Horror Watch: The Substance (2024)

Watched:  02/19/2025

Format:  4K disc (SimonUK's disc)

Viewing:  First

Director/ Writer:  Coralie Fargeat

Worst.  Shazam movie.  Ever.

Let me start by saying, I quite liked The Substance (2024).  I'm not sure what's going on at the Academy that this got a best picture nom, my confusion mostly stemming from the fact this is a satirical body horror movie and that sort of thing doesn't usually get nominated over Very Serious Pictures(tm) - but I am thrilled for everyone involved and for this movie getting the nod.  

I was unimpressed with the original trailer for the movie, and then after the movie came out, Simon told me he'd already seen it a few times,* and then later said he'd seen it four - and I was supposed to see it with him on his 5th viewing. However, I went to the wrong theater.  SO.  Tonight he brought over his new disc and we watched it.

On paper, this movie is what I figured from the trailers - to a point.  And it is all along the way more entertaining, bizarre, fascinating and generally better than I expected.

The only prior Coralie Fargeat movie I'd previously seen was Revenge, which I don't remember well, just that it lost me at some point and didn't win me back.  But re-reading my own review to refresh my memory - I can see a loose breadcrumb trail that led to The Substance, and what Fargeat was doing with Revenge that maybe didn't work for me but landed well with me in this instance.  

Chabert Watch! Crossword Mysteries: Terminal Descent/ Riddle Me Dead (2021)

Watched:  02/14/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  Peter Benson/ David Winning

Job: Puzzle Maker and Police Investigation Meddler

new skill:  complete knowledge of plant scientific names/ riddle show participant

Man: Brennan Elliot

Job of Man: Detective

Goes to/ Returns to: Remains in NYC

Event:  canceled puzzle contest w/ a computer, taping of a game show

Food:  Italian cooking made by supporting characters/ some diner food

I guess I should mention, Jamie was digging these movies a bit.  Her reason, and I agree, is that they're not structured like a Christmas film or romcom, and the two leads bounce off each other very well.  It's a refreshing change.

Anyway - we went ahead and knocked these two out.  You're welcome.  

I will note - the audio was pretty bad in these two movies.  I can't say what happened, but there were garbled lines, the echo of shooting on location mixed with ADR. Wind.  It was all over the place.  

With two years since our last movies, we have some new supporting cast, and we're given some lines about what happened to the former colleagues.  

Marvel Cap Watch: Captain America - Brave New World (2025)

Watched:  02/13/2025

Format:  Cinepolis

Viewing:  First

Director:  Julius Onah

It was hard to miss the negative reviews for Captain America: Brave New World (2025), which was maybe a good way to go in.  I already had pre-purchased my tickets, even knowing this movie has been delayed for months, had serious reshoots, and I'd noted Marvel was already pushing Fantastic Four and Thunderbolts as hard or harder than this movie.  

I also know that taking to social media and bravely saying "this new Marvel movie isn't very good" is the current cool thing to do, whether it's Quantumania, which fully deserves every iota of hate it got, or Deadpool and Wolverine, which was amazingly meta and a fun Saturday afternoon at the movies (and richly rewarded for the effort).

After numerous misfires and mid-level efforts, it's fair to say Marvel hit the point where the quality of what they do has slipped.  What I think folks fail to appreciate is that Marvel's long run of putting out fun, watchable stuff was singular and extraordinary.  No one else has come close.  And if you're younger, that's hard to appreciate.  In a couple dozen movies - they became an institution almost as much as the idea of the Western or Costume Drama.*   And, of course, being an institution rightfully means they're the ones to take down/ make fun of/ be skeptical/ cynical of, especially in their modern work.

At the core, I think the same problem plagues Marvel movies that plagues Marvel (and DC) comics themselves - which is that there's a crippling level of continuity in their sprawling universe, and that can be paired with the fact that Marvel seems unwilling to build any second-generation characters in the old-school fashion with their own mythologies, rogues gallery and *personal* continuities.  Characters like Sam Wilson just kinda loosely fit into the big picture and exist in the Marvel Comics U.  And that is how this movie feels.  Captain America: Brave New World operates more as a sequel to 2008's Hulk and other MCU continuity threads than it is a Captain America film.  Arguably, Sam Wilson is not the star of his own movie in much the same way, Steve Rogers was one of many characters with understandable motivations in Civil War.

