I love Christmas specials. I have been watching them for years. My all time favorite is Santa Claus Is Coming to Town. When I was young I would scan the TV Guide for weeks to find out when it was on to be sure not to miss it. I know every word to the Put One Foot In Front of Another song. I even bought the DVD last year to add it to my collection. I like all of the specials though and there is a fondness in my heart for all of them.

Needless to say I was excited when I discovered a couple of weeks ago that there was a live action version of The Year Without a Santa Claus being televised this year. I did my research, found out when it was on and made sure to have my roommate DVR it since I would still be in Maine. I finally got a chance to watch it last night.

In a word...

IT SUCKED!!!!

It was painful to watch. There was not one interesting thing about it. The script was bad. The acting was bad. The production design was bad. The direction was bad. Having it end was the only good thing about it. I felt like I was watching a small town's community theatre production of The Year Without a Santa Claus. To make matters worse it was two hours long with is about 60 minutes longer than a kids show should ever be. Especially one that doesn't have jokes built in for the adults. But wait it didn't stop there. As the icing on the cake...it was offensive. There was a guest appearance by "every one's favorite TV therapist" Dr. Laura. How did anyone think this was a good idea. If I remember correctly her TV show only lasted a second because of all the controversy. Really? How did anyone think this would be a good idea?

Tonight my roommate and I were watching TV and I mentioned that I had watched the show last night and how bad it was. He didn't believe me. How could John Goodman and Delta Burke not be funny? How could that be. It's a children's show. It had to have a few redeeming qualities. When the show we were watching ended he started the recording. Within 15 minutes my point was proven. Santa was grumpy and mean. The writing was boring, not engaging, and so far nothing had happened. He wanted it to end. I did recommend seeing the production number of the Heat Miser and Snow Miser so we fast forwarded. Even that was disappointing. The chorus for each of them were 4 scantily clad girls in heels doing their high school choreography from Guys and Dolls. Where were the people? To put it mildly even the song was bad.

So what's my point? I don't understand how this crap got made. Who would think it was a good idea to do this? The original is wonderful fun. I have watched it every year for decades. Why do we need to take something that was done well in the first place and make a mockery of it? I think of the money spent to do this show and can't help but wonder how many homeless people could have been fed. How much medication for the elderly could have been purchased. If they let me be in charge for 5 minutes the first thing I would do is fire the person who green-lighted this project.