When we think of the holiday season, two types of movies come to mind. There are the stone-cold classics like Home Alone and Elf, and then there is the onslaught of Hallmark movies, which have become a guilty pleasure for many, including myself. There is plenty of silly romance widely available across the best streaming services.
Look, you can't help it sometimes. This time of year, it's impossible to scroll through Paramount Plus without seeing them, and I often find myself drawn to some of the titles because they just sound downright ridiculous, predictable, and the perfect background noise. I like watching bad movies sometimes. I'll continue to go to bat for Sharknado, thank you. Come to think of it, maybe a Christmas Sharknado is a good idea?
But, I digress. The point I'm getting at is while there's so much twee romance, there's just not enough action. Many of us agree that Die Hard is a Christmas movie (and if you think the same, congratulations, you're right). Still, outside of Bruce Willis tearing up Nakatomi Plaza, there are not as many straight-action flicks set during the festive season. Personally, I think we need more mindless fight scenes and action set pieces during this time of year.
This is where Red One comes in. You've probably seen it performing very poorly on Rotten Tomatoes over the past couple of days, and it currently has a 33% critic score. It's not great, but you know what? I had a great time. It allowed me to shut off my brain for a little while and fall into some mindless festive action.
In defence of the mindless action movie
In the same way that we can't get enough of Hallmark cheese, there's no reason why we can't enjoy a big, silly action movie over the holiday season. I would probably consider Red One to be a guilty pleasure, just like watching a romance movie called A Castle for Christmas. Going in, you know it's not going to be the next 2001: A Space Odyssey, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
You could even argue that Red One is better because it has an ensemble cast to enjoy, if nothing else. There is admittedly a great cast here, folks. We've got Dwayne Johnson, Lucy Liu, Chris Evans, and Kiernan Shipka, not to mention JK Simmons as Santa Claus. I mean, come on, the guy who terrified us in Whiplash and then did it again in Baldur's Gate 3 playing Santa? Now we're talking!
You can roll your eyes at me if you want, but I say we should have some more over-the-top action movies to enjoy this time of year, enough to rival the countless romances that are churned out. Let's just start beating up sentient snowmen or something. Let's get silly. Christmas is a time of joy and celebration; we don't have to take everything so seriously.
I appreciate the classic, critically approved Christmas movies we do have, but I also have room for movies that make you "Wow, that was stupid, I loved it!"
Give Red One a chance. No, it's not going to win any awards or anything, but you've got a giant polar bear who gives off King Shark in The Suicide Squad energy, which is how I've started selling it to people.
There's loads going on in this Christmas movie. It doesn't always make sense, and it is a bit cringe-worthy in places, but it set out to entertain, and that's exactly what it does. Sometimes, losing yourself in the dumbest, needlessly violent movie you've ever seen is fine, and we should stop pretending it's a bad thing.
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