Why Did I Do This Watch: Madame Web (2024)

the derp crew

Watched:  02/12/2025

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  Second

Director:  SJ Clarkson

I swore I'd never watch Madame Web (2024) again, but I did.

A year on, it's horribleness has already reached mythic status in the superhero movie nerd community, and it's just growing in stature as Sony piles on Morbiuses and Kravens.  

I stand by every word of this lengthy discussion from last year.  

What I was trying to sort out was whether I just misunderstood the movie the first time, had I missed something?  Worse - was this just such a new take, and maybe a female-centric one I didn't get, that I was too hard on this movie?

Action Watch: Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning (2023)

Watched:  02/09/2025

Format:  Amazon Prime

Viewing:  First

Director:  Christopher McQuarrie

This whole movie could have been an email.

Dug tells me this movie has a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, and I have no idea why.  It is true the entire Mission: Impossible franchise has been a struggle for me, going back to MI:2.  The movies are mostly Cruise running around and not getting his MacGuffin, punctuated with Ving Rhames reiterating the threat, so you don't forget what we're doing here, and Simon Pegg giving objectives for the next action sequence.  However, the action sequences go on so long, I completely forget what the objective was by the end.  Between the cut-scenes explaining things and the long, overly complicated action bits - it is very, very, very much like watching someone else play a video game.

The cast is impeccable.  The globe-trotting locations tremendous.  Cruise looks 45 at age 60.  Stunts are stunty.  

The plot is that an AI has gone rogue - and seems conscious.  And devious!  It has failed QAT, and apparently the dev team had never seen a Terminator movie.  The MacGuffin is a literal key that exists in two pieces that will *possibly* help control the AI.  People keep having it and then not-having it.  No one wants to just put it somewhere safe.  Hayley Atwell* shows up as one of those thieves that exist in movies like this.  She's not a spy, she's just big on ripping people off.  Vanessa Kirby, the latest addition to the Marvel U in this summer's coming Fantastic Four movie as Sue Storm, appears as The White Widow, just as she has for a couple of these movies.  Rebecca Ferguson shows up, and has like two lines, and I struggled to remember why she was important, but I think she's been in several of these.  Pom Klementieff shows up as our sexy, silent awesome hitwoman (and it feels like they let her dress herself, which I applaud).

Valentine Chabert Watch: An Unexpected Valentine (2025)

I am profoundly upset by how this is not the color, make or model of the car in the movie

Watched:  02/01/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  *unlisted at time of this writing*

Job: Chocolate scientist 

new skill: picking up Lyft drivers
Man: Robert Buckley
Job of Man: Lyft driver/ mediocre artistic photographer
Goes to/ Returns to: just drives in circles, really
Event: product reveal gala?/ gallery show
Food:  baked goods and peanut butter chocolate cookies

This is a movie about a woman who is so lonely on Valentine's Day, she sleeps with her Lyft driver.

I'm sorry, you can dress it up any way you want, but that's what this movie is about, and I'm okay with it.

We watched this movie on a slight delay during its broadcast premier as Hallmark pivots to a two week extravaganza hoping people can believe Valentine's Day, the worst holiday, is as big a deal to people as Christmas, which is a lie, Hallmark.  A terrible lie.

In this movie, which has a script that needed several more passes and major issues with what we like to call "pacing" in the movie-blogging biz, Chabert plays a New York City-based food science person who specializes in chocolate (please remember the chocolate detail).  

I feel like the script was written by AI or a MadLib, because it does follow some oddly specific Hallmark tropes but then refuses to make sense.

Chabert's chocolate scientist starts the movie, as happens A LOT in Hallmark movies, giving a speech to colleagues around a table about their corporation's widget of choice.  In all Hallmark movies, often in Chabert movies, people are blown over by the set-up of a lukewarm corporate presentation explaining the hero's job and that she is good at it.  Her colleagues and bosses will lose their minds and offer promises of better jobs.  A rich fantasy.

In this case, I would believe the script is written by AI as the product Chabert is showing off is: a chocolate purse.  

Oscars Cartoon Watch: Flow (2024)

Watched:  01/27/2025

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Gints Zibalodis

If you want to know what moves me and can make me want to cry for the entire runtime of a movie - put an animal in danger.  Especially an animal with personality that manages to still recognizably act like an animal.

