Hey, we made it. It’s nearly Christmas which means it’s nearly the end of The Bad Year™. Sure, 2021 is going to suck, too, at least for a while. But the good news is that you’ll have plenty to watch, read, listen to, and obsess over as the yule log crackles in the fireplace (or on your TV).
Looking for a guide? We’ve got copious lists of our favorite TV shows, movies, albums, books, and video games. Surely there’s a title or 10 in there you’ve yet to consume. You know, like First Cow. It’s time to stop putting off First Cow. We’ve also got lists of our favorite trailers, movie scenes, and TV episodes, each adorned with a digital sprig of holly. And, yeah, they won’t be quite the same on the small screen, but Wonder Woman 1984 and Soul will also premiere on HBO Max and Disney+, respectively, this week.
That should give you plenty to peruse as we power down for the next few days. We’ve still got plenty of fun content running, including the best and worst stuff we saw online this year, but the Newswire desk will be off duty until Monday, December 28. So, as another year comes to a close, we offer many thanks for your continued patronage, your spirited discourse, and, of course, your passion for pop culture in all of its many manifestations.
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For those of you like me who were wondering, the article photo is from the 2005 Santa slasher movie Santa’s Slay. I wish I was making that up.Happy holidays, you degenerate ingrates!
I LOVE that movie! I recognized the pic, too!https://pureblather.com/2015/12/09/santas-slay/
On the Dave Thomas Continuum, it’s above Intern Academy but well below Strange Brew.
When your adapting Shakespeare you have a strong structure for your comedy.
Former AV Club writer Nathan Rabin recently did a write-up of Santa’s Slay over at his Happy Place. Go check it out!
Also, Santa’s Slay is goddamned awesome!
I’m surprised that there hasn’t been a writeup here on the recent Fatman — this year’s weirdly violent Santa movie. Or is it intentionally ignored to due to the presence of Mel Gibson in it?
When the DVD rental place closed back in college (2007ish), we bought all 28 copies of this MASTERPIECE and gave them to everyone we knew for Christmas.
Really? That was a joke in 1988’s Ernest Saves Christmas.
Uh… what was?
And yes, the fact that I grew up in a home where we watched Ernest Saved Christmas is one of the major reasons for my many deep-seated issues.
And yes, the fact that I grew up in a home where we watched Ernest Saved Christmas is one of the major reasons for my many deep-seated issues.
I grew up outside of Wetaskiwin, AB, where they filmed a bunch of scenes; it is absolutely hilarious to look back at how hyped up the filming of this glorious abomination was.Also, another sad RIP to Tiny Lister.
Doesn’t Goldberg play Santa in that?
The best thing about that movie: casting a Jewish man as Santa.
Oh hey, happy holidays from Russia, you crazy Americans.It’s weird to think that I’ve been reading this site for nearly ten years now. I remember I was reading wikipedia entries of How I Met Your Mother episodes which I was watching for the first time, cause I each page had the section for running gags, which I enjoyed following. And in the every entry there was the “critical reaction”, and they linked Donna Bowman’s reviews, which I started reading religiously. Then I found reviews for other shows I was watching, newswires, which, in a way, got me addicted to American pop culture. Haven’t stopped since. Back in early 2011 watching HIMYM and reading Donna’s reviews played a major part in helping me get through a terrible, incredibly painful breakup. For which I’m greatful.I should’ve probably written this in a few months instead of now, but what the hell.
Howdy! Glad you’re here.But haven’t I heard somewhere that Russians are crazy, lol?
I never watched HIMYM but Donna’s reviews of Breaking Bad (and now Better Call Saul) and Newsradio are the best in the field.
AND A HAPPY HOGSWATCH TO YOU AS WELL.
HO. HO. HO.
Say hi to the Death of Rats for me! I hope you and “The Grim Squeaker” have a great Hogswatch.
It’s time to stop putting off First CowI was disappointed when I learned that it wasn’t a sequel to Alpha and wasn’t about how mankind tamed cattle. I was hoping there would be a new DCU — Domestication Cinematic Universe.
I refuse to believe that First Cow is anything other than a movie about a farmer being elected President and moving into the White House with his prize steer.
