’Tis the season to rag on superhero movies, with legendary director Martin Scorsese comparing them to “theme parks” and comic book writer Alan Moore calling superhero culture “tremendously embarrassing.”
Yet superhero films from Avengers: Endgame to Shazam! have comprised most of this year’s biggest blockbusters. It may be fashionable to hate on them, but that won’t make them less popular.
You could say the same for another much-decried genre of film: the Hallmark Christmas movie.
Hallmark has kicked off its holiday programming this month, with 40 new films scheduled to debut this year. This brings its total list of corny flicks to more than 150.
After the Hallmark Channel began in 2001, the company started churning out films with a simple, winning formula. Typically, a high-powered businesswoman returns to her small town, meeting a handsome blue-collar gentleman who reminds her of the true meaning of Christmas, which is always something about love and generosity and embracing simpler times.
The films really may be the equivalent of a cheesy Hallmark card come to life, but that doesn’t make them unpopular. Last year, 72 million viewers watched Hallmark’s Countdown to Christmas, according to the company. For women aged 25 to 54, the Hallmark Channel was their favorite cable destination during the holidays.
And women aren’t the only ones who enjoy these stories. One of this year’s new Hallmark films is based on a novel by Rikk Dunlap, a 57-year-old school maintenance worker. Dunlap overcame addiction by picking up his pen, using his writing to resurrect a fond memory: commuting by a Christmas tree lot near his Illinois home.
“Writing saved me,” Dunlap told People. Now, Hallmark has adapted his story into the film Christmas Under the Stars.
One technology company, banking on these films’ popularity, is offering a Christmas superfan $1,000 to watch 24 films in 12 days, as long as the recipient shares the whole experience on social media. Not to miss out on the market for corny holiday fare, Netflix and even the recently launched Disney+ are creating content of their own.
“Hallmark Christmas movies are like PBR or Taco Bell: It’s not that you don’t know there are better, higher quality options out there,” writes one critic at entertainment website the A.V. Club. “It’s that you’re craving the specific taste (not to mention the cheap convenience) of a familiar favorite.
In his defense of “good bad books,” philosopher G.K. Chesterton argued that “men’s basic assumptions and everlasting energies are to be found in penny dreadfuls and halfpenny novelettes.” If he were writing today, he might say the same of superhero films or Hallmark movies and all the good bad films people have always secretly enjoyed.