I'd heard a few trusted sources gives a thumbs-up to Flow (2024), and then it got nominated for a 2025 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.  And, yes.  Consider this the highest level of recommendation I'm likely to give a movie for pretty mush anyone and everyone.  Go watch Flow.  

This post will be short.  I loved this movie so much, I don't want to ramble on and I don't want to spoil it.

Chabert Watch: Sweet Carolina (2021)

Watched:  01/25/2025

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  Peter Benson

Job: Marketing VP

Location of story:  North Carolina

new skill: parenting

Man:  Tyler Hynes

Job of Man: basketball coach/ horsebarn attendant

Goes to/ Returns to: Returns to

Event: funeral? bake sale? middle school dance?  

Food:  Baked goods - especially scones

My first foray into a full Hallmark tragedy/ drama!  Also, I note Chabert co-wrote this one, so good for you, Lacey!

If I tipped my hat to Lacey Chabert milking Hallmark for nice vacations when discussing the Hawaii movie, I must also salute Hallmark for using the same Canadian locations and insisting they're various parts of the US with about ten seconds of establishing shots purchased from some establishing shot clearing house.  And then going hard with the movie's branding around the supposed location while remaining very non-specific about how this is, say, North Carolina and why it matters.  

But, yeah, this same Canadian high school was used for Three Wiser Men and a Boy released this Christmas.  Kimberley Sustad and Lacey Chabert are like ships in the night, passing through the halls of this school.  

In Sweet Carolina (2021), Chabert is a successful marketing exec from New Hope, North Carolina (the titular sweet Carolina, so suck it South Carolina.  You salty.).  After introducing her family in Canada North Carolina, the film immediately kills off her sister and brother-in-law, and during Chabert's trip home, she learns her sister named her, a career-driven-city-gal, as the guardian for her children.   

Because you demanded it - the year of Chabert: Groundswell (2022)

Watched:  01/20/2025

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Lee Friedlander

Firstly - absolutely no one demanded this.  Maybe Chabert's manager would like it, but Randy pitched turning this into a Chabert fan-site and never one to turn down a challenge that is totally pointless, here we are.

We do our little experiments here at The Signal Watch, and we like a theme.

Now that I'm not watching Christmas movies, I've realized Lacey Chabert is not just getting paid to appear in movies in Canada, she's all over the planet.  There's a Safari movie that takes place in South Africa, we watched the Iceland and Ireland movies at Christmas, and last year a Scotland movie.  I don't know what Chabert pulls down per movie, but tacking on some fun travel seems like a great perk.

This one takes place in Hawaii.  So, big props to everyone involved who managed to be in a movie about Hawaii that is mostly about surfing and eating.  If this is a thing, sign me up.

Chabert plays a chef - keeping in line with Hallmark's insistence that heroines have careers that seem kind of arty - who gets mad at her boyfriend/ boss (a terrible combo) after he takes credit for her dishes.  Wisely, she dashes off to her Aunt's amazing place in Hawaii.  

There, we meet Chabert's soon-to-be love interest, played by 1% BMI fellow Ektor Rivera as "Ben".  Ben is a broody fellow who gave up surfing and now runs a surf shop and refuses to button his shirts.  Good for him.  

Vamp Watch: Nosferatu (2024) - second viewing

Watched:  01/19/2025

Format:  Alamo

Viewing:  Second

Director:  Robert Eggers

Originally, I'd planned to see Nosferatu (2024) upon its Christmas-time release with MRSHL, a man who knows and loves vampire fiction.  And, he's an Eggers fan.  However, the stars failed to align and we didn't make it work.  But!  We finally got around to it here in mid-January.

I already spent a lot of time writing up this movie in recent history, so I'm not about to do that again right now.  

I do think I was better able to blow through some of my preconceptions and better get at the Ellen/ Orlok relationship, and it better confirmed some of what I thought was going on regarding Ellen's nature and Orlok's drive.  

Anyway, I dug it.  Glad I saw it again.

Pope Watch: Conclave (2024)

Watched:  01/14/2025

Format:  Peacock

Viewing:  First

Director:  Edward Berger

All Christmas season long, Jamie's sister-in-law, K, kept lightly suggesting we go see Conclave (2024), and I was pretty direct in my opinion of "no, I do not want to see that".  But curiosity, gentle nudging and my Peacock subscription got the best of me, and I went ahead and watched it over two nights.

