularly special for you: a piece called "Department of Letters." This one opens in a mail room, the day before Christmas.... By: Erin L. Snyder Iyla’s joints cracked like breaking ginger snaps when she stretched her fingers, but the sound was lost in the noise of grinding machines and rippling paper. She was tired - they all were - but the season was almost done. The shipment had come in a few hours earlier: it was a big one - always was on Christmas Eve - but it was also the last. She was a Letter Specialist, 3rd class, in the mail subsection of DLWL (Department of Letters and Wish List). She knew six languages, which was why she was still third class: the leads knew at least two dozen each, and it was rumored the director could read every

Hey, Christmas is even in the title! This totally counts! I love Nature. Even if you don’t, I recommend you watch the first part of this. It has one of my favorite scenes that has ever been on Nature or any other nature program, ever. It’s the part with the fox. I love it. I’m not going to tell you more. The rest of the program is great too. It follows animals searching for food and shelter in Yellowstone National Park in the dead of winter. Bison, elk, wolves, bears, birds, otters and humans all make appearances. I was actually surprised how much I liked following the photographer Tom Murphy as he showed how he camps out in the snow, both to get amazing photos and just because he loves the area. The scene with the people who came out with telescopes to look for wildlife on Christmas day was pretty fantastic as well. The narration tips over the edge into pretentious once or twice. By and large I’m willing to overlook silly narration in a good documentary, but the bit about the

My first angel project is complete! (Well, she technically needs a coat of sealant, but it hasn't been dry enough to take her outside to spray her.) And yes, she's not currently hiding her face, but her eyes are closed, and I liked the Weeping Angels best when they were about implied danger. I bought three shiny angels this year for nefarious purposes: Here's a closer shot of the one for this project: I bought it very cheap on sale at a craft store. First I gave her a decent sanding, but didn't go overboard, since the dust created by the resin she's made of couldn't be good to breathe in. She got sprayed down with plastic-friendly primer next. I could still see "Hope" a little too clearly on her banner, so a little Kneadatite epoxy putty took care of that: And all that was left to do was paint. I first painted her all over a sort of medium gray, and then just kept going over her, adding darker grays to the inset p

Unless you watch a lot of ABC, you most likely won't have heard of this ABC Family made-for-TV Christmas movie about "Nick Snowden," the new Santa Claus, going in search of a missing reindeer named "Buddy." It probably goes without saying, but you're not missing much. The movie moves at a snail's pace as it alternates between the two leads, Snowden and his love interest, Sandy (I swear I'm not making this up, folks). Sandy works at the zoo which wound up with Buddy, courtesy of the movie's villain, Buck. Nick Snowden is bumbling and ineffectual in his attempts to break Buddy out of the zoo, and in pretty much every other respect. He's got one "super power", which is the ability to turn mirrors into portals. I'm assuming this was an artifact of an early draft of the script which didn't include reindeer, since he really shouldn't need to travel around the world by sleigh if he can just teleport from home to home. It

If you're just joining us, every midnight between the 1st and 25th brings a new piece of genre fiction, always about Christmas Eve. This series is called 25 Christmas Eves, and we're on night 16. Today, I've got something especially Christmasy: a piece of far-future military SF called, CHRISTMAS CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE! Enjoy. By: Erin L. Snyder Admiral Belle Samson stepped onto the lift, coffee in hand. A small, green holographic image of the Blitzen-6 appeared before her. The lift shaft was highlighted in red, and she motioned towards the bridge and braced her coffee as she began accelerating upward. “Would the admiral like to view Captain Yuleson’s report on the status of the Spruce Queen?” The computer’s voice was clear and brisk, as always. “No. No thank you,” Samson said, blowing on her coffee. She then removed a flask from her coat pocket and added a modest amount of Irish Cream. A light blinked while she put the flask away. “Notice. It is against regulations f