God Awful Movies - 97: Christmas with the Kranks

Episode Date: December 24, 2024

Sure, we're off this week, but we had a secular bonus episode ready to go for our patrons anyway, and we figured that, if ever there was a time of year for gifting a bonus episode to everyone else, this was it. Happy holidays! --- If you’d like to make a per episode donation and get monthly bonus episodes, please check us out on Patreon: http://patreon.com/godawful Check out our other shows, The Scathing Atheist, The Skepticrat, Citation Needed, and D&D Minus. Our theme music is written and performed by Ryan Slotnick of Evil Giraffes on Mars. If you’d like to hear more, check out their Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/EvilGiraffesOnMars/

I was trying to think of like how I could do this to torture Heath. I would hire carolers to come out and sing Like the half of a chorus of his favorite 90 songs Like they come out back streets back, and then they just leave and come out Naked wielding a bat being like if you fuckers don't sing alright in the next eight seconds, I'm taking as many down with you with me as possible! Okay, well, I'm an in-sync guy, you know nothing about me. Hahahaha! Godawful...

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Movie! Movie! Movie! Movie! Sitting 700 miles to my immediate left is my good friend Heath and right Heath welcome back Kim Allen tackler. Let's Ideas no no Come on 30 years since the last time that was funny and sitting 900 miles to my northeast is my bad friend Eli Bosnic Eli How are you this fine afternoon, sir? I don't think it was funny 30 years ago. No, I don't know. It was one time.

It was one. It was funny in a standup routine one fucking time. Yeah. OK, if you say so. Yeah. You say it was before your time. I get it. I get it.

I was gestating. I wasn't there. Was he still a coke dealer at that point or was it? No, it was just post coke. It was post coke. I was still on coke, though. So maybe that has something to do with it. So, tell us, Heath, what will we be breaking down today?

We watched Christmas with the Cranks. It's the story of learning the true meaning of Christmas. And that would be fascism. You have to celebrate Christmas or you're evil. And evil, exactly. And Jewish kind of, according to the movie. Yeah, either or and, yeah. So Eli, how bad was this movie?

Well, if you love the things your grandma doesn't like are funny comedy stylings of the 80s, but you wish they'd been filmed 20 years after they'd been not funny in the first place. You will love Christmas with the Cranks. Which is why nobody loves Christmas with the Cranks. Oh my God. This is like truly difficult to watch every minute.

Oh God. Like it hurt, it hurt my face to watch. One of the things that we often say is like, it's really hard to review bad comedy because the only note you can make, the only joke you can make is, I don't find that funny. Right? So that's nothing. But this crossed the Rubicon into, I have jokes to make

because it's not, I don't, I do find it. I find every moment of this not funny movie deeply funny. Yeah. In like an upsetting sad tragic funny right yes exactly yeah right so is there anything you guys want to nominate this one for being the best to be in the worst ass best best turtlenecks it's okay if there's one highlight in this movie for me it's it's most importantly Jamie Lee Curtis Jamie Lee somehow they got Jamie Lee Curtis. Somehow they got Jamie Lee Curtis. She's a great actor and she's in this movie and she goes fucking hard on the like 90s

turtleneck thing with the Christmas theme sometimes. They're aggressive. They get like they get bigger throughout the movie. It's awesome. Famously talented and beautiful actor Jamie Lee Curtis, and they think that if they put her in enough sweaters, we'll forget that she once carried an entire Arnold Schwarzenegger movie with a strip tease. Like, the idea that they have fooled us into thinking Jamie Lee Curtis is like a frumpy

nobody because they put her in high-waisted pants is like top three craziest things this movie believes about. And this movie has no idea how important the L.L. Bean catalog is to my sexual development. So that didn't even work if they tried. It was going the opposite direction. This week you are not alone, Ethan, right? Next week back to alone. Yeah, right, right. Just for the Christmas season. So, I was going to go with best worst vestigial title,

right? So, this movie was originally, it was supposed to be called Skipping Christmas. It's actually based on a novella by John Grisham called Skipping Christmas. By Hitler? Pretty much, yeah. By John Grisham? Yes! Yeah, it's based on a John Grisham short. Okay, wait, I'm so sorry. I know this is supposed to be a short for a part of the show, but we have to pause and we have to talk about that. Like John Grisham, the firm, that guy, yeah. Yes, that guy, yes, yes, the legal fucking drama guy.

Yeah, so for those of you who don't know, John Grisham hasn't written a book in 75 years, right? He pays poor writers to write the same fucking legal thriller bullshit that he's written. But you know he fucking wrote this. Oh, yes. You know, he was like, oh, yeah, he stepped behind the typewriter. It's time for you to show the face of common. I'm reading Skipping Christmas. The minute we get off this record, I'm reading it out loud.

Oh, this was a passion project, like the band that gets, you know, the one hit wonder and they're like, oh, well, now I can really get into my stuff, my real stuff. Yep. Like skipping Christmas. Yeah. The book. Wolf. So, yeah. So he's a hundred ninety eight page. It's a tiny little novella.

And he comes out with this book and then they decide to make it into a movie. They're going to call it Skipping Christmas. But there was a different bad comedy that was already coming out that same year called Surviving Christmas. So they changed the title to avoid confusion, but that's super fucking awkward because they'd already filmed it and the movie contained something like 11 title drops. It's so funny. And they get increasingly

insane now that that isn't the name of the movie and you're just like why do you people keep saying skipping Christmas? Why do you keep pausing when you say skipping Christmas? What's that little numb of a tale of the title right there? Yeah, right. And I am gonna go with Best Worst redemption. Okay. So look, Tim Allen's character spends this movie being unlikable in the way only men who voted for Trump and don't speak to their kids anymore can think is redeemable. All right.

Yep. And the way this movie chooses to quote unquote redeem him is so pathetically emblematic of why an entire generation will never understand why they're history's villains that the movie might as well end with an open letter to Dennis Prager about kids these days. All right well I'll tell you what we've got to figure out how to make this isn't funny funny for the span of an episode. Eli seems to have some ideas so we're gonna

take a quick break to strategize. But we'll be back in a minute with all the loathsome assholery that is Christmas with the Cranks. A lot of our notes is just like, how would Tim Allen kill himself right now if he had to? I wonder. We got to create a line in that. Tim Allen's notes too. And so I said, I'm not doing cocaine at a funeral, I'm doing cocaine in the bathroom.

Exactly, no, that's totally different. Guys, guys! What's up, Chris? Did the famous man get me-tued and therefore needs us to chime in in the Facebook comments that people are innocent until proven guilty? No, no, that's super important, but I have an amazing movie idea. Oh yeah? Let's hear it. Okay, so I have an amazing movie idea. Oh yeah? Let's hear it. Okay, so what are the six best comedies ever made?

Why, the National Lampoon Vacation Series, of course. Of course! So I was thinking, what if we made one of those movies now? Dude, what are you talking about? People these days aren't ready for the comedic brilliance of, I don't care for the food I haven't tried. Yeah, or slip and fall down. They cannot handle it. I'm not saying you're wrong. Okay. Maybe this generation will be able to take it. Okay. Maybe we'll be before our time, but for the sake of posterity, for the sake of art, we have to make this movie. Dude, you know what? F it. You're right.

Let's do it. Heck yeah. Let's do this thing. Make the world demonstrably worse on three. Ready? One, two, three. Make the world demonstrably worse! We all voted for Trump three times. Sure did. Can't wait to vote his fourth time. Yop.

And we're back for the breakdown and we're gonna open up on a close up of Tim Allen's ugly fucking head. Right away. I was just like, okay, Tim Allen's a terrible person. Let's do this. My first note is I see why cocaine gave up on this guy. Yeah.

My second note is I hate his face. And then my third note is I like that he's looking all sad. Yeah. So it's like him and Jamie Lee Curtis being like the kind of bored couple sitting in bed together just kind of sad. Yeah. You can see in his face that he's like fucking Jamie Lee Curtis is so much better than me at acting. God damn. She won't talk to me when the cameras are on. Every time they say cut she goes and sits in that special oxygen tent. And she says, I'm not allowed in there. And she's like, I'm so much better than Tim Allen acting.

I can't be the same guy as this guy. Right, so the two of them are sitting in their bed all morose and everything over something. Whatever could it be? And we get their stupidly cheap last minute title. And then we get them taking their daughter, their 23 year old daughter to the airport. So I guess she's in the Peace Corps. She's going to go to Peru and she's going to be gone over Christmas.

Yeah. Because the Peace Corps usually keeps you for three to five years, not four and a half months. Yep. Yeah. So well, actually it would be even less than that, right? Because like they're leaving the Sunday after Thanksgiving. We know that because Tim Allen says, well, you're the Sunday after Thanksgiving, the busiest travel day of the year.

It's not that's not a fucking thing. We travel more in the summer than we do at fucking Thanksgiving. But he says that anyway, just so that he can start the movie off being wrong about shit. He's the worst. And then the daughter, Blair, right? Yeah. She says goodbye. She's like, I love you, mom. She hugs Jamie Lee Curtis. And then she's like, okay, bye, Tim.

Bye Tim Allen. Yeah. Bye Tim Allen, a man who I will not hug even when pretending he is my father. Well, so here's the thing though, is that like, Tim Allen is supposed to be this like distant dad with his armor up and never shows any emotion or whatever. And you keep thinking that at some point in the movie, they're gonna like, deal with that, but they're not.

No, in fact, at the very end of the movie, Jamie Lee Curtis will do what your mom does when your shitty abusive dad behaves so badly that even she can't ignore it, where she's like, well, now everything's quiet and I'm weird and sad. Yep. That's it, that's the closest this movie gets

to any kind of dealing with Tim Allen's behavior. All right, what are you gonna do, Protestants, right? What are you gonna do? All right. Poison your husband with one of the many household chemicals available to you? And then say it's a heart attack? They'll believe you. And be instantly believed?

They want Tim Allen to be dead. Does anybody have a ricin guy? So they're heading home from the airport. It's very rainy, but they have to stop to get a few things. we're gonna have this moment like it's rainy he's forgotten his umbrella and now he has to go out and get wet and and what's supposed to be happening here is we're supposed to be feeling sympathy for this poor every man who's being like you know bossed around by his nagging wife or whatever but it's Tim Allen and fuck that guy so none of it works. Also fuck anyone who feels this way.

I don't want to go into the grocery store with you. You go get wet and I stay drunk. Just kill yourself. You don't have to be here. You don't. If you're upset about doing this favor for your wife, it's not gonna work out. You're never gonna find a thing you like. You're just gonna keep finding dissatisfying experiences.

You should blow your tailpipe. Like, it's gotta end. It's gotta end. There are kids starving in India. Cut yourself up and mail yourself to them. Do something. Get the divorce and look up hoflation first and get into all the men's rights bullshit, but then definitely kill yourself.

