FILM FOCUS: MIXED NUTS

I hope that a lot of you are already familiar with Mixed Nuts, but I suspect that it flies somewhat under the radar, despite being directed and co-written by the notable Nora Ephron.  Certainly it was neither a box office nor apparently a critical success when it was first released.  I was first introduced to it one Thanksgiving when one of my aunts played it in on the TV in the den that we kids were confined to.  As a kid the movie just seemed odd but as an adult I’ve developed quite the love for this zany and very Christmasy movie.

The ensemble cast is a veritable who’s who of excellence: Madeline Kahn, Steve Martin, Juliette Lewis, Liev Schriber (in drag!) and, in small roles, Joely Fisher, Parker Posey, John Stewart and Rob Reiner, among others.  Victor Garber even provides the voice for an unseen neighbor in one scene.  Since this movie came out in 1994 be prepared to spend a lot of it marveling at how young everyone looks (or how old it makes you feel).  

Mixed Nuts is an adaptation of a French film and it’s a farce in the grand European tradition.  It’s set (almost) entirely on Christmas Eve and mostly in one location.  I’ve always been a fan of this format, which relies mostly on character to drive the story.  I know when a TV episode is confined to a single locale and timeframe it’s called a bottle show, but there must be a term for a movie of this type as well?  

Anyhoo, the action revolves around Lifesavers, a suicide prevention hotline office in Venice Beach, California.  Steve Martin plays the beleaguered, nice guy owner/director.  Madeline Kahn is Mrs. Munchnick and Rita Wilson is Catherine, his two employees.  They are to be evicted by the New Year by their greedy landlord and are surrounded by wacky neighbors, zany clients and oddballs in general.  Mishaps, slapstick and mayhem ensue.  By Christmas morning there will be a suicide, a murder, a serial killer will be exposed, a baby will be born, a miracle will occur and everyone will find new love.

Madeline Kahn owns this movie in her role as the irritable Mrs. Munchnick.  Every single expression she makes and word she utters makes me laugh; she truly was a comedy genius and I wouldn’t be surprised if several of her best bits in this were at least semi-improvised.  I don’t get why her performance here doesn’t get more critical love.  Her character is trapped in an elevator for a good portion of the movie, and she utilizes several wrapped presents in an effort to call for help, including a sort of electronic keyboard-beat box thing, resulting in one of my all-time favorite scenes in all of cinema:

That scene just kills me!  Liev Schriber also deserves a shout-out for his role as a lonely transgender woman.  It could potentially have been an offensive, one-note part but he brings a lot of humanity, humor and sweetness to it.  His character even develops a romance with a very young Adam Sandler and, I can’t believe I’m typing this, even Adam Sandler is quite charming in this movie in a goofball kind of way.

I remember at one time being a little put off by a scene between Chris (Schriber) and Philip (Steve Martin), in which they share an awkward dance.  Philip is freaked out by Chris’ romantic attentions and does his best to physically distance himself.  I’m sensitive to gay panic (or trans panic) humor just because it’s so pervasive in Hollywood and also just so lazy.  However Philip is genuinely sweet and kind towards Chris throughout the movie, telling him to never care what people think of him.  And Chris finds love by the end of the film, so all in all it’s a very positive portrayal.

As far as the Christmas quotient, Mixed Nuts does not disappoint.  One subtle aspect of the film that I love is how the office is slowly transformed and decorated over the course of the movie.  It starts with a tree and characters (mostly Juliette Lewis) add decorations until it’s a Christmas wonderland, with lights, garlands and stockings by the fire. I like how the holiday creeps in.  I also appreciate a Christmas movie that takes place in sunny California, since all of my own Christmas memories are rooted in the West Coast. You also get Anthony LaPaglia in a Santa Suit, several Christmas trees, and a soundtrack that features some of the best Christmas music around, including a charming original song also titled “Mixed Nuts.”  There's even a beagle (or beagler, as Nick would say), which has nothing to do with Christmas but automatically adds 10 extra credit points to any movie.

Despite its welcome touches of black comedy this is a very tenderhearted film, featuring a cast of characters who are all damaged or dysfunctional in some way but kind and good underneath, drawn together by the magic of Christmas.  So sit back, watch, snack on some of those salted, smoky almonds (which we always have around during the holidays), and enjoy!

