Picking up the threads of The Santa Clause film franchise 28 years after the original film (and 16 years since the last entry), the new series deals with an aging Scott Calvin (Tim Allen) dealing with a dwindling list of kids still believing in Santa Claus and his Christmas magic beginning to fail. While first ignoring his problems after trouble one Christmas, he must face the truth when circumstances repeat the next year. If Santa feels a bit worn down so does the series trying to squeeze some Christmas magic out of a franchise that dried up over a decade and a half ago.
The first episode of the series focuses on the growing concern of Santa's family and the elves, with Santa falling off a roof at the end of the episode poor Santa must finally consider retirement and a replacement. We also get the introduction of game designer Simon Choksi (Kal Penn) facing distribution problems who catches a glimpse of Santa's reindeer one Christmas Eve laying out an obvious arc for the character over the remainder of the series.
"Good to Ho" features the kind comedy and effects fans of the movies would expect. Along with Allen, Elizabeth Mitchell (introduced in the second film) returns as Mrs. Claus and Eric Lloyd as Charlie while recasting the Claus children (including casting Allen's real-life daughter in the role of Sandra) and the elves with new actors. The first episode sets up the premise of the series, with the search for a new Santa beginning in Chapter Two. We also get a few politically incorrect Santa moments, taking some cheap shots at Scott anger of having to recognizing ADHD instead of simply labelling a child as naughty or people being not allowed to say "Merry Christmas" any longer which, aside from being divisive and problematic, feels like a cheap way for Disney to cater specifically to right-wing viewers.
- Title: The Santa Clauses - Chapter One: Good to Ho
- IMDb: link
No comments:
Post a Comment