MYSTERY 101: WORDS CAN KILL (2019)

It seems like they really hit their stride with this third installment of the MYSTERY 101 series. The mystery was good with lots of twists and turns, the movie itself looked good and somehow the non-relationship relationship between our two main characters actually didn’t move forward at all, which is what we all want. Just let it stay in that cute awkward flirty stage forever!

Elmstead College is holding a Mystery writers convention. Of course, our hero professor’s mystery novelist dad is going to be there, but so is another writer that he used to have bad blood with and even an old agent who he also has bad blood with. Things happen and bodies start piling up. So now it’s up to our favorite professor and the handsome homicide detective stud to solve the case! It’s awesome and a lot of fun. I especially loved the scene where they were in a well lit parking lot at night and he insists on walking her to her car, they then walk over like 8 steps and they’re at her car. I don’t know why, but that scene cracked me up.

Of the three MYSTERY 101 films that I’ve seen, WORDS CAN KILL is the best so far. It was cute and silly and did a solid job of building on the groundwork laid by the previous two films. Some grumpy fucks might poo-poo all over it, but, as far as low-stress comfort films go, I really liked it. Check it out!

Part 1 - Mystery 101 (2019)
Part 2 - Mystery 101: Playing Dead (2019)
Part 4 - Mystery 101: Dead Talk (2019)
Part 5 - Mystery 101: An Education in Murder (2020)
Part 6 - Mystery 101: Killer Timing (2021)
Part 7 - Mystery 101: Deadly History (2021)

CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S (2014)

"Christmas is about profit and numbers."

Alicia Witt is unemployed as fuck, broke as fuck and fucked as fuck cuz she cannot pay her rent, she has a super annoying kid she has to provide for and it's Christmas. But wait a minute cause undercover angel Wallace Shawn performs some olde tyme Christmas angel witchcraft and gets Alicia a job as a store Santa at the prestigious Cartwright’s department store. Oooooooooooh! Fancy. Now you might be asking yourself: how does the payroll and tax stuff work with a woman secretly acting as a dude at a job where literally nobody knows her secret…and you might even be curious how she was able to pay her overdue back-rent after only being on the job for like three days, but, you see, you’re thinking too much! This is a Hallmark movie, motherfucker! Relax. Take your big, ol’ overheated noodle and put it on a shelf and quit thinking. If you do insist on thinking while you watch this upbeat motherfucker, think about how easy (and fun) it would be to re-edit this into a horror movie. Example: Wallace Shawn isn't an actual angel...he's just fucking crazy.

As much as I would like to be a Hallmark movie expert, I’m not (since I don’t come across the DVD’s that much), but I have thoroughly enjoyed the ones that I have seen. CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S is no different. It’s awesome. The story is predictable as fuck, the acting is all over the place (especially by the background actors), the annoying child character is easily the most emotionally mature character in the entire film (despite the fact that she cannot spell the words “blue” or “night”), the production design and sets looks interchangeable with other Hallmark films and the positivity! Oh my god. The shit is off the scales! I think I talked back to the television for the entire movie. At one point towards the end, I remember standing straight up and yelling “This fucking movie!!!” with my left arm out. Haha. I was seriously getting upset with the two main characters not hooking up.

Overall, I really enjoyed CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S and was surprised at how much I enjoyed Alicia Witt’s overacting. Especially all the funny faces she made. It was awesome. Even if her hair was too short. I also really liked Gabriel Hogan. He had a playful demeanor that I thought was cute. His hair was okay.

Now that I think about it, I don't remember seeing any horrible jackets in this movie. That seemed to be a running theme in the couple of films that I saw in the MYSTERY 101 and CHRISTMAS IN EVERGREEN series. I thought that might be a Hallmark, uhhh, hallmark.

[Not part of the review: Cerealously though, if anybody has some Hallmark discs, send them my way.]

Oh fuck...I was just going back and watching it again and I remember in the scene were the kid cannot spell "blue" in class, right when she got it wrong, I said "Stupid!" and at the exact same moment the kid sitting behind her said "Dummy." hahahaha, oh shit I was dying.

SANTA JAWS (2018)

For Christmas a teenage boy gets an ink pen that will (unknowingly to him) bring anything drawn with it to life. He draws a shark wearing a Santa hat. The next morning, the Santa shark eats the kids grandpa while they’re out fishing. Instead of calling 911, the kid tells his parents who tell him to stop lying and take away his phone. After that, the rest of the movie is just the kid and his dorky friends (and eventually his family) fighting the shark and never once calling the police even as they all die one by one. Fin.

As far as Christmas stories go, SANTA JAWS is more believable and less depressing than the Biblical Nativity Story, so it does have that going for it, but unfortunately, while the story also shows a few glimpses of imagination…the execution is fucking abysmal. Horrible dialogue, bland scenery and sets, Satanawful look to the entire thing (is that because it’s shot on a digital camera or something? Why do you look like such ass, bro?), literally not one single person on screen that isn’t part of the story…no cars driving by or people simply walking in the background, middle school play-level acting, zero nudity, zero gore, zero cheerleaders, ugly clothing, an ending that goes on for way too long, weak as hell special effects, multiple bad puns and jokes that kinda make me believe this might have been a comedy.

Comedy or not, SANTA JAWS is an amusing watch, if you’re into this kind of thing. Overall, it sucked, but I did enjoy it and have no regrets in watching it. Although I doubt I'll ever watch it again...unless I decide to explore just how shitty the subtitles are on the DVD. Jesus wept.

[Not part of the review: I’m very fascinated by this entire type of movie. Not killer animal movies, but this budget range of film that is obviously not going to be a masterpiece but somehow marketed well enough to make its money back. It’s endlessly fascinating. I really wish I knew more about it. If there isn’t already, somebody should make a documentary about it. I just love how there seems to be an endless supply of these weird, nothing movies. Then again, maybe I’m not real and I’m just dreaming all of this up as I slowly decay.]

[This really has nothing to do with the review, but on the IMDb page for SANTA JAWS it says there is a "Goof" where "During the fishing scene with Papa and Cody, Cody is holding his rod upside down." I including a shot of Cody fishing with his grandpa and the fishing pole is being held just like the grandpas. With the line roller thing on the bottom. There are two shots of Cody's rod (insert low effort penis joke here) in this scene and they both look like the screenshot included below.]

The subtitles on this DVD are nearly worthless. In this scene, the actor clearly says “Ho, ho, ho. You son of a fish.” and this is what the subtitles say.