Mistletoe Murders: Death of a Humbug (Hallmark+ - 2024) ft. Alonso Duralde

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_01] Hi, I'm Brandon. I love Hallmark Christmas mysteries. You're getting there. I'm Dan. I despise Hallmark Christmas mysteries. I'm Alonso, Tom Cavanaugh, and Jake Epstein. Calm down, Mistletoe Murders. And this is the Deck The Hallmark Podcast.

[00:00:17] [SPEAKER_00] Deck The Hallmark, it's his podcast. My friends host his podcast.

[00:00:27] [SPEAKER_03] We hope you like this jolly podcast.

[00:00:35] [SPEAKER_02] Spoiler alert, Alonso. You said it. Alonso, the fact that that wasn't spoiled for me, neither of those, and I watched it this morning, the fact that those weren't spoiled for me is just, I couldn't believe it. I was shocked.

[00:00:50] [SPEAKER_01] You know, you thought Steve Lund was going to be here. That's right. It's a parade of, it's a cavalcade of stars.

[00:00:58] [SPEAKER_02] I will say after they killed Steve Lund, as soon as Tom Cavanaugh came on screen, and we're way ahead now, but I just said, they're going to kill Tom Cavanaugh.

[00:01:05] [SPEAKER_01] Like, immediately, I was like, they're going to kill. You can't kill Ed. You can't kill Ed. You can't do it. You know, I, well, he thought you could think of him as killing the reverse flash or whatever. Oh, that's fair. Yeah. I bailed way before we got there.

[00:01:20] [SPEAKER_02] I did not.

[00:01:21] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, of course you didn't. But yeah, no, I'm telling you, I think Mistletoe Murders is really hitting on something here, which is like the, if the, if the murder victim is going to be the one who you only have to get for like a day, you know, because they, they, for whatever their scenes before the murder and then maybe some flashbacks. Why not? Oh, yeah. Like a name.

[00:01:41] [SPEAKER_02] We're not to the hot take yet, but I don't think it hurts this, this movie. I'm calling it what it is. I don't think it hurts this movie, like to have Tom Cavanaugh on that role.

[00:01:51] [SPEAKER_00] It's a benefit for sure. Yeah. Well, before we dive into the movie, even though we did a little bit, Alonzo, how are you? It is great to see your face.

[00:02:00] [SPEAKER_01] Lovely to be seen. You know, so my regrets to having missed the deckies over the weekend. I heard it was, well, you know. You streamed it.

[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_02] You saw what happened. Right.

[00:02:10] [SPEAKER_01] Greenville PD is still talking about it, but I'll let you guys sort that out with your lawyers.

[00:02:14] [SPEAKER_02] Which of the bits was your favorite? Which of the bits that we did was your favorite?

[00:02:17] [SPEAKER_01] I mean, I don't like to encourage the use of live animals in performing situations, but you know, the thing with the yak was kind of out there. It was out there.

[00:02:27] [SPEAKER_02] Pretty impressed. Do you think anyone would have a full, like bags of dongles in their car? Do you think bags of them? Of dongles?

[00:02:35] [SPEAKER_01] If anybody would, it would be Patrick Serrano. Yeah, it would be. You're right. Yeah.

[00:02:41] [SPEAKER_02] That's true. That's true. And that stings. That does sting. Yeah.

[00:02:45] [SPEAKER_00] Man, oh man. I'm excited. After, we're almost done with this little merge. This is it. And then I guess we're moving on to the holidays. Holidays. Holidays. Which we haven't really talked about, but those are kind of stand alone episodes, right? Like we can't combine episodes like this.

[00:03:03] [SPEAKER_01] Yes. We can't. Those are not a movie waiting to happen. Those are actual episodes.

[00:03:07] [SPEAKER_00] Yes. So we will handle those one episode at a time. So come on back next Monday. And then, I don't know what we're doing after the Hallmark Plus stuff, but we're going to dream big.

