Dear Santa Trailer Doesn’t Deliver any Presents
The Christmas Spirit’s arch-nemesis is coming to Paramount+ this year. The streaming service released a trailer for Dear Santa, an upcoming family Christmas comedy with (barely) a tinge of horror. In Dear Santa, a boy named Liam Turner writes a Christmas letter to Santa… only he misspells the name, and the letter goes to Satan. Satan then comes to Earth in answer to the boy’s wish, and wacky Christmas hijinks ensue. Jack Black stars as Satan, with Robert Timothy Smith as Liam; Keegan-Michael Key, Brianne Howey, Hayes MacArthur, and Post Malone join them. Directed by Bobby Farrelly from a script by Peter Farrelly, Ricky Blitt, and Dan Ewan, Dear Santa arrives on Paramount+ and will be available for digital download on November 25, 2024. You can see the trailer below:
There are three Christmas movies being released this year: Red One, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, and now, Dear Santa. I love Christmas movies, so normally, this would be a cause for celebration; unfortunately, they all look kind of lousy. The trailers make them all seem silly but not funny, lacking any of the elements that would make them good movies beyond being about Christmas – or, at least, lacking well-executed versions of those elements (for Red One, action; for The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, comedy; for Dear Santa, scares). Unfortunately, Christmas movies are among the many casualties of the general lack of quality in cinema today, and while there have been one or two great ones in recent years – Violent Night, 8-Bit Christmas – they mostly suck, and it looks like three more are about to be added to the naughty list.
That’s unfortunate in the case of Dear Santa because it’s got some great talent behind it. The Farrelly Brothers, the duo behind classic comedies like Dumb and Dumber and There’s Something About Mary, are spearheading the creative team, with Bobby Farrelly directing it and Peter Farrelly co-writing it. One of the other writers, Ricky Blitt, used to write for the first few seasons of Family Guy, when it was at its very best; he even wrote the episode “Death is a Bitch,” which featured the legendary Norm MacDonald as Death. (“Yeah, that felt good, throwing me hard on the couch like that.”) He’s also written three episodes of the Netflix series Loudermilk, which I’m told is hilarious. And yet, the Dear Santa trailer is wall-to-wall corny, with childish humor and those strained jokes where the actors talk too much for the gag to land. Maybe the actual movie is better, but if this is indicative of the style of humor, I doubt it.
Dear Santa feels like it should’ve been made in the 80s, when these kinds of movies had bite. Imagine doing this film with the same tone as The Monster Squad. If you’ve never seen that Fred Dekker classic (co-written by Shane Black!), it was about a group of 80s kids who formed a club called the Monster Squad and suddenly found themselves facing the Universal Monsters, who’d been resurrected in the modern era so that Dracula could take over the world. The movie works so well because it lets the kids handle the humor, but it takes the monsters seriously; the guy who plays Dracula is excellent, very menacing and evil. Now, look at Dear Santa; Jack Black is playing the Devil, and he does nothing but bungle around looking for laughs, playing silly pranks on people instead of doing anything outright devilish. That’s because kids’ movies that are made today always play it safe, aiming to amuse four-year-olds and no one else rather than giving kids of all ages something to enjoy. And Jack Black can play a menacing villain; he was great as King Koopa in The Super Mario Bros. Movie, even if the film undercut him with goofy humor too often. Dear Santa looks like one to leave on the shelf this Christmas.
Let us know what you thought of the Dear Santa trailer in the comments!
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Comments (5)
That’s why I decided to focus on older movies this year. I’ve seen so many great films, even ones that I immediately considered classics, and a lot of them aren’t well known. It’s amazing some of the themes and storylines you’d see that would never even make a pitch meeting today. My hope is that this election, because it was so decisive and encompassed many different government seats and was reflected in every state, will make them realize that there’s a huge audience for the kinds of movies we used to get, but I doubt they care.
Billy Bob already did this with Bad Santa. Guess we can always count on Hollywood to ruin special holidays. Seth Rogen tried it and failed big time with Sarah Silverman.
Howard Stern really liked Bad Santa. Gotta say, everything Don Imus ever did was better than that Stern/Kamala interview.
Yes, I do. I haven’t used it in a while, but I reviewed some older movies on there.
https://criticless.com/users/3182703e-edee-420a-84d7-b6245698e071
Movies are dying. The talent left the building. Hollywood insists on Nihilism and ugliness. Saw Heretic and Conclave yesterday and both sucked. Every Christmas, the haters in Hollywood try to pull the same stunts with blood, gore and other insulting type things.
It actually impresses me that the public has stopped going and stopped supporting. Most of the time, I walk out of theater feeling lousy and ripped off and jipped. I think movie watchers out to be able to sue for refunds. Eventually, I made expand this to reviewers who lie and shill for terrible and insulting movies.
Jack Black is probably the perfect personification of the stereotype though. He looks obese and fat, dirty, try-hard, totally ugly, smelly, and washed up. This is what Hollywood wants to say is the stereotypical American male. Jack Black also, in this trailer, looks like someone you would not want around kids. Not sure if u get what I’m getting at here. To think that he’s in the Minecraft movie. I would not trust most of them around any kids, especially, Jack Black.
At least the public is still good enough to start rejecting movies and shows and media in favor of activities and social media. That gives me a bit of hope, as does the election. I know the new president said something about an Iowa State Fair festival to celebrate 250 years as a country or something like that. Hollywood, over the years, affected me, so I am really uplifted by people who seek out wholesome things.
It is very rare that I walk out of a movie feeling good. I did that with Jesus Revolution and Top Gun: Maverick and The Wild Robot and maybe, The Last Wish, but again, it’s rare now. Maybe not even 20% of the time. I don’t think it’s worth it to go. Streamers are better now.