In 2024, we called our secondary post-Christmas tour “Christmas Follow-Up” and it ran from December 26, 2024, to January 1, 2025.

This year we’ve improved the name to “Christmas Leftovers”. This time it’s running from January 1, 2026, to January 12, 2026. This is not ideal! In the future, I plan to have Christmas leftovers only between Christmas and New Year’s. But this year, I want to complete the debuts of all the reviews that were previously posted to the text group, and there remains eight to go. So bear with me these first couple of weeks of January.

Now, just like if you were checking your post-Christmas refrigerator offerings, don’t expect all of these Retro Reviews to be super-tasty. You may like some more than others. Most of the best dishes were served before Christmas or on Christmas, after all.

Four of the upcoming reviews making their Substack debuts are Retro Reviews of remakes of two films that we visited on our 2025 Christmas Tour. Specifically, we will visit two theatrical remakes of The Shop Around the Corner (1940), and two made-for-television remakes of Miracle on 34th Street (1947).

The remaining four Retro Reviews that will be making their Substack debuts are films I originally scheduled for the main 2025 Christmas Tour, but later moved to this 2025 Christmas Leftovers schedule to give myself a little more time. All four of these films made at least eight of the ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I consulted. Spoiler alert: If these are near the top of your list, you may not like my reviews of these films. It’s not as if I completely hated all four… well, you’ll see.

We will visit these eight movies in chronological order of their original release, as is always my preference.

As we did during the 2025 Christmas Tour, for the reviews below, after the name and year of the reviewed work, I will include, where applicable, how many Best Christmas Movies lists that each film made out of ten 🎅, followed by the Retro Review Grade given (explained here). The next line includes the Family Suitability Rating I have given 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 (explained here) and the Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values Rating I have given ✝️ (explained here). Last but not least comes the Dark Whimsy score and readings (explained here). These will be added after each day has passed, so check back to see where we have been at a glance.

There won’t be posts mixed in along the way with new comments like we did for the 2025 Christmas Tour, so if you are following along reading these as old archives and want to re-enact the experience of those who were discovering this in early 2026, then just check out each review in order, and come back here for the next post rather than following the “Previous” and “Next” buttons which will follow the different order of the 2024-2025 Christmas season when these were originally posted.

Jan 1 | Post: 2025 Christmas Leftovers [You are here.]

Jan 3 | Review: In the Good Old Summertime (1949) 🎅 [0] B+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎0️⃣⚠️ | 🚫5.4 | 🌚5 🌝7
Remake of The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

Jan 6 | Review: “The Miracle on 34th Street” (1955), Television remake broadcast on The 20th Century Fox Hour s1 e06 🎅 [0] B ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️⛔1️⃣ | 🚫5.7 | 🌚5 🌝9
Remake of Miracle on 34th Street (1947)

Jan 7 | Review: “Miracle on 34th Street” (1959), Television remake broadcast on NBC Friday Night Special Presentation s1 e09 🎅 [0] B+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 🚫6.7 | 🌚6 🌝9
Remake of Miracle on 34th Street (1947)

Jan 8 | Review: Black Christmas (1974) 🎅 [8] D+>
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌4️⃣ | ✝️⛔4️⃣ | 🚫0.6 | 🌚12 🌝0

Jan 9 | Review: Home Alone (1990) 🎅 [10] A-v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎9.4 | 🌚9 🌝10

Jan 10 | Review: You’ve Got Mail (1998) 🎅 [3] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅1️⃣⚠️ | ✝️❎0️⃣⚠️ | 🚫5.4 | 🌚5 🌝7
Remake of The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

Jan 11 | Review: Love Actually (2003) 🎅 [10] B ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌3️⃣ | ✝️⛔3️⃣ | 🚫3.2 | 🌚6 🌝3

Jan 12 | Review: Bad Santa (2003) 🎅 [9] D ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌4️⃣ | ✝️⛔4️⃣ | 🚫3.4 | 🌚9 🌝3

Finally, from January 13-17:
Rick Retro’s Rankings: All-Time Best Christmas Movies
Rick Retro’s Rankings #7: #25-#16
Rick Retro’s Rankings #8: #15-#11
Rick Retro’s Rankings #9: #10-#6
Rick Retro’s Rankings #10: #5-#3
Rick Retro’s Rankings #11: #2-#1

Don’t forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2026-01-12

Goodbye, 2025!

2025 was a good year in Rick Retro’s Realm. Retro Movie Reviews began the year as a text group with eleven participants, and after debuting on Substack in February, now has 55 subscribers. We added 34 new Retro Reviews, while also re-reviewing and debuting on Substack 35 of the 43 Retro Reviews previously only published to the text group. The remaining eight will be re-reviewed and make their Substack debuts in the next couple of weeks, if all goes as planned!

Hello, 2026!

And speaking of plans for 2026, after finishing up the Christmas Leftovers project that begins tomorrow and runs through January 12, I will be taking a week or two to work on behind-the-scenes construction in The Realm.

First up is cleaning up all the posts and links, making sure that everything that was initially posted to the text group is all transferred correctly over to Substack, so that the archives are one continuous story from the beginning. I will be making sure formatting is correct, links work, etc.

That will complete the foundational era of Rick Retro’s Realm. Next up is structural stuff. I will introduce a couple new “Sections” that I plan to use. While working on finishing up the structure of The Realm, we will return to the Retro Reviews of 51 Dark Whimsy Favorites that we were visiting. 32 were posted in 2025, so there are 19 to go in 2026.

When the structural work is done, hopefully by the end of January, we will celebrate with a Realm-wide Grand Opening Party. The target date is February 10, the one-year anniversary of our Substack debut, but that may be optimistic. We’ll see. I haven’t marketed Retro Movie Reviews much, even to friends and relatives, because I have been focusing on the foundations and structure of this website/realm. But that changes soon and we will grow our community population in 2026!

OK, that concludes the “front page” of The Realm Report #10.

Feel free to read on if you wish, or stop here if the important news was enough for you today!

Be safe in your celebrations tonight, and we will see you in 2026!

Behind the Scenes, Part 1

I promised that in this Realm Report I would share a little about the process of re-reviewing and debuting on Substack all the Retro Reviews previously posted only to the text group. It’s pretty much the same process I now use for all of my reviews, except for the first step when I’m experiencing a work for the first time. So if you are interested in how the sausage is made, read on. If not, feel free to skip this!

1. My initial experience of a work. (I skip this step if I have already experienced the work before.) This is when I watch that movie or read that book for the first time.

2. My initial notes on the work. Some of this may have happened a long time ago, since I’ve been entering grades for movies I’ve watched in a handheld database for a couple of decades now, and for books, several years too. If I’ve just recently experienced a work, I take down more notes right after reading/watching. If it was a long time ago, I may add some notes before step 3.

3. My supplemental research. I check outside sources and add to my notes from Step 2, so that I know what to expect and look for in Step 4.

4. My analysis experience of a work. I read or watch again, working from my notes taken in Steps 2 and 3. Here I go slowly through the work, adding, confirming, and changing observations in my notes. I’m looking to solidify and document several grades and ratings by the end of this analysis: Overall grade, Entertainment Quality grades, Family Suitability and Alignment with Judeo/Christian Values ratings and the Dark and Whimsy scale readings. For a feature film, this analysis typically takes four to six hours!

5. My Retro Review first draft. (I was able to skip this step with the reviews previously posted to the text group, using those posts as a new “first draft”.) Depending on the review, and how hard I work on it, this generally takes two to four hours.

6. My Substack formatting. This includes such nuisances as getting all the fonts correct, and adding tags to posts that you don’t see, but help the post to be found and give me some structural options to use later. This step also includes fun chores like picking out still photos from films that illustrate the review well. This is when I also review the review and often make changes to the first draft. I also document the post in a spreadsheet to make sure nothing has been missed and for future reference, since sometimes future connections with the review are planned. It usually takes me about two hours for this entire step.