Yeah, exactly. I mean, you can pick up whatever hobbies you want along the way. We're not here to tell anybody what to do. Here's the thing. I so didn't relate to this viewpoint that when the camera followed him instead of her, I was confused. Right. Right. I was like but wait he's not the main character he's the antagonist behaving like a big sack of shit. Well and to just make him even worse there's a guy there selling umbrellas and like oh how convenient that would have completely eliminate or not completely but that would mostly eliminate the problems that you're

having in the movie right now and but he's mean to the umbrella guy. Mm-hmm. Yeah, no, he might as well somehow believe that like being mean to the umbrella guy and not having an umbrella will lower the price of the eggs that he's about to buy. He's actually now a perfect metaphor for the country that we live in. Yeah. So, okay, so he comes back out, he's soaking wet, he gets splashed while he's out, and mom's crying because she just got a phone call from the daughter. She called from the

plane, and dad's like, huh, that's really expensive. And I'm like, oh, in case I didn't hate him enough, they did add that. Don't call from the airplane. It just waits like a couple hours. Just call after, whatever. I actually, for a second, I was like, that's, that's a valid complaint. Don't do that. Heath, I had to erase so many notes that I had in here when I saw how sympathetic you were

to Tim Allen's character. Yeah, Heath, join me over here for a second. They make me defend Tim Allen throughout this fucking movie. Could you just come over here for a second? Hey, can you just take it, take it, me? When we're just like, you just take it. Are we in the whisper area?

Yeah, we're just over here. The podcast listeners can't hear us. It's just like, we're going to villainize Tim Allen and you're going to be like, what? That's totally normal. But if you just like, just tuck in, tuck in those moments, you just tuck it in and say, okay, nothing instead. Three, two, one break.

Okay. I think I lost the audience already when I said no, no, it's okay. They can't hear us here. They can't. Right. If we last too long, no, we'll. And we're back. And we're back.

Hey, where are you guys? Ben? I was talking about this movie. They can't hear us here. They can't. If we last too long, Noah will. And we're back. And we're back. Hey, where you guys been? I was talking about this movie. So yeah, so he goes, he has to go back into the store to get more shit. And, and then, and then he gets even wetter and the umbrella guy tries to sell him a umbrella again. So yeah, sorry. That's like all my notes are just what's happening in the fucking movie. I bad in Kara notes. Kara, I hate me notes.

Yeah, I liked the rising action of this though. I thought by the end he was going to be like sealed in a magician's water tank, just actively drowning until I was like, okay, that one's bad to be fair. No, no, that would be annoying. So but as he's as he's doing all of this, he sees an advertisement for a Carnival Cruise. And I'm like, Yes, Tim Allen, that is what you deserve. One of the worst things that I could possibly wish on anyone a fucking Carnival Cruise, but please one that tips

over and gets norovirus or something. I was gonna say Carnival Cruise because they can gets norovirus or something. I was gonna say Carnival Cruz cuz they can't advertise norovirus Yeah I don't like Cruz's. Eli, can you join me in the whisper area? Yeah, go come on over. What's going on? What's going on? Is it cool to not like Cruz's cuz I didn't like him a movie once and everybody hated me Yeah, no, they hated you They hated you so much and you went over to my shitty show that four people listened to to take it back

And it's like it's like six guys You know, I redeem myself during that. I think you totally redeemed yourself, but they got a listen over to your old dad's Wait they can't hear me right now and we're back Okay, so that evening they're having like hate each other dinner, which they're not, right? I wrote that in my notes, but like it's just because Tim Allen is so fucking hateable that I can't imagine eating dinner with him

without hating him. That's not what's supposed to be happening at all, right? Yeah. Do you think they did a couple of takes where charismatic beauty Jamie Lee Curtis tried to vamp with Tim Allen and he was like too many Mexicans and she was like alright you know what why don't we just start the scene in silence and then you'll say your first line. There you go.

So yeah so we have this like she asks about the plot he tells her about the plot and then we have this long moment where he's staring at her and the the comedy beat they're going for is she thinks he wants to have sex now that the daughter's out of the picture, but he wants to sell her on the idea of doing a cruise. Yeah. He's like, I've got an idea. And he's kind of making eyes and she's like, all right, let's fuck exactly. And he like goes out to do his idea for a second.

And she's like, okay, gotta get drunk to fuck, exactly. And he like goes out to do his idea for a second. And she's like, okay, brrr, gotta get drunk to fuck Tim Allen. Brrr. Yes! Drinks an entire glass of wine in one go. Two glasses, she reaches over and grabs his too. Yep, she needs to be drunk enough to fuck that guy. But then he comes back in and he's like, no, no, not sex, shut up, what are you doing?

We're not doing sex, we're doing some accounting. And he's gonna introduce the plot of Skipping Christmas Now. Yeah. This is the first time that the movie expects us to think that Tim Allen would rather do anything except fuck Jamie Lee Curtis. I was so confused, I was like, but Tim, Jamie Lee Curtis has indicated

that she's willing to fuck you. There's literally nothing short of a medical emergency that would stop you from fucking Jamie Lee Curtis. One would think. That should stop you from fucking Jamie Lee Curtis. If Jamie Lee Curtis appeared in my weird recording studio right now and did a series of gestures, I'd just stop talking.

So yeah, but instead he brings out his ledger and he's showing her, he's like, Hey, look, look at all this money we spent on Christmas last year. $6,000 for that money. We could do a 10 day Caribbean cruise with Carnival. Yeah. Okay. Eli, whisper area real quick.

Please come on over. Can I point out? Can Noah come? Can I? Yeah. I feel like he's fell in love with Noah. Noah come on over here. Noah?

Noah whisper area? I'm editing this bit out anyway Yeah. I feel like he's fell left out. Noah, come on over here. Noah, don't whisper here. I'm not. I'm editing this bit out anyway. See, this is why he's left out of the whisper corner. Okay, so. We try to open our hearts, Dan.

I would like to point out to everybody that this is a great idea to use your money. $6,000. No, I'm out of the whisper corner. I don't. I'm not. And go back. He lured me. Nothing happened.

So here's the inherent conflict in this whole thing, right? Because his idea is, hey, you know that money that we usually spend on other people every year? What if we just spent that on us, right? Yes. Eli and I wrote a lot of jokes about how like, yeah, that's the opposite of being a good person there. But then Heath was like,

his entire thing is just to treat us on why that's actually really a much better idea. Heath laid out a budget for him and Anne this year. It's, it's upset. There's a spreadsheet in the center of our house. This is totally reasonable to go on a trip and maybe not be around at Christmas sometimes. This is a great idea. No, absolutely.

Empty nesters want to just get out and do their own thing, maybe revive their marriage a little bit. But the movie has to make this like the bad guy idea from Tim Allen. So they have to add a little thing of like, Jamie Lee Curtis being like, we could still donate to charity with a little bit of that money

and still go on the trip. And he's like, no, total boycott, which is a dick move. And to add that to make the bad guy thing sorta work. That's exactly what I was gonna say is cause there are reasonable versions of this, but turn of this movie he'll be like and by the way we're not giving the orphans new crutches. Yeah exactly. Well right no look absolutely but the entire movie is ruined if they say hey you know what being around the house without our daughter for the first time is gonna be

very difficult and everything is gonna remind us of Christmas why don't we just go on a trip and avoid that like if they just say that and then tell that to people this movie has no conflict whatsoever right right when people do that they generally don't be like and I'm also not sending Christmas cards because fuck all of you and I'm not getting any of my employees gifts right yeah exactly it's shit like that so they argue about my first instinct is like Christmas cards are dumb, too. No, but I actually I've turned on this one. And your card was a Christmas card with all of us and Bailey, the Golden Retriever.

And it's my favorite. It's on my fridge right now. I was going to say it's on my fridge, too. So they argue about whether they can do the charitable donations and eventually agree that they can. So this is now the plot. They're gonna skip Christmas and go on this cruise. Right? Yeah. So his first step in this is the plot of this movie is a phone call with my aunt where I'm playing video games. Yep. Yeah.

Just like, oh, you know, sorry, give me one sec. You're in here like beeping and booping in the background. That's Max. He's got AIDS or something. I don't know why I didn't just yell fuck. He didn't say that crazy. So, yeah. So his first stop, Tim Allen's first. He goes to work the next day and he writes a it's not even a fucking email. He prints this out and hands it to everybody.

It's a little memo that says, fuck Christmas. I'm not getting you shit and I'm not going to your stupid fucking parties. Yeah. I thought this was a great idea. Before we did this review, just a couple of days before this review, No Illusions got me a truly wonderful Christmas present, but I can't help but

wonder if that Christmas president's expediency was spurred on by me not having jokes at this particular moment in our review. Noah's watching the movie and he's like, ah, fuck, Amazon, Amazon Tim. Kykel spent 27 minutes on this. So yeah, but- Noah, whisper area? Yeah, right. No, I'm going now.

I'm going this time. Maybe same idea, but you know, without the slur. Yeah. And we're back. Yeah, so we'll find out. We'll see if Eli's got it all out of his system and then I'll tell you if we're back. But yeah, so, but this is the first of the title drops.

This is where his memo ends with, I am simply skipping Christmas. Okay, he says like, I'm not doing gifts, nor am I taking gifts. It's just eminently reasonable to do this. It's even, it's fair. It's better than the normal system for most people. That exchange doesn't usually work.

This makes sense. Yeah, but if you have employees, you have to give them gifts. This is a one-way, that's the give them. This is a one-way. You're not supposed to. It's a one-way gift relationship, right? If he was going to all his coworkers and saying, hey guys, I, you know, we're, we're doing this trip and I'm not really going to be able to afford it. And so I'm, I'm out on the secret Santa thing. That's nothing, right? That's absolutely nothing. But giving your fucking secretary, I'm not buying you anything for Christmas this year. So I can go on a trip memo

is a dick fucking Julie's never sent us a basket he that's a one-way street them baskets so what happened okay so so then we thank you Julie for your. Julie, join us in the Woodstock corner. You have it. Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! So, okay, so then we cut to Jamie Lee Curtis salivating over the Christmas cards that she can't buy either.

By the way, we should also establish, I didn't mention this at the time, but when he did the math, they spent $6,000 on Christmas, the cruise only cost $3,000, right? So they have 3,000 extra dollars to match the money they spent $6,000 on Christmas, the cruise only cost $3,000, right? So they have $3,000 extra dollars to match the money they spent, right? So they could do the Christmas cards and buy the gifts for the... right? Like they don't even establish that as a financial need. I just want to point out again how stupid the plot of this movie is. But that cruise is gonna ding you on a bunch of extras.

Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely. God knows. Never think that an all-inclusive cruise is all-inclusive. Oh, Dolphin Swim's 110 a person, oh man. So anyway, but she can't buy the Christmas cards and apparently, so her Christmas card salesman who knows her name chases her down on the street. Yeah. Right? He's like, hey, you know, if you want those Christmas cards that you like, you're going to have to order them soon to get them out on time. I get get it just so that we can have an awkward. I'm not doing Christmas She's like I'm not doing it this year and he like sprints after her and tries to tackle her

It's a lot. He follows her into a restaurant Yeah, yeah, we might as well do a follow cut to like him carving his name into a pillar in his car job He's doing pull-ups that say Christmas card on his knuckles to like him carving his name into a pillar in his car. He's doing pull ups that say Christmas card on his knuckles. So we pose her into this restaurant where she's having lunch with her friends. And he's like, you know, wait a minute, how could you not be doing Christmas cards? What are you not doing Christmas? And all of her friends are like, wait, don't you have the big Christmas Eve party that we all go to every year?

Are you not doing that? And she's like, no, don't you have the big Christmas Eve party that we all go to every year? Are you not doing that? And she's like, no, I'm not, right? Sorry, this is the fucking plot of the movie. I've got nothing else. The movie's got nothing else. She's like, hey, Obby, card guy, can you join me in Lewisbury? Yeah, right.

