Advent Calendar House - TV Holiday & Christmas Specials
TV & Film:TV Reviews
On this Scrooge Sunday edition of the Advent Calendar House, we venture into the uncanny valley on a trip back to 2009 to rewatch Disney’s motion capture nightmare version of “A Christmas Carol,” starring 4 Jim Carreys, 3 Gary Oldmans, 2 Robin Wrights, and a Cary Elwes in a pear shape.
On This Episode:Mike Westfall (@fallwestmike), a touch cross-eyed and mysteriously shrinking for no reason.Matt Weiland (@DinnahDawg), chasing me through the streets of the future in a phantom hearse, and a fee-free Disney Vacation Planner at Matt’s Dream Destinations.Topics and Tangents:Watch “A Christmas Carol’ on Disney+ while it’s still there for the Christmas season.Respect to a Disney movie that jumps from a storybook opening to a corpse’s face.Despite being the 5th highest grossing Christmas movie as of 2020, this is also considered one of the biggest box-office bombs of all time.Coins on a corpse’s eyes in 19th century England had less to do with paying the ferryman’s toll and more to do with keeping their eyes closed.Cary Elwes, who plays one of the “portly” solicitors, is a descendant of John Elwes, a real-life inspiration for the character Scrooge.Christopher Walken as Captain Hook in “Peter Pan Live” and forgetting his lines.Whoever updates Disney’s Movies website accidentally credited Gary Oldman as both Kermit the Frog and Robin the Frog. No one tell them. I think it’s funny, and I hope it stays like that for a bit.Macy’s Dickens Village in Philadelphia.The Ghost of Christmas Present’s whatever-he’s-doing with turning Scrooge’s floor transparent and flying the entire room around London is some weird mix between Disney’s Twilight Zone Tower of Terror and Soarin’ rides.Jim Carrey on his various accents for Scrooge and the ghosts of Christmas Past and Present.Playing Want, of the usually cut for time Ignorance and Want, is Julene Renee, whom I remember from Nickelodeon’s “Roundhouse.”Christmas Yet to Come and the 6-minute chase scene we never knew we were missing.It’s a Robert Zemeckis movie, so of course we get Scrooge hitching a ride on the back of a moving vehicle.Previous Podcast Episodes Mentioned:A Christmas Carol Cast Draft (Season 1, Episode 8)Mickey’s Christmas Carol (Season 3, Episode 1)The Stingiest Man in Town (Season 4, Episode 10)Other Previous Scrooge Sunday EpisodesMister Magoo’s Christmas Carol (Season 4, Episode 8)The Real Ghostbusters: Xmas Marks the Spot (Season 4, Episode 3)BraveStarr: Tex’s Terrible Night (Season 5, Episode 3)Commercial Break:McDonald’s “Scrooge’s Party” Chicken McNuggets Commercial, 1984, as preserved by Dinosaur Dracula.Podcast Promos:Merry Britsmas, exploring Christmas music, TV, film, and traditions from a British perspective.Yuletide TV, a quest to try and find the best Christmas TV episodes ever made.“Disney’s A Christmas Carol” © 2009 Disney.
The Advent Calendar House is on the web at adventcalendar.house, on Instagram @adventcalendarhouse, and on Twitter @adventcalhouse.
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