7. My final review and publication. I make sure that the spreadsheet entry and review itself look complete and then I schedule the publication to Substack. After that a few details need to be checked, such as adding links to previous reviews that referenced this new reviewed work. This step just takes a few minutes, and then I’m done and a new Retro Review soon is posted for your pleasure or displeasure!

As you can see, it’s a lot of work. The great thing for me, being disabled, and unable to spend too many hours working at my desktop, is that I can complete Steps 1-4 almost entirely from my couch!

I prefer to do Step 5 at my desktop, where I can type at full speed, but if I’m not feeling well enough, I’m able to do Step 5 from my couch as well. Steps 6 and 7 really require me to be at my desk, so they sometimes can be a bottleneck, if I’m not feeling well. But overall I really enjoy the entire process, even the desktop part, so I feel blessed to be able to build a website/realm and work on populating it with content, all for you to enjoy.

Looking Back on the 2025 Christmas Tour

I also promised to share lessons learned on the 2025 Christmas Tour. Really it comes down to one significant lesson: from now on, I will strive to avoid announcing release dates of posts I haven’t written yet!

This will mainly impact Rick Retro’s Realm in terms of announced projects that are happening. Instead of one project always following another, there may be multiple projects going forward at once. Some will not have schedules, just a summary page that lists new posts after they have appeared. Other projects will have an order so that you know what is coming next, but not an itinerary, so you won’t know when the next post is coming. But there will still be the occasional project with an itinerary, and when that itinerary first goes up, all posts will be already complete and ready to appear on schedule!

Behind the Scenes, Part 2

While working on reviews posted during the 2025 Christmas Tour, I tweaked a few things that have slightly changed some of the Dark Whimsy scores and Content Details ratings.

First, I changed the deduction methodology in Whimsy points, because the Whimsy scale wasn’t delivering scores that always felt right, especially with highly penalized works. The new methodology raised a handful of scores, although a couple of scores were lowered slightly. For the tiny fraction of you interested in the details, the full Whimsy scale methodology is here.

These previously published Retro Reviews now have Dark Whimsy scores that have been updated to reflect the improved methodology:

RR#23 Trading Places (1983) from 🚫0.4| 🌚8 🌝0 to 🚫3.4| 🌚8 🌝3
RR#26 Die Hard (1988) from 🚫6.6 | 🌚12 🌝6 to 🚫5.6 | 🌚12 🌝5
RR#51 The Sting (1973) from 😎8.4 | 🌚11 🌝8 to 😎7.5 | 🌚11 🌝7
RR#54 Being There (1979) from 😎8.1 | 🌚9 🌝8 to 😎9.0 | 🌚9 🌝9
RR#57 The Gods Must Be Crazy (1980)
from 😎😎10.4 | 🌚10 🌝11 to 😎😎10.5 | 🌚10 🌝11
RR#59 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1983)
from 😎😎10.0 | 🌚10 🌝10 to 😎😎10.4 | 🌚10 🌝11
RR#63 The Natural (1952 novel) from 🚫0.5 | 🌚10 🌝0 to 🚫1.6 | 🌚10 🌝1
RR#70 Raising Arizona (1987)
from 😎😎11.0 | 🌚11 🌝11 to 😎😎11.7 | 🌚11 🌝12

In addition I changed the Violence/Scariness grading in the Content Details Line that help form the Family Suitability rating.

Previously the top four Violence/Scariness grades were defined as follows:

😡+4 = No violence or scariness.
😡+3 = No violence or just cartoonish violence, possibly scary for younger kids.
😡+2 = Cartoonish violence, including superhero or sci-fi, standard TV violence, injury with a little blood, or bloodless deaths.
😡+1 = Standard TV violence, death with little or no blood.

Now I am better recognizing the truth that beginning around kindergarten most children can usually handle some cartoonish violence. The top four grades are now defined as follows:

😡+4 = At most, a light or moderate amount of cartoonish violence, possibly too scary for preschoolers.
😡+3 = A moderate or heavy amount of cartoonish violence, possibly too scary for younger kids.
😡+2 = Less realistic fantasy violence, including superhero or sci-fi. Light to moderate standard TV violence, including injuries with a little blood, or bloodless deaths.
😡+1 = Moderate standard TV violence, including bloody injuries and deaths with little or no blood.

This change meant that the first item in the Family Suitability Detail/Content Detail Line in several reviews changed from: 😡+3^ to 😡+4.

The Retro Reviews affected:
RR#2 “Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost” (1901)
RR#3 “A Christmas Carol” (1910)
RR#4 “Scrooge” (1913) (aka “Old Scrooge”)
RR#8 “Scrooge” (1928) (audio recording)
RR#16 “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (1964)
RR#17 “A Charlie Brown Christmas” (1965)
RR#18 “How the Grinch Stole Christmas!” (1966)
RR#19 “The Little Drummer Boy” (1968)
RR#21 “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” (1970)
RR#44 The Wizard of Oz (1939)

This completes the “back pages” of The Realm Report #10.

See you in 2026!

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-31

In the early 1990s, Pure Dark Whimsy was on full display for the three stops on our 2025 Christmas Tour. If you missed those reviews, you can find a summary and links here:

Our next stop is in 1994. The Dark is toned down a bit, but we’re still looking at Dark Whimsy. (😎8.8 | 🌚8 🌝11) Tim Allen becomes cinema’s most well-known Santa in The Santa Clause. It’s a solid Christmas comedy, but I was a little surprised that it made nine of the ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I looked at, because for me, it was maybe a double, not a home run.

B+v

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | PGa

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⚠️0️⃣ Tolerable (Not in alignment with Judeo-Christian values, but focuses more on entertaining, not on advocating its viewpoint or pushing an agenda.)

Our next stop jumped ahead nine years, for our first Christmas film for the 21st century. Elf was an instant Christmas classic, but there are holdouts: It only made nine of the ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I consulted. At 😎9.9 | 🌚9 🌝13, it’s just a whisker short on Dark to be Pure Dark Whimsy, but it’s top of the scale in Whimsy. Like Buddy the elf dwarfs the other elves, the Whimsy in Elf dwarfs the Whimsy in most other movies! And it’s definitely at or near the top of the list, depending on who you ask, when it comes to the funniest Christmas movies ever!

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | PGa

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair/Slightly Favorable

On Christmas morning, my gift to you was the Substack debut of my Retro Review of Eureka s4e21 “Do You See What I See?”. This little gem is Pure Dark Whimsy (😎😎10.9 | 🌚10 🌝13) from 2011, and it’s a loving tribute to, and spoof of, animation and old-time Christmas specials.

Now I understand that it was Christmas, and family is a priority over Substack. And I get that this isn’t a famous Christmas film that all of you are curious to learn if I like or dislike the way you do. But I was still disappointed that this review hasn’t received a lot of views yet.

I’m not on Substack expecting to light the world on fire and get tens of thousands of subscribers by reviewing old movies and TV shows. I’m here because I want to encourage people to revisit good memories from their past, and to share good and great entertainment with people who have missed it so far. And this is a television series Christmas episode that I don’t think you should miss! Check out my review and decide for yourself!

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | TV-PG

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⚠️0️⃣ Tolerable (Not in alignment with Judeo-Christian values, but focuses more on entertaining, not on advocating its viewpoint or pushing an agenda.)

This completes our 2025 Christmas Tour. I had planned to include the 2025 Christmas Leftovers as part of the tour/project, but last year the 2024 Christmas Follow-Up was a separate project, and I just decided it makes more sense to do it that way again this time. Look for that to happen the first twelve days of January.

In order to fit the 2025 Christmas Tour into its original schedule of 31 days, I have decided to add a little behind-the-scenes tour epilogue in The Realm Report #10, which will be posted on December 31. I’ll share a little bit about my process of debuting reviews to Substack that I previously posted just to a handful of family and friends. And I learned a lot during this project, so I will share some lessons learned and how they will affect the rickretro.com website going forward.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-27

In the early 1980s stops on our 2025 Christmas Tour, we visited a couple of Pure Dark Whimsy feature films, A Christmas Story and Gremlins.