[00:03:18] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, I think we're going to, no, I definitely want to watch Carry On. I was told we were doing Carry On at some point. Oh, okay.

[00:03:22] [SPEAKER_00] So Dan wants to get back to the 2024 Christmas movies that we missed. That's what I heard. No, I don't want to do all of them. I will find, I'll find them. No. There's nothing I can do.

[00:03:30] [SPEAKER_01] I'll find them. We could do Carry On. We could do Christmas Eve in Miller's Point. Yeah. We could even do Best Christmas Pageant Ever. I think these, yes. Maybe even Red One. Oh. Yeah.

[00:03:42] [SPEAKER_02] And then what?

[00:03:43] [SPEAKER_01] And then what? And then what?

[00:03:45] [SPEAKER_02] And then what? Unicorn Two. But that's how many. Thank you. That's what I'm trying to get. How many holidays episodes are there? Six. Six? Plus the four he just gave us. I mean, we've got three full months of coverage. I mean, that gets us February, March, April. That gets us basically to May. Then we can do, you know, Alonzo can choose one for his birthday. We'll choose a couple more and then we'll be, you know, basically Christmas in July and Bramble Fest. Yeah. You know, and then we're all dead.

[00:04:10] [SPEAKER_01] Eight episodes of holidays. Oh, eight. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[00:04:14] [SPEAKER_02] We're clear on this. We've got the next three months planned out. What's your problem is? Don't give me a unicorn Christmas. I'm trying to have fun. Oh, nutcrackers. That was the other one.

[00:04:23] [SPEAKER_00] Nutcrackers. Carry on.

[00:04:25] [SPEAKER_02] Nutcrackers.

[00:04:25] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, well, then if we're doing all these, we also have to do Dear Santa because I just got to talk to folks about that one. All right. Well, we've got things planned, I guess. And then then a unicorn for Christmas to welcome to our production meeting in June. I think we'll get to a unicorn to and in June. Hopefully sweet. Um, let's get to a mistletoe murders. Death of a humbug parts one and two part one, November 28th, part two, December 5th, 2024. A little something like this.

[00:04:55] [SPEAKER_00] We're at the Fletcher Grove real estate Christmas party. It's finally here. Everyone, a guy dressed as Santa comes in and kills the vibe a bit. It's Glenn. He owns the bookstore in town. He owns a bowling alley. Yeah. He's very like passive aggressive towards people about how no one comes to the bookstore. No one appreciates books anymore. Uh, Glenn has a pass clearly, and he's banned from the diner.

[00:05:25] [SPEAKER_00] But since the party is a private party that happens to be held at the diner, can't get in trouble for this. And, um, he gives presents to people and, uh, tells Emily that he picked this one, especially for her. Uh, cause it's rare to find a fellow mystery lover. Emily's like, what a guy. Uh, the night continues and Emily sees Glenn in his Santa suit scurrying quickly outside.

[00:05:52] [SPEAKER_00] So she goes to follow him and finds his hat on the floor and then sees a car speed off. Just as that happens, she hears a scream. She runs inside and sees Sue, who is the one who was throwing the party. She is crying as she looks at Glenn. I thought Glenn ran out. Glenn didn't run out. Glenn has been stabbed in the heart. He's too late.

[00:06:19] [SPEAKER_00] He has books today. Wow.

[00:06:27] [SPEAKER_02] I've never seen you struggle that much.

[00:06:29] [SPEAKER_00] Uh, when Emily gets home, she, uh, opens a gift. It is a special green edition of A Christmas Carol. We get a flashback of Emily visiting the bookstore for the first time and meeting Glenn. And she tells him about this very edition of A Christmas Carol that her parents used to read to her. So clearly he remembered that, tracked this version down and gave it to her. What a gift. And as she opens it, a letter falls out from the book inviting her to a very special event at the L.

[00:06:59] [SPEAKER_00] law offices tomorrow at 8 p.m. What?

[00:07:04] [SPEAKER_03] What the hell am I up to? What the hell am I up to?