The poster can be the American Gothic couple in front of the White House but the wife is one of the Chick-fil-A cows in a bonnet. The entire plot is keeping her bovine nature a secret, which is easy because everyone’s an idiot. There will be a game tie-in, an Octo-Dad sequel called First Lady Madame Bovary.
I’ve got a lot of problems with you people, and now you’re gonna hear about it.
You! Cougar! My son tells me your company stinks!
It has been a shitty, shitty year, so why not celebrate with the annual look back at the true spirit of Christmas: The Shart Thread, miraculously born from a Hater article about the Charmin bears and a crew of AV Club commenters with nothing better to do for a solid week than share stories of how they shat themselves. Some hero dug up the full Disqus thread in all its foul brown glory a few years back, here it is. God bless us, everyone: https://disqus.com/home/discussion/avclub/this_holiday_message_is_brought_to_you/oldest/#comment-271796068Original Hater here: https://www.avclub.com/this-holiday-message-is-brought-to-you-1798215388
I was thinking about that thread a while back when trying to articulate the value of allowing comments. That, and the Choose Your Adventure thread and Law & Order spec script thread.
I’m three days late, but happy whatever the fuck you Seppoes call Christmas from Down Under:
2020 makes 2016 look like 1996.
Remember how much we bitched about 2018 and 2019?
Thanks folks. In London restrictions mean Christmas with the family (and even my girlfriend) is cancelled, so am spending it entirely alone, which is a first. Like most people in this position, I’ll just get drunk, watch films, and eat shit food. Don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas, but there’s something nice about the lack of pressure and not having to go through the whole charade.
I hope everyone is going to enjoy theirs as much as I will mine.
I have done this pre-quarantine and it is wonderful.
Warning: If Santa attempts to enter your quarantine, DO NOT HUG HIM. Santa is a Covid superspreader. First, try to calmly lure him away from your residence using a combination of sugar cookies, unpasteurized milk, and Kentucky bourbon. If that doesn’t work, then physical violence is your only recourse. Remember, startled Santas tend to charge directly into your fist. Happy quarantine Xmas everybody.
We’re doing a small gift exchange here, and also we’ll be celebrating by watching either Soul or WW84 while building the Lego Razor Crest I got as a gift as a family activity.
Happy holidays, Clubbers. My Christmas will be challenging this year, due to an unfortunate recent medical diagnosis, but I’m committed to making it as jolly as possible. See you all in 2021, hopefully a reprieve from this year’s clusterfork.
Oh shit I’m sorry. I hope everything’s okay.
Thankyou for that. It’s a pretty serious diagnosis, but treatment is underway and I’m keeping positive.
Thanks for continuing to create a place where we can mostly not talk about current events or politics. Much appreciated. Happy holidays.
yeah. I’m over politics for a little while. Happy holidays matey, and to the rest of ya.
Happy holidays!
Is anyone buying themselves a present this year?My apartment apparently has winter mice, the smart kind who steal bait without setting off the traps, so I’m going to take that sweet, sweet COVID money and buy myself a cat. I figure even $600 bucks minus adoption fees will be enough to cover a year of vet bills and food, even though the cat really should be able to sustain itself entirely off a diet of mice and not manipulate me into doing its grocery shopping.Also, does anyone have advice on how to pick out a cat who is a natural born mouse killer? With all my previous cats, it’s kinda been a toss-up as to whether they’re hunters or just fat lazy slobs with nothing to contribute to society.Anywho, Merry Chrimbus to all, and remember to keep your bush trimmed and wet!
Merry Chrimbus to you! A Merry and financially lucrative Chrimbus to everyone! Also this is not based on science, but good mouser cats tend to come from ‘rural areas’ (IE my cousin from VA gave me a cat once), be an orange tabby cat (my beloved Tigger) and live in a house where there’s just not a lot of food (my home as a teen and into my 30’s-basically before marriage). Those three combinations created a lean, mean killing machine who wouldn’t just mouse but saw as his personal goal in life the need to extinguish multitudes of mice, birds, squirrels and anything else he was bigger than. So rural Orange Tabby with lack of food will work. He also loved MST3K at midnight (when they did that on Comedy Central) but will paw at the bong in your lap while you’re trying to smoke and enjoy the show.
Happy Holidays, AV Club!
Hope everyone has a good holidays this year. Stay Safe.