Everything changed in the late 1980s, where the focus was on big name stars.

Now, we find ourselves in the early 1990s and Pure Dark Whimsy is the name of the game. We visited three outstanding films with Christmas themes or settings, and every single one of them registered very high on our Dark Whimsy meter. Two of the three were from Dark Whimsy master Tim Burton, so it’s hardly surprising!

First up was Edward Scissorhands, probably my favorite Tim Burton film. It registered 😎😎12.0 | 🌚12 🌝12 on our Whimsy meter, just missing the top reading on both scales. It was on eight of the ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I consulted.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ⚠️0️⃣ Problematic for teens and sensitive adults. | PG-13

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair/Slightly Favorable

Next we checked in on The Muppet Christmas Carol. At 😎😎11.9 | 🌚11 🌝13, it isn’t quite as Dark as Edward Scissorhands, but reaches the maximum reading for Whimsy. Not only that, but it’s a superb choice for the whole family to enjoy together, and it was a unanimous selection on all ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | G

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

After our look in on the Muppets delightful Christmas entry, we returned to Tim Burton Town, where we visited The Nightmare Before Christmas. Here Burton goes next level on both Dark and Whimsy, getting the maximum reading on both scales! 😎😎13.0 | 🌚13 🌝13 !!! This film also was a unanimous selection on all ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I inventoried. All that said, while The Nightmare Before Christmas is a great film, and a double-holiday classic, I must admit a slight preference for Edward Scissorhands and The Muppet Christmas Carol. But whatever order you rank these three movies in, you can’t go wrong. Each one is fantastic.

A+>

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | PGa

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎0️⃣ Neutral (No clear values of any type or ⚠️ includes both negative messages and positive messages, which balance out.)

There are two more Christmas-themed Retro Reviews making their Substack debuts over the next two days, and then a special gift on Christmas morning, the Substack debut of the Retro Review for my favorite Christmas-themed television series episode.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-22

Merry Christmas! 🎅

This will perhaps be the last issue of The Realm Report in 2025, so let me wish you all a very merry Christmas, and a happy new year!

A Schedule Change

I’m adding twelve days to Project #4, the 2025 Christmas Tour.

I wish I could say that I’m giving you twelve additional great reviews, but the truth is I just can’t keep the original schedule.

I’ve taken a couple of the planned reviews and moved them from the main tour into the Christmas Leftovers portion of the tour. That includes the one scheduled for today. Then I’ve also added in a couple of post-Christmas recovery days. So instead of winding up Project #4 on December 31, I’m now aiming at wrapping it up on January 12. The updated schedule plan is posted here:

I thought I could do it all in December. In my imagination I figured that it shouldn’t be too hard to reformat and upload reviews I wrote last year and release one each day. But in reality, I also wanted to re-watch each reviewed work so that I could add more information than I used to include. Specifically, I’m talking about the Dark Whimsy, Family Suitability and Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values ratings.

I feel like all three of those are valuable ratings that I bring to my reviews. Nowhere else that I know of can you find a Dark Whimsy rating!

Sure, there are lots of places that discuss content, but most of them come from a rather permissive viewpoint. I’m a little tougher. From my Christian viewpoint, I think that when content is questionable or borderline, you should wait until children have matured more before exposing them to that content.

When it comes to Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values, I know of at least a couple websites that address that issue. In this case, I feel like they are often too tough. For example, a film that satirizes bad behavior is not condoning bad behavior, it is mocking bad behavior. I try to look at how ideas are presented to discern the intent of the creators and the messages that they are trying to send.

All that to say that adding those ratings to my previous reviews that lacked them is really important to me. And it’s a major reason for this project. It gives me an opportunity to accomplish the re-reviews while also bringing the content from the original reviews to my now larger audience.

But Here’s the Thing…

Every now and then, I mention that I have a disability, a chronic disease, that sometimes interferes with my ability to work. The weird thing is, that has played no role in this particular schedule change. I’m not entirely surprised. For some reason I’ve noticed that in November and December of most years, my chronic symptoms usually are less severe than the rest of the year. You’d think maybe the climate is part of the reason, but I’m not sure. I’m based in Los Angeles, where the weather doesn’t change much to begin with, and I’m basically homebound in a controlled environment. So who knows?

Instead, it’s just the amount of work, more than expected, that has forced me to extend the schedule. Just to give you an idea, in order to feel like I’m giving an objective accurate report on those three ratings mentioned earlier, I take notes on my phone during a viewing (or reading) of the work I’m reviewing. Typically that at least doubles the time it takes to watch the film or read the literary work. Sometimes, with more complicated works (more adult content or works sending mixed messages), it can triple the reviewing time. So a two-hour film can take me four to six hours to analyze. Then add a couple more hours for finding screenshots, formatting for Substack, etc., and well, I’m working too more hours than I can manage.

I considered keeping to the schedule just by posting old reviews without the new analysis, but I really want to get those done once and for all. So I’m going to keep doing the new analysis, but I can’t keep up the pace of the old schedule while staying healthy and keeping other holiday obligations.

2026 Plans…

…remain uncertain. But I can tell you one thing: I’m resolving to only schedule new projects after having completed at least 75% of the work on them! I don’t like changing release schedules that I’ve published and very much want to remove the necessity of that happening any more.

Behind the Scenes

While working on reviews posted during the current 2025 Christmas Tour, I tweaked a few things that have slightly changed some of the Dark Whimsy ratings and Family Suitability Details ratings. I’ve updated the former changes to this website, and still haven’t updated the latter. I don’t want to take the time right now to complete that, but I will make those changes soon, and include a list of the changes in the next issue of The Realm Report.

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-18

After visiting the early 1980s in our 2025 Christmas Tour, we then turned to the late 1980s, and three of my reviews previously posted to the text group in 2024 made their Substack debuts. In the early 1980s, the Christmas films we looked at were generally more story-driven, while in the late 1980s, we visited three films that were more star-driven.

First up was Die Hard, the 1988 Bruce Willis hit that turned him from a rising television star into a bona fide big-screen action hero. It was on all ten of the all-time best Christmas movie lists that I checked, so at least among the list-makers, it’s unanimously a Christmas movie. This despite that it was actually a summer hit in its debut year, released in July of 1988!

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ❌2️⃣ Moderate adults-only content. | R

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

Bill Murray was already a star when 1988’s Scrooged debuted. It made eight of ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked. One of my least favorite performances by Murray led one of my least favorite adaptations of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

C ^

Family Suitability
+ ❌1️⃣ Light adults-only content. | PG-13

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⛔4️⃣ Horrible/Extremely Unfavorable

Our last late 1980s Christmas film was the 1989 Chevy Chase vehicle, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It landed on nine of ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked. Like Murray, Chase was already a star via Saturday Night Live and previous films. Unlike Murray in Scrooged, Chase gave one of his best performances ever in this film, managing over-the-top bumbling slapstick, and remaining a warm-hearted sympathetic character, while simultaneously being a jerk who delivers pointed sarcastic commentary on at least half of the other characters in the film!

A+v

Family Suitability
+ ❌1️⃣ Light adults-only content. | PG-13

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⚠️0️⃣ Tolerable (Not in alignment with Judeo-Christian values, but focuses more on entertaining, not on advocating its viewpoint or pushing an agenda.)

The Substack debut of Retro Review #29: Home Alone (1990), originally scheduled for this afternoon has been postponed. Instead, The Realm Report #9 will be published, giving you a little insight as to why.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-18

The last recap of our 2025 Christmas Tour, Part 2 of “A Very Special Christmas” linked the Retro Reviews of the second tier of Christmas TV specials that ran from the later 1960s to 1970. There wasn’t anything worth checking out right away in the rest of the 1970s, so we headed straight for the early 1980s, and three of my reviews previously posted to the text group in 2024 made their Substack debuts.