Conclave centers around the events that take place in the wake of the passing of a Pope, and the politicking among the clergy (cardinals) who are called together to determine who will be the next Pope.  

Sadly, it turns out there is no Catholic sorting hat to handle this task.

I will start by saying, there are many things I liked about this film.  As promised, the performances by Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Isabella Rossellini, and many others are impeccable.  This movie is an opportunity for these actors to do amazing work - enough so that my immediate thought was "really, this would be a tremendous play" after the film ended.  A sort of 108 Angry Cardinals.  

Viking Watch: The Northman (2022)

Watched:  01/14/2024

Format:  Disc

Viewing:  Second

Director:  Robert Eggers

A long while back now, I picked up the 4K of Eggers' The Northman (2022) after liking it quite a lot on a first viewing, and knowing that it deserved a second viewing.  And since Jamie had actually liked Noferatu, a movie I wasn't even going to take her to, she voted for The Northman.*

I re-read my post from May of 2023, and I think I agree with myself here.

SPOILERS

I can say confidently that I am very glad I rewatched the film, especially when you aren't walking in blind as you start to realize "oh, wait... is this some imagined proto-Hamlet?"  And, indeed, go Google "Amleth" because, boy, while I knew Shakespeare didn't really come up with original stories, was I surprised to find out about the many versions of Hamlet existed story prior to Billy Shakes putting it down.

Cunk Doc Watch: Cunk on Life (2024)

Watched:  01/08/2025

Format:  Netflix

Viewing:  First

Director:  Al Campbell

A couple of years ago I stumbled across the amazing documentaries guided by journalist Philomena Cunk.  Insightful, sprawling, challenging television in which our host dares us, the audience, to ponder the pictures both big and small, how they fit together, and what it all means.  From Shakespeare to biology, there's no topic Philomena Cunk can't take on while wandering through the woods.

Her team assembles a wide variety of academic notables to shed light on the topics at hand, and Philomena is not shy about asking the hard questions to shed light on the thorniest of subjects.

I'm not sure this special counts as a movie, but it is slightly longer than an hour, and is also self-contained.  In this new installment, Cunk on Life (2024), we're taken to the start of life on Earth, look into the meaning of life in a Judeo/ Christian context, look into nihilism, the Higgs-Boson particle, the Big Bang, and the value of streaming services.

I highly recommend this doc.  It's something like 70 minutes and well worth your time.

Doc Watch: Super/Man - The Christopher Reeve Story (2024)

Watched:  01/06/2025

Format:  Max

Viewing:  First

Director(s):  Ian Bonhôte & Peter Ettedgui

Well, I'd been avoiding this doc for a bit because I know more about Christopher and Dana Reeve than the average bear, and I knew it was gonna break me.  And, it did, but I think my certainty that I was going to be destroyed kind of helped prep me for the film.  (YMMV re: squirting real tears during this doc)

Look, one of my earliest memories is seeing Superman: The Movie in the theater.  And then seeing Superman II and III in the theater?  Yes.  I absolutely remember both.  

I'm not alone in being of a certain era and Christopher Reeve meaning a lot to us as our Clark Kent and Superman.  Eagle-eyed readers will note the name of this site is a Superman reference, and Superman is kind of a thing for me.  I take the Superman films starring Reeve very seriously and will be happy to bore you talking about them anytime.

It Was On Watch: His and Hers (2024)

Watched:  01/03/2024

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director:  Linda Lisa Hayter

Jamie had this on while I was working on my End-of-Year posts, and it is a movie.  And I guess I watched it.

I wasn't going to write up His & Hers (2024), because it kind of broke my rule for "I was engaged with the movie" rather than "I was on my laptop", but it was designed to be semi-watched, so semi-watch it I did.  Plus, Jamie told me to write it up.  So.

This is a sort of legal romantic dramedy that is deeply untethered from reality, and the whole time you're watching it, you sort of think "this was not the original version of this script.  This has been hollowed out to be a Hallmark film".  

The basic concept is that Chabert plays a civil attorney who does *not* practice family law, but is married to a divorce attorney.  Two reality TV stars have a public break-up, and the husband winds up with Chabert's husband (Hallmark stalwart Brennan Elliot) as his attorney, and because of reasons, Chabert is asked to represent the reality TV wife.  Elliot has to do it because it's his ticket to becoming partner, and Chabert owes her boss for sentimental reasons.