Yeah. I love the moment though, where Felicity Huffman, who plays one of the friends in just this scene, is like, well, what are we supposed to do if we can't go to your party? And she very sanely is like, well, what are we supposed to do if we can't go to your party? And she very sanely is like, anything you want to and they're like, but you're not having a party.

I want to go to your party. Right. Okay. So here's the thing though, if you're the person who has the Christmas Eve party every year and you've decided not to do Christmas, it's incumbent on you to go to like reach out to these people and say, Hey, I'm not doing the Christmas Eve party this year. Like, and also when they ask her about this, she doesn't say, well, you know, without Blair there, it really feels empty and sad in our house.

So we want to get away and everything. At which point her friends would say, oh, yeah, no, we support you in that because we care about you and are your friends. Instead, she has to be really angry about it or the movie doesn't work. Yeah. Felicity Huffman is like, trust me, I get how hard it is when your kids not help. Have you tried posing her with just some starving kids and saying she went to the preschool? Really hard for the kid when one of the parents goes to jail too, as I learn. So yeah, but she says she's not doing Christmas and the entire restaurant stops to stare at him like the bad guy just walked into the saloon.

Everybody in this restaurant hears skip Christmas. Those two words and they're like, Jewish, get her. They're so mad. I wrote in my notes, okay, they should have renamed this movie the town without Jews, apparently. Yeah, right. Well, this is a suburb of Chicago. So yeah, no, that's right. Well, this is the suburb of Chicago, so.

Yeah, no, that's fair. They are Christmas fascists. They are ruthless. Clearly. So OK, so then we get Tim Allen at home when the door-to-door Christmas tree salesmen show up, just like every year, right? These stupid, manufactured fucking conferences.

But they're not buying a tree this year, which means that they're ruining the Boy Scouts. Yeah. And I just have to talk about this. Don't support the Boy Scouts. That was a bad move by the movie. Yeah, support the Girl Scouts. But at the same time, they have this physical bit that I just have to point out, right? So when Tim Allen finally breaks it to the Boy Scout guy that he's not going to buy the tree, he dramatically tips it over. but the person who wrote this movie has the memory of a goldfish, so then he just has to pick it up and take it away.

They, they just wanted that bump, bump sound effect that comedies from the eighties did where something fell over. That was the purpose of the entire scene. Yeah, right. They're just like, guys, we're like almost 30 minutes in and nothing has fallen over yet. Yeah. The center of this writer's visions board is just a trumpet

going, All right. I thought the drop thing was going to be impactful. If we get a grab it, we have to, because otherwise we're just giving him a free treat. We have to take that now. We'll walk away. But yeah, so he's ruined the fucking boy scouts Christmas

and shit by not getting a tree. And then and of course, he has to explain it like an asshole again, he can't just say, well, we're actually not going to be in town for Christmas, at which point everybody would be like, Oh, right, it'd be weird to get a tree then. Yeah. And we learned that it is okay to go out of town for Christmas later in the movie. It's not it's not that everyone's trapped in their homes like that thing where Scarlett Johansson

and that guy give birth to a nerd bird, right? Like this is something else. Yeah. I don't think it was Scarlett Johansson. I think it was a different actor who I don't remember. You guys know what I mean. Yeah, there's a neighbor who goes away during Christmas and it's fine.

Yeah, yes. But it's only because that neighbor left all the lights on outside their house, did the whole decoration thing, got a tree, and kept a fire hazard going for a week with nobody there. And they're like, okay, that's cool. I have a theory about why I think they're okay with that neighborhood leaving the neighborhood.

We'll get to it when we get to it. Yeah, I was just saying, we don't need to poach the content in this skeleton of a fucking movie. Like racially? Yeah. So then we cut to, without context, that's even better. in this skeleton of a fucking movie. Like racially? So then we cut to, without context, that's even better. So yeah, but they go inside and after telling the Boy Scouts that they're not gonna get the tree,

and now they're worried because the Boy Scouts are telling their neighbor Dan Aykroyd, who is the fucking fear of Christmas fascists, apparently. I fucking love Dan Aykroyd. He's awesome. He's been doing the same performance in every movie, his entire fucking career. It keeps working. Completely unaware that he's in a movie.

And every time I'm like, yup, adore it. He's, he's almost never funny, but he's just managed to be synonymous with comedy somehow. Yeah, it's awesome. They just picked a guy. Got blown by a ghost in Ghostbusters. It was not even remotely in keeping with sort of the theme they were going for, but he's like, no, I'm getting blown by a ghost in this fucking movie.

And they let him do it. This man's entire comedy career is based on talking like someone trying to get the intention of an entire marching band at once and it has carried him for 30 years, 40 years. God bless him. Yeah. Big maestro energy. It works. As far as I can see from a brief Google, not problematic. So hey, I'll take it. I mean it from a skeptics perspective he's at least a bit problematic but oh no what did he do? oh he's he's just woo all the fucking way he believes all the shit he said in Ghostbusters it's just compared to some I mean you know he's no Chevy Chase

but you know if a ghost offers to blow you, you say yes, though. That's true. So is that what it is? Did the ghost come forward? He did one of those iPhone things. All right. So, so that night Tim's taking out the trash when Dan Ackroyd comes up to give him some shit for skipping Christmas.

Right. And we see like everybody putting up Christmas decorations except for him. Also, there's for some reason there are sound effects like aliens are racing their photon bikes somewhere behind. I never figured out what the fuck that was supposed to be. That would be Dan Aykroyd's mom, his character's mom, and she's got a t-shirt cannon device that she's firing into their yard to spread big clumps of tinsel. Yeah I was very confused. That seems like an environmental nightmare. Okay. Just a terrible idea. And then we also got these

other neighbors out there doing like putting up lights in an infomercial slapstick. Yeah man I kept being like oh I wonder how that's gonna turn out to be funny and then I realized nope that's the joke that happens to be like seven times throughout the movie. Oh well he did fall down. I wonder what they're setting up with this guy falling down and I'm just like oh no that was um that was all they were hoping for. Yep yep so but Dan Aykroyd's kind of giving him like you know it's a great this this entire neighborhood does Christmas, it would be a shame if somebody was to not do Christmas and ruin the neighborhood.

Yeah, he's described as the ward boss of the street. So they make this like, he's like the HOA psychopath of the street. Right. And they make him into the good guy just because he likes Christmas and that's like automatic good guy status. I hate it. I wrote my notes like as inherently douchey as what Dan Aykroyd's character is doing here,

Tim Allen still manages to be the bad guy by just being Tim Allen about it. Yeah, it's good casting in that sense, I suppose. Imagine how hard it is to be worse than a guy whose entire purpose is making other people put Christmas decorations right in their house. Yeah. So okay, so now it's the next morning. Well, so there's some fucking thing. I don't even get this, but everybody in the neighborhood puts a frosty the snowman out.

Yes. At on the same day or something. And this is some grand tradition that everyone is gonna be like really super upset about if they don't do it. Now to be clear they already own the Frosty. Yeah. Right so the purported purpose of this movie which is saving money it saves them nothing to put up the Frosty. Even worse we get Dan Ackroyd and his kids out on the porch yelling to them that, hey, we'll put it up for you. We'll actually do the work of putting it up. Yeah. And they, and, and they still won't do it. Yeah. Yeah. But wait, guys, is there something Tim Allen could do to make sure that No Illusion hates him for

the rest of this movie? Why? It's stepping on a cat. Oh my God, it gets so much fucking worse. Yeah, okay. So now we have to introduce the neighbor that he doesn't get along with, Walt and Walt's cancer wife Bev, right? Yeah. So Walt and Bev live across the street

and they have this adorable long-haired Persian cat and Tim Allen steps on its tail over and over again. That's a comedy beat, right? Like again, Eli's like, yeah, Eli's like, what are they setting up with him stepping on the tail over and over again. That's a comedy beat, right? Like again, Eli's like, yeah, Eli's like, what are they setting up with him stepping on the cat over and over again? Nothing, him stepping on the cat is the joke. Were I a trickster god trying to convince no illusions

to fight an individual human on the planet? Having them step on a cat over and over again is my like third runner up, and that's only if I can't fit Lucinda under their foot. Alright, so like, for those of you who don't follow me on social media, about four different fucking times this month I've posted videos of like the street cats that I come across on my walks and me giving them belly rubs and shit like that. Yeah, I wrote my notes. Oh, his neighbor's cat doesn't like him. He must be a terrible person. That's the only explanation. Exactly, all cats hate him because cats are liberal. Everyone knows that.

Yeah, that's yet another reason why they're better than dogs. Okay. Cats are definitely all in real life, hating Tim Allen. Like they see him and they prickle up and they get the thing going because they can see evil somehow in that other dimension. They know yeah

You know when your cat like kisses at a random spot in the wall and you don't know why it's Tim Allen somewhere They are pointing exactly at Tim Allen Tim Allen's personality is on the wall. He's like mecca. He's like the anti-mecca for cats. Yeah for cats. Yeah. So hate mecha for cats. Wait, I'm going to buy Tim Allen is the hate mecha for cats. Yeah, no, yeah, sometimes you gotta get that. I get it. Okay. So okay. $11. So then it's already owned. Buy a cat. So okay, so so he goes to work where everyone hates him for not Christmasing. And then we've got his wife at home, right? She like, Jamie Lee Curtis is stuck at home

while everyone in the neighborhood hates them for not putting up their frosty. So we have this whole long bit where like, the kids are all screaming, give us your frosty. We don't know why they won't give them the frosty she starts hiding under the blanket from them cuz I guess she thinks maybe there's some humor under there somewhere oh god just what an awful thing to do to Jamie Lee Curtis to be like I don't know like what do you think would be funny cuz that's obviously what happened

right yes she looks out the window and she was like what do I do and he was like I don't know happened, right? She looks out the window and she was like, what do I do? And he was like, I don't know. Like, what have you like hit under the bed? And she was like, I don't fit under the bed. I'm walking in the house. I don't know. Well, that exactly, there's just nothing. There's no funny premise or setup anywhere to be found

in this stupid fucking movie. So now she has to drive away from her house, but she has to drive as though she's sneaking? Yeah, because of the Christmas fascists that are gonna attack her, but they actually do attack her. So she like tries to sneak out in her delightful 90s Ford Taurus wagon, and she's all bundled up because it's cold,

but her driver's side window is open, which makes no sense except that it's gonna set up a physical violence bit when she gets attacked by Ackroyd. Right, right. It has to be open so Dan Ackroyd can hang out of it and get the finger, the window rolled up on his fingers. Exactly. All right. Well, these are the only stakes this movie will ever have really. So we need a quick break to cope with that. But we're going to be back in a minute with even more of Christmas with the Cranks. Hey, podcast listener, has this ever happened to you? I may not be perfect, but you know, I love you. That's right, your shitty dad is post-hoc inferring a lifetime of love and affection

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Pah. And we're back for more of this shit and we're going to rejoin the action with Tim and Jamie Lee Curtis meeting at the restaurant to talk about the plot some more. Yeah, they're talking about gender roles and invisible labor and it's going as well as you imagine that conversation goes with Tim Allen. Yeah. It's such a weird cell phone in the movie. Yeah, Jamie Lee Curtis is pointing out that like Christmas decoration shaming

is like a real thing that happens, and it's kind of a feminist issue because the woman in a couple in this case is the one who's taking the brunt of all that. And that's like very real for sure. Right, and then Tim Allen's response to that is is the one who's taking the brunt of all that. And that's like very real for sure. Right. And then Tim Allen's response to that is, counterpoint, look at this skimpy bikini I bought you.