First up was Trading Places, the 1983 Eddie Murphy vehicle that was part of his rise to fame. It would have counted as Dark Whimsy were it not for the abundance of adult content that sucked out the Whimsy. We won’t even call it Dark Whimzy, because what delightful childish elements it had were overcome by the “mature” content.

Trading Places is a cynical look at human nature with villains that posit environment vs. genetics as a false dichotomy for explaining good and bad behavior, completely ignoring human free will, to their own undoing. Nevertheless, it is a very funny movie that remains popular and found it’s way to eight of ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked. So I reviewed it.

B ^

Family Suitability
+ ❌3️⃣ Heavy adults-only content. | R

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⛔3️⃣ Very Poor/Heavily Unfavorable

Next up was the Pure Dark Whimsy masterpiece of comedy and nostalgia, 1983’s A Christmas Story. It made nine of ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked. Our Retro Review praises this film enough that I probably don’t need to add any more praise here. Read the review and see for yourself!

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅1️⃣ Mostly OK for teens and adults. (Grades 10+, ⚠️ Might be considered inappropriate for sensitive teens and adults.) | PGc

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

Our last early 1980s Christmas film was the over-the-top Pure Dark Whimsy 1984 film, Gremlins. It also made nine of ten all-time best Christmas movies lists that I checked. If you like your Dark Whimsy really Dark and reading strongly on the comedy portion of the Whimsy scale, this one is for you. If you don’t, it’s not for you. By the time you finish reading our Retro Review of Gremlins, you should know if it’s in your wheelhouse or not.

A+v

Family Suitability
+ ✅1️⃣ Mostly OK for teens and adults. (Grades 10+, ⚠️ Might be considered inappropriate for sensitive teens and adults.) | PGc

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⛔1️⃣ Subpar/Slightly Unfavorable

The Substack debuts of Retro Reviews for three Christmas films from the later 1980s are due up between now and the next recap summary. Enjoy!

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-14

The last recap of our 2025 Christmas Tour, Part 1 of “A Very Special Christmas” linked the Retro Reviews of the “Big Three” Christmas TV specials that premiered in the 1960s and still dominate “Best Christmas Movies Ever” lists today. Yesterday, our tour included the Substack debuts of the Retro Reviews for the second tier of Christmas TV specials. These three specials are not revered as highly as the Big Three, but are still well-regarded. All of them made at least three of ten “Best Christmas Movies Ever” lists I consulted, with the second one found on four lists.

Since those reviews will be post-dated soon, to reflect their initial debuts to our pre-Substack text group during our 2024 Christmas Tour, this summary post will preserve their Substack debuts for current and future readers following along with the 2025 Christmas Tour.

All three of these second-tier Christmas specials were based on songs. Up first was the special more focused on the Christian meaning of Christmas than any other, including even the Big Three.

A v

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

Next up was the second-tier special that landed on more all-time best lists than either of the other two. I’m not sure why. It’s a good special to be sure, very cute, and great for kids. But of all six of the Christmas specials I’ve reviewed, it’s my least favorite for adults. Find out why in the Retro Review!

A v

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | TV-G

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

Finally, we concluded our look at the second-tier of Christmas specials with the Retro Review of the one that almost merits being in the first-tier. In the review, I’ll briefly tell you the main reason why it missed out, but spend a lot more time telling you about the reasons why it was a great TV special in its own right. If you missed this review yesterday, click through and read it today!

A+>

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

From here through Christmas Eve, starting this afternoon, our 2025 Christmas Tour will present the Substack debut of a Retro Review for a Christmas movie previously posted only to our text group during the 2024 Christmas Tour. Every few days I will include a recap post like this one so that both tours can be followed in the proper sequence by future visitors to our archives.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-12

As our 2025 Christmas Tour leaves the post-war era, we enter the 1960s where the new trend is the TV Christmas special. There are three that have been the most enduring to this day and landed on most of the “Best Christmas Movies Ever” lists that I checked, even though one could dispute whether or not they are “movies” that should be compared against feature films. That said, our first and third stops were on nine of the ten lists I checked, and the second was on all ten.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

Notably, all three of these specials are appropriate for the whole family, even the younger children. They also all align very well with Judeo-Christian values, most notably this second stop that shares the Christmas message straight from the Gospel of Luke.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | TV-G

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

All three of these Christmas specials register high on the Whimsy scale, and while the first two have enough Dark to be considered Dark Whimsy, this final stop is Pure Dark Whimsy from Dr. Seuss, a master of Dark Whimsy, beloved by children of all ages.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

After visiting all three, feel free to comment in the post below with your opinion as to which of these specials is best in a variety of categories. And definitely visit the post to vote in the poll for overall best!

Tomorrow our tour takes us to the second tier of Christmas TV specials, sitting just below the Big Three in stature, but still more renowned than all the rest.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-10

The last few stops on our 2025 Christmas Tour were movies set in New England, New York state, or New York City. All of them included eligible bachelors finding romance during the snowy holiday season, typically soldiers back home from World War Two. Thus were the holiday filmmaking trends in the 1940s and 1950s, a regular Yuletide Nor’easter! These trends are not ending with today’s stop on our tour!

Yesterday we visited the Big Apple for Miracle on 34th Street. The romance there wasn’t a big part of the story and WWII wasn’t mentioned. But we at least had snow in New York trending.

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair/Slightly Favorable

Today’s stop on our tour doesn’t just confirm our holiday trends, it doubles down on them. We have scenes in New York City and New England. (This time it’s Vermont, not Connecticut.) Not only that, but we have not one, but two returning soldiers as our eligible bachelors in danger of romance. And for this epic Christmas musical, the holiday filmmaking trends are brought to you in living color!

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

I gave Miracle on 34th Street and White Christmas equally strong grades in the top third of the “A” range. If you’ve seen both which do you prefer?

We’d love to hear the reason for your vote in the comments!

Leave a comment

Tomorrow, we leave the holiday trends of the 1940s and 1950s behind. In the 1960s the new trend was holiday television specials, and we will visit the big three that kicked off that trend.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-09

The last stop on our 2025 Christmas Tour was in 1945 Connecticut, but we will back up a couple of years to pick up a 1943 short story, because, well, it sets up the next stop.

A+>

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

The next film on our tour was on all ten “All-Time Best Christmas Movie” lists that I checked. It topped some of those lists. It’s not everyone’s favorite Christmas movie, but it would be a contender in any poll. If our last stop was an elegant little lobby, this stop is the exquisite and grand museum to which it provides an entrance.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+)

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

Tomorrow, another review posted last December to the text group makes its Substack debut.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-07

As our 2025 Christmas Tour takes us into the 1940’s, yesterday we visited The Shop Around the Corner. Set in a Budapest, Hungary, leathergoods shop, it’s a crowd-pleasing romantic dramedy that ignored the cloud of War that had already descended on Europe. A safe decision in the 1940 holiday season with the United States not yet officially participating in the Second World War. James Stewart is the eligible bachelor, an ambitious young salesman working at the shop.

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair/Slightly Favorable

The next stop on our tour finds us back in the States, near the end of World War Two. In fact, it was released during the three months between victory in Europe and victory in Japan. A romantic comedy of the screwball comedy genre, this film didn’t ignore the combat, giving us an ever so short glimpse of a “You sunk my battleship!” moment. But it quickly leaves the war far behind, giving us a returning war hero as the eligible bachelor. Delivering escapist romance and the wacky situations that screwball comedy is known to bring, was just the right recipe for war-weary audiences.

A >

Family Suitability
+ ✅1️⃣ Mostly OK for teens and adults. (Grades 10+, ⚠️ Might be considered inappropriate for sensitive teens and adults.) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ⚠️0️⃣ Tolerable (Not in alignment with Judeo-Christian values, but focuses more on entertaining, not on advocating its viewpoint or pushing an agenda.)

