This town has something called “Basket Shop.” For all your basket needs.
Julie Brown is in this. Downtown or regular?
This kid with a bowl cut is disappointed about having eggs instead of cereal.
Holy shit, I think it’s Jerry from Parks and Rec again. He’s telling some guy named Chris that to find the perfect wife he needs to be in NYC or LA or something. Blow me, Jerry, Fred found me in KY.
Bowl Cut’s mom is hassling a coworker about dating the boss. Mom’s name is Jen and she’s a human interest reporter. The new guy Sam does crime. I think I’m supposed to find him attractive. Jen sure seems to. Sam is wearing a V-neck sweater with the shirt underneath open.
Jerry is trying to convince some guy to let Chris be a mall Santa. I guess Jerry takes the pictures. Chris: “This might sound corny, but for me it’s a labor of love. It’s what I was born to do.” Some weird sound effects happened that make me think he kinda hypnotized the mall guy.
Jen is too tired to put up decorations with Bowl Cut and Julie Brown (regular, not Downtown.) How is she tired? I haven’t seen her do anything. Julie Brown is telling Jen that the Mike Maxim action figure the kid wants has been sold out for weeks. Jen: “What I remember about Christmas is being left with an infant when my husband walked out.” Either that small-town paper pays a lot or she gets mad child support. They’ve taken the boy to see mall Santa. I sense a meet-cute. But first, a pointless montage of kids on Santa’s lap. Bowl Cut’s name is Eric, which Santa somehow knows. Jen has gone back in to yell at Santa for telling Eric he’d get Mike Maxim. OMG, Jen is annoying and whiny. I can kinda see why her husband left her. He talked to her for like, 30 seconds and now she’s all happy. He’s definitely got some kind of mind power. Now he’s staring at her like she’s something special.
According to Jerry, Chris only has until midnight Christmas Eve to find a wife. Because he’s the son of Santa. Apparently he can’t take over without a Mrs Santa.
New guy Sam is now asking out Jen.
Eric is supposed to be seven, but he acts like he’s four.
The boss is making Jen have dinner with some random family. He really wants a feel-good Christmas story.
Jen took Eric to the Christmas tree lot, which is run by Chris. He has a tree all picked out with Eric’s name on it. Okay, at this point I would be thinking he was a stalker, but Jen invited him for cookies. How the hell did she get both forearms coated with cookie dough to the elbows?
Jen is trying to get Mike Maxim on eBay. They’re going for over $400. Now she’s whining about not having a man who treats her right.
Chris is telling Jerry that his powers are getting stronger and this is somehow because of Jen. To prove it, he pointed out the naughty kid in a group, but the kid looked like a little asshole to me and I don’t have any Santa powers.
Jen has brought Chris (as Santa) to the dinner with random people. These are the most cheerful motherfuckers on the planet. Which is weird, considering the dad said he hasn’t “worked in quite awhile” and they “decided” to have no presents this year. And the mom burned the hell out of the turkey. Chris is gonna fix it, though. And he’s offering the dad a job at the Christmas tree farm. As year-round manager. And he left them some presents. That’s a pretty big house they have; they could maybe sell it.
Flashback to the night Jen’s husband left. He says she tricked him into having a baby. He seems like a dick; why’d she marry him in the first place? He broke the ornament her mom gave her before she died.
Jen: “There’s no magic, Chris. There’s just life.” Has she never seen Michael Jackson perform? Or heard a cat purr? Is she unaware of David Bowie?
Chris is telling Jerry about how he “reverse-cooked the turkey” and “generated presents.” And he still insists it’s because of Jen, who has yet to do or say anything remotely interesting or special.
At the office Christmas party, the boss is proposing to the lady he’s been dating. I’d be so pissed if someone did that to me. Now he’s telling Jen he was surprised by how good her “Christmas spirit” article is. Jen: “Maybe Santa has been rubbing off on me.” Me: “BAHAHAHAHA!” Sam just told her she could be “doing something important” and offered to teach her investigative reporting. I think he offended her, but I can’t tell because she didn’t tell him to go fuck himself.
Chris has arrived to take Jen on a Christmas Eve date, and while tucking Eric in, Eric told him that all he really wants for Christmas is for his mom to get a man. Seriously? Wait. If it wasn’t Christmas before, why was that family having a big turkey dinner? The date is ice skating, which was her favorite thing to do as a kid on Christmas Eve. Now he’s predicting a proposal at the rink. He’s finally telling her he’s Santa’s son. She doesn’t believe him, but she’s falling in love with him (in what? a week?) He’s in love with her, too. And he’s rambling about life at the North Pole, which seems to have made Jen physically ill. And angry.
Chris is now whining to Jerry that Jen is “the one” and he screwed up. Jen has called Sam and is telling him she’d like to have a man in her life, but she has to think about Eric, blah blah. Sam is letting her know that he had no intention of having a serious relationship with her.
Back at home, Jen is crying to Julie Brown. Eric overheard, so now she has to explain it to him, too.
Chris and Jerry are packing up to leave. Suddenly Jerry also believes that Jen is “the one.”
Eric somehow spotted a present all the way behind the tree. It’s Mike Maxim, of course. Now there’s a gift for Jen. It’s the ornament from the flashback and she immediately runs out to see Chris. I hope she’s too late, but it isn’t that kind of movie. Heh heh, she passed Julie Brown on the way out and “gave” her Sam.
She was almost too late, but there he is in the parking lot. They’re kissing. And it’s snowing. In what I’m pretty sure is southern California. For fuck’s sake.
Eye of Newt 