Vampire Watch: Nosferatu (2024)

Watched:  12/29/2024

Format:  Cinepolis Theater

Viewing:  First

Director:  Robert Eggers

I am looking forward to seeing this movie again soon, which I believe I am planning to do with PalMrshl.

SPOILERS BELOW

As advertised, Nosferatu (2024) is a gloriously detailed, stylized retelling of the 1922 classic horror film.  That original film, in turn, was a copyright-infringing German production that liberally stole from the novel Dracula, changed some names, set the story in Northern Germany, and had a production company with weird, cultish origins.  

In general, I was looking forward to my third Robert Eggers film, having previously seen The VVitch and The Northman.  A big, studio remake of Nosferatu is something I think could go a lot of ways, but if anyone working now was going to do it, Eggers was one of the strongest choices.  I'd only seen two of his three prior films, but I think - and argue with me here - Eggers isn't so much concerned with telling wildly original stories, but telling almost primordial stories and relaying them in ways that show why those stories work, and that it's in the teller and telling that we get at what the stories are about in ways that declutter them from romanticism and remove some of the guard rails.  

Example:  The VVitch is the earliest Anglo North American arcana - it captures the old world fears we brought to the New World as we faced it's sprawling wilderness we couldn't quite tame. Against that backdrop, our concerns about the unknown were turned inward and metastasized.  Those concerns continue to manifest and mutate in paranoid American fantasies that go well beyond the scope of this post.  The Northman is a sort of proto-Hamlet, digging into Nordic tradition and beliefs, and bringing the brutality of the stories in the Eddas to life, exploring revenge in a world that relishes might making right.  With some promise of glory for the fallen warrior along the way.

For veterans of prior incarnations of Nosferatu, whether we're talking the 1922 film or the 1979 version by Werner Herzog, there's a mix of old and new in Eggers' vision.  It's certainly, at it's core, not too different from the original 1922 version, but expanded and...  really well considered.  

Hallmark Holiday Watch Bonus Round - 3 movies I kinda watched

Christmas at Castle Hart

Watched:  12/?/2024

Format:  Amazon?

Viewing:  First

Director:  Stefan Scaini

Some Hallmark movies I just put on, and they played and I didn't pay them much attention as I did other things.  In the past, I generally didn't even bother with mentioning them or doing a write-up with these, but I feel like I'm doing everyone a disservice if I do that to you good people here.

Regret Holiday Watch: Christmas In The Spotlight (2024)

Watched:  12/20/2024

Format:  Amazon/ Lifetime

Viewing:  First

Director:  Michelle Ouellet

Thanks.  I hate it.

Well.  Two movies were released for Christmas this year counting on the public's fascination with the Taylor Swift/ Travis Kelce real-life romance between a music star of epic proportions and a pretty good football player.  The first film blinked, dumped any comparison to that romance, and made itself about the Chiefs being a really good football team since Andy Reid showed up, and avoided mention of Kelce and Swift.

This one is a weirdly lofi version of someone imagining how the romance between a pop star and football player would go down.  And then cast someone you know that, back in high school, would have been mean to you for no reason as the pop star, and then cast a ham with eyes as the football player.

About twenty minutes into the movie, I realized I don't know anything about Taylor Swift or Kelce.  I don't even know any Taylor Swift music aside from "Shake It Off" which has to be a decade old at this point, and I haven't watched a Chiefs game since last season.  But we'd committed, and so we persevered.

It's just a movie that doesn't know how football works, or what it looks like to watch an actual football game.  I won't pretend I know how the pop music machine works in 2024, but I'll guess this is just as accurate as their football take - which includes a pro football fields with soccer markings painted on the field.  

But, wow, you don't really appreciate the talent in these movies until you're left with two largely unlikeable leads role-playing what it would be like to watch two shallow, boring people circle each other until sex happens.  And because this is Lifetime and not Hallmark, sex is definitely implied.

It is funny watching the difference between Hallmark and Lifetime as Lifetime *does* seem to exist more in a world where people do normal things, like make out.  But it turns out real life is kind of dull.  I don't actually want to see two people doing puzzles and cooking together.  Especially not these two.

And if you want to know how awful they are, the finale is them hi-jacking a Christmas performance benefiting a children's hospital to declare their love for each other.  The supporting cast is fine and mostly better than the stars, especially the mom.