Up next, a short story and the classic film it inspired.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-06

Yesterday, we visited a bunch of short films based on Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” and today our 2025 Christmas Tour (a reboot of the 2024 Tour for new subscribers) takes a brief break from Scrooge as we enter the 1930s and leave silent films in our rearview mirror. Our first feature film on our tour, a Laurel and Hardy classic, only made three of the ten all-time best Christmas movie lists I checked, but it was the oldest entry on any list, so it felt like a must-see.

B+>

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair/Slightly Favorable

Next up we’re going back to Dickens with the first two feature-length Carols on our Itinerary. The first wasn’t on any all-time best list, but it’s not too shabby, and the second only haunted two lists, but perhaps deserves a better legacy than that. By viewing these two we complete our round-up of the early Ebenezers as a reference point for future travels:

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

A+v

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | Approved

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent/Very Strongly Favorable

After this we move on into some of the best Christmas films from the 1940s and 1950s, beginning tomorrow with a review from the text group that has never previously been uploaded to Substack.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Based on post originally posted to text group 2024-12-02
Last updated 2025-12-04

We kicked off our 2025 Christmas Tour (a reboot of the 2024 Tour for new subscribers) on December 1 by revisiting the review of the classic Dickens’ novella, A Christmas Carol.

A+^

Family Suitability
+ ✅2️⃣ OK for teens and adults. (Grades 7+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎4️⃣ Excellent

Now that we’ve read the original novella for comparison purposes, our visual journey can begin. I invite you to read each review below to get a feel for the early short film adaptations of Dickens’ classic tale. If you have more time, watch each one and then join us in the comment section of the review (no spoilers) or the chat for the review (spoilers and passionate analysis invited).

Later we’ll get to a couple of the best adaptations of this Dickens Christmas standard, but for today we’ll just visit the earliest ones.

From 1901 to 1928, ten films based on Scrooge’s travails were made. Nine were short films (40 minutes or less). Two of the shorts and the feature-length film are lost and must be skipped. All are in black and white, all are silent films except for the final stop. We have seven stops to make, but they’re all quick.

To watch them, just click on the embedded YouTube link in each review, or go to YouTube and search on the title, followed by the year. For many, there will be a number of options, with varying picture quality and different added music (which can really impact your enjoyment, but I don’t have time or desire to rate every variation, so I’ll pick one and go for it.) Tip: check the runtime to verify you’re on the right video.

Off we go to:
1901 “Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost” /£ (6 min, 20 sec) (the £ means it’s a British film)

B ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎1️⃣ Fair

We can’t watch the lost short film:
1908 “A Christmas Carol”

But we can visit:
1910 “A Christmas Carol” (13 min)

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

We must also skip this lost Italian film:
1910 “Il sogno dell’usuraio” /€IT

Two stops in Dickens’ home country follow:
1913 “Scrooge” /£ (aka “Old Scrooge”) (40 min)
1914 “A Christmas Carol” /£ (22 min)

C-v

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

A ^

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

Then we skip the first feature film based on Scrooge, as it’s also a lost film:
1916 The Right to Be Happy

Our last three stops remain in jolly ole England:
1922 “Scrooge” /£ (18 min, but that original version is lost, they later released a version with sound at 10 min, and we can watch that.)
1923 “Scrooge” (aka “A Christmas Carol”) /£ (25 min)
1928 “Scrooge” /£ (12 min)

B-^

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

A ?

Family Suitability
+ ✅3️⃣ OK for older kids. (Grades 4+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎3️⃣ Very Good/Strongly Favorable

B v

Family Suitability
+ ✅4️⃣ OK for younger kids. (Grades K+) | NR

Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values
+ ❎2️⃣ Good/Moderately Favorable

Our very last stop was the first “Scrooge” short with a soundtrack, but alas, only the soundtrack has survived! You can listen on YouTube but search “Scrooge 1926” instead—it's mislabeled.

You can watch all seven movies in just a bit over two hours and get a great glimpse of early film adaptation technology. If you read the novella right before watching them, you will receive a great education on both the creativity and limitations of early cinema.

Don't forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Based on post originally posted to text group 2024-12-01
Last updated 2025-12-03

Yesterday we kicked off a new project in The Realm Report, but every project needs an official directory/itinerary, so here it is today.

We are touring via Retro Reviews many of the films generally regarded as among the Best Christmas Movies of All-Time. I surveyed 10 different lists from varying sources, most including 100 or so entries, and counted the number of lists that included each prospective review subject.

A word to the reasonable skeptics: The dates on Project #3 Itinerary, which is as yet incomplete, took a beating, so it’s probably 50/50 whether or not I can keep to this schedule. But in our favor this time, is that all of the reviews were written last year. So it’s just a matter of updating the reviews for Substack, adding stills from the films, formatting and all that good stuff. I hope to also re-watch all or most of the reviewed films to add more information, bringing them up to my current review standards, but that takes longer and might be left out in some cases to meet the dates below.

For the reviews below, after the name and year of the reviewed work, I will include, where applicable, how many Best Christmas Movies lists that each film made out of ten 🎅, followed by the Retro Review Grade given (explained here). The next line includes the Family Suitability Rating I have given 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 (explained here) and the Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values Rating I have given ✝️ (explained here). Last but not least comes the Dark Whimsy score and readings (explained here). These will be added after each day has passed, so check back to see where we have been at a glance.

Dec 1 | Post: Home for Christmas (The Realm Report #8), project kickoff post
Linked Review: A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas (1843), novella by Charles Dickens [n/a] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎😎10.1 | 🌚11 🌝10

Dec 2 | Post: 31 Days of Christmas: The Itinerary for a December to Remember [You are here.]

Dec 3 | Post: The Ultimate Guide to Early Film Adaptations of A Christmas Carol. (1901-1928)
Linked Reviews:
“Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost” (1901) [n/a] B ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 😎8.1 | 🌚9 🌝8

“A Christmas Carol” (1910) [n/a] A >
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎😎10.0 | 🌚10 🌝10

“Scrooge” (1913) (aka “Old Scrooge”) [n/a] C-v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎9.1 | 🌚10 🌝9

“A Christmas Carol” (1914) [n/a] A ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎9.4 | 🌚9 🌝10

“Scrooge” (1922) <sound edit version> (1929) [n/a] B-^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎9.2 | 🌚10 🌝9

“Scrooge” (1923) (aka “A Christmas Carol”) [n/a] A ?
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎9.1 | 🌚10 🌝9

“Scrooge” (1928) <audio recording> [n/a] B v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎7.2 | 🌚9 🌝7

Dec 4 | Post: Do You Hear What I Hear? - Christmas Films of the 1930s
Linked Reviews:
Babes in Toyland (1934) (aka March of the Wooden Soldiers) 🎅 [3] B+>
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 😎9.8 | 🌚9 🌝12

Scrooge (1935) 🎅 [0] A ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎7.4 | 🌚10 🌝7

A Christmas Carol (1938) 🎅 [2] A+v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎9.4 | 🌚9 🌝10

Dec 5 | Review: The Shop Around the Corner (1940) 🎅 [8] A ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 🚫5.2 | 🌚7 🌝5

Dec 6 | Post: Bride Shopping at Christmas
Linked Review: Christmas in Connecticut (1945) 🎅 [8] A >
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅1️⃣⚠️ | ✝️⚠️0️⃣ | 🚫6.3 | 🌚6 🌝7

Dec 7 | Post: Christmas in Bedford Falls
Linked Reviews:
“The Greatest Gift” (1943, short story) [n/a] A+>
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎7.1 | 🌚8 🌝7

It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) 🎅 [10] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎8.1 | 🌚9 🌝8

Dec 8 | Review: Miracle on 34th Street (1947) 🎅 [9] A ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 🚫4.7 | 🌚4 🌝9

Dec 9 | Post: Christmas Is Trending!
Linked Review: White Christmas (1954) 🎅 [8] A ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 🚫6.5 | 🌚6 🌝8

