It Is Happening Again
The Hallmark Channel's Countdown to Christmas turns 16
Deck Them is a seasonal newsletter exploiting the Hallmark Channel’s annual Countdown to Christmas ⭐ Fa-la-la-la-la and find out ⭐
If you can believe it, it’s the Hallmark Channel’s Countdown to Christmas once again. That’s right, Our Holiday Giant is back for its 16th year of around-the-clock holiday programming with 24 new movies, including the continuation of its partnership with the NFL, a new partnership with the Grand Ole Opry, and two new original series. Happy Sweet 16, Countdown.
We’ll be following the nearly 80 hours of new programming across the next 10 weeks a little differently than last year, examining Our Holiday Giant‘s broader cultural implications and connections while exploring other aspects of the holiday season. No matter how much you love it, Julie & Julia-ing this amount of mass market schlock can take its toll.
We won’t end the nightmare; we’ll only explain it, because this is Deck Them.
The festivities kicked off last Friday with the premiere of Mistletoe Murders. Just kidding! This is the same season that aired exclusively on Hallmark+ last year, but don’t tell anyone who still owns a television set.
A Royal Montana Christmas and A Christmas Angel Match premiered Saturday and Sunday, respectively. We didn’t watch either, but depending on who you ask Montana is either (a) bad or (b) the steamiest pairing since Grace Kelly and Cary Grant. As for Christmas Angel, we get that Benjamin Ayres is, like, Hallmark’s Joel McHale, but does Hallmark really need a Joel McHale?
The Countdown to Christmas will continue premiering new movies on Saturdays and Sundays, all season long, through December 21st.
FALL INTO LOVE
Despite being its corporate embodiment, the Hallmark Channel has failed to entirely embrace Fall Girl Fall. It seems like the perfect fodder: the time of year when Instagram is ablaze with chasing the changing leaves, white girls in Uggs, and cozy activities and tips to numb yourself to existential dread. It should be Our Holiday Giant’s cup of pumpkin spice, and yet, we are left with a dearth of fall-themed Hallmark. What we do get is a pile of dog shit hidden under the unraked leaves.
Of the six Autumnal premieres we did get in this year’s Fall into Love programming, there were two standouts.
Adventures in Love & Birding is a classic fake dating scenario for the birding crowd, where facts don’t matter and the plot doesn’t make sense. Starring Rachel Boston and a shirtless Andrew Walker (for two whole seconds!), Love & Birding has already been dragged to hell and back for its inaccurate and lazy bird identification, but there are still a few hijinks! And sentiment! Rachel Boston remains kind of charming! And birds, of the AI-slop and stock footage varieties!
In Haul Out the Halloween, beloved Evergreen Lane becomes Ever Scream Lane as its festive residents take on Halloween, inspired by their new neighbors, Halloweentown’s very own Kimberly J. Brown and Daniel Kountz. With each plot point more loosely tied to the next, we end up spending more time with Wes Brown’s Oedipus complex and Lacey Chabert’s frenemies than anything else.
Fun fact: Wes Brown was in an episode of Twin Peaks: The Return, which was edited by David Lynch’s long-time editor Duwayne Dunham, who directed Halloweentown. And for those of you in the minimal Venn diagram of Hallmark-heads and Twin Peaks obsessives, Paramount has just released a Damn Good Holidays collection featuring Twin Peaks-themed ugly Christmas sweaters and greeting cards—because you asked for it!