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_00] Uh, so she, uh, she, do you want to try your hand at the heart thing or are you good? Stab through the heart. Okay.

[00:07:16] [SPEAKER_02] Who's to blame? Is it her or somebody? Somebody wasn't much better, but it did run.

[00:07:23] [SPEAKER_00] Or is it him? Somebody. Somebody. So, uh, she goes to tell Sam about this and he says, uh, how would you feel if I was kind of like your plus one to this part? It's not anything that I just want to take a game. That's right. Yeah. Keep my eyes on what's going on here. They show up in the video plays. It's Glenn, um, basically predicting his own death. He's like, if you're watching this, I'm gone.

[00:07:49] [SPEAKER_00] And so he then sets up a treasure hunt for the people that are in the room. There are other people and they were all given a, uh, a version of a Christmas Carol. Sam tries to, uh, get everybody to give him their copy of the book and they're like, no, we're trying to find treasure. You don't have a warrant to take our books. Fair. Uh, it doesn't take Emily long to find the first clue using a UV light on the book.

[00:08:18] [SPEAKER_00] Cause that's something that she would do. She, uh, thinks that the other books all have clues written in the same way. And so they all have to work together to figure this out. So she gets two others on board, a hot dog stand owner named Harry and Brooke Carmichael from the others. Uh, Glenn's nephew, Fred, uh, Glenn's nephew, Fred says that he and his wife don't want to participate mainly Fred's wife.

[00:08:48] [SPEAKER_00] Cause she didn't like Glenn thought he was taking advantage of him. And then there's one book that we don't have accounted for, uh, to make matters worse. There's a, yes, there's one book still missing.

[00:08:56] [SPEAKER_01] The diner owner threw her.

[00:08:57] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, that's exactly right. We think the diner owner threw it out and, uh, she's like, sorry, trash came today. Nothing we could do about it. Uh, Sam finds out that Glenn had a Huntington's disease. So, which was something that no one knew about. After Fred finds this out, he decides that they want to participate. You know, maybe there's something to this, even though they're missing one book, they decide to put all the clues that they found in their books together to try to figure out what it's pointing to.

[00:09:25] [SPEAKER_00] Well, we have a good amount of clues. Let's see what we can do. And, uh, it says something to do with a precious memory. And Fred says, well, the only memory that I can really think of with Glenn is him reading Twas the Night Before Christmas every Christmas while I sat on his lap. Might be that one, Fred! Um, Emily says, well, why don't we go find the, maybe you have that book in the bookstore. Maybe there's a clue. And so as they're walking to the store, Emily sees the car that sped off that night

[00:09:51] [SPEAKER_00] and notices a letter that clearly came from Glenn is sitting in the passenger seat. Just then, Fred realizes that the bookstore is unlocked. Sam goes in first, finds a guy in there. It is Fred, Fred's brother, Noah. They haven't seen each other in quite a long time. Apparently when their mom got sick, Noah left. They haven't spoken since. Sam takes Noah in for questioning and presents him with some pretty tough evidence.

[00:10:16] [SPEAKER_00] Uh, they found Glenn's Santa suit in his trunk and the USB drive with, uh, Glenn's video on it from the lawyer's office, which was also broken into that. Uh, that was found in his car. He gives reasons for all of it, but it's not looking great for our guy, Noah. Fred tells Emily that, uh, he did finally find the book and found a USB drive in the back cover. And so they agreed to all get together tomorrow to watch what's on it.

[00:10:44] [SPEAKER_00] Cause sometimes you gotta wait as Emily's going home and SUV speeds at her, tries to hit her. And, uh, she has to tuck and roll out of the way. Good thing. She has training from, uh, her past, uh, the next day they all get together. And it's another video with a very cryptic clue. We find out that somebody, uh, is sitting in a car listening in on the conversation, uh, from somewhere later. The group gets back together and Fred is nowhere to be found.