Hehehehe. Literally, like what a weird cell phone. So, but, but the bathing suits are so that they can go tanning together. Hey, hey podcast listener, this is one of those times where I too sat there and was like, I can't wait to see how this joke pans out. That's it. They just go tanning. I'm just going to spoil it for you.

Right now. Jamie Ligert is bonks her head at one point. So that's why we have nothing to spoil. Yeah, right. So they get to this episode was only 28 minutes long. Yeah, that's mostly because I had to cut out all of this fucking going off into the whisper room. That's true.

Podcast listener, you don't know, but it's been the the perceptions you've heard they are they are the last remaining messages. So okay, but she doesn't want to do it which makes it funny. So then they go to the tanning place and there's one girl that has way too much tan and that is a bottomless well of humor. You don't even have to make punch lines. Set up that good is just already funny enough. She's way too tan.

She works there, so she probably got too tan by using the thing where she works. Yup. You guys remember when comedy was just stuff your grandma didn't try as a girl is funny? I guess, yeah, that must have been in Europe. Raw fish? No, thanks. Call me when you cook it. Lesbian sex.

Oh no, your grandma tried that. Your grandma tried that with Amelia Earhart. I know, the great grandma. Did she? Yeah. My great grandma had sex with Amelia Earhart, everybody. That's canon, that's canon. That is the coolest thing about me.

Yeah, it'd be the coolest thing about most people though. Me. So. But then we have Jamie Lee Curtis in the tanning booth. She's changed into the skimpy bikini and she sure isn't comfortable now. But she lays down in the tanning booth, right? And then some perv comes in and she hits her head when she tries to sit up. Right. A lot of setup for that. Yep. So then, but

now she has to go out in her skimpy bikini to get a band-aid and how embarrassing And who and who should be there with the priest? The priest and a gang of mall walkers that are gonna shame Jamie Curtis now Well, and the priest is just gonna openly stare at her tits the whole time. I don't know And like father I get it, right? Like I was also, but also like, it's a bathing suit. Right. People wear those. Yeah, this movie. And she's a grown up, so it doesn't even fit with your character. Right. Yeah, exactly. Oh, God. Right. Well, and then so, and then Tim comes out to see if she's okay and he's

wearing a skimpy bathing suit too. But here the thing is that these two people were in way too good of shape for this bit to work. There's a way that this is funny where it's like, oh, I'm so embarrassed to be out in public and whatever. In the 90s, early 2000s, body-shamy comedy kind of way, you know, like you said, the 90s to the early 2000s body shamy comedy kind of way You could have made this funny, but not like these two like It'll look pretty fucking good in the bathing suits. Yeah. Yeah whisper room for a second Can I say Tim Allen's dad bod is looking pretty good? Jamie Lee Wanted a lot more like flaps Yeah, would have been nice

Yeah But yeah, they were way too good a shape for the fucking bit to even work and it's a bad bit to begin with. That's the kind of shit we're dealing with. Okay. Yeah. Again, the comedy baseline that this audience is aimed at is someone might see me in a bathing suit. Yes. Yes. Well, and now they're in the newspaper in their bathing suits because the newspapers run a front page story about the fact that these two are skipping Christmas.

Okay, as someone who had a small like corner of a neighborhood shitty newspaper, I empathize with this moment very deeply. Yeah, I guess probably. As someone who's scraping up his dad's car once made front page of said shitty corner newspaper, I felt this moment was very realistic in its depictions. Very accurate. Anyone who might say otherwise? We'll move on. We'll move on. I don't want to dredge any shit up. So, okay. So then we cut to Jamie Lee Curtis volunteering at a soup kitchen and you're like,

oh, well at least she, and then you see it's the Salvation Army. And you're like, god damn it. God damn it. This movie. It's the fucking Boy Scouts and the Salvation Army now are the charities we're representing. Fuck.

But then just in case this movie was in danger of being funny, one of her friends comes in and goes, oh dear, Bev, the neighbor you don't like from across the street, her cancer is back. And you could just see Jamie Lee Curtis's face go, oh, comedy gold, thank you then. What a weird tone to include in this film. Well, it gets even worse, right?

Because the next scene scene we have Tim L and he gets home and he's mad because he can see that the newspaper to like to get the picture that's in the newspaper they would have had to step like stand on the neighbor's house or whatever so he would have to give him permission to take the picture. So he goes to confront this guy who we just learned his his wife's cancer is back right just in case there was any potential humor here. Yeah. And they do this bit.

This is a big bit. Everybody gear up where he, the older guy keeps calling Tim Allen, old man. And he's like, stop. Don't. But he does. Yeah. That's the comedy. Yeah.

That's what boomers argue about, apparently. This is what boomers apparently think it is okay to hold against somebody. Not that they vote for a fucking fascist, but you know, if you give them a nickname they don't like, that's a real reason to part the ways and step on their cat. Yeah, and so Tim Allen and the neighbor guy Walt,

they're about to have like a fist fight, and Jamie Lee Curtis has to come over and stop that and be like, hey, I heard about Bev and the cancer. I'm really sorry about that. What is like the purpose of the cancer in the movie? Is it on like team Christmas, like the cancer? Yeah. Good question.

I couldn't help but be struck, not to get bummery, right? But here we are. I couldn't help but be struck, not to get bummery, right? But here we are. I couldn't help but be struck at the realism, because I've known so many Bev's in my life, right? Women just married to grunting oafish monsters, and then their cancer hits, and he just uses it as a reason to stand in his front yard staring into the middle distance. Like, I deeply, deeply felt the, like, Beth's death and illness not being about Beth-ness of this film. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Sorry, hon. I know I should probably be inside helping you confront the wolf

as it was known to the ancient people, but I'm outside having a fight with Tim Allen about what his nickname should be. Just so many women silently dying, never knowing what it was like to be loved back. Oh, Jesus Christ. He put the tissues out of reach. I'm probably going to drown. Hey, Eli?

Yeah? Can you join me in the whisper room? Yeah, let's go to the whisper room. I don't want to go to the whisper room. I'm leaving you in the whisper room now. Can we just avoid shuffling off this mortal coil as part of the commentary? I should not have jerked off last time we were in there. Jesus Christ.

I got bored! At least it was the whisper room. So we pan across the neighborhood and we see like all the houses are so over decorated except for theirs which is the first time I wrote boy does this movie have a fuck the Jews and J-dubs vibe underneath it all, right?

Yeah, this is the first time I wrote, how is there an hour left in this movie? Yeah, no shit. So okay, so now there's the doorbell rings and there's a couple of cops there selling their annual charity fundraiser calendar. This needs to be like super illegal, right? Right, yeah.

Soliciting bribes as a cop? Get out of here. Hey, is one of those cops Cheech? Yes. It's Cheech Marin and Jake Busey. Yeah. It took me a minute to pick up on Jake Busey, but yeah, yeah, it's Cheech and Jake Busey as the cops here. I was like, it's Gary Busey's teeth, what is this? Oh, it's his son. It's his son.

Jake Busey I'm okay with. Cheech, what's going on my man? What happened to Cheech that he's in this movie? It's so sad, he's such a fucking sellout. Cheech is a cop. Come on, give me a fucking break. Come on Cheech! But, so, yeah, so, but they're collecting money for their their calendar and he's like, oh we're skipping Christmas So we're not gonna buy one this year and they're like, but you always buy one and this isn't Christmas This is just a calendar. That's a completely unrelated thing. He's like, right. I'm gonna be a dick about this too though No, I'm just a dick for the month of December. That's the plot of the movie. Right! Yeah, exactly.

And it's a porn calendar It's like a hot cops counter. Yeah, yeah, I wanted to see cheech's page, which they don't show us Full gape by the way yeah, oh really yeah, I see that you you need to buy that motherfucker Tim He's I gotta buy the DVD. It's in the cuts So then so yeah, so they don't buy the calendar either. Why? We don't even fucking know at this point. They can't afford a fucking calendar. I mean, I get why I wouldn't buy it, but apparently they normally do. And it's, you know, how they bribe the cops in this world. Yeah. So, but just then outside some carolers, like a truck full of carolers show up.

And the like lead caroler lady turns to Walt, the neighbor, and she goes, Hey, is this, this is the actual line in the movie. Is this house, are they Jewish or what? I wrote in my notes, okay movie, I'm intrigued. Unmarked white van, Christmas themed gangsters. All right, things are still the temperature is arising

Yeah, are they Jewish or like lukewarm Christians? It just it determines our strategy right now How we they kill the Savior or are they disappointing him? Yeah But they're like no no, they're not Jews that are like Muslims. No, not Muslims, all right, well, what the hell? They're like, well, you know what? They just don't have enough Christmas spirit. So then, like, the weaponized carolers carol at them. Right. And Jamie Lee Curtis and Tim Allen react to said carols like it's incoming gunfire. Yeah. Again, like, what is this even supposed to fucking be? Right? They start ducking and like they're moving from cover to cover now. Yeah. Tim Allen was clearly like, oh, this is perfect. I can do my Navy SEALs thing. I know a lot of the, you know, the hand signals.

I know a lot of the hand signals for a lot of good. Jake Busey's been showing me a lot in between takes. So, yeah, but then they get sung at a bunch. And again, like, you know, if the idea is we're trying to save money, like, you know, people singing outside of your house, that doesn't cost you money. Does not cost you any money, it turns out. I mean, you know, you can give them money. I mean, you should give them money. Yeah, sure. Well, it depends on what they're collecting. I don know, you can give them money. Nor, nor, I mean, you should give them. Yeah, sure. Well, it depends on what they're collecting. I don't think you should give them money. Yeah. I was thinking I was trying to think of like how I could do this to torture Heath.

And I've come up with several options, but I like to use my strongest one, which is that I think I would hire carolers to come out and sing like the half of a chorus of his favorite 90 songs like back streets back and then they just leave and half naked wielding a bat being like if you fuckers don't sing all right in the next minute down with you with me as possible okay well I'm an in sync guy you know nothing about me foiled again damn it foiled again, damn it. Foiled again. So yeah, so they do that. The guys are singing at them really hard. I guess they go to hide in the basement from the singing.

Yep. The thing is that this movie is behaving based on its own weird rules that we're not privy to. So they go down to the basement to hide from the caroling. And damn it, if the frosty that the kids want them to put on the roof isn't there glaring at them. I don't know. I don't fucking know. So the issue is that they feel judged by the by the frosty is where we are now.

Yeah, yeah, I guess. All right. So we cut to the next day that there's kids out on their lawn chanting free frosty. And I wrote my notes. I have no comprehension of anyone's motivations here. Right. Like, I don't know why they're skipping Christmas to the degree that they're doing it.

I don't know why they're violently resisting it. And I don't know why these kids give a fucking shit whether they have a snowman in their yard. None of this makes any fucking sense. There's a point here where they show Jamie Lee Curtis, she's walking by and a kid has a big stack of Christmas presents, and I half expected her to just smack them out of the kid's hands like a nerd's books or something. Or for him to pull a Tommy gun out of the bottom one. Right, yes.

We said free frosty. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. And then in case you didn't hate Tim Allen's character enough, we cut to him spraying water on the sidewalk, on his sidewalk so it'll freeze and people who walk by will get hurt. Right. And the first person who slips and falls and hurts themselves is the mailman

who has not been in the movie yet. No, and we see Tim Allen celebrate, haha, got one! But it's the mailman. It's the mailman who hasn't been part of the movie, right? You could have had the mailman be like, where are your Christmas cards this year? You could have had the mailman be like, where are your Christmas cards this year? You could have had the mailman do something besides be a random public servant that Tim Allen celebrates the injury of.

