I watched Happiest Season the other day, which I have to say that I would give it three out of five stars. The major thing I hated about Happiest Season was that I think it was the first major lesbian cheesy holiday film, and they butchered it with so much homophobia. It was an incredibly triggering movie, to be honest. While I hated it, there were some aspects/characters that I liked about the film.
One thing I liked about the film was some of the characters: Jane (Mary Holland), Riley (Aubrey Plaza), John (Daniel Levy), and Abby (Kristen Stewart) (only sometimes). Jane was a light in the film; even though I didn’t like her at first, she really grew on me as the movie went on and she definitely won me over near the end. Being neglected in your family is so traumatic and her speech during the white elephant party made me sob. She was a wonderful character and I loved her. John was a wonderful comedic relief, but he brought such a serious moment in his coming-out story conversation with Harper near the end of the film; he made me sob too.
I absolutely loved Riley too; she was probably my favorite character. When she told Abby her story about how Harper outed her, I had never wanted to punch Harper in the face so much. Riley is so hot and I wish she had more scenes with Abby AND I wish they ended up together instead of Harper and Abby (which I’ll explain in the next two paragraphs).
Abby was one of my least favorite characters. She was so sweet and kind that I was rooting for her, especially when she broke up with Harper near the end. However, I don’t think she knew her self-worth since she let Harper manipulate and walk all over her throughout most of the film. Since Abby has always been out, it was hard to watch Harper take advantage of her by being closeted throughout their entire relationship.
Harper, of course, was my least favorite. She treated her partner like absolute crap. She lied to Abby about being out to her parents and she ditched Abby to spend time with her old high school ex-boyfriend. You think her family is the villain of the story, but Harper is the real villain. She is so blind to her own problems that I definitely don’t believe she was ready for a real relationship (but Abby still stayed with her). Yes, Harper was going through a lot of family pressure, but it was so easy for her to turn on Abby by saying she wasn’t gay when her sister outed her. Just minutes before she said she didn’t want to lose Abby, so what’s the truth? If you’re so insecure about your sexuality, you are not ready for a serious relationship with someone who isn’t. She learned nothing from her past since she outed her ex, Riley, in high school; she did it again with Abby years later. She chose the worst option every time, especially when she forced Abby back in the closet for the holidays.
Aside from the characters, I felt like the entire movie was horrid. It felt like the gay version of Get Out, to be honest, but I actually loved Get Out and hated this movie. The entire family is in desperate need of therapy; they keep their kids at a distance by having Harper and Sloane basically beg for their attention, and then they completely ignore Jane. ALSO, how are you going to tell me that this entire homophobic family is okay with one of their daughters having a Black husband? That seems incredibly unrealistic and inconsistent, especially since their whole shtick is being a perfect family with a father who is running for mayor. While I’m glad it was a happy ending, I hated that the entire film was so centered around homophobia. On top of this, the happy ending was way too fast; I think it’s such BS that the audience is supposed to believe Harper’s family isn’t homophobic anymore. The thing is, we don’t get a lot of scenes with Harper and Abby being a good couple. Maybe they were in a great relationship, but there were just so many scenes where they were horrible to each other that I was rooting against them. The storytelling was so trash, and I’m not sorry for saying that.
Overall, while I did enjoy some characters and parts of Happiest Season, I just couldn’t understand why they had to make the relationship between Abby and Harper so awful. She was a manipulative liar and I stand by that. I loved some of the movie, but I hated most of it. I would just love if there was an LGBT+ holiday film that didn’t set its entire narrative around homophobia.