BERRY MERRY CHRISTMAS

Strawberry Shortcake
Season 1 (2003)

Being a child of the late 80s and early 90s of course I’m familiar with Strawberry Shortcake. I still covet a Berry Happy Home dollhouse of my own.  Strawberry is slightly less popular than some of the other 80s kid franchises and therefore has been revived, rebooted and remodeled several times over the past decade in an attempt to boost her popularity. She's kind of like Doctor Who; she keeps regenerating into new forms.  For reference, here is a side by side comparison of the original character and the current, sleeker and slimmed-down incarnation:

In 2003 Strawberry was revived (and thankfully looked more like her original self than she does now) with a cartoon series, from which this Christmas episode springs.  It has an extra-long running time, features several songs and a ton of characters with cutesy food names.  I have to admit I was pretty eager to watch this; nothing gets me more in the holiday spirit than Christmas-themed cartoons. It reminds me of those exciting childhood days when school was out and Christmas was around the corner.  Instead of trudging off to school I got to watch cartoons in the morning, usually reruns on USA Network. 

Strawberry in her 2003 incarnation.

In “Berry Merry Christmas” Strawberry Shortcake is obsessing over finding the perfect presents to get her friends, despite the fact that they show up and literally announce exactly what they want/need.  “I lost my COOKIE CUTTERS!”  “I love SUGAR PLUMS!”  This version of Strawberry was more than a little dim.  She spoke slowly in that irritating Dora the Explorer manner and constantly asked questions aloud: “What--should--we--do?”  Where--are--we?  What--is--happening?”  Clearly this is aimed at a very young audience (and gay adult male holiday bloggers, because I kind of loved it).

Ignoring their very obvious requests, Strawberry sets out with Honey, a self-centered horse, to Holiday Land to find gifts for her friends.  Holiday Land is the best part of the episode; it’s the sort of Christmas fantasy land I spent most of my childhood drawing, thinking about and trying to escape to.  One by one Strawberry figures the appropriate gifts.  She gets sugar plums from a Sugarplum Fairy, helps stop a crisis at a candy cane factory and gets cookie cutters in return, and so on and so forth.  

Somebody give Honey a  goddam saddle already

Ultimately a magic wind whisks Strawberry and Honey direct to Santa’s workshop where they chat up the jolly old elf and Strawberry randomly bursts into tears when he asks her what she wants for Christmas.  She and Honey make it home only to discover the snowballs they made as a gift for one of their friends melted and ruined all the other presents but—surprise!—Santa restores them, along with a gift for Strawberry (a quilt with her friends pictures on it).  Then everyone sings a song about friendship being the greatest gift of all.

Aside from Strawberry’s stupidity and slow talk, her singing was a bit painful.  She sings in this very childlike voice that isn’t very pleasant on the ears. But otherwise this was really charming, worth it just for the cute food-pun names and Holiday Land décor (such as an all-bell shop shaped like…a bell!).  It reminded me of a childhood favorite that I have on VHS, The Care Bears Nutcracker Suite.  The story is equally insipid but the backgrounds and images just scream Christmas.

Honey and Custard, my new favorites

I liked Honey, the vapid horse, who either asked for or suggested someone be given a saddle approximately every five seconds.  If I was a more ambitious person I would track how many times the words “saddle” and “berry” occurs in this episode, as I’m sure the results would be mind-boggling.   My favorite character, though, was Custard, the bitchy cat.  Custard told Strawberry that her singing hurt her ears, that she didn’t want any presents, and that she planned on hibernating from Christmas until New Year’s.  Custard don’t care!

Recurring Themes: Strawberry undergoes a Perfect Gift Search and the Real Santa Shows Up.

Christmas Quotient: 4

See It, Skip It, Own It?
Admittedly not everyone can stomach this type of kiddie fare, but if you’re feeling nostalgic or like cartoons in general give it a watch (it’s up on Netflix Instant).  Plus Custard and Honey make for a fun diva-bitch duo!

MURPHY'S PONY

Murphy Brown
Season 1 (1988)

I would trade a sliver of my soul for a full DVD release of certain shows: the final seasons of The Bob Newhart Show, Muppet Babies, Pepper Ann, and Murphy Brown among them.  Just the first season of Murphy Brown is available to own; it was released some time ago and apparently there are no plans to bring out more due to low sales and the expensive music rights involved (call it The Wonder Years Problem).  