Yeah, and by the way- You could have not done this scene at all. That would have worked. That would be even better, especially because while he's spraying down his sidewalk, we see him spray the fucking cat that lives outdoors sometimes in December. It's cold enough for the water to freeze instantly He probably killed that cat y'all

Yeah, I wrote my notes He sprays the cat and there's now literally no physical harm Noah is not okay with them under going Yeah, if the rest of this movie was just them living out funny games. It's a comedy Eating Tim Allen's eyes after he died in the house. Right. Yeah. More enjoyable. The eyes, the asshole, the genitals. Yeah, that's where they go. So yeah, then... I would request that my cats not eat my asshole first. That's why he doesn't have a cat, actually.

Third? Like seventh. I want it way down there. Yeah. Okay. What if Judaism's true and you're around your corpse for 48 hours? Oh, okay. Yeah, that would be awkward. That would be where's the penis on the list? First. First. Okay. First. Yeah, because that's complimentary, right? When they say that, you know, the animals feasted on his penis or whatever. It's like, you know, taking an awful long time for him to eat my dick other ghosts. I don't know if you've noticed pretty You all died in this mass shooting too. I don't have to tell you

Why is my head great it's boring about it, so Jesus Christ So okay, so everybody slips around on the ice and shit and falls down. We see the cat frozen just so I can hate him more. And then we cut to Jamie Lee Curtis and she's reading Christmas books to kids at a cancer ward and then Tim Allen shows up and we're like, somehow he's going to fuck this up. Right, he side tackles her mid read. I said we're skipping Christmas. Right, right. And he's wearing this white suit.

At this point, I wrote in my notes, even his suit is an asshole. But that's okay, because this is all just a setup that Tim Allen got Botox! Well that should be funny, right? Honestly? Have you heard about this? Have you seen this? People are injecting their face. Watching Tim Allen gargle a fruit cup for the remaining eight minutes of this scene

is the punishment I deserve. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, so here's the thing is that like he starts this bit because this is a bit that like, you know, you give this to fucking Jim Carrey or somebody like that who's a physical comedian. Like they could, they could probably do a lot with this whole Botox bit.

Right. But all he can think of is I can't chew because I my face is numb or whatever So every time I put stuff in my mouth it falls out and so he does that I'm not exaggerating here seven times It's so many times Like the one time he thinks of something else to do he leans his head back and he starts like chewing like that So we get to watch Tim Allen chew a pineapple with his mouth open. Yeah. Tim Allen was like, no, this is perfect. Remember when I did the Navy SEALs bit and that was amazing? I've got this other bit where I do a fruit cup

and that and that's it. I just I have a fruit cup badly. How much room do you have left on your camera? 67 hours? Okay, that should about cover it. Yeah. You might want to buy a second deck and also this this Interacts with the movie in no fucking way right this exists for its own sake. They're like. Oh, you know it'd be really funny We'll just give Tim Allen a Botox bit Yeah, right and then we were done with this the Botox doesn't come back to pineapples don't come back. We weren't getting anywhere We weren't setting anything up It's like an improv troupe forcing their way to like a Bill Clinton impression

that one of them has that makes no sense. And he's just like, I do the voice. Yeah, right. Name a former Democratic president that's not the president now. And isn't that isn't Jimmy Carter or Obama who's white, white. He has to be white. John F. Kennedy. God damn it. In a life. In a life.

John F. Kennedy. All right, Dan Aykroyd. I want to be the head of Health and Human Services. All right. All right. We'll see. So now it's Christmas Eve, and they're getting packed for their big trip

And and we watched them kiss for a really long time Which is even grosser to watch like this watching Tim Allen kiss somebody's just gross to begin with but he also just did all that Dribbling food down my fucking chin shit guys So whatever whatever else happens to us, and I know we've been through some hard times know I had his heart attack else happens to us and I know we've been through some hard times Noah had his heart attack but we didn't have to kiss Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis did Jamie Lee Curtis did nothing to deserve kissing Tim Allen. No she seems like a good person mostly. She's a good person she made the yoga commercial seems nice Freaky Friday. Yep. Always gives it her best. I love that Freaky Friday is where you went. I'm just saying, she did a good job in Freaky Friday too. Thank you.

So OK, so but they're like, they're trying to make out, but the kids keep calling them about the frosty. They keep getting prank calls. And then they get a call from Blair, who you'll probably have already forgotten is the daughter she's gonna be a home for Christmas after all and that and she's engaged to Enrique which is a new thing he's Peruvian and then

Taman's like fucking communist probably literally probably it's literally the joke that it goes that is yep yep that proves not a communist. Swain scared gets close. But yeah, so but she's like, yeah, me and Enrique are coming home and we're engaged and Tim Allen isn't happy for them being engaged because he's the biggest possible asshole at every fucking moment.

And she's like, I can't wait to see the house all decorated for Christmas by the time I get there in six hours. Bye God, it's so stupid. This is now. This is like the stakes of the movie. Yep She calls them from Miami Airport not from Peru because you know Peru is communist and doesn't have fucking Her week at the phone. Yeah. So this sets up like a ticking clock of her, whatever, many hours before she like arrives and needs to see the Christmas Eve party or else something. But. It's bad.

But there's there's no they have established no reason why they wouldn't just say, oh, well, you know, honey, we actually weren't doing a big thing this year for Christmas because you weren't going to be here, but we'd still love to see see ya and boom. There's no tension in the fucking movie, right? There's no stakes But can I say I would actually love for this to happen to more bad comedies, right? Just three-quarters of the way through we brought a zoo Blair calls and she's like I'll be home for Christmas I think you should get a Blair card where if you just as long as Blair calls and says she'll be home for Christmas and that's what the movie's about. I think you should get a Blair card where if you just, as long as Blair calls and says she'll be home for Christmas,

you can still have a movie when it's a bad comedy. Just a whole bunch of movies that the last half hour is this movie instead of the original. Yes, exactly. The Godfather is this at the end. Yeah, exactly, Godfather 3, the bad one. They could just be like Blair, had called three quarters through. That would have been shorter, yeah. And been like, Willem Dafoe, This at the end. Yeah, exactly Godfather 3 the bad one. They could just be like Blair

Recorder that would have been shorter. I've been like willem de vaal. I'm gonna be home for Christmas and he had been like, oh I gotta get ready So I don't have a willem de vaal. What's his name? Robert Duvall? There you go. I don't have a Robert Duvall. He just talks like he died. So you also don't have a willem de vaal Oh, I have a willem de vaal. He's in there. I'm something of a scientist myself. Oh, I have a Willem Dafoe. He's in there. I'm something of a scientist myself. Oh, you do have Willem Dafoe. My bad. Yeah.

All right. My wife went to jail for doing things. Now, Jamie Lee Curtis, she gets off the phone and she's like, now we have to- That's my image, Tracy! It's all coming together. So okay. So now, Jamie Lee Curtis gets off the phone and she says, oh we have to like pretend we've been doing Christmas this whole time She'll be here in a few hours, and we're all like, but why would you do that though? And she's like cuz then

There's tension shenanigans will ensue assures us Yeah, right so So Tim Allen heads out. He's got to get an emergency Christmas tree. But apparently the Boy Scouts are the only fucking game in town. The rest of this movie, I know we're going to talk about it. But podcast listener, the rest of this movie is just revisiting the first half of this movie. And Tim Allen blah blah can we do it now? Yep.

Yes. Yeah, so now he's trying to get a tree and they don't have any good trees left and because he didn't buy the tree that they wanted him to buy, they're gonna charge him extra for this tree. Got him. So, so he gets the tree, but it's a bad tree and by the time he gets it home it has no leaves on it and so he just throws it away. Which makes no sense because he spent $75 on it.

Why wouldn't he at least use it? Why would he have bought it if he wasn't going to use it? If he was going to throw it away, why would it... Also, it wasn't tied down in any way. He just picks it up off of his car and throws it. He might as well throw it and the last six pages of the script away at the same time. That scene doesn't matter anymore. Yeah. Throws himself over a fence.

Yeah. Al Borland's there. So, but now Wilson looks from across another. Yeah, right. Right. So, but now his new plan is that he's going to borrow the tree from a neighbor that we've never met in the movie. That we've never established in any way.

No, he runs up to his neighbor, he says, hey, I see you're going out of town, can I borrow your tree once you leave? And the guy says, yeah, now that sounds like shenanigans heaven, absolutely you can do that. Well, he says, sure, you can, but don't tell my wife, and because this is an 80s movie made in 2004. They're both like, give me secrets from your wife is inherently funny. Yeah.

Our divorce rate is 55%. This is the first time I wrote I know my job is going to be hard when I look back over my notes and it's all just the shit that happens in the stupid fucking movie. But yeah, so so but he agreed that the neighbor agrees to that. And then he, he goes back to his house. The kids are still chanting free frosty on his, on his lawn. And he tackles one of them.

He like scares them away, but he needs their help. So he like side tackles one of the kids. Yeah. He, he's, he decides that spike that's Dan Aykroyd's kid, is gonna help him like move this Christmas tree across the street from neighbor Wes' house to his house that he's borrowing. But the kid starts running away and he violently tackles this kid like way too hard. Way too hard. And then hits him again like an extra late hit after the kid gets down. He tackles him again like he fucking plays for the Texans or something.

Yeah. Trevor Lawrence. Hey, never forget. Never forget. But yeah, but then I think that was hey, no, join me. That was 9-11 slash Holocaust slash Alamo. All at the same time. Absolutely. Fuck, yeah.

I mean, we weren't going to do much with this season anyway, but still. 30 fucking hit. So, OK. So meanwhile, so mom is at the market trying to get all the things that she needs from the store. And that'll be complicated because, you know, there's not enough of them. And it's very soon. have them. Watching I then at this point I had sort of sunk into the insanity and I was like you know who I'd like to be the other actor in this scene about who gets the honey baked ham? Meryl Streep. I want them to be

racing and I want Meryl Streep to be the other lady, and I want Anthony Hopkins to be the ham. I would just like to, how much talent and humanity can we waste on the celluloid of this fucking film? Could we take a million dollars cash and just blend it in front of starving children for the last eight minutes of this movie? That's what I'd like to do. Oh my God.

And then like we have this whole bit where the neighbors see Tim Allen taking the other guy's tree and they think that he's stealing it or something. And they're no, not setting anything up there really. Then we cut back to Jamie Lee Curtis racing this lady for a ham and she loses. Okay, she could have won though. I was like, kick the lady's cart, kick the cart, kick the cart. Wait, it's so obvious. The lady she was racing had a cart and she didn't. It's so easy to win that race. There are so many ways. Even without even playing dirty. But yeah. The one time we unified as a podcast during this movie is that we all agree

she should have pointed that woman's cart into a nearby display and gotten her victory. Yes. Tackle me. Are you in it to win it or not? Yeah. Damn it. So, but then she goes out and she buys a ham from somebody who just got the last ham at the checkout or whatever. And then we cut to, we cut back to Tim and the kid. They've got the tree on their wagon now. They're going to wagon it across the street. I hope they don't lose control of it. Oh, I literally wrote in my notes, I hope they don't lose control and wacky shenanigans ensued.

