‘The Santa Clauses’ Review: Tim Allen Franchise Returns in Disney+ Miniseries Missing Holiday Spark

That the Christmas spirit is not what it as soon as was is the discontent on the coronary heart of Disney+’s The Santa Clauses, which sees Tim Allen’s Santa pondering retirement after practically three many years on the job.

Really, although, was it ever? This is a franchise that started (within the 1994 movie The Santa Clause) with a bitterly divorced salesman killing Santa the evening earlier than Christmas. Its spun-sugar vacation magic has at all times been a bit of askew — and with the newest addition from creator Jack Burditt, it’s taken on a distinctly bitter tinge.

Here is a Santa who gripes that “Saying ‘Merry Christmas to all’ has suddenly become problematic,” and huffs at the concept deeming a child too naughty for presents is “brat-shaming.” He’s shocked to appreciate that the lovely moppet who left him soy milk 20-some years in the past (as we’re reminded of in one of many miniseries’ occasional inclusions of grainy clips from the 1994 movie) has grown into an aimless 30something (Casey Wilson) who’s forgotten all about him.

Santa’s elves (chief amongst them Station Eleven‘s Matilda Lawler, well cast as his brusque lieutenant) have started to float the idea that it might be time for him to move on. Santa’s circle of relatives would are inclined to agree. Mrs. Claus (Elizabeth Mitchell) feels more and more marginalized in a task so thankless she doesn’t have a lot as a primary identify. (Apparently “Carol,” her identify in The Santa Clause 2, doesn’t depend as a result of it was her “before name.” No, I don’t actually get it both.) His children, teenage Cal (Austin Kane) and tween-age Sandra (Elizabeth Allen-Dick, Tim Allen’s real-life daughter), are spending increasingly more time in VR goggles that enable them to simulate the thrillingly mundane expertise of mowing lawns in Kansas.

All that’s left to do earlier than Santa can depart is to discover a successor. While he’s but to seek out one by the tip of the second chapter (the final despatched to critics, of a six-part season), it needs to be apparent to all however the least skilled viewers that it’s destined to be Simon (Kal Penn) — a vaguely Bezosian sort whose vaguely Amazonesque ecommerce enterprise is in determined want of no matter North Pole enchantment permits Santa to ship toys to properties all over the world quicker than any cutting-edge drone.

There’s some poignancy in the concept “Santa” might grow to be simply one other a kind of overly demanding professions that lead holiday-movie dads in all places to neglect their households till some heartwarming third-act epiphany — significantly when it’s mirrored by Simon’s arc as a person for whom the job represents a chance to spend much less time on Christmas Eve work calls and extra time decking the halls together with his extraordinarily cute daughter (Ruplai Rudd). Penn tasks an innate cuddliness that makes him simpler to heat to than Allen’s crank of a Santa arguably ever was.

Unfortunately, such gleams of real emotion or allure are inclined to get buried below shoddy workmanship. For each half-decent joke (“I don’t like wearing anything Ozzy Osbourne wore better,” Mrs. Claus quips of her velvet capes), there’s a nonsensical groaner about “ASS — Acute Squawk Syndrome.” The soundtrack consists of tunes chosen for his or her potential to sound type of just like the Ghostbusters or Indiana Jones themes, however not a lot that they’ll price actual cash.

The undemanding plot and glossy visuals is perhaps sufficient to quiet a room full of youngsters for a half-hour at a time, and probably even elicit a twinge of nostalgia or two of their Millennial dad and mom. But if The Santa Clause‘s central worry is that there’s simply not sufficient vacation magic on this planet anymore, this halfhearted collection appears unlikely to be the reward that’s going to carry it again.