Hulu’s new holiday rom-com has no doubt hit your radar this Thanksgiving. And it probably wasn’t for the best reasons.
“Happiest Season”, directed and written by Clea DuVall, tells the story of Abby (Kristen Stewart) and Harper (Mackenzie Davis) as they try to navigate a Christmas spent with Harper’s family, who is unaware that she and Addy are in a romantic relationship. It was released as Hulu exclusive content on November 26th, 2020.
As soon as it was announced, members of the LGBTQ+ community were overjoyed to hear that a holiday movie would center around a lesbian couple. When I googled “LGBT holiday movies”, only ten results appeared, so their excitement was understandable. However, upon the movie’s release, that excitement quickly turned to disappointment.
While I cannot speak on behalf of the LGBTQ+ community, I can speak as a lover of Christmas movies. So here are some of my thoughts on “Happiest Season”!
WARNING: THE FOLLOWING PIECE INCLUDES SPOILERS FOR HULU’S “Happiest Season”! PROCEED WITH CAUTION!
It is not a romantic comedy.
Although marketed as a fun holiday rom-com, there’s nothing really funny about it. I think I made it through the entire hour and 42 minutes without laughing once.
It’s good for the first few minutes, but as soon as Abby and Harper leave to go see Harper’s family, Abby is just miserable for the rest of the movie. And that’s just sad to watch. The movie also carries more of a serious tone than a humorous one, so any jokes that appeared in it usually felt out of place.
it’s barely a Christmas movie
The beginning feels like Christmas. The ending scene before the flash-forward feels like Christmas. But everything in-between forgets about Christmas completely. There are no warm Christmas cheer moments that are a staple of the holiday classics! It just feels like a normal movie that just happened to happen during Christmas.
Abby and Harper
Abby (Kristen Stewart) is probably my favorite character in the entire movie. She wanted to meet Harper’s family under the impression that they knew she was Harper’s girlfriend. But when Harper waits until the last second to tell Abby that she hadn’t come out to her parents yet, Abby is fine with. She keeps their relationship and her own sexuality a secret just to keep Harper happy, because she loves her and Harper promises to tell her family after the holidays.
Harper (Mackenzie Davis) is probably my least favorite character of any Christmas movie that I’ve ever seen. She ditches Abby in favor of sucking up to her parents and hanging out with her ex-boyfriend! She gaslights Abby into thinking that she’s the victim and that Abby is overacting about certain things!
Eventually, Abby break up with Harper… only for Harper to run after her and convince her to stay. And Abby does… only to break up with her again, this time when Harper denies their relationship after being outed by her sister at the Christmas party (in front of all of her family and friends). I don’t feel like this should have to be said but apparently..
IF THE CHARACTERS IN YOUR CHRISTMAS ROM-COM BREAK UP TWICE, THE AUDIENCE ISN’T GOING TO WANT THEM TO END UP TOGETHER!
But of course, Harper runs after Abby again and they end up living happily ever after. woo.
My favorite part of the movie is when they broke up. I loved watching Abby tell Harper off, it was great. She deserved it.
a waste of Aubrey Plaza.
It’s just an objective fact that Abby should have left Harper for Riley.
Riley (Aubrey Plaza) was Harper’s first girlfriend from highschool. In my favorite scene in the entire movie, Riley tells Abby that when she and Harper were lifelong best friends that fell in love. But when someone found a love letter from Riley in Harper’s locker, Harper outed Riley to the entire school rather than come clean about their relationship. So ultimately, she and Abby were in similar situations.
Every scene with Abby and Riley hanging out or even just briefly interacting is just infinitely better than any other scene with Abby and Harper. The absolute best scene in the movie is when Riley takes Abby to a drag show to cheer her up! It’s really one of the only scenes in the movie that feels like Christmas!
Riley had chemistry with Abby that Harper NEVER did, not even in the being of the movie when they were a happy couple! I don’t understand why they didn’t up together.
the end.
the climax was stupid and I hated it.
Harper’s sister Sloane (Allison Brie) finds out about Harper and Abby’s relationship. She and Harper get into a physical fight that ends with a painting being smashed over Sloane’s head, a Christmas being tackled by three grown women, and Harper denying her and Abby’s relationship to her entire family. I didn’t enjoy it.
the ending was stupid and I hated it.
Harper receives no consequences for her actions and Abby just forgives her for everything. It’s such an unsatisfying ending and overall really disappointing.
In conclusion…
it was frustrasting to watch.
There is still so much about this movie that I haven’t even touched on!
- The rest of Harper’s family (and how badly they treat Abby)
- Abby getting arrested!!
- John, and he’s subplot about killing a fish!
- THE ENDING FLASH FORWARD!
But seeing as I’m almost at 1000 words on this post alone, I’ll just leave it here. Maybe I’ll revisit it for a part two next week?
A better Christmas movie with LGBTQ+ representation is “The Family Stone” and although it’s no where near perfect, I prefer it much more that “Happiest Season”. But hopefully in the years to come, there will be more than just ten options for LBGTQ+ Christmas movies!