[00:11:13] [SPEAKER_00] Turns out that he was attacked from behind. Uh, he says that he doesn't know who did it. Sam gets a call. They found Fred's wife's DNA on the Santa suit. She says, listen, uh, I found out that the first additions that, uh, Glenn had in the bookstore were gone. I wanted to go find out where he put them. Cause that's Fred's inheritance basically. And when I go to confront him at the party, I found him dead. I freaked out. I knew it wouldn't look good that I found him.

[00:11:43] [SPEAKER_00] And so I put the Santa suit on and I ran out, but I didn't kill him. Emily finds no. I did not. I did not. I can't believe you didn't say it. Sorry. I'm sorry. I did not kill Glenn. I did not. Um, Emily finds Noah in the diner. Uh, he's been released. She convinces him to join the group and solving the mystery. He comes to her store and sees that there's a hole in the wall. Wow. What a hole. Uh, she has a leak in the store and they've begun to figure, try to figure out what that is.

[00:12:12] [SPEAKER_00] He's he's like, I thought maybe it was one of those secret compartments that these old buildings in the area have. What? Okay. That gives them an idea to look in the bookstore and see if they can find one of these, uh, secret areas. And they end up finding it inside of it is a suitcase. It's a go bag. If you will, uh, they discover a folder with a plane ticket to Switzerland inside of it for the day after the party and also a brochure for a place in Switzerland for end of life care.

[00:12:41] [SPEAKER_00] So it seems like he was planning to leave after the party, um, and die in Switzerland because he had the disease and that's where he was going to spend the rest of his life. And Emily recalls that on tape, he says, if you're seeing this, that means I'm gone. He didn't say that he was going to be murdered. He was just planning on disappearing. So they then find the final clue. They watched a video. Suddenly Harry, the hot dog guy, he's gone. And so are all of the books. Emily puts it together.

[00:13:10] [SPEAKER_00] He killed Glenn. Um, and was just trying to solve the mystery because he needed to figure out where all those books were so that he could have it. So she goes to confront him in the cemetery where the final clue leads to. We find out that he showed up to steal the first edition of a Christmas Carol and threatened to kill Glenn to get it. Glenn laughed in his face, knowing that he was dying. I'm not afraid of death that offended Harry.

[00:13:40] [SPEAKER_00] And then he stabs them to death. Emily then fights Harry, takes them down and puts, uh, some plastic cuffs on it on him and then goes and gets to treasure. She figures out that, uh, it was the lawyer who hired him because he, she always wanted that first edition of a Christmas Carol. And when she found out that she, the user, he was like taking them or whatever, she got mad. Uh, and so she wanted to get it stolen.

[00:14:04] [SPEAKER_00] Anyway, uh, she gets the group back together one more time, hands out what she found in the box, uh, at the final location. It's all very sweet. The movie ends with Emily coming down to her store and seeing Sam fixing her wall in her store. They end up making out hard. Uh, she has like, Hey, maybe we should go for a walk in the snow. Classic. Uh, classic what you do after making out hard. She says, let me go change real quick. I'm wearing my slippies. And that's when he gets a phone call. Oh boy. Uh, he's sorry.

[00:14:34] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. He's been investigating Emily and notice him in discrep or some discrep. What is it? Discrep. Discrepancies. Indiscrepancies is what I said. Um, he, uh, put a, uh, then he got a call from a higher up that basically said, drop everything and all the research that you're doing on her. Don't ask why. So clearly she isn't who she says that she is. The episode ends with her coming back in and being like, you ready for a walk? And him going, who are you? Really?

[00:15:03] [SPEAKER_00] It faced the black and that my friends was. The mistletoe murders. Death of a hawk. You knew it.

[00:15:10] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, I knew it.

[00:15:10] [SPEAKER_00] Uh, let's take a quick break. We'll come back. We're going to break this down here on deck.

[00:15:14] [SPEAKER_02] The hallmark.

[00:15:15] [SPEAKER_00] Hello everyone. Uh, it's great to be back. We're talking the mistletoe murders. We're talking death of a humbug. The final two episodes of the mistletoe murders series. Let's break her down. Let's start with the hot take. We'll share how we felt about this. I'll start with you, Alonzo. Alonzo, what'd you think? Death of a humbug.