Dec 10 | Post: A Very Special Christmas, Part 1
Linked Reviews:
“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (1964) 🎅 [9] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎8.8 | 🌚8 🌝11

“A Charlie Brown Christmas” (1965) 🎅 [10] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎7.8 | 🌚7 🌝11

“How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (1966) 🎅 [9] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 😎😎10.7 | 🌚10 🌝12

Linked Post: Rudolph vs. Charlie Brown vs. The Grinch: Who’s The Best? (aka Rick Retro’s Rankings #1: The Big Three Christmas TV Specials)

Dec 11 | Reviews:
“The Little Drummer Boy” (1968) 🎅 [3] A v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎😎10.0 | 🌚10 🌝10

“Frosty the Snowman” (1969) 🎅 [4] A v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎8.8 | 🌚8 🌝11

“Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” (1970) 🎅 [3] A+>
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎4️⃣ | 😎😎10.4 | 🌚10 🌝11

Dec 12 | Post: A Very Special Christmas, Part 2
Review: Trading Places (1983) 🎅 [8] B ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌3️⃣ | ✝️⛔3️⃣ | 🚫3.4 | 🌚8 🌝3

Dec 13 | Review: A Christmas Story (1983) 🎅 [9] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅1️⃣⚠️ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎😎10.8 | 🌚10 🌝13

Dec 14 | Review: Gremlins (1984) 🎅 [9] A+v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅1️⃣⚠️ | ✝️⛔1️⃣ | 😎😎12.8 | 🌚12 🌝13

Post: A Christmas Story of Gremlins Trading Places

Dec 15 | Review: Die Hard (1988) 🎅 [10] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌2️⃣ | ✝️❎3️⃣ | 🚫5.6 | 🌚12 🌝5

Dec 16 | Review: Scrooged (1988) 🎅 [8] C ^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌1️⃣ | ✝️⛔4️⃣ | 🚫5.6 | 🌚12 🌝5

Dec 17 | Review: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989) 🎅 [9] A+v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦❌1️⃣ | ✝️⚠️0️⃣ | 🕶️8.6 | 🌚8 🌝10

Dec 18 | Post: The Stars Are Out for Christmas
Post: 12 More Days of Christmas (The Realm Report #9)

Dec 19 | Review: Edward Scissorhands (1990) 🎅 [8] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦⚠️0️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 😎😎12.0 | 🌚12 🌝12

Dec 20 | Review: The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992) 🎅 [10] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅4️⃣ | ✝️❎2️⃣ | 😎😎11.9 | 🌚11 🌝13

Dec 21 | Review: The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) 🎅 [10] A+>
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️❎0️⃣⚠️ | 😎😎13.0 | 🌚13 🌝13

Dec 22 | Post: Of Scissors, Muppets and Nightmares

Dec 23 | Review: The Santa Clause (1994) 🎅 [9] B+v
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅3️⃣ | ✝️⚠️0️⃣ | 😎8.8 | 🌚8 🌝11

Dec 24 | Review: Elf (2003) 🎅 [9] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️❎1️⃣ | 😎9.9 | 🌚9 🌝13

Dec 25 | Review: Eureka ep64/s4 e21 “Do You See What I See?” (2011) 🎅 [0] A+^
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦✅2️⃣ | ✝️⚠️0️⃣ | 😎😎10.9 | 🌚10 🌝13

Dec 27 | Post: Wrapping Up the 2025 Christmas Tour

Dec 31 | Post: Moving On to a New Year (The Realm Report #10)

Coming in January: What’s That in the Fridge?! (Project #5: 2025 Christmas Leftovers)
and finally, from January 13-17:
Rick Retro’s Rankings: All-Time Best Christmas Movies
Rick Retro’s Rankings #7: #25-#16
Rick Retro’s Rankings #8: #15-#11
Rick Retro’s Rankings #9: #10-#6
Rick Retro’s Rankings #10: #5-#3
Rick Retro’s Rankings #11: #2-#1

Don’t forget the popcorn!

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2026-01-12

Happy Holidays! 🎅

I hope you all had a fantastic Thanksgiving weekend with family and friends! May the rest of your holiday season this year be blessed!

Joy to the World! ✝️

The Lord has come!

Of course, the Good News of Christmas is the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

On a Good News Scale of zero to ten (ten being that particular Christmas Good News), the return of Retro Movie Reviews with a post for the first time in over three months comes in at probably dead flat zero for most people, but hopefully more like 0.2 or so to my wonderful subscribers. 🙂

The reasons for the lack of posting are many and varied. I’ll fill you in later, but that’s not important right now. Let’s get back to the fun stuff first!

Subscriber Count 😲

Do you have any idea at how humbling it is to see my subscriber count continue to grow despite not posting for three months? It almost makes me afraid to post, because it’s when you do and offend people that they go away! 😂

We are up to 52 subscribers in our community, up eleven from the last issue of The Realm Report, in July, when it was 41. In reality that is a slower growth rate than when I was posting regularly, but I’m surprised and grateful to see any growth at all!

So What Now⁉️

For now, Project #3, Dark Whimsy Favorites will be placed on hold for the holiday season. We will return to it in 2026.

Retro Movie Reviews began in the holiday season of 2024 when I started sending reviews of Christmas movies to a group of around ten friends and family members via text. Here’s the post that kicked off my 2024 Christmas Tour:

After transitioning to Substack I have uploaded several of those original reviews, but not all of them. So it seems to me that with five times as many subscribers now, it’s a good time to shore up the Christmas section of this Substack. Roughly following the itinerary from last year (found in posts linked in the 2024 Christmas Tour post), I will either link to previously uploaded reviews or upload/post the reviews from last year that had not yet been added here.

As much as possible, I will re-watch (or re-read) the reviewed works, in order to update them to my newer review standards. But that depends on my time and abilities to do so, therefore, I make no definite promises!

If you are one of my original followers via texts, the transition to Substack has added a lot to these reviews, including still photos from the films, so there is new content to enjoy. If you are one of my Substack subscribers or a random visitor, I hope you enjoy these reviews of some of the best Christmas movies ever.

What the Dickens?!

When I decided to review the best Christmas movies, I checked 10 different lists of “Best Christmas Movies Ever”. There were a few hundred entries that showed up on at least one list. However, only one work inspired 10 of those entries. That work is the novella A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas by Charles Dickens, first published in 1843. (Bonus points if you knew the full title.)

So just like last year, in preparation for reviewing some of those films, we should revisit the original novella. Here’s my review:

This Wikipedia link has numerous options for free online reading under External Links:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol

That’s all for today. Tomorrow I will post the official project itinerary and the next day we visit the early short films based on this novella.

If you are one of those completists (a vice that I share) who is new to this Substack, you can start from the beginning with my first post to the text group and continue forward with the “Next (all sections) ➡️” links until you reach those “not-yet-uploaded-to-Substack” posts that I’m going to be adding this month. Hopefully. 😉 By starting from the beginning, you will get extra commentary between reviews, little details which I will probably not refer back to during this year’s reboot tour.

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-12-01

Introducing Recaps

Rick Retro’s Realm has just added a new section that I call Recaps.

Retro Recaps are simply shorter reviews. In a typical full Retro Review, I lay out my opinions in prose, punctuated with still shots from the film, but in a Retro Recap I trim down the coverage of the reviewed work to 5 main points:

1. About — The basics of what the recapped work is about.

2. Pros — What I liked about the work.

3. Cons — What I didn’t like about the work.

4. NPCs (Not Pros or Cons) — Other comments about the work.

5. Bottom Line — Whether or not I recommend the work, and to whom.

Retro Recaps may (or may not) include most of the other information that I typically include in a Retro Review, so the Reference Overview and other pages in the Reference section will still help you understand what all the abbreviations and emojis used mean.

In fact, there are two different reasons why I might post a Retro Recap instead of a Retro Review.