Oh, sorry. That might nearly be a film. Yeah, right. Jesus fucking Christ. This could lead to a tragic slapstick accident. Let's see what happens. I'll start playing Yakety Sax and we'll see what happens from there. But here's the thing is that see what happens. I'll start playing Yakety Sax and we'll see what happens from there

But here's the thing is that nothing fucking happens nothing does they lose the track they lose control of it That is the joke. Yeah, they regain control of it. It doesn't even fall over Eli's just like ah man if Kenneth Branagh could be the tree and is giving us a little quickie right now Kenneth Branagh could be the tree and he's giving us a little quick right now. Gets tackled by Kiefer Sutherland. The cops. What? Kiefer Sutherland, huh? Yeah.

You guys remember that? For, for the great actor. Are you guys not remembering when Kiefer Sutherland tackled a Christmas tree? Cause look, there's 28 seconds left in this film. Nothing happens. And I need both of you live on air right now to Google Kiefer Sutherland tackles Christmas tree. Was it in 24? Jack Bauer has to tackle a tree? Is that a thing? Yeah. Kiefer and the Christmas tree. Oh I gotta watch an ad apparently. Well when the ads over... You see? That's real!

Alright, well that was worth grinding everything to a halt for. Listeners, that was worth grinding everything to a halt for. I hope you kept that in real time. Don't edit around that. Oh, I will edit around it. I want the seven seconds of silence while YouTube loaded. I like that it goes for the full body block of the tree. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, no, that was funny.

So that has no place being compared to this fucking movie. So then the rest of the review, I'm just showing you guys viral videos. So then she goes to the Charlie bit my finger. We saw Charlie bit my face. Sorry. Sorry. So then then Moe Dang predicts Donald Trump is gonna have a hard time.

So then, so Jamie Lee Curtis, she's walking out, she's got her ham, but she drops it and it rolls away. I sure hope a truck doesn't run over it. It does. When she screams after the Halloween ham, you guys had a moment where you were like, oh yeah, she was really good in Halloween, right? Because she does a horror movie scream for it

and you're like, right, she's in that too. It's just one more time where you're just like, oh, look at all the talent that we're using for this movie. Yeah, and now Tim Allen is getting arrested for stealing his neighbor's Christmas tree, Cheech and Jake Busey show backup. And they say, should have bought a calendar. As in we wouldn't have arrested you if you bribed us.

Yeah, I mean, look, there's not a single non-white person in this film who we won't just use as a vehicle to borrow a tree from. But in a world where people of color do exist and they do, that's a pretty terrifying sentence. Yeah, right. Wes definitely bought terrifying sentence. Yeah, right. Wes definitely bought a calendar. Oh yeah, he bought several. Yeah, he's got to. One for each kid.

But Spike, the kid that was helping him, shows up and exonerates Tim Allen, so nothing has happened now, there. And then now Jamie Lee Curtis gets home, she doesn't have ham, and the tree isn't good enough. What a disaster! Yeah, and she got smoked trout instead. She couldn't get the canned ham, which is supposed to be this giant prize in this movie. The hickory honey ham in a tin. It looks terrible.

But she's got smoked trout, and that's bad, because like, fish is gay or something. I guess, yeah, I would much rather got smoked trout and that's bad cuz like fish is gay or something. I guess yeah I would much rather have smoked trout The seven fishes like from there. Oh Yeah, so So she looks at the tree and she's like, oh, there's not enough ornaments. He's like, yeah, they fell off I was getting I was so so I was bringing them over and I'm like, but you guys have Ornaments user and decorations, right? Like you didn't you don't have to buy those new every year. Do you flash cut to me on my Gameboy? Oh, that's crazy

You don't have enough ornaments. What are you gonna do and Yeah So and then just to make matters even worse Blair calls and she's like hey mom, you're gonna make the caramel cream pie that I like so much, right? And she's like, of course I am! And now she has to go out again and we have to do the same fucking scene again. Yeah, now see I would have actually been super psyched if they had done the beat-for-beat same scene again, which is running for the caramel, gets hit by the same truck. We realized we're in like a repeating hell dimension.

Tim Allen keeps turning to camera. We can't get out of the movie. We can't get out of the movie. Oh, this is Bill Murray punches him in the face. Tim, Tim Allen. Blam. Sold me a light bag. I wrote my notes. Like I know what the stakes are. I just don't know why the stakes are now.

Like she can't tell her, oh no, I'm not making that pie. Why? Why? Why are they lying to Blair? Just be like, oh no, that's one part that's not going to happen. Or just tell her the truth of the whole thing and nothing matters. There you go. Yeah, okay. Well, this movie is desperately injecting stakes like Eli trying to spike Heath's dinner with Aphrodisiac. So we're going to give it a minute to catch its breath here. But first, let me give Act 3 the hard sell.

Will Tim Allen's character ever do anything selfless to redeem himself? Will he receive some sort of comeuppance for his inexplicable assholery throughout the movie? Will their ruse all unravel at once in classic farce fashion? No! Just no, no, no! None of that. See what they do instead when we return for the unconscionably lazy conclusion of Christmas with the Cranks. They just end the movie. They do!

And you know what? They don't even ever get to Christmas. And the movie is called Christmas with the fucking Cranks and it ends on Christmas goddamn eve. The film might as well do that like sputter sputter sputter thing. That would be better. Brad Pitt's dick. That's his real dick. You guys know that? Oh is it? Yeah. Wait. Let's pause the game real quick. Do you have a video

for that? Yeah. Wait hold on. Seriously? Yeah. I'm. Alright I Googled Brad Pitt's dick and I got different stuff. I'm stopping now. Hey, hey movie writer guys, he's here. Hold your applause. Hey, Tim Allen. That's the Tim Allen to you. I'm sorry, you want us to call you the Tim Allen? Yeah, you guys. I'm not gonna do that.

Okay, so anyways, I was looking over the script and I had some thoughts on the comedy. Let me stab him. Mike, Mike we had a whole meeting. Fine. Okay. What are your what are your thoughts there Tim? Okay so I love physical comedy as much as the next guy. I mean home improvement. Yes. I was I was on that show. Yeah no we know. Right yeah. Anyways I just wanted to go over some of the physical gags you guys have written, like right here on page four. Luther slips on the ice. Yeah, that's a classic.

Sure, but then in the action line you put, and we can't use a stunt man, it has to be Tim Allen, and we need at least five takes. Uh-huh. Only scripts are supposed to say how many takes it's gonna be. We're very hands-on with this particular piece, so. Okay.

Well, oh, there's this second moment on page 18. You've written, Tim Allen gets hit in the nuts. You didn't even write the character name there. You just wrote Tim Allen. Oh, well, that's just, that's a typo. We can fix that. Okay, but then on page 33, in the mall, the action line is just whatever kills Tim Allen.

That feels unspecific. Well, we're open to collaboration on that. Well, can I not die? No. Yeah, firm line. OK. Do it now. While we watch. Let's do a practice. And we're back for still more of this shit.

We're going to rejoin the action with Tim Allen putting the snowman on his roof. OK. This is my favorite Chekhov's gun that doesn't go off in the movie, right? Because this whole movie is just I guess that's the joke. He's putting Frosty up on the roof with a noose. Yes. A very clear noose.

Okay. It seems like you don't need specifically a noose. Like he's using a rope. It's like the movie thinks that like if a rope touches a neck, it has to be in a noose. I guess. Noose shaped when it does. But I thought that this was setting up a moment where he's caught in the rope and people think he's trying to hang himself or Frosty falls off the rope.

Or he actually hangs himself. Or he thinks he's hanging Frosty. Or that would have been great. But right, right. Like it seemed like a really lazy way to have the snowman hanging from a noose later when the daughter showed up. Right. Something.

Right. But they did absolutely nothing. It's just like Dave from Props was hanging himself when they came in the room. Yeah. And they were like, oh, is that the thing for later in the movie? And he was like, mm-hmm. Yep. It's for the snowman I guess. Yep. This is NASCAR driver who sees a rrrr, we don't really like him

Well, also- wouldn't let me borrow his Christmas tree And also like he's this is apparently something he's done every he does it this every year So him not knowing how one would do it is a weird beat as well Yeah, and again, many people must fall off the roof every year doing dumbass Christmas stuff. Oh yeah. Yeah. All iced up and they're, they're using pulleys and ropes for heavy shit. It's a terrible idea.

Yeah. Well, I mean, there is a, there is a survival of the fittest advantage. What I was saying. Thank you very much. That's fair. No, you're right. COVID was pretty good if you I was saying. Thank you very much. You know, that's fair. No, you're right. COVID was pretty good, if you think about it. Thank you.

So then we we have Jamie Lee Curtis running into the stuttering lawyer from my cousin Vinny at the liquor store. Yep. And the bit here is that he knows her, but she doesn't remember where she knows him from, but she's trying to convince people to come to her party anyway, so she invites him to the party.

Yeah. Now our assumption at this point is that this is in classic first fashion. He's going to turn out to be some kind of drunk that was in love with her in high school or whatever. Serial killer. Something. Yeah, to make it really awkward later. It'll be worse than anything you can imagine.

It's nothing. It's somehow the dumbest version of nothing you could conjure. Yes, exactly. Like, hey, if you wanna play along at home, podcast listener, go ahead and pause the show and write the dumbest denouement that could be for this character

that also made the entire movie meaningless. Right. It's that. Yep, yep. The movie will outdo you. So okay, so Tim's dragging his snowman onto his roof. Dan Aykroyd sees him doing it because he stares out his window with binoculars on a regular basis. And he says, kids, let's all go help Tim Allen.

So they run out there and Tim Allen's wrestling with the snowman and he can't get it up. And Dan, so that, see, it's impossible. It's the cocaine. Okay, yeah, no, thank you, thank you. I had to pause long enough for the dick joke to come out. So when you get to be my age, sometimes it takes a little longer to get to the dick joke

than it used to take. But the acroids all come out to see and they're like can we help you and he obviously needs help and he goes no and they're like why not he's like shenanigan purposes and then falls off the roof so hard yeah so hard for Tim Allen to get hanged by this news like I was like even showed us a player shows up just as the post-mortem erection starts I mean there's lots of funny stuff like God have done with that. And she's like, God bless us everyone.

Yeah, right. And Rikki's like, I see where you'll get it. I got ya, hey! It's literally better than this movie. I wrote a better movie just now. So, yeah, but now he's all caught in the rope. The snowman's broke and he's caught in the rope. The ambulance and the fire truck show up within seconds.

They were just hanging out watching Tim Allen being like, I really hope he hangs. They drive around the block really slow. Oh, we'll be there in a second. Right there. A lot of blood running into his head right now. You think now, okay, let's get a few more calendars to sell. So so he they cut him down. He falls, but not in a humorous way.

He just he just falls. And then this is the part where they now have to explain, like Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis explained to the neighbors that Blair's coming home after all, and that's why they're trying to decorate their house at the last minute. Right. So then like the Dan Aykroyd's like, well, all right, everybody abandon your Christmas Eve plans to help these people who have been assholes to everyone throughout the entire movie.

And everyone's like, hooray. Yeah. And one guy, one guy in the movie is like, hey, maybe bad behavior should have consequences. And then we're like, no! No, no. Christmas, your mom loves you even if she voted for you not to have rights anymore. Right. You can't, it's not about who you,

you have to vote in the next election. You have to. So, but yeah, but the neighborhood agrees that they'll do it for Blair, damn it. He has to add a bunch of fictionalized shit to make us care. Oh, wasn't Blair there when your house is caught fire? And wasn't she secretly Superwoman? She fought off Doomsday that one time. Come on.

