A Miser Brothers' Christmas

Apparently people still love to talk about the Miser Brothers from The Year Without Santa Claus and it’s remake that we get A Miser Brothers’ Christmas. 

Or maybe they got reminded from a terrible TV season that came out between the Remake film and this film with Moltar and Flurious from Power Rangers Operation Overdrive. Coincidentally, this was written by Power Rangers RPM writer for first half, Eddie Guzelian. This is the only Rankin Bass related sequel to be produced by Rankin Bass.

Ms. Claus tells the story how there almost is a year without Christmas. Santa does his usual inspection onto the elves and reindeer before Christmas. He gets to Tinsel, the youngest elf, who constructs the new super sled. Heat Miser (reprised by George S. Irving) and Snow Miser (this time voiced by Juan Chioran) go to the family reunion with Mother Nature. One of the siblings is the North Wind wants to take over Christmas (who I swear is the ghost of the villain from Corpse Bride, after he became a corpse.) Santa had an accident in the middle of the Miser Brothers brawl partly because of North Wind’s minions and unnoticed to the Misers. Santa is out of commission around Christmas. Mother Nature brings the Miser Brothers to punish them by taking Santa’s place.

The design was “intended” to combine the design of Rudolph’s phase designs and The Year Without Santa Claus’ phase designs. That explains why the elves and reindeers. Santa is closer to the original with Rooney’s voice. Though I kinds wish they stick to one phase on style, since this is either feels like a loose continuation or another reboot. It’s still the Miser Brothers, though I miss the insane energy Dick Shawn created for the original, as it was his own as shown in Mad. Mad, Mad World. This is the last time we hear both Mick Rooney as Santa and George as Heat Miser. It’s sad to lose them both.

The stop-motion was done by Cuppa Coffee Studios, who gladly continued Celebrity Deathmatch, and sadly created Glen Martin, DDS. They did an OK job for the animation, but I really miss the original style, wide expressions, and energy. Maybe if they used Stoopid Monkey’s production to do the animation. They proved it a little better with the Animated Elf Musical and Spongebob Christmas. They have experience doing Rankin Bass related in Robot Chicken. The background music can never top Maury Laws’ music. Then again, I ever recall good background music lately aside from Steven Universe and most of MLP:FiM. The only music that worked is the Miser Brothers music, but not much when they did a remix of it.

I didn’t like A Miser Brother Christmas when it first came out, but it got harmless with time, unlike a certain rotten egg (Peter Cottontail: The Movie). I like the backstory of the Miser Brothers they showed through the Naughty and Nice list. It’s just an average Rankin Bass related sequel with Rankin Bass involved, as it’s the last of the sequels. It has some of the spirit of the original, but the spirit of ABC Family and the stop-motion is sorta dragging it down. It’s not the last Rankin Bass film for me to review, that’s reserved for their very last original film.