Christmas on TV: "A Golden Christmas 2: The Second Tail"

Before I get into the meat of this post, I need to express how much I dislike putting the tale/tail pun in the title of a movie. Okay, moving on.

I was intensely excited to see that A Golden Christmas has a sequel, so last night I made my roommate sit down and watch it with me. I had high expectations for The Second Tail to be as awesomely bad as the first one. After watching the sequel, I'm here to tell you that bad story lines should only be taken so far, and in the case of made-for-TV Christmas movies, that "so far" equals approximately one movie.

I've complained before about Christmas movies that are obviously filmed in the middle of the summer, and this one (set in retiree-heaven Florida) falls into that category. All the extras in the background are wearing bikini tops and short shorts (women) or cargo shorts and no shirt (men). Obviously it wasn't that cold.

But beyond just masquerading as a cold-weather Christmas movie, this movie shows even more definitively than its predecessor that these films probably originated as a "matchmaking dog" franchise. They had to add the Christmas element before anyone would agree to produce it.

As matchmaking dog Christmas movies go, this one is deeply flawed. For one, it is intensely SSSLLLLLOOOOOOOOOWWW. The main couple spends more time expressing their feelings about each other to others than actually expressing them to each other. And while you could argue that such is the case in most romcoms, this one takes the cake. And then has a dog run into it for comic effect.

Even so, the movie also leaves plenty of things unexplained. Ten minutes into the movie, a random 10-year-old blonde girl wanders into the movie, and it takes them fifteen more minutes to explain how she even knows these people. Also, I asked myself several times during the movie why her love story (with a Justin Bieber/Zac Efron wannabe) was better than the film's actual love story.

Actually, this film brings up more questions than it answers. Questions like

1. Why would a guy roll up his jeans like "man-pris" while popping the question?
2. Why is the materialistic crazy girlfriend suddenly all nice and huggy at the end?
3. Why would anyone propose with a ring from a vending machine?
4. Why do these people think the story behind why someone would propose with a vending machine ring is touching? (Because it's not. And the background music doesn't help sell it. At. All.)
5. Why do these people share their life stories with old people they met less than five minutes ago?
6. Why do these old people act like therapists if they trained as lawyers?
7. Why do the young people treat the old people like therapists?

And, the most important question of all: Why do people think that by adding more puppies to a movie franchise you will improve upon it? Because experience has shown (Air Bud 2-17, 102 Dalmatians, Beethoven's 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th) that more dogs just make bad movies worse.

If you sat through the original, this movie is worth a watch. But if you didn't, do yourself a favor and quit after you hear the reggae/calypso version of "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen"about ten minutes in. Made-for-TV Christmas is better than this. At least, it can be when it wants to.

Star power: Chad Michael Murray's original girlfriend from A Cinderella Story falls in love with the main missionary from The Best Two Years despite his best intentions to get engaged to Lydia from the pink/Mormon Pride and Prejudice--a made-for-TV movie full of "B" movie stars

Use of made-for-TV Christmas conventions: random characters resembling Santa Claus, Christmas tree lights turning on for dramatic effect at key moments, rekindled love amid drastic circumstances, child characters with no actual purpose