He might as well say, come on, people, this is what the movie's about. Right. Yes, right. So, yeah. But so but everybody agrees to abandon whatever plans they may have had and do this instead. And then he turns to the cops and he's like, Hey, you guys go to the airport and get Blair and they're like, well, we're on duty police officers. We can't do that. Relax. You're in like a fancy suburb of Chicago.

Cops should have to do Uber stuff when there's nothing else. Yeah. Dan Aykroyd pulls out a handgun, shoots one of the neighbor's dogs there. All right, your job's done. Can you give this guy a ride? Listen, Wes is out of town. You've got plenty of time. You're fine.

Oh, no. Get him on the way back. Yeah, but Aykroyd is like the fucking boss tweet of Christmas in this town I guess and that's made out to be a good thing here. He gives this right cuz it's Christmas He's like, yeah Christmas. All right Right and the cops are like, I don't think we can go get her and he's like Do you want me to call the chief of police and then they're like, oh well I guess we have to shrink away from boss tweet

But like why would he be able to make that threat? Look, look the movie could have done anything they wanted they could have established done anything they wanted. They could have established that he's the mayor. They could have established that he's the chief of police. He could be the chief of police. It doesn't fucking matter. No, he's the head of a corrupt Christmas political machine with like the Daley family. Weird.

Clearly, yeah. So okay, so now everybody helps him put up his snowman and it starts snowing and people are showing up for the party and they're decorating as they go. And then, like, it's hard for me to feel sorry for Tim Allen, but they clearly, they told him, hey man, let's make the everybody putting up decorations thing funny. Just ham it up. And they pointed a camera at him and the best he could come up with is pretending that these cinnamon things were blunts. Oh, those were cinnamon things like cinnamon.

What are you supposed to do with those? Put your drink, your cider with them, I think. But here's the thought that I had when he was doing the like pretending these are blunts thing. He was a coke dealer. Yeah, which means he's done enough drugs. I bet if you could go back in time and show coke dealer Tim Allen that someday he'd be in a 2004 Christmas film called Christmas with the Cranks where he pantomime smoking a cinnamon stick he'd kill himself to disrupt the time loop. So okay would never have this movie. So, okay.

And then we inject some of the dumbest and most meaningless stakes that this movie actually has in a movie with no stakes. This is probably the dumbest thing. Blair calls, her plane has landed early. 55 minutes early. Now, the last time we heard from them,

they were in Atlanta. Right? They were flying from Atlanta to Chicago and arrived 55 minutes early. This is an hour and 55 minute flight. So they lost, they got half the flight early. Well they ran into a really good wormhole. Oh, right, I see. But now the ticking clock is slightly shorter. Right, but again, it doesn't make any fucking difference. But now the ticking clock is slightly shorter. Ticking or.

Right, but I get it. It doesn't make any fucking difference. Yeah, right. So, but Dan Aykroyd has an idea. He'll tell his son to call the cops and stall them. Right, tell them to stall. So, okay. So we cut to the airport.

Blair and Enrique are there and they're like, mm, you know, where are your parents? And I wrote my notes, you're an hour early. Your ride just isn't there. Chill at the fucking Cinnabon or something. Yeah, why would you think they would already be there? You just called them to tell them you would be an hour early. From that airport, yeah, exactly.

In fairness, my mom's in the cell phone lot like four hours ahead, ready to go in case there's a, she's a really good picker-upper Yeah, cuz she loves me Hey, if she was a really good picker-upper, she wouldn't be in the cell phone. She'd be in the airport Okay, that's right. Well, you really love somebody you're at the fucking airport. You're in the airport Yeah, you buy a ticket to somewhere else so you can go inside and so you can get in. So right exactly Be in there, but that's what I do when I picked up Kelly

I was in the airport so okay, so Jacksonville Airport. Well. Yeah, no that's true Push a fucking cow out of the way Don't even have security at the Jacksonville Airport Oh, I bet when you go through security they're like put your laptop in the bag or don't fucking do it. Jihadi And you're like Trevor Lawrence Jersey in there like all right go ahead yeah yeah how bad could it be well pretty bad so okay so you're tackled by a guy from Texas. D'Amico Ryan comes out and says well actually I thought you know it's a good

sportsmanship on that play so all right so then they they look around and the cops are standing there and they've got a sign up for Blair and Enrique But they don't know how to spell Enrique because that's a foreign name Classic one of these cops is Cheech Marin by the way Yeah, yeah, well, okay. Why do any of this? Why speed up the thing with the police escort? Like just don't. Right. Now the movie has to, they do that. And then the movie's like, fuck, we sped up our own movie.

We have to slow down our own movie now. Right, yeah. They wrote Spike into the plot. Right, Spike calls the cops on the cop radio and he's like, hey, you have to stall them for a little while now. And we're all like, the movie has to stall the movie now? So, sorry.

Yes, the next scene is a stalling scene. Yes, yeah. Dan Aykroyd steps in front of camera. Hey folks, would you mind putting your voovie player at.25 speed? We know you're probably watching this on Hulu with ads so we'd really appreciate it. Yes his solution is to drive very slowly and I wrote my notes. Boy is slow driving funny. I hope we watch two full goddamn minutes of it. Don't worry we do.

God and we watch Cheech Marin be sad visibly about being in this movie. Because he's now doing like, I don't know, stalling work is all it says in the script and he has to do that. You remember when I did other comedy in a vehicle? That was funny. Like Cheech Marin, he was clearly told, okay, so your character's going to drive slow, but you know, make it funny, hamming up, hamming up. And he's like, it's just driving, I would just be driving.

Can I talk about weed? I usually do a lot more, I do like character based humor in my movies. It's a lot more sophisticated than it's usually, that's fine. So okay, oh, meanwhile at the party, my cousin Vinnie lawyer shows up and nobody knows who he is.

Pin in that. Okay, at this point I wrote in my notes, please be Jesus Christ of Nazareth. He's not. No, I want you to know the, if this, if he had been, this would have been your main feed episode, Christmas. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So, but yeah.

And then, so now they've got all the lights set up on his house now. So they try to plug him in, but there's too many lights and it shorts the whole neighborhood out. Not how that works at all. But here's how stupid this fucking movie is. All the power goes out and then Dan Aykroyd is like, I know a guy from Con Ed and then we see the guy from Con Ed and then all the power's fixed. The movie, they're stalling it.

Nothing. That's it. That's the whole thing. They're just Blair coming home to the movie. We might as well watch like, all right, Con Ed's going to be here late on next Friday, so we'll just stand here. Yep. Wait, will you say next Friday? Okay. So then we cut to... Honestly, that would have been great if there had just been like a lip smacking, hand swinging, four minutes of the been great. There just been like a lip smacking hand swinging for minutes of the film. Yeah. Where you just been like, so why do you get a blowjob? It was originally a whole scene as a whole separate sequence in the movie.

They got caught. I thought the blowjob part was funny and I asked them to keep it. Oh, it's fun. Behind the scenes fact. Were you in second? So that is Bill Murray. Nice. Yeah, he's OK. So then so we cut to we cut to cheat and shake. They're pretending now they're stalling by pretending to check out an

imaginary crime. Right? We also we have this dumb fucking I guess this is supposed to be humor. So Jamie Lee Curtis in order to keep Blair from knowing they were planning on going on the cruise, doesn't want Tim Allen to have such a tan. So she's going to like use makeup to reduce his tan, but she accidentally just painted his face white with cream. And then they take it off and they never reference it in the movie again, but he's not tan anymore. Yep.

Yeah. So this movie sure not tan anymore. Yep. Yeah, so So fucking though and it might as well just be tearing pages out of the script going and now that doesn't matter Yeah, and now that doesn't matter and now that doesn't know when he sees himself with his face all white He's like oh this I look like my dead mother and I'm like, oh, yeah He's making jokes about his dead mom in case there was any chance at redeeming qualities of this fucking character opens up the window looks like I'll be looking like Bev pretty soon I don't like Walt very bad cancer Bev you're going into a void Bev there's to avoid, Bev. There's nothing. There's nothing. Eli, do you miss your dad? Yeah. Show me the whisper corner. Yes! So the cops are like, they're checking on a pretend crime when they see a real crime.

God, this is so fucking lazy. There's a... It's like a theory of mind at this point, right? It's just like crimes, criminals, windows, breaking, the bro shark test, love, window, bro squad. Yeah. So yeah, but they catch a guy that's trying to steal a VCR. That dates it a little bit, I think. And then... Horse, TV, VCR. Yeah. Man little bit I think and then horse TV VCR

So but they tackle the bad guy Blair screams for reasons that I don't understand and Then we cut to Tim and Jamie Lee Curtis getting ready for the big party Jamie Lee Curtis turns to him and she says, Blair is never to know about the cruise. And I'm like, why? And she says to me, she turns straight to the camera and she goes, for farce reasons. For the movie. Yeah, so the stakes are Blair coming home

and seeing a tan, becoming suspicious and being like, wait, were you pre-tanning for a cruise that would block Christmas, but you did this anyway? And here we are at a party, but you were gonna? That's the stakes. Yeah, that's, apparently those are the fucking stakes. Cause then Blair gets there and she's like, dad, you have a tan.

And he's like, fuck you. You have a tan. Again, like if it was, I can't help, but make it funnier. So now they're reuniting, the party's going off without a hitch so far, Again, like if it was a, I can't help but make it funnier. So now they're reuniting, the party's going off without a hitch so far, but VCR thief is outside, freezing to death in the cop car, and he catches Spike on the way in and starts feeding him a bunch of bullshit

about how he's starving and they should really let him go. Yeah, so he calls Spike over to the cop car with this criminals in the back of the cop car and apparently they let you control the power windows when you're in the back of the cop car and he rolls it down. Yeah. You know, yeah. And he's like, I would, I would abuse that for sure. I'm just, stop it.

Stop it. Stop. Stop. Stop resisting. I'm just, I'm figuring out whatever note, two note song I can do in that cop car. So they're escorting me like Luigi Mancione by the, you have no idea what this guy did with the windows. It's like jingle bells on it. Eric Adams is here. So he's getting pardoned.

But he, he explains though that he's the starving to death and it's like,le Bells on it. Eric Adams is here. So. He's getting pardoned. But he explains though that he's starving to death and the kid should let him go. And so then the kid suddenly has the keys to the handcuffs, which is convenient. And the kid says, okay, go in there and get some food, but then you have to come back to your cop car. And he's like, yeah, no, sure.

I'm totally gonna do that, Ken. Now look, that's a ruse by the burglar because this movie was made by Republicans but like even if it was true you wouldn't go into the holiday party and grab some food you'd get away from the jailing that you're right yes exactly right so yeah but so we cut back into the party. If I can, we have this weird moment where the cousin, the lawyer from my cousin Vinny, this character's name is now Marty. He speaks Spanish and used to live in Peru. So him and Enrique become friends.

And they talk in Spanish 101 for a second. Yeah, right. Yeah. Me llamo Marty. Guitar. Ay la biblioteca. This is nuts. He goes and I wrote my notes at this point like why the fuck do I care there are 15 minutes in this stupid movie right but then so they make friends the burglar goes off to steal some shit at the party, and then Cheech Marin and Jake Busey play the guitar, and they sing a Christmas song.

