Christmas at the Kringles' Teaser Is Just Halloween Again

The teaser for Christmas at the Kringles' looks festive but plays exactly like Halloween: as Bloody Disgusting reports, Ron Livingston is dropped into a neighbourhood of killer Christmas fanatics, complete with a chainsaw and, somewhere in the mayhem, a leather daddy. That is not a row over outdoor lights, that is a slasher with a wreath on the door.

I did not go looking for this either. I was three days into my "ease gently into fireside season" playlist, candle lit, jumper on, when the internet decided I needed to see it. So let's be honest: this is not a Christmas film, it is a Halloween film that changed into something warmer, told everyone it was "doing a dry December" and hoped nobody would notice it never actually stopped.

The tinsel is doing a lot of work

I love a good seasonal disguise. Cosy jumper, string lights, a mug of something hot, and underneath it all the exact same bones as every slasher I have ever hidden behind a cushion for. Give a film a wreath and a carol on the soundtrack and suddenly it is "festive" instead of "the reason I am sleeping with a lamp on." Christmas at the Kringles' is not even trying to hide it. It has swapped a mask for a Santa hat and called it a costume change.

Poor Ron Livingston. The man has apparently had every kind of terrible day a horror film can invent for him, and this one sounds like the worst Christmas of his life specifically, which is a high bar when the neighbours are this committed to their aesthetic. I would like to know what he did to deserve a leather daddy with a chainsaw showing up at his door, but I suspect the honest answer is "agreed to be in the film."

Is Christmas at the Kringles' just Halloween in a Santa hat?

Here is my genuinely dry take, and I stand by it: horror does not have a season, it has a wardrobe. Round here it is never really October or December, it is just horror wearing whatever coat suits the calendar. A killer Christmas fanatic is a slasher in a jumper. A haunted house at Halloween is the same haunted house in July with better marketing. The costume changes. The chainsaw does not.

So no, I am not putting this one off until December. If a film is going to be this committed to gore under a string of fairy lights, I am watching it exactly when it has the good manners to arrive, and I am not pretending it is anything other than Halloween that got itself a nicer jumper.

I will be keeping half an eye on this one as more comes out. In the meantime, if anyone needs me, I will be on the sofa, coffee in hand, mildly regretting how much I now want to know what the leather daddy's motive is.