Murphy Brown had one of my all-time favorite Christmas episodes, “Jingle Hell, Jingle Hell, Jingle All the Way,” from its third season.  It was briefly up on YouTube but now isn’t available anywhere, which is a crime against Christmas.  For now we’ll have to content ourselves with this Season 1 offering, “Murphy’s Pony.”  It starts out slow but gradually amps up the Christmas quotient, ultimately making for a moving and satisfying holiday viewing experience.

It’s two days before Christmas and Murphy Brown is her typical irascible self, absorbed in her work and indifferent to the forthcoming office Christmas party that perky Corky is attempting to organize.  Three children show up at the FYI newsroom with a letter for Murphy: their mother has abandoned them to her care.  Murphy plans a quick escape via social services but she ends up stuck on the phone all day and has to take the kids for the night.

Santa and the pony he rode in on

The kids are actually quite bratty throughout all of this, making it hard to sympathize with their plight.  They grab everything in their vicinity, dump ice cream on Jim’s head and start a food fight at a salad bar.  But when it comes time to hand them over to a social worker on Christmas Eve Murphy has a change of heart.  It’s a brilliant bit of acting displayed by the ever-capable Candice Bergen, as she attempts to speak but is blindsided by emotion.  Murphy ends up taking the kids back to her house, which she has decorated and outfitted with presents, a visit from Santa and even a pony for herself (since one of the kids earlier asked that Santa bring Murphy a pony).

Of course you know where this is headed.  Suddenly the kids’ real mother returns and sweeps them away.  Murphy gets her to accept a check before she goes (lesson: abandon your gifts for monetary reward) but nobody questions why she dumped off her kids in the first place, or even gets her to promise not to do it again.  Biology wins out over common sense, I guess.  Anyhoo, a depressed Murphy then takes her housepainter/houseboy Elton to the FYI Christmas party.  In a nice final gag, all of the decorations are Hanukkah-themed since Miles (who is Jewish) was in charge of decorating.

Merry Hanukkah!

As I wrote, this episode is something of a slow burn, with nary a Christmas tree in sight for the first half.  But as Murphy warms up to the kids Christmas creeps in, and the last few scenes, set at Murphy’s house and the office party, are genuinely heartwarming.  And this works as a Hanukkah episode as well, which is always nice.  Plus Elton sports a shirt version of Audrey Penney’s gift wrap dress, which is pretty awe inspiring!

This shirt is 100% Christmas certified 

Recurring Themes: Murphy finds herself in a classic Abandoned Child scenario.

Christmas Quotient: 3

See It, Skip It, Own It?
Go buy Season 1 of Murphy Brown on DVD in order to send a message that we need the rest of the series released!  But this Christmas episode is pretty solid on its own merits as well.

FILM FOCUS: WINDOW WONDERLAND

Back in November, when I was perusing the list of upcoming made-for-TV Christmas movies (as one does) I was particularly excited about the Hallmark Channel's Window Wonderland.  When I was a kid one of my chosen future careers, among architect, ice cream man and Disney Imagineer (which they put as “Engineer” in my junior high yearbook, thinking I just couldn’t spell), was window dresser.  I was inspired by Rhoda Morgenstern on The Mary Tyler Moore Show-- I wanted Rhoda’s job but Mary’s apartment.  

Creating elaborate holiday window displays still sounds like a pretty terrific job, though I don’t think full-time “window dresser” is really even a profession anymore.  It's all farmed out to corporate sponsors and celebrity guest window designers.  Even in Window Wonderland the heroine describes herself as a “visual merchandiser.”  

I have to admit that I only half-watched this movie.  I did a late-night Christmas cards cram session and watched the movie at the same time.  I would pause every time they unveiled a new window display and then just sort of listened to the rest while writing cards, only glancing at the screen occasionally.  My lack of full comprehension of the plot might actually jazz up this recounting of it, as the movie itself, I’m obliged to report, was rather dull.

Window Wonderland is, like every other movie of this type, set in New York but filmed in Canada and stars a mix of semi-recognizable D-List American actors and totally unfamiliar Canadian ones.  Chyler Leigh plays the female lead.  I knew and somewhat liked her for her role on the very short-lived spinoff That 80s Show, in which she sported a mohawk.  In this movie she looked lovely but didn’t bring the energy or magnetism that Autumn Reeser showed in Love at the Thanksgiving Day Parade.