[00:15:43] [SPEAKER_01] Well, you know, I mean, this is a, a nice combination of a whodunit and a Christmas. A scavenger hunt. Yeah. Uh, which is a fun, uh, a fun way to go with this. Um, yeah, I mean, look, not without its weight, Watson, we'll get there, but, uh, you know, I thought, uh, this, this, this moved at a good clip. Um, you know, it, it, it, it's kind of labyrinthine in terms of like, they're looking for these clues, but also trying to solve this murder and, you know, multiple things going on at

[00:16:12] [SPEAKER_01] the same time. Uh, the, the Emily's hidden past story continues to bubble up in an interesting way. Um, and you know, they, she and Sam finally get off the pot as far as like, uh, you know, finally, you know, pursuing their relationship until they don't, but you know, that that's where they leave us. So, you know, not bad.

[00:16:36] [SPEAKER_00] Um, I thought that this, this was the strongest by far. And it was the one where I, as I was watching, I was like, this is it. This is, you know, we, I talked in the prior weeks about how there was hype going into this. And that's always tough for me to know how to navigate that. I wasn't like totally bought in this did it. This delivered, uh, everything that I could have wanted it to the cast of this one is incredible.

[00:16:59] [SPEAKER_00] Um, the kiss is bonkers and, uh, the mystery kept me engaged the entire time. And so it checked every possible box that you could have for one of these movies. And, uh, it was, it was really good. I really enjoyed myself. Um, you know, if there's any critique for me personally, it was once again, I feel like it's kind of been the same thing for all three of these, but I feel like the explanation

[00:17:26] [SPEAKER_00] of the, the crime isn't great, but everything else around it is fantastic. And so, uh, big, big props and I can't wait to see what they do next. I hope it, I hope it, hope there's more in the future because I'm, I'm bought in. I'm very intrigued, very intrigued.

[00:17:43] [SPEAKER_02] I definitely want more of these. I think this is the best of them. Um, you know, quibbles aside about the fact that these are movies and not episodes. And so little care has been taken to change that. Uh, this is the most entertaining mystery by a mile. The cast is an embarrassment of riches. I mean, Tom Cavanaugh, uh, Jake Epstein, Sarah drew Peter Mooney across the board. The cast elevates this material. Yeah. The motive of the actual person behind the killing is just kind of like, okay.

[00:18:13] [SPEAKER_02] And then the fact that it's like, we have all of these family, her close friends, and like a little bit of an off put, but very, I mean, these are minor details because I loved, I was entertained by the mystery scavenger hunt combo. I thought it was fun to have this video. It reminded me of the show called the Goodwin games, which was on for one season with Bo Bridges. And it turned out to be not great across the board, but the idea of it was good.

[00:18:41] [SPEAKER_02] These are strange siblings whose dad on his death, like when he dies, sends a video to make them like all get back together and like love each other again. So it has some really fun vibes in it. And it's one of the better things that we've watched this year. I do think it's, if not the best kiss of the year, it's one of the best kisses of the year. If I have like a quibble, it's because of how good it is that I just imagine the better version of this show, which is not two episodes is really one movie and we have to solve a murder every two weeks.

[00:19:10] [SPEAKER_02] If we had met, I know this is impossible, but if we had met Tom Cavanaugh in the first episode and he's just like this bookstore owner that some people love and some people hate and there's more than meets the eye. And we meet some of these people and she's solving, I don't know, smaller crimes or maybe trying to put together her backstory. And then this murder takes place over the last half of the season. And it makes a little bit more sense. That's like broadcast network stuff to me.

[00:19:38] [SPEAKER_01] Like that's like a show's not called mistletoe misdemeanors, Dan. That's true. It isn't called mistletoe misdemeanors.

