Christmas Creeps

It's finally here! We conclude Vaughn-a-thon this week with Vince Vaughn's other holiday offering: The $100 million comedy spectacle Fred Claus! What happens when St. Nick's deadbeat brother Fred gets arrested for grifting money away from Salvation Army Santas? Nick bails him out on the condition that he come work for him at the North Pole. And then there are some shenanigans involving Kevin Spacey. Yes, it's all very unpleasant. Anywho, also in this week's episode, Joe breaks out some Fred Claus marketing material, Brad gives the Santa Talk to his dog Charles, and we ponder the difference between Santa Claus and his clan and your average pack of vampires.

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

Welcome to Vaughn-a-thon! This month we're highlighting the two holiday features produced by and starring Vince Vaughn. We kick things off with Four Christmases, which we assumed would be the lesser of two evils. We assumed wrong. From the sheer volume of A-list stars with nothing to do, to the film's weirdly antagonistic tone, to the way it forces regressive notions about family upon a couple with more modern sensibilities, Four Christmases is a dire experience all the way around!

Also in this episode we discuss Freeform's Halloween TV schedule, ponder how seasonal creep operates in the Southern hemisphere, and Joe and Bradford gets a chance to gush about one of their favorite films! Check it out!

(NB: Movie chat begins at 23:50)

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

Summer is winding down, and since we've been in the superhero mood lately, we thought it would be fun to look at a film from earlier this summer. Shazam! not only takes place around the holidays, but makes particularly good use of it in service of its themes of family and togetherness. It's also a pretty damn fun movie, with a positive streak a mile wide.

Why would a studio produce a movie set at Christmas, only to turn around and release it in April? Why would a wizard tell anyone they weren't worthy of magic directly to their face? Why does one of the monsters in this movie strongly resemble Venom? We get into all of that and more!

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

Happy August, everybody! Have you spotted any signs of Christmas Creep out and about? It'll be here before you know it! Anywho, on this week's show, Joe & Johnny-5 take a look at "Christmas with the Joker", the first of two holiday episodes produced for Batman: The Animated Series! Batman and Robin's quiet Christmas Eve is interrupted by The Joker, who's kidnapped Commissioner Gordon and set up all sorts of holiday havoc.

Where did "Jingle Bells, Batman Smells" come from? What did Batman think of It's A Wonderful Life? What is it about Batman that always seems to work so well with Christmas? Just a few of the questions raised in this episode. Come join us!

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsVisit us on the web at ChristmasCreeps.com!

Every once in a while you hit a brick wall, and your only options are to give up or to power straight through it. That's the situation we found ourselves in this week, as we finally subjected ourselves to the astoundingly brain-dead children's comedy SANTA WITH MUSCLES.

Hulk Hogan basically plays himself as a do-gooder fitness guru who gets conked on the head just hard enough to believe he's Santa Claus while defending a beleaguered orphanage from a wacky mad scientist played by Ed Begley, Jr. That is the saddest sentence I have ever written.

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

Every once in a while you hit a brick wall, and your only options are to give up or to power straight through it. That's the situation we found ourselves in this week, as we finally subjected ourselves to the astoundingly brain-dead children's comedy SANTA WITH MUSCLES.

Hulk Hogan basically plays himself as a do-gooder fitness guru who gets conked on the head just hard enough to believe he's Santa Claus while defending a beleaguered orphanage from a wacky mad scientist played by Ed Begley, Jr. That is the saddest sentence I have ever written.

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

It's six months til Christmas, the 4th of July is right around the corner, so what better time to discuss a Jaws movie?! Jaws: The Revenge, to be specific, the movie that IMDb's users have declared the 27th worst movie ever made. It's also the one Jaws movie that actually takes place around the holidays, so like it or not, here we come!

Also in this episode, the guys take a stab at writing their own Jaws sequel, Joe and Bradford actually learn something about foreign culture from this movie, and a Winnie The Pooh meme short circuits J-5's brain...

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsFor show notes, visit us at ChristmasCreeps.com!

With a brand new X-Men film currently in theaters, Joe & J-5 take it upon themselves to discuss "Have Yourself a Morlock Little X-Mas," the Christmas episode from season 4 of X-Men: The Animated Series.

The Morlocks have lured the X-Men into their lair in the hopes of delivering an X-Mas miracle. Can Jubilee, Wolverine and Storm save a young mutant's life and get back home in time for Gambit's X-Mas dinner? In 22 minutes, you'd better believe it!

Also in this episode, Joe waxes on about Dark Phoenix, the guys commiserate about the state of streaming television, and what constitutes a miracle in a world where everyone has mutant powers.

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsVisit us on the web at ChristmasCreeps.com!

We're wrapping up Ani-May this week with one of the finest holiday films we've ever featured! Satoshi Kon's 2003 holiday opus Tokyo Godfathers is a fairy tale about redemption, miracle babies, and all the good stuff you would hope a Christmas movie would be about, all wrapped in the guise of a quest narrative that's slightly comedic and slightly melodramatic, but it all works out in the end.

Joining us this week are Niall Flanagan and Dwayne Moloney of the Secret of the Sailor Madness podcast. Niall and Dwayne are the finest animation experts we know, leading us through the finer points of Satoshi Kon's catalog, mid-2000s Japanese culture, and more!

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsVisit us on the web at ChristmasCreeps.com!

We're back with another Stocking Stuffer, this week tackling "Christmas at Tiffany's", a Christmas episode from stalwart anime Lupin the Third's second series.

Lupin & Co. spend the holiday in New York City when they're offered the chance to rob the world famous Tiffany's for fun and profit. Will the heist go off without a hitch? Or will the gang find themselves behind bars for Christmas? We break it all down this week! There's holiday heists, there's lightsabers, there's even a cameo from a certain Home Alone 2 hotel. It's all here!

Questions/Comments? Email us at [email protected]Tweet us @ChristmasCreepsVisit us on the web at ChristmasCreeps.com!