(The Disneycember logo is shown, before showing clips from both The Santa Clause 2 and The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause)
Doug (vo): Well, looks like I'm the only one who couldn't get into the original Santa Clause movie as they made not one, but two sequels to this film, both with Tim Allen reprising the role. How do they hold up? Well, I guess like the first Santa Clause, there's some elements that are really magical, unique and nice, while other moments are painfully predictable and extremely boring and, well, do they balance out? Well, that depends which one you're looking at.
Story of The Santa Clause 2
Doug (vo): In Santa Clause 2: The Mrs. Claus, Tim Allen has to find himself a wife and get married, or else all the powers of Santa Claus will disappear. And, of course, being typical Disney, he only has a month to do it and convince her to marry him.
Review
Doug (vo): Uh-huh. Shit like that makes this really stupid. But what makes it good are some really genuinely romantic elements. And, yes, it's still done in a month, and that's weird, but if you look at everything else as kind of this first date and just a couple slowly falling in love, then, actually, it's not that bad. He tries courting a principal at a school that, at first, he thinks is really cold-hearted, but the more he talks to her, the more he realizes that there's actually more to her than he thought. And their chemistry, I think, is totally believable, and really charming, and leads to a lot of very nice romantic moments. But, guess where it leads? That's right. He has to tell the truth about who he is, she gets angry and doesn't believe him, and it all starts over again. We saw it in the first film, it wasn't good then, why are we watching it again?
[The film's villain is shown in several scenes]
Doug (vo): But to the movie's credit, there's a subplot about a robot Santa who's taking over the North Pole, and it's surprisingly really funny. Let me rephrase that. It's so awkwardly acted that you can't help but find it funny, and I don't know if that was intentional or not, but it actually does get a giggle out of me.
[Another subplot in the film is shown, as well as more various clips]
Doug (vo): But then you gotta sit through another subplot about his son being put on the naughty list which, really, you don't need. You could've cut this and everything would've been fine. And you also had to sit through some incredibly unfunny moments where Tim Allen seems like a jerk and is really annoying, but then at other times, he seems really charming and really nice, and then at other moments, the comic relief can be really funny, and other moments, they can be really not funny and...oh, it's just all over the place. But for me, though, I at least give this movie credit that it's trying something different...for the most part. There's another Clause and there's another mission, but at the same time, we see more of the North Pole, and we see some really nice Christmasy moments, and we see Santa Claus actually being really charming, and, yeah, Tim Allen actually is turning out to be a very unique kind of Santa Claus. It's still Tim Allen, but, yeah, he sort of gives it his own spin. So I did find myself actually liking it enough, because, eh, there's enough unique things to it.
Story of The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause
Doug (vo): The third one, on the other hand, is a bit of a different story. This one's called The Escape Clause, and we have Martin Short come in as Jack Frost, who's trying to totally dethrone Santa and take over his job. Well, that's all fine and good, but we have a subplot where his wife wants to bring her parents up, but they can't, because they don't think they can keep a secret, so they try to convince them that it's Canada. Well, okay, that's kind of funny. That can work, but then we have yet another subplot with her about to give birth, and yet another subplot about him being too busy, and yet another subplot that's combining, like, three different movies where he goes back in time and it's like he never existed as Santa and what does that mean? So we sort of have Back to the Future and It's a Wonderful Life and the other Santa Clause movies and any other movie you can throw in here that's not entirely original.
Review
Doug (vo): There's still some strong elements, like I enjoy how a lot of the machines making the toys break down, so he has to make the bits of the toys that are still around into one other toy, a brand-new toy, that's actually pretty cool. Again, it's showcasing how the Tim Allen personality could actually make an okay Santa Claus. But the parents are miserable characters, most of the time is just spent with people being unhappy, not getting many laughs. Even Martin Short is really underplayed in this comedy. But the designs are still really nice, and I really enjoy these enchanted side characters, like the Easter Bunny and Father Time and stuff like that. They were a good addition in the second film, and they make much more of an appearance here, and I really like them. But for me, there's just not enough fun to it, or comedy.
Final thoughts
Doug (vo): So, yeah, on the whole, I actually would kind of recommend the second one if you can get through some of the bullshit, but the third one just has too much bullshit for me. I give credit that they try to do something new with the idea and at least try to evolve it, and when it works, it's great, but when it doesn't, it's a pretty awkwardly annoying Christmas. But, hell, if you're a Christmas junkie like me, you're gonna see it anyway. So check it out and draw your own conclusions.
[The second movie's final scene, showing Santa flying away on his sleigh, is shown]