You know at some point it was like, Cheech, hey, you know the, like, you know mariachi guitar, right? Cause like, you're a fan. And he's like, yeah I do, but that's not the point. I... It's not the point. I do. There's coincidence. The car was made of meat.

I'm an American asshole. With the shit. Hahaha! So yeah, so they sing, I wrote my notes. Who the fuck thought that this was what happened next in the movie? Yeah, I wrote, hey, I don't fucking care. Hahaha! Right, right.

So okay, so they finished the song and Enrique proposes a toast and he toasts to his new family or whatever. And then everybody turns to Tim Allen, who's supposed to toast next. But he can't think of a good toast. He can't come up with a good toast because he's an ordinary old guy and you know your dad loves you even now and then yeah Hey, there's a noose outside. Do you want to check it out? So yeah, so I did a lot of space work on my side of the mic

I was really moving. Well the distance between your mouth and the microphone changed quite dramatically So we assumed that there was something going on. Yeah So okay, but Jamie Lee Curtis tries to give a toast in his stead, but it's not enough because she's a woman. Right. And the true meaning of community is for there never to be consequences for bad behavior. Clearly, yeah. And this is the new conflict of the movie. Tim Allen couldn't think of a nice follow-up toast, and Jamie Lee Curtis covers for him,

but she's a lady who shouldn't be really doing any toasts, let alone important follow-up toasts. So that's the movie now. That's the problem. That is the plot. Yeah. Yeah. So then, okay.

So we cut to the kitchen where Tim Allen's drinking champagne all by himself, all mopey because he couldn't come up with a good toast is the plot. And then Jamie Lee Curtis is like, hey, you should have come up with a better toast is the plot and Then they talk about what a prick he is He apparently he still wants to go on the cruise damn it He got this whole tan and everything Why would you not go on the cruise at this point though that I don't understand like you did the hot you did the Christmas Eve Party for Blair. Yes, you're good to go you paid right already yeah well it's

well now fool that you are Heath this is so that we can see that he's a good guy after all no it's not it that's not what happened good we never see that yeah it doesn't matter how you behave as long as you do a nice thing at the end. But he doesn't. He doesn't. It wouldn't even work. No. And it's dumb. Yeah. So, okay.

So, speaking of which, right? So, he looks across the street and he sees that his neighbor Walt and his cancer wife, whatever her fucking name, Bev, are not at the party. Everybody else in the neighborhood. Bev and Noma is across the street in his field of vision. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And so, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food.

And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food.

And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food.

And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get some food. And then, he's like, I'm gonna go get invite cancer across a street, right? Yeah, no, he explains it. The rate he goes across the street and there and he's like, so, hey, why aren't you at the party? They're like, well, you know, it's snowing and. You suck. You just fucking suck.

Okay. It's a whole Bev Bev can't cross streets anymore. Yeah. Yeah. Well, right. Yeah. So pin in that. Right.

Right. Yeah. Keep in mind that we're about to establish that Bev isn't up to crossing a street because it's snowing Yes, right, right, but he's like, yeah, so I'm having a moral redemption arc asterisks No, I'm not but I'd like to regift you a ham here have a canned ham to make up for your cancer death That's impending. It's yeah Well, and then just to make this even fucking worse, Walt is like, well, actually I'm allergic to pork.

And yeah, my wife doesn't really eat a lot of meat. Just fucking take it anyway, I'm doing a thing. I'm redeeming, I'm redeeming. It's not, it's the thought that counts. Exactly, that's, he's like, but it's your problem anyway, because I gave it to you now and I'm redeemed. And they're like, I don't think that you. Like the climate, it's like what my it's your problem anyway, because I gave it to you now and I've redeemed and they're like, I don't like the climate.

It's like what my generation did with the climate. I wanted Walt to grab the ham and just lock eyes with him, walk to the garbage and throw it in the garbage. Throw it in there. Thank you. Now I threw it out for you. Right. It's a thoughtless gift that was just lying around anyway. He was awkward about giving it to him.

He made them do all the work and shit's just shitty. So then he turns around and he sees like everybody in the house having fun at the party and there's this moment where like I thought it was supposed to be like, ah everybody's a lot happier when I'm not around. Boy sure there sure is a noose already hanging from my house. Gently puts the barrel in his mouth. Yeah, right, right. But no, we're not gently just it goes upwards.

We just get a drone shot up towards the stars as there's a single gunshot. He puts it in their credits. Oh, there you go. So yeah, so but but then he turns back to Walton Bev's house and he and he goes back over there and he's and he decides to give them the cruise. And he has to walk back across the street and I was like, please get hit by a truck or something. I don't care.

Yeah, I didn't know. Just shot by Luigi, whatever. Any death is funny here. Of Tim Allen, the real person. You're the real human being. Yeah, right, well of course. So but the idea here is that now he can't go on the cruise. So he gives it to his neighbors that he doesn't really like

so that they can have a great trip one time before she dies. Right. That's supposed to be where we're going with this. But like as Eli just pointed out, she can't walk across the street. I feel like parasailing is out. Even if she could walk across the street, none feel like parasailing is out. Yeah, even if she could walk across the street, none of this would work. You can't just switch the names with like a crayon on plane tickets and whatever. This is post-911. That's not happening. Yeah, right. Right, exactly. Yeah, there's no fucking way any of this works anyway.

Just cut to Bev with a chemo bag getting held up at the TSA like this now Your name's not on it and we can't do this. You gotta put it you have to have a bunch of really small No bags. I have to have a bunch of small chemo bags or a big plastic bag that goes Bev is like well, you know I don't think my doctor would want me to be away from my treatment for 10 whole days and he's like stop making excuses. Bev, the treatment's not working. The stupid shit plays out. Come on Bev, we both know that you're you've got no chance. You got no chance Bev. Yeah. Let's go fucking see some dolphins because you're going you're going. And he's like look I didn't. You're a corpse I'm looking at a corpse now. And I'd like to be next to one on a boat.

That's all I'm asking you. 40 years of marriage, Bev. That threesome with our son and this cruise, this is all I'm ever asking you. Oh, Jesus Christ. But that's the other thing. That's what they said in the movie. Hey, Eli.

Okay. So you're at Whisper Room? Whisper Room? So, but they decide that they're ultimately that they're gonna go and this is I guess supposed to showcase his humanity, but he's literally sacrificed nothing. Yeah. He could not get to do the thing no matter what. He's sacrificed nothing.

He's inconvenienced people who probably can't go on the cruise. It is the perfect emblem of a generation that thinks they can redeem themselves by like chucking you on the shoulder after a lifetime of abuse and homophobia. Yep. Yeah. Uh huh. As there's a great bit where like as they're leaving, Walt is like, hey, on balance, you're still an asshole.

You don't expect me to start being nice to you at this point, do you? And he's like, no,, I'm I'm fucking terrible Are you kidding me? No, don't no one would ever change in this movie There could be no change or difference or anything, right? So he goes back to his house and hey, guess what Ned is stuck on the roof. He's freezing to death Who's Ned? Who the fuck is Ned? Fuck you. That's why. Yeah. So, okay. So then we cut back inside. The burglar is upstairs robbing the house and Spike comes into apparently Tim and Jamie Lee Curtis' bedroom. Not sure what he was

looking for there. Looking for some JLC panties. I get it. Okay. All right. So, but he catches Spike stealing from him. And then he runs downstairs to get the cops. So the burglar tries to get out through the window. But damn it, if Santa isn't there to hit the burglar with an umbrella. Made it made of an anvil, apparently. And then he's like, remember? Yeah, because that umbrella is the beginning of the movie. You remember earlier there was a guy selling umbrellas.

He was dressed like Santa. Now that- Remember the second scene in the movie? Yes, right. And apparently that Santa was the stuttery lawyer from My Cousin Vinny who is now dressed like Santa. We haven't like seen that happen in the movie though. Right? Like he showed up at the party dressed like just a dude. And now he's dressed like Santa. We haven't like seen that happen in the movie though. Right? Like

he showed up at the party dressed like just a dude and now he's dressed as Santa. Yes. One is left to assume that he dresses like Santa to fight crime. Right. Yeah. Right. Like he went into a fucking phone booth and came out dressed like Santa. Yeah. But then he leaves the cops get the burglar again, and Jamie Lee Curtis comes out and she's like, hey, I heard what you did in that last scene, you're totally redeemed. And we're like, is he?

Because I don't think he is. Yeah, I once read a tweet that said, everything boomers think is a firmly held belief is lead poisoning. That's how I feel about this movie. It's lead poisoning the movie. Yep, yep. And then as they stand out and they look back

on their house and everything, and Jamie Lee Curtis is skipping Christmas. What a stupid idea and title, apparently. But then she's like, maybe we skip next year though. She has like a quick switcheroo right at the last second. Yeah. Yeah. One of the director to run out anderoo right at the last second. Yeah. Yeah. One of the director to run out and be like with the cranks.

So yeah, so but then they back away and we see that Marty is Santa Claus. What the whole time. Like the literal like the literal Santa. He literally flies off in his car sled. Yep. With with with reindeer and everything leans out the window Fuck you trying to understand this movie. I guess yeah, right So with that bizarre goddamn moment and again no actual

Denial and look there was no point where anybody ever had to deal with a consequence to their decision or grew as a person or as a Character nothing that every nothing ever fell apart the daughter was fooled decision or grew as a person or as a character. Nothing! Nothing ever fell apart. The daughter was fooled. There was never a reason to fool her with nothing having been resolved. We're gonna bring bonus episode number 97 to a Merciful Close. Once again, a huge thanks to all of you for helping make the show go. If you have questions, comments, or cinematic suggestions, you can email godolphinmovies.gmail.com Tim Romperson handles our social media our theme song Which was written and performed by Ryan Slatkin and Louis Vujac on Mars all the other music was written and performed by our audio engineer

Morgan Clark if you like what you hear hear more by following the link in the show notes for this episode Thanks again for giving us a check your life this month for Heath Enright, Neelay Bosnik I'm No Illusionist promising to work hard to earn another chunk next month until then we'll leave you with a Breakfast Club close We'll leave you with a Breakfast Club close. Jake Busey went on to star in Roadhouse 2 Last Call and Jamie Lee Curtis focused on yogurt for a while, because she hated this experience. Ned died of exposure a few hours later. Luther died of COVID when he refused to get a vaccine. Yeah.

All right. So I just want to point out that I am doing this one in protest, this first interstitial in protest for the unfounded relation that you draw between this movie and National Lampoon movies. They're the same movie. Fucking hilarious. I'm sending you that meme that's like they're the same picture. Yep. Fucking, well three of the six of them. Three of the six of them.

Corporate wants us to explain the difference between Chevy Chase and Tim Allen. Yeah. Yeah. Well yeah, no Chevy Chase sucks. He does suck. Doesn't suck like Tim Allen sucks though, right? Like Tim Allen, we can at least agree,

sucks on a completely different level than Chevy Chase sucks. In both cases, I don't get why everybody loves, they're like, that's so funny though. Like, especially Chevy Chase, even more so, I don't get why he's like revered so much. I think it's like advanced astronomy to me, which is that like I've reached the limits

of my understanding, I just know that they both suck. So the differences between them is beyond what I can comprehend. It's like dividing by infinity, sure. Exactly, sure. 0.999. No, zero. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle

and a Thunderstorm LLC copyright 2024, all rights reserved.