This movie exists because someone was going to make it, not because it was a good idea.  Or had any particular story to come up with other than idly speculating about Swift and Kelce, I guess.  Is this what it's like to be famous?  I don't know.  Probably not.  There's no agents, no coaches, no regimens, no concert tours or press to do.  No press agents to handle mishaps.  But there are two 30-something actors fumbling with each other whether you like it or not, giggling way, way too much.

And, I'll say it, both actors have weird heads.

Not Quite Christmas Watch: Winter In Vail (2020) - a study in StrudelFest

Watched:  12/19/2024

Format:  Hallmark Streaming

Viewing:  First

Director:  Terry Ingram

So.... we were maybe 35 minutes into this movie before I realized it wasn't a Christmas movie.  It was a "winter" movie.  I guess this is what Hallmark puts on between Christmas and springtime?  I don't know.  

This movie was essentially a misguided travel brochure for Vail, Colorado, which - as I understand it - is a high end resort town and place for rich people to live and play.  I've been to Colorado once for 3 days for a conference.  It was nice.

The basic gist is that Lacey Chabert is a go-getter at an events planning company.  She's by-passed for a much deserved promotion the same time she inherits a whole "chalet" in Vail, and says "@#$% it, I'm quitting and heading for Vail."

She meets a nice handy-man/ failed architect, gets to see very select parts of Vail and Canada doubling for Vail, and - this is where things get dicey - gets involved with the "old town" portion of Vail that the movie purports to be a sort of hokey German styled tourist trap, where people wear lederhosen and sell German food.*  I assume this is a real thing in Vail.

But by 2020, Vail was also where one went for high end cuisine and fancy nouveau riche nonsense like drinking hot chocolate with gold in it, and I guess the folks who go to Vail in this world abandoned the kitschier part of town.  I have to think calling out people for not sticking to schnitzel and their roots and side-eyeing tourists for wanting sushi is probably a fair point?  Maybe?  But it seems like poking the town you're filming in in the eye for being what it is, is maybe an iffy proposition.  Although this columnist was pretty sure a lot of this wasn't even Vail, and the idea of this house in Vail was even wackier and wasn't so sure they all eat German food non-stop in Vail.

Using her event planning super powers, Chabert cooks up "StrudelFest" to attract people back to German-land.  It works, blah blah blah.  

Anyway, the most fun part of this whole movie is that they simply cannot stop saying StrudelFest.  Once the word is introduced, it's repeated every 30 seconds until the end of the film.  

I think Jamie and I have decided that "StrudelFest" is our go-to codeword for "things are getting out of control" - perfect for the holidays.  

There's something about the need for StrudelFest at all in the movie and the slobs vs snobs posturing that winds up getting squished in favor of including the high-end chefs as judges for Strudelfest's Strudel Contest that just feels like it's both giving us the necessary party, and throwing fuel on the unnecessary fire.  It's a real StrudelFest.

Never before in a narrative has strudel played such a vital part.

StrudelFest.

There's a lot more to this, but no one cares, and all I want to do is talk StrudelFest.

*Central Texas has a heritage of Czech and German settlers.  So I'm actually pretty familiar with the odd Oktoberfest-style celebrations and whatnot 

Hallmark Holidaze Watch: Time For Us To Come Home For Christmas (2020)

run away, Lacey!

Watched:  12/18/2024

Format:  Amazon Streaming - Prime

Viewing:  First

Director:  David Winning

So:  Tonight Jamie and I admitted to each other that we weren't going to watch any of our usual holiday movies.  We gripped hands, Thelma and Louise style, and declared we are going over the Hallmark cliff this year.  I still have two movies I want to get in that are not Hallmark, but if it doesn't happen, I'll live.

Also - I started wondering if the movies at Hallmark had actually gotten better and harder to drag, or if I just got soft.  I mean, I keep talking about how Hallmark recognized it's issues and doesn't make the exact same junk anymore.

Well.  Thank you, Time For Us To Come Home For Christmas (2020), because I've realized, it not me, it's Hallmark.  Or, it was, as recently as 2020.  This movie was super fun to riff and I had a great time.

What's remarkable about Time For Us To Come Home For Christmas is that it's a horror movie in almost every way, but instead of it ending with Lacey Chabert running for her life before putting an axe through a dude's skull, it wimps out and has a nice, Hallmark ending.

Why it's a horror film: