Red One (2024)

"I'm not gonna like you. I can tell right away, out of everyone here, I like you the least." 

Honestly, seeing the poor reviews for this film, I kind of have to disagree, to an extent. Is it an incredibly stupid movie? Yes. Does The Rock's face lowkey piss me off? Also yes. Did Kiernan Shipka and Lucy Liu serve face the entirety of the runtime? Absolutely. As an actual film, no, it was not good. As a Christmas film made for probably ten to twelve year-olds, it was fine. 

I have to give credit where it's due, and to me, I think the idea of an original Christmas movie concept is something impressive in itself. Is the kidnapping of Santa Claus original? No, not really. But the E.L.F. protective service SWAT team or whatever they were was a cool idea, I loved the addition of Krampus, and the inclusion of the Christmas Witch, which I don't even know if is a real thing or not. 

This, in my opinion, was definitely a movie made with the target demographic being elementary school boys, elementary school children at the very least whose parents were looking for a holiday release. Why they decided to release this in the middle of November compared to the beginning or even middle of December I'm unsure, but I'm sure there's plenty of parents out there who were happy to have a somewhat decent holiday movie to find some peace for two hours, which was too long of a runtime for me. There was absolutely no reason this film was two hours instead of an hour-forty-five or sometihng. 

Love to see J.K. Simmons, even though he just benched hella weight and then slept in a chair for the entirety of the movie. Kiernan Shipka was so cunty in this role, and so was Lucy Liu. It's nice to see Chris Evans play these corny villains and not-so-nice (no pun intended) to see The Rock typecasted in his stereotypical role. 

I didn't think that it was half as bad as everyone is saying. I knew going into it that it was going to be something made for elementary schoolers, and that's exactly what I got. The fact that a holiday movie was made that was entertaining and wasn't the same exact script as some previous ones already done was enough for me to have decent expectations and be satisfied. Not sure if this will be added to the Holiday Watchlist, but still a decent holiday watch nonetheless.