The much-anticipated Sunny Christmas special was something I knew I needed to buy this Thanksgiving break and watch with all of my friends. I didn't expect it to cost $20 (for something only 43 minutes long? yikes!) but cost wasn't really a constraint here. Anyway, earlier tonight I did indeed bring it to a friend's house, and it was enjoyed by all present. My biggest fear going into the double-length episode was that, being a Christmas special, this episode would have some kind of "very special" bullshit twist to it, like "the gang learns that the true meaning of Christmas is giving" or "love and friendship are the greatest gift of all" or something similarly feel-good and tacky. And it almost did employ such a twist. No thank you. I like my Sunny the way it's typically served: relentlessly amoral. Fortunately, there was just enough of that good old me-first Sunny spirit to save the episode. But it was not without its weird moments. At times, it really seemed to drag. In fact, the Dennis and Dee half of the story was downright boring, save for a ridiculous off-the-wall scene that ends with a sweaty, naked Danny DeVito escaping from the interior of a leather couch. But the Mac and Charlie half was very solid; they were able to carry the story pretty well for the first half hour or so. Then, in the final dozen minutes, things got kind of weird. There was a musical Rudolph-style claymation sequence (Frank's dream) that would have made for a great DVD extra but felt very out of place in the episode itself. The ensuing ending was also a little weird. It lingered around the "feel good" cliche that I had been so desperately hoping the special would avoid before ultimately ending in a way-too-expectable-to-actually-expect twist that kind of undoes what the "feel good" ending had done. The episode finally ends with the gang embracing one of Mac and Charlie's favorite Christmas traditions: throwing rocks at trains. The whole thing just felt a little too weird by the end; what had started as a solid (if sometimes slow) Sunny episode became something entirely different about a half hour in. So, in rating and reviewing the DVD, I'd call it 75% decent Sunny episode, 25% fucked up (different) Sunny Christmas special. In that order. I'm not disappointed by it as much as I am confused, I guess. Oh well. What matters most is that I have no regrets. And that says a lot, because I paid $20 for this 43-minute "movie" of an episode.
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