Kaoteek

Sugarplummed was fun, but I gotta admit it kinda sorta lost me slightly in its last third, when everything became less fun and more life-lesson-y. Still, one of the better Hallmark parody out there - and there's been a lot of mediocre ones.

Yeah, that's the format, IIRC. Six families = six episodes + 1 intro episode + 1 outro episodes where everyone will probably help each other during the storm, and end up celebrating Christmas all together.

To my surprise, I really enjoyed The Finnish Line. It was different enough, funny enough and snarky enough to make up for the obvious Santa Claus village sponsoring, and it went places I didn't expect it to. A nice surprise. (and I'm also quite enjoying the Holidazed series)

I think I liked the idea of The Christmas Quest more than the execution, which lacked energy, danger, action - heck, everything that makes a good adventure movie (even considering the fact that it was a Hallmark Christmas movie masquerading as an adventure movie). It wasn't bad (though the final cavern, and its cheap decorations + candles all lit up, was pretty bad), and i'm glad Lacey got another one of her paid vacations, but I probably wouldn't watch it again. As for the Succession/Mrs Miracle quasi-crossover, eh. I don't know, it felt kinda forced - Rachel Boston's Ashley Williams-esque enthousiasm, the plot, the characters... I just never really got on board. And I'm not a huge fan of Pascal Lamothe-Kipnes.

Struggled with Believe in Christmas. I know that the lead couple is a couple IRL, but eh. And the apparent age difference between the bff and her love interest just didn't work for me. Also, something fun could have been done by pushing the whole immersive experience premise even further, but alas...

Can't say I cared much for this one. I also struggled with the actors' ages, more than I expected to, it kinda felt like they cut corners during the production (continuity was sometimes all over the place - the artificial snow fixed on the roof of the magical Uber was quite obvious, being there in one shot, not there in another, then back, then not), and aside from a few winks here and there, I just felt the 90s setting was underutilized.

The Three Wise Men sequel was fun. I think I'd rate it slightly below the original, but still, cute. Didn't care for A Novel Noel, too derivative. Unwrapping Christmas 3 was bland. UC4 (with Busby and Jake Epstein) was probably the better of the four, but it was still very low-key, forgettable and they overdid it on the fake snow (gotta love foam flying all over whenever a car drives on a road).

Happily surprised by the Confessions of a Christmas Letter one, despite going in with serious reservations. As for the male lead, it just goes to show how much of a difference a movie can make. In Unwrapping Christmas 1, as the bland rich investor single dad of a precocious teen, he was insipid, seemed completely bored and uninterested (and he wasn't helped by the awful ADR). Here, in this excentric family, he seemed to have fun and enjoy himself, which in turn made him fun and enjoyable to watch.

I liked Jingle Bell Run. Especially after this past fall's annoying Falling Together where Ashley Williams was so hyper that it ended up quickly dragging the movie down for me. Here, she was calmer, less hyper and less grinny, and she had a nice rapport with meathead-mode Andrew Walker. And overall, the movie was different & dynamic enough to be interesting. I'm kind of hesitating on giving the Christmas Letter a go, especially given the returns here : I'm curious about Angela Kinsey in a Hallmark movie, but I've never seen the female lead, and I gotta say the male lead didn't make much of an impression on me in Unwrapping Christmas 1, far from it.

Didn't hate Christmas with the Singhs, but it was very standard Meet the Parents fare with added indian flavor : not good, not bad, just there. But at least it's some welcome ethnic diversity in a season where the "token ethnic and/or gay bff/colleague/boss" trope is back in force. Speaking of diversity, Unwrapping Christmas 2 : Mia's prince was your standard Hallmark Royal movie, only with black actors and a romance novel twist that probably could have led to something better (the exact same movie, but with an ending like "the Prince was all in her head and she's still single, but now she's more confident, stronger, and isnt afraid to speak her mind" might have been more interesting than what we got there). I liked the lead actress, and it was easily better than UC1, but that's about it. (also, since Hot Frosty has been mentioned... I ended up not minding it, despite the dreadful title. It felt very first draft-y, and Milligan's overexcited puppy acting was too much early on, but it all ended up settling down later on, becoming less caricatural and more sincere. Nothing great, but better than I expected... which wasn't hard, since I expected nothing from it)

The Irish one was okayish. A bit slow for me, but I didn't hate it. The first Hallmark + Unwrapping Christmas movie, though, wasn't great. Production-wise, the sound was very uneven, with mediocre ADR ; the leading man was... bland, the kid felt too old for the part, Natalie Hall was overacting (I usually like her, but her vibe was entirely different from the rest of the movie's, here), and the story was the usual "we've gotta save that historical building before Christmas" fare. Meh. Hopefully the other three Unwrapping Christmas movies will be better. (also, enough with the "Die Hard is a Christmas movie" quips, it's getting tiring, to the extent I'm now docking points from Christmas movies that go there)

I wish I liked Santa Tell Me more than I did (and more than most apparently did). If only for the three Nicks who had fun in their roles, and for the overall tone of the movie, much broader and dynamic than most. But the plot was so, so basic/predictable and, dare I say it, shallow to an extent, that it ended up feeling kinda forced (just like that brief, fleeting moment of LGBTQ representation at the end). Also, I must say I couldn't care less about home renovation tv shows, so...

Same. I have absolutely no nostalgia for Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and one of the two aunts fared a lot better here than the other, but it was perfectly watchable, and despite some initial doubts, I ended up really liking the young couple. Nothing groundbreaking, but an enjoyable watch.

I liked Our Holiday Story... until I didn't. I like the main couple, and it was fine for a while, but then, it dawned on me that it was all really just the same old "he's a manly single-dad small town woodworker who believes in fate and is messy, she's a rational, numbers-oriented careerwoman who recently came back in town, yadda yadda yadda", only wrapped into that How I met your mother schtick of telling it all in a fractured way... So overall, meh. Might have worked better without all the unlikely plot contrivances, but then, it wouldn't have lasted 90 minutes.

Gotta say I didn't care much for A Carol for Two. I don't know, I care about Broadway and carol singing about as much as I do about the tough, harsh world of aspiring playwrights & wannabe actors (in 5-year Christmas Party), the cousin was grating, and I must say that, although they've got great voices, both leads felt kinda bland to me. Eh.