BW Media Spotlight

This came out right after Thanksgiving and I wasn’t ready to watch Christmas specials just yet. This is when I found time to watch it, and no, the above video isn’t from the special. It is however tied to the special’s origin.

There was a time when Hallmark would release a special edition Christmas stuffed animal set, and would have an animated special made for home video, both sold together at Hallmark stores, with the characters saving Christmas for some family. Nowadays they just use the same two or three recycled romance plots, and set it at Christmas, like a romantic Die Hard, something set at Christmas but has nothing to do with the holiday itself. That’s right, I said it! Nobody’s telling you not to watch Die Hard at Christmas; just stop trying to convince us it’s a Christmas movie as if you need a reason for explosions and dead bodies. Sorry, neither of those things are Christmas. Deal with it!

Anyway, Reindeer In Here, co-produced by CBS, isn’t from Hallmark but it follows that dropped tradition. Created by TV producer Adam Reid, the goal was to give his children a Christmas tradition that also celebrated being different. The concept (official brand website) is otherwise similar to “elf on a shelf”. You give the kid the plushie and related storybook, the kid names the reindeer (and decide if it’s a boy or a girl, though now they come in multiple existing characters as well), the reindeer supposedly learns what the child wants, and then at Christmas it “magically flies away to the North Pole” to tell Santa what they want for Christmas. To celebrate uniqueness the various reindeer has certain features. The original reindeer has one antler smaller, another is pink, another has buck teeth and glasses, and so on. At first this was sold through Amazon but I guess Target picked it up as well.

This year CBS Studios released a CG-animated special to promote the book & toy set (and to have a Christmas special all their own I’d wager) airing on CBS and streaming on Paramount Plus. They aired it at an odd time, Tuesday at 9PM ET. I don’t know if that translates to 6PM Pacific Time (usually dinner time) or if they do the thing where it airs at 9 Easter, 8 Central, and then at 9 and 8 respectively for Mountain and Pacific, but to air in on a Tuesday night when the kids will be in bed because they have school the next day seems kind of dumb. At least do it on a Friday or Saturday where the parents may let them stay up. CBS even aired Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer at 8PM ET that same night. I know you don’t like kids, Hollywood mindset people, but at least don’t torture them with a new Christmas special they can’t stay up for just because you have a streaming service! But enough backstory, let’s review the special.

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