The male lead was played by Paul Campbell, a Canadian actor, and he was one of my biggest obstacles in enjoying this movie because both the actor and the character came across super gay.  Which would not have been an issue except that the whole movie was predicated on his romance with the female lead.   I'm not one of those who says gay guys can't convincingly play straight roles, it's just that either he's gay and wasn't trying to play it straight or is straight and the director told him to camp it up for some reason.  It didn’t help matters that he was playing a window dresser with a fondness for outlandish sweaters.

Naomi Judd played the mother of the heroine and added a much-needed zing in both performance and character, playing a sassy, semi-Southern truth teller type that keeps critiquing her daughter’s makeup.  

Not even Naomi's red hair and facelift can rescue this movie

I can’t remember the characters' names so I’ll just called them Girl and Boy.  Girl and Boy are rival “visual merchandisers” who work at a fictional department store in New York (really Toronto).  When the head “visual merchandiser” quits unexpectedly they engage in a competition for her job, each trying to outdo the other with a series of Christmas-themed store windows.  Cute premise, right?  Of course their rivalry slowly morphs into love, as is legally mandated in every romantic comedy ever, and Girl eventually dumps her snobby boyfriend after overcoming her shame about her working-class family (poor Naomi Judd).  

Now here is where my half-watching causes me to get a bit fuzzy on the plot, because at some point it’s revealed that Boy sleeps in the department store at night so I guess he’s also poor and homeless?  He also wants to be a real artist and likes to paint.  After  both Girl and  Boy mess up their window displays they get fired and then set off an alarm and then do another window display featuring themselves just standing around and it turns out the kindly old window cleaner they’ve been nice to throughout the movie is really the store owner in disguise and he’s also in love with Naomi Judd.  Whew!  

Just look at the chemistry between these two!  And by two I mean Boy and his sweater.

Sadly none of the above was executed very well or with any real excitement, even of the kitschy kind.  Chyler Leigh’s character of Girl was really boring and, as I established earlier, Boy was distractingly gay.  At one point Nick wanted the movie to be a love story between Boy and his (also gay) snarky supervisor but then quickly lost interest when he realized it was meant to be a love story of the heterosexual variety.  The window displays themselves would have been the big draw here except both characters had a thing for minimalism, meaning the movie was running over budget.  So the few window displays we see are very bland and stark, a major disappointment, like the movie overall.

Movies of this type are a crap shoot; they all have alluringly cheesy titles and promise to deliver Christmas cheer in a major way but a lot of the time they’re pretty bad.  Only sometimes you get a diamond in the rough like Snowglobe or Holiday in Handcuffs.  This wasn’t even particularly very Christmasy, save the sparse Christmas windows and the not-gay gay Boy's sweaters. The characters also kept talking about having a “turdunkin,” a turkey covered in Dunkin Donuts batter, which sounded pretty amazing.  But then they never even bothered showing the turdunkin, in blatant violation of Chekov's golden rule: You do not tease a turdunkin in the first act and then fail to show it in the third.

DO YOU FEAR WHAT I FEAR?

Ellen
Season 3 (1995)

I like a touch of darkness mixed in with the sticky sweetness of Christmas, whether it’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, a sonorous rendition of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” (the most somber of carols) or a Christmas-themed Fear Street horror novel.  This Season 3 episode of Ellen fits the bill, perfectly mixing the brightness of the holiday with comedy and a good dose of the macabre.

Ellen is preparing for another Christmas with her parents and she convinces her cousin Spence to join her, warning him of the many annoying family traditions that await them.  Her parents, however, announce that they spontaneously booked a cruise for the holiday and so they’ll have to celebrate prior to their departure.  When Ellen and Spence arrive Ellen’s parents are already in their cruising clothes and rushing out the door, as their flight is overbooked and they have to hurry to depart.  They decide to have Christmas in the car on the way to the airport.

A very automotive Christmas

Despite her earlier protestations Ellen is miffed over the harried version of her family’s traditions (which includes carols, ambrosia and the opening of gifts).  Things take even more of a turn when she unwraps her big gift from her parents: a cemetery plot.  With her parents gone and a saddled with her final resting place she falls into a morbid mood, despite her friends’ efforts to cheer her up, which includes a visit from Spence dressed as a half-assed Santa. In one of the episode’s best scenes Ellen chases her bookstore’s customers away by throwing candy canes at them and reminding them of their imminent deaths.