[00:19:44] [SPEAKER_02] And I think to its, unfortunately, I think that's a problem. Although the murder mistletoe murder sounds really good. This one was really good though. I was very entertained by it and knowing where our two leads are, it makes it like they've been consistent with the two leads having motives that make sense as to why they don't want to tell the truth, why they both want to try to solve these crimes and why they're into each other. And now why Peter Mooney is going to take a step back. No one is acting crazy here.

[00:20:13] [SPEAKER_02] They're all acting like actual adults would act. Hey, you're not who you said you were. I was about to really enter a relationship with you. And now I find out that you probably aren't even your, the name you're giving me probably isn't right. So everyone's acting the way they should act and they're good actors. And so all of that helps. And I hope we get more of this.

[00:20:33] [SPEAKER_00] It's time for all the feels where we talk about what in this gave us feels. Alonzo.

[00:21:06] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. It goes with this series being like, what if, you know, a Hallmark mystery show, but always Christmas. And we do, we do find out that it's not quite yet the 22nd. Right. So finally we're getting a little bit of idea of where the heck in December we even are. Um, you know, yeah, that kiss was, you know, pretty scorching by this network standards.

[00:21:30] [SPEAKER_01] And, uh, you know, uh, to, to then have them, you know, rope a dope it with like, Oh, wait a minute. I don't even know who you are, uh, is, is a thing. Um, so yeah, those are my main ones, but yeah, I agree with Dan. I think the, the cast is really good and it's written well enough for, to give them real characters to play.

[00:21:50] [SPEAKER_00] Um, I, I really enjoyed a few things and I want to give a shout out, uh, to the, the folks that cared about, uh, the little things in this series. One, I, I really liked the opening title card that they did for these three movies, six episodes with the little mistletoe murder thing to dun dun dun dun. And then like the blood come from the snow. Very cool. Very short. Look, it looked great. And it like was a great, it was just sure.

[00:22:18] [SPEAKER_02] That was the most serialized TV thing about this.

[00:22:20] [SPEAKER_00] It felt great. And I really, really liked that. I, I really liked the bookstore. Uh, I thought that they put a lot of care into the bookstore and making it look awesome

[00:22:29] [SPEAKER_02] about the secret door because secret door.

[00:22:32] [SPEAKER_00] I love the secret door. Yes.

[00:22:34] [SPEAKER_02] Because of how you talked about it. I mean, it was borderline inappropriate how you talked about secret doors.

[00:22:38] [SPEAKER_00] You can talk about secret doors. I wasn't, I wasn't on my list.

[00:22:40] [SPEAKER_02] I don't have it as my field. It's not my fields. It's your field.

[00:22:43] [SPEAKER_00] Well, I love secret. I, I, I, if you, he has, he loves, if you stumble upon, all I'm saying is if you stumble upon a secret door, uh, you're going to freak out. You're going to freak out about the secret door and, uh, you're going to be very excited about it. Right? Yeah. That's crazy.

[00:22:59] [SPEAKER_02] You said, this is what really gets me going. Yeah. Secret doors.

[00:23:02] [SPEAKER_00] I love a secret door. And then you went across one.

[00:23:06] [SPEAKER_02] If I ever found a secret door. Yeah. I'd be pumped. You'd be pumped.

[00:23:09] [SPEAKER_00] I'd be pumped. I just, I've been waiting for my whole life. Yeah. Secret doors. Uh, I lost track now of my, uh, Oh, Oh, this, this episode, uh, or these episodes, uh, were, were the music was great. The ending of this episode where it's all, uh, the, the fight scene, her finding the thing. It's like this really great score behind it with, I want to say was like God rest you merry gentlemen, or, uh, or some, one of those songs that was like, it was got rest you.

[00:23:40] [SPEAKER_00] Like, Oh, randomly in there, the melody of it was in it for a second. Then it would go away and it would come back. And it just like worked really well. And so all these little things worked together to, to elevate this even more than, uh, the performances, which were phenomenal, phenomenal, phenomenal, phenomenal. Phenomenal. It's a new thing I'm trying