O Natal dos Irmãos Avarento

My daughter loves it! Updated tale from the classic Year without a Santa Claus. Great lesson on cooperation! No matter what my brother says, this is a modern classic!

As with practically every TV show and movie, when you try to resurrect characters years later, the efforts are usually pretty pale imitations of the original. Some examples are the new Indiana Jones movie, the latest Star Wars films and attempts to revive the TV show "The Odd Couple". If I really thought about it, I am sure I could create a very long list of such misses--and you could as well.

Well, in this same tradition, two somewhat obscure characters from the Rankin-Bass special, THE YEAR WITHOUT A SANTA CLAUS (1974) debuted--the Heat Miser and Snow Miser. They were great characters for kids and when I recently saw this old TV special again, I still enjoyed their antics. When my daughter found out that these two guys were returning for a NEW special, she insisted we watch it.

The show is once again nominally about Santa Claus and through some intrigue that I could care less about, the evil North Wind is intent on destroying Santa and it's up to the two feuding Misers to make up and work together for the good of Christmas. In addition there are a whole host of immortals who control earthquakes, nature and head lice (I made that one up). This is all rather odd, I grant you. The problem is that not only are these new characters rather boring, but as a result of all this silly mumbo-jumbo, this hardly seems like a Christmas special at all! Additionally, the old Rankin-Bass stop-motion style has been replaced with a nice looking but noticeably different CG animation that is meant to mimic stop-motion. So, in other words, they deliberately made the characters move in a jerky fashion to imitate the old film. But, try as they might, it didn't look like the old film but this wasn't nearly the problem that the insipid story posed to the production.

As far as the voice talents go, most of the original cast had either died or perhaps weren't interested other than Mickey Rooney who once again plays Santa. You can't blame them for not getting Shirley Booth or Dick Shawn since they were dead, but it was terribly obviously different if you watched this immediately after seeing THE YEAR WITHOUT A SANTA CLAUS. Mrs. Claus, in addition to a different voice, has been replaced with a younger and sexier new Mrs. Claus! The bottom line is that a bad story and too many changes result in a movie that the kids might like but parents will find tough going. Watchable, but just barely.

My biggest gripe on this one was not Snow Miser or Heat Miser...it was the other characters in this story. I think they did a decent job with the two main characters, but outside of them everything was beyond terrible. They did not even try to replicate the characters. They all looked different.....much cheaper. The elves for example looked not as detailed...they looked like an after thought. In fact, most of the elves were kids or kids with mustaches. Mrs. Claus looked like that lady from Sylvester and Tweety...you know the granny that hits Sylvester over the head with a cane. Santa Claus......it's hard to describe....he looked like he was from another story...not a Year Without Santa Claus. Mother Nature? The same. Why no Jingle and Jangle? Seriously why do a half attempt. It is almost like they were rushing this out for Christmas and said...oops we gotta get this out in a couple days hurry up design some characters.

On top of that, the music was terrible....besides playing the Heat Miser and Snow Miser themes on more than one occasion. They even had Snow Miser sing "He's Mister Green Christmas". Then had Heat Miser sing "He's Mister White Christmas". Any opportunity to play this song possible. Other than these songs......hardly a thought was given to the music.

I did enjoy baby Snow Miser and baby Heat Miser. And seeing both Characters again.

It was nice to hear the original Santa and Heat Miser voices included....although both voices where different due to the fact both men are now in their 80's.....especially Santa. I really had no gripes with Snow Miser cast. Everything else...URGH! I ask why they just could not do this right. Make the Characters look at least somewhat like they used to...which means include Jingle and Jangle. Spend a little more time coming up with decent Christmas songs.

It hurts me to say this but...........thumbs down.

Maybe "Anyone Can Be Santa" but not anyone can be Rankin/Bass! Though it (very poorly) replicates characters and stop-motion animation style from a R/B special, it does not not reproduce their knack for warm storytelling, enchanting character and set designs or fanciful catchy songs. The scenes involving Heatmiser and Snowmiser, along with the rest of the Mother Nature family are actually quite tolerable and work the best. Even their newly introduced bad-guy brother, North Wind is kinda cool. It's everything outside of that that stinks and stinks hard. Why they chose to drastically change the look of every character (and not for the better) other than the Miser Brothers is beyond me! The new elves are particularly annoying and bland. They totally dissed Jingle and Jangle. And just who are these bland imposters posing as Mr and Mrs Claus?! Everything in this one looks cheap cheap cheap ... and sounds! ... like a cheese grater on your ears! The songs are the worst part - scratchy annoying kids voices akin to a kindergarten class en-un-ci-at-ing each syl-la-ble to a song they are forced to sing in a school play backed by cheap electronic music. You can't even compare that to the wonderful, lush orchestrations by Maury Laws and co that populated the R/B classics. Just stick with the original Year Without A Santa Claus (and avoid that poor live-action remake as well!) Though this may be tempting to those aching to see more Heatmiser and Snowmiser ,watching this sequel will leave you feeling as you do when you have that extra hunk of cake that you really did not need or want.

Our society seems to have lost the capacity to make a decent Christmas special. I don't know where to start. I'm a huge fan of The Year Without a Santa Claus (I even have the action figures) and the models they used in this "sequel" for the miser brothers don't really resemble the originals. They didn't even try with the other characters of Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Mother Nature who all look completely different. The original characters were charming and warm but these ones seemed like lifeless dolls. The story line was nonsensical and the music was simply dreadful. I honestly think the music and lyrics were written in a single evening. The only decent songs in the whole program where the retreads of the miser brother songs from the original. This is the second flop based on The Year Without a Santa Claus so I'm inclined to say leave well enough alone and don't attempt any more. Just because we now have the technology to churn out shows doesn't mean you can skip the story telling and music writing. Too bad because I love the originals and was hoping for some additional originals for my daughter's generation. Guess that was too much to hope for.