Puppet Master: Blitzkrieg Massacre (2018)

AKA: Full Moon's Bunker of Blood: Chapter 1

A random collection of death scenes from the Puppet Master series thrown together haphazardly and slapped on with a new title to make a quick buck. It doesn't even make an effort to try and tell a cohesive story like The Legacy; it's a cheap entry that serves as a "greatest hits" package wrapped in a comic book framing device meant to evoke Creepshow. Despite the title, it doesn't just focus on the Nazi years, it covers the whole spectrum of the series. This was so awful, I went back and retroactively raised my rating on the last film.

0 dollars spent out of 5

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)

The third installment in the Vacation series is also the quintessential standalone movie about staying home for the holidays. It covers all of the usual bases; putting up Christmas decorations, putting up with family, putting up with the stresses of work and bonuses and all the bullshit that goes along with it. It's one of those movies that grows with you year after year until it can do no wrong; it becomes perfect. One of the most laugh-out-loud funniest movies and enjoyable parts of the season, as far as I'm concerned. 

Chevy Chase's incredulous look at the end says it all: I did it.

5 Jelly of the Month Clubs out of 5

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Oh, somewhere deep inside of these bones
An emptiness began to grow
There's something out there far from my home
A longing that I've never known~

I remember excitedly watching this movie on opening day, and being thrown into a stopmotion world of wonder and delight. It's not so much a Christmas or a Halloween movie, so much as a lonely skeleton trying to find his place in the world. Oh, how I identify with the plight of Jack Skellington, the poor pumpkin king who longs for something more in his life, something new and exciting. The forest of holidays is the stuff dreams are made of. The union of Tim Burton and stopmotion was a spectacle simply "meant to be." (Ugh, that was bad.)

5 clowns with the tearaway face out of 5