"Ho Ho Ho! Santa says cheer up!"

En route to a party on Christmas Eve with her friends Ellen requests a detour, which ends up being the cemetery.  She finds her plot and then refuses to leave; her friends rally around her.  After convincing Ellen that her life is meaningful and sharing some egg nog and pfeffernusse the group decides to decorate the cemetery to the strains of “Linus & Lucy.”  The episode ends with a series of snapshots showing the cast goofing off amid the bedecked tombstones and memorials.

I've always loved this shot of Joely Fischer--gives me a Tim Burton vibe

This is a hilarious and clever episode that makes good work of Ellen DeGeneres' comedic skills, first via her attempts to downplay the weirdness of her Christmas gift and then later her holiday funk.  The supporting cast is great as well, especially Clea Lewis as ever-perky Audrey, who sports first an amazing gift-wrap dress and then later a sexy Santa ensemble over the course of the episode. 

If only all women dressed liked Audrey Penney! 

A young Jamie Kennedy (remember him?) also appears in this episode as Tad, the dimwitted extra holiday help at the bookstore This is the perfect episode for anyone who both loves Christmas but also likes a hint of bitterness to balance out the yuletide sweet.

Recurring Themes: Ellen does some Yelling at Carolers.

Christmas Quotient: 5

See It, Skip It or Own It?
Add this one to your permanent collection!

THE BABY-SITTERS SPECIAL CHRISTMAS

The Baby-Sitters Club
Season 1 (1990)

I teased this Christmas episode of The Baby-Sitters Club back in my very first Halloween post and I’ve just been itching to re-watch and write about it.  So let us now delve into this very special (you know it’s special because “special” is in the title) Christmas episode.

We begin with a perfect opening scene, set to the show’s insanely catchy theme song, featuring the members of the Baby-Sitters Club first gazing at  one of those awesome Christmas store windows seen in TV shows and then shopping at said store.  The store reminds of me of a now-defunct retailer from my childhood that was called simply The Store.  It was a sort of all-in-one drug store we used to go to during summer vacations at Lake Tahoe.  It was less than a department store but more than your average CVS or Duane Reade.  It had tchotchkes galore and, like my childhood self, the babysitters are loving it. Even better, the store seen in the show is decked out in a major way for Christmas.  

Not only Green Berets wear green berets

While at The Store Kristy falls in love with an expensive baseball glove, so expensive no one dares utter how much it actually costs throughout the episode.  They just say things like “very expensive” when asked and at one point Kristy whispers the price into her mother’s ear.  Seriously, how fucking expensive is this thing?  It’s like the Voldemort of baseball gloves: The Price That Shall Not Be Named.  Kristy’s mom says if she does chores to pay for some of it she might get the glove, so we see her doing chores throughout the episode.  A lot of chores, because that baseball glove is very expensive.

That’s just the B-plot, though.  The main story involves Stacey, who can’t stop eating holiday sweets despite her diabetes.  Dawn is extremely distressed by this and is all over Stacey every time she freakin’ takes a bite of something.  At one point they get into an argument and Stacey says something about “knowing her own body.”  It’s intense!  But Dawn is ultimately justified by staying on Stacey’s ass because Stacey has zero self control and can’t stop nibbling on cookies and fudge until she starts acting like instead of having high blood sugar she’s wasting away from some subtropical influenza.  Seriously, she acts so sedated she can’t muster the strength to read a Rudolph picture book aloud to one of her babysitting charges. 

Too tired for carols. So. Very. Tired. 

The day before Christmas the friends gather at a diner for their Secret Santa exchange.  This reminded me so much of many similar gift-swap lunches I attended during junior high and high school, at pizza joints and a local sushi restaurant.  Much jewelry from Claires, scented lotions from Bath & Body Works and those candy-cane plastic tubes filled with M&Ms were exchanged over the years.  Anyhoo, the red-headed babysitter, who barely speaks in this episode, is totally shafted at the gift exchange.  One girl gets earrings; another bath stuff.  And the redhead gets a round orange plastic figurine that we earlier saw one of the girls playing with at The Store.  “It squirts water,” says someone amidst the gift-opening flurry.  Someone gave her a squirt toy?!  There’s always at least one dud in every Secret Santa exchange.