The first reason for posting a Retro Recap is that I have just experienced a work and want to save the time that it takes to write a full review, in part, because the work doesn’t seem important enough to write that full review. I still want you to know what I thought and felt about the work, but it saves a couple of hours to write a Retro Recap instead, and I can use that time for other improvements to Rick Retro’s Realm. In such cases, you will still usually see all the extra information that I typically include in a Retro Review.

The second reason for posting a Retro Recap is that I want to let you know about a work that I experienced some time ago, before I began writing reviews regularly. In these cases, I haven’t found the time to experience the work again for a full Retro Review yet, so the extra information that I typically include in a Retro Review will probably be missing. The grade I give won’t include one of my arrows, because I didn’t assign those previously, and I’m just going by my increasingly weakening memory as to the Pros and Cons of the work. 😂 These Retro Recaps serve as good placeholders to point out Bottom Line recommendations until such time as I can write a full Retro Review for the work.

No matter the reason for posting a Retro Recap, any of you inhabiting or visiting The Realm can request an upgrade to a full Retro Review by adding a 🩷Like or comment to the Recap. From time to time I will upgrade the most requested Recaps.

Here’s a link to the Recaps section.

And here’s Retro Recap #1, due out tomorrow.

Gowns, aka Reviews Get a Makeover

From time to time, I’ve noticed little things I want to improve here and there in my Retro Reviews. But it’s a lot of work to go back and touch every review to make them more consistently the way I want them.

So I’ve been saving up some thoughts until the weight of needing to make changes became overwhelming enough to go forward. 😁 At least this way I can combine several changes into one makeover for each review.

From the top of the review to the bottom, here are the changes you will see:

1. The first line of each review (and also each post that is not a review) will now repeat the subtitle of the post. I don’t like this redundancy, but Substack kind of forces it on me by not including subtitles when I include inter-stack links in my posts. They do include the first line of the post in links, so by including the post’s subtitle within the first line, I am working around the Substack oversight.

2. I’ve added a Review-at-a-Glance Section into the Header Block of Retro Reviews and Retro Recaps. This section includes the Grade I’ve given the work and also how I rate the work’s Family Suitability and Alignment with Judeo-Christian Values. I still give more details on these items later in the review, but I wanted to help out my conservative and Christian subscribers by including those ratings, very important to them, right from the start of the review.

3. I’m ditching the old form of the Left-Right Line in the Opinion Block and replacing it with a new, more objective approach where I will collect and evaluate the opinions of a spectrum of critics about the work. This will leave n/a (not available) ratings for a while until I have compiled that data, but will eventually give you better info about how the work is viewed across the spectrum than my guessing about how it is viewed.

4. I’ve changed the scale for content in the Family Suitability ratings and Content Detail ratings. It used to be +3 to -4 including both a +0 and -0. Now it is +4 to -4 with all of the plus ratings adding one point. So there is no longer a +0 rating, and the ratings are more symmetrical.

5. Other pieces of the review are moved around a little and formatted differently for more or less emphasis. All of the Reference section has been updated to explain and reflect the new formatting. The first Retro Review to get the full makeover is Big (1988). I will be updating all the archived posts to the new format as time allows.

New Old Post Posted to Substack!

In case you missed it last week, Rick Retro’s Rankings #1, The Big Three Christmas Specials, from the old text group was finally uploaded and upgraded onto Rick Retro’s Realm on Substack for the first time. That still leaves 25 old reviews to bring over, plus a few more Retro Rankings. So you can still expect more emails for reviews of Christmas movies here in the summer of 2025! 🤣🎅

Behind the Scenes: Scheduling Disaster Continues!

At this point, I have to accept that Project #3, Dark Whimsy Favorites will not be completed in 200 days by August 28. At this point, I just hope to complete it by September or October. I’m not even going to try to project review release dates any more. I just have to accept that with my chronic disease it isn’t reasonable to commit specific long-term dates to you. I have recently had some longer-than-usual disease spells, which I could have probably avoided by being less active, but sometimes the chance to connect with people away from home overrules the known cost I expect to pay. And spending a lot of time on building out the site with new sections and new looks takes away from reviewing time too. So the updated Project #3 schedule no longer includes dates, just guess-timates. At least the release order is correct, so if you wish to follow along, you still know what to watch next:

Subscriber Count!

Every now and then I also check my follower count. Currently it’s over 150. That’s a lot! I have no strong idea how to convert them to subscribers, but perhaps that will come in time. Odds are they are people who saw something they like, but just don’t want to make a commitment yet. We will focus on improving The Realm and our subscriber community to make it more inviting over time.

We are up to 41 subscribers in our community, up four from last issue, when it was 37. It’s humbling to see 5% to 10% growth on almost a weekly basis, when I’m not even trying for that yet. And when I look at what other Substacks my subscribers are reading, I find a lot of you seem to be movie lovers, and many of you share my conservative and Christian viewpoints. Movie lovers of all viewpoints are welcome here, and we’re looking to create a community of subscribers that have at least one or two things in common with each other, whether that be conservative Christian views or just a love for movies, books, and/or Dark Whimsy! It looks like we are succeeding! Thanks so much for being part of the journey. The Realm is growing!

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Last updated 2025-07-17

Get Around, Round, Round, I Get Around…
(A Timely Way to Introduce Some “Behind the Scenes” News)

I was sorry to hear about the recent passing of Brian Wilson from The Beach Boys. They preceded me in this world by a couple of decades, but I share a Southern California upbringing, and they have been one of my top favorite bands since I first discovered their music. Their sound is unique and Brian was the primary creative genius behind their original success. It’s always sad when the world loses someone like that, who will never create something for us to enjoy again, but this one touches me more deeply, because The Beach Boys have been such a favorite of mine.

How does that relate to the news I have for you today? Not well. 😉I might do music reviews some day way in the future, but I’m focusing on movies right now and television and books will probably be featured here before music. So the illustration, sub-heading and first paragraph here are just intended as a little tribute to The Beach Boys and a segue to introduce a recent update to Rick Retro’s Realm.

And that recent update is this: I’ve fixed some plumbing in the Realm. There were a lot of inactive “⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️” links at the bottom of posts. Now most of them work. A few still don’t, because before Substack I was posting reviews to a small text group of family and friends, and not all of those posts have been uploaded to Substack yet. So in between posts that aren’t here yet, the posts with the regular “Previous/Next” links inactive, will have active links below that look like this:
⬅️Previous Available, skipping over text group posts not yet uploaded.
Or like this:
Next Available, skipping over text group posts not yet uploaded ➡️

What this means to you, is that now every Rick Retro post that is here, whether originally posted to the text group or originally posted here on Substack, exists in an unbroken chain. You can start at the beginning and follow the “Next” links all the way to this post, and beyond once I’ve posted more. Or you can follow the “Previous” links back to the beginning from here if you wish. (Each section of The Realm has its own “Previous” and “Next” links conveniently supplied by Substack if you are only interested in a specific section, but my added links include everything posted.)

And for the majority of you who weren’t a subscriber when I began, here’s a link to my very first text group post. The minority of you who are like me and feel compelled to begin at the beginning might even want to visit this link! 😁

Here’s my first Substack post, for anyone who wants to skip the text group posts, especially right now when many of them still have not been reformatted and uploaded.

In other site-navigation “Behind the Scenes” news, I am making most internal site links more visible by linking them not only in the text, but also by adding a more visible link the paragraph where the original link is included. The double linking should make it easier to get around as well as add visual appeal to the posts. (You can see examples in the two previous paragraphs here.) These added links can be extra helpful to those reading in the Substack app where text links are underlined instead of in color, and easy to miss. The enhanced post-paragraph links don’t show up quite as well in the app as they do in your browser, but that’s a topic I will address more later. I haven’t yet applied the double linking to all previous posts, but it doesn’t take long and should be complete soon.

New Old Review Posted!