Anyhoo, Stacey eats fudge and dies.  No, but she does end up at the hospital on Christmas Day, the same hospital her friends are conveniently at for a children’s ward party.  She gives a surprisingly well-written speech about how it sucks being sick all the time and ends up attending the party in her pajamas.  Kristy ends up giving her new, very expensive baseball glove to Ned, a really gloomy kid in a wheelchair whose parents we are told earlier are too poor to afford gas to drive to the hospital to see him.  Everyone is happy.  And oh yeah, baby Danny Tamberelli, in his pre-Adventures of Pete & Pete days, is in this episode as one of the kids the girls babysit for!

You're never too sick to smile

As if you couldn't tell, I love this episode.  The weird 90s fashions make it worth the watch alone, but it’s also very Christmasy and melodramatic.  There are a ton of Christmas decorations in every scene and I want to live in The Store.  But I do feel bad for the redhead who doesn’t get any lines AND gets stuck with a squirt toy.

Recurring Themes: Our first instance of Giving Up the Gift, in which a character really wants a specific present, receives it, and then gives it away to someone in need.  We also get a Group Sing Finale and a Children's Hospital.

Christmas Quotient: 5

See It, Skip It, Own It?
If only this was available to own and treasure for all time!  For now content yourself with seeing it and give thanks to Netflix for making it happen!

DWIGHT CHRISTMAS

The Office
Season 9 (2012)

The first Christmas episode of The Office is a real gem, and while the show offered up quite a few holiday episodes the quality dwindled with each subsequent season.  Dwight Christmas is from the final season of the show so my expectations were low, though apparently not quite low enough.  

My lack of knowledge of the later seasons’ storylines and characters also interfered with my ability to enjoy this episode.  Where is Kelly? Where is Andy?  Who is this random guy flirting with Erin?  I love you, Catherine Tate, but what are you doing here? Why is Jim leaving for a job in Philadelphia?  Angela was engaged and Oscar slept with her fiancé?!    Oh, Office Season 9, you disappoint me so.

We start with the staff of Dunder Mifflin suddenly realizing that today is the day for their office Christmas party, which apparently everyone forgot about.  I was instantly confused by this opening scene, as we get a shot of a paper turkey, so at first I thought it was November and the party was meant to be happening early.  But no, I guess it’s December and they just didn’t bother taking down the Thanksgiving decorations?  As a sort of parting gift for Jim (who is leaving for the aforementioned job in Philadelphia), Pam convinces the party planning committee to let Dwight take the lead and host a “traditional Pennsylvania Dutch Christmas.”

Hark! Belsnickel draws nigh

Pam and Jim have fully morphed here from likeable underdogs to sneering cool kids, treating Dwight’s heartfelt efforts and traditions as fodder for their mockery.  They even rush to make fun of him when they spot him holding a candle and reading aloud.  Maybe he has it coming after 9 seasons of annoyance but really? Dwight, normally the antagonist, comes across as the bullied do-gooder in this episode.  His traditions, rooted in obscure-but-real German holiday festivities, involve serving pig stomach and dressing as Belsnickel, a sort of anti-Claus.  As Belsnickel he judges each co-worker either “admirable” or “impish,” respectively resulting in either a gift or a thrashing with a bundle of sticks.  Upset when Jim leaves the party early, Dwight gives him a hard thrashing in one of the episode’s standout moments.

Yeah, I'm not really feeling this party either.

After Dwight loses his shit the rest of the staff reclaims the party, transforming it into a more familiar office Christmas party (and a somewhat melancholy reminder of the show’s former Christmas glory).  There are like three other subplots also going on; like the current season of Parks & Recreation this episode suffers from subplot overload, with way too many characters running around doing way too many inconsequential things. Overall, it’s a mixed bag.  Belsnickel adds some spark and there are a few funny moments but overall it just isn’t very festive—and that can’t be blamed on the pig stomach but rather a show that didn’t know when to bow out gracefully.

Christmas Quotient: Not even the final scenes, which harken back to the Christmas Office episodes of old, can elevate this past a 2.

See It, Skip It, Own It?
December is flying by and there are lots of quality episodes to watch so skip this one.