Yes, the rumors are true. Retro Review #18, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas!” (1966), from the old text group was finally uploaded and upgraded onto Rick Retro’s Realm on Substack for the first time. That leaves 25 old reviews still to bring over, plus a few Retro Rankings. So you can expect more emails for reviews of Christmas movies here in the summer of 2025! 🤣🎅

More Behind the Scenes

Also behind the scenes, along with connecting plumbing and improving links, I’ve had to make schedule changes. Once again, too much outside activity has triggered a bit of chronic disease sick time and affected the schedule for Project #3, Dark Whimsy Favorites. The odds of finishing the project in 200 days are getting really slim, and one more big delay might end my chances completely, but I’m still hopeful I can finish on schedule by August 28! By the way, I just added the grades given to already reviewed films on the itinerary post, to help see how the project is going. Take a new look at the updated schedule and the grades given to my favorite Dark Whimsy films reviewed so far, in the link that follows this sentence:

The tricky part is that I’m trying to do more stuff than merely completing this project, since I’m still building out other parts of the site. So I’m trading off time considerations, but I hope to focus mainly on completing this schedule and then take it from there. If all goes well my review of Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) will post tomorrow!

Subscriber Count!

I lost a subscriber, but since then I’ve gained three. That means the count is now 37, up two from last issue, when it was 35. I’m not really surprised to lose a subscriber now and then, especially because I’m not where I want to be yet with my website quality and subscriber support. There is still more planning, building and systematizing for me to do before I focus on community growth. That makes me all the more grateful to those of you who are already here, sticking by me, even if you just see some potential. I hope I am entertaining and informing, and that I can continually improve the experience for you. I want Rick Retro’s Realm to be a fun place to hang out! Feel free to comment or message me directly if you have suggestions, complaints, or just want to chat about movies and TV, books, baseball, Christianity, politics or anything else that interests you! My interests are not unlimited, but they are at least rather broad, and I am interested in you, my subscribers, so I think I would enjoy hearing about any topic that excites you. 😁

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

Updated for new post formatting 2025-07-17

The Walls Are Going Up!

I am not talking about border walls. Rick Retro’s Realm is isolated in time and space (think Narnia) and does not need such mundane things. I’m talking about the planned sections being added and introduced upon the existing foundation of the Realm, such that the various neighborhoods of the Realm can be visited and explored.

Rankings is being added right now, since some of the old posts sent only to my original text group subscribers need to be placed in that section. I hope to add a new section each week or two for a few more weeks until the structure is complete!

As this is posted, there’s nothing to see yet, just an empty room. But here’s the link for the days ahead.

New Old Review Posted!

Earlier this week, Retro Review #17, “A Charlie Brown Christmas” (1965), from the old text group was finally uploaded and upgraded onto Rick Retro’s Realm on Substack for the first time. That leaves 26 old reviews still to bring over, plus a few Retro Rankings, I believe. So you can expect more emails for reviews of Christmas movies here in the summer of 2025! 🤣🎅

Behind the Scenes

Turns out that I have three, not one, planned events in June that could trigger my pesky chronic disease and delay my already behind schedule Project #3, Dark Whimsy Favorites. The odds of finishing the project in 200 days are perhaps decreasing, but I’m not quite ready to relinquish that hope yet!

With that said, if all goes well, I think I have figured out a sustainable rhythm, and will be able to post a new review on most Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays until caught up. The revised schedule is now reflected in the project link in the previous paragraph, and while mostly an MWF schedule, there are slight variations based on anticipated issues. Expect my review of Roxanne (1987) tomorrow!

Subscriber Count!

I woke up from a short nap this week with two new subscribers! That had never happened before, and added to one earlier in the day. We’re clocking in at 35 now, a gain of just under 10% since last issue, when it was 32. I can only imagine what will happen when I focus on growing the community and can hardly wait to finish building and start inviting!

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

Last updated 2025-06-06

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️

The Top 10 Reasons My Old Friend Just Subscribed to My Substack

• #10. My other stack is one of blackmail material on him.

• #9. We have Dark Whimsy.

• #8. Probably looking for attention, and I’m foolishly enabling him by giving it.

• #7. He’s a schoolteacher in England, where he is up against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and a legion of young students of the Dark Arts, competing in a fight to the death to see who can inspire the most Substack subscriptions in 30 days. (See, I told you we have Dark Whimsy.)

• #6. Ultimately, despite his many faults, Scott has good taste!

• #5. Just wants to hear me drop the line, “‘Ah, interesting.’ thought the crowd. ‘Nice point.’” one last time.

• #4. Hopes I can direct him to a shrubbery for the Knights Who Say “Ni!”

• #3. He’s really getting tired of soccer, rugby and cricket, and longs for some news of Angels baseball.

• #2. Surreptitiously checking out a mistaken rumor that I was auditioning for a part that he wants.

And the #1 Reason My Old Friend Just Subscribed to My Substack:

• #1. He’s originally from Idaho, so no rational reason is needed. 😁❤️

But Seriously, a.k.a. “Why My Friend's Surprise Subscription Is a Game-Changer for Me.”

OK, “Game-Changer” will probably turn out to be an AI-fueled exaggeration. But I can hope, right? And it is very inspiring when you haven’t yet been promoting your Substack to very many friends and family and one of your best friends ever finds it on his own!

Scott, a.k.a. Scooter, a.k.a. Scotty, and I were friends in college. He was an extroverted drama major attending a private Christian university in Southern California, with Hollywood stars in his eyes. I was a more reserved commuter student, originally a Bible major, converted to a drama major, more interested in directing than acting, at least at first. When I began acting, I observed Scott, and found him obnoxious, not the least because we competed for similar parts! 🤣 But soon we both were cast to be on a mime ministry team that performed primarily for children and youth at local churches. We got to know each other fairly well, became good friends and, later, roommates.

Scott loves movies and my love for them grew along with our friendship. I believe he discovered The Gods Must Be Crazy at a little independent theater in downtown L.A. and alerted me to go see it. I’m sure we must have attended together at least a couple of the early 80s films I’ve reviewed here. We even beat Mystery Science Theater 3000 to the punch, roasting a bad martial arts comedy out loud in a mostly-empty theater during a Thanksgiving matinee. It was such a bad film, I’ve long forgotten its name!

There are lots of other shared memories from last-minute rushes to Angel games, to shared classses, to working on the same theatrical productions, to late-night toilet-papering of professors’ domiciles, to adventures in his home town of Coeur d’Alene. Over the years, we have been in and out of touch, but some friendships last forever. Scott, I’m glad you’re here!

Scott is as much of a people-person as you will ever meet, and would perhaps like to know all of the subscribers in our community better. Introduce yourself to Scott (and all of us) in the comments below, and tell us where you are originally from.

Leave a comment

Behind the Scenes

Yes, I’m now waaay behind schedule on Project #3, Dark Whimsy Favorites. Unanticipated events and more bad spells of health than usual played a role, but so did distractions I should have dispensed with. So no excuses, I didn’t live up to my expectations and perhaps not yours. I’m still learning what I am capable of and not capable of, and trying to keep my ambitious expectations realistic. Thanks for your patience while I figure it out.

That said, I only see one planned event that could slow down my June schedule, so I hope to work overtime and get Project #3 back on schedule, while also working to finally get all of those old text-group posts from last December into the archives here for all of you new subscribers to enjoy.

So as a reminder, if you get an email for a review of a Christmas movie here in the summer of 2025, that’s from last year and means it is now entering our Substack archives!

Subscriber Count!

Scott is #32. Not much more than last issue, when it was 29. Still no worries. Still not making that a high priority, but glad to see slow growth!

Around 40 years ago, I spied a large sign by the side of the road that read “Welcome to Idaho, Rick!”.

Welcome to Substack, Scott!

—

Thanks for your support.
Keep the comments coming!

Leave a comment

Last updated 2025-05-30

⬅️Previous (all sections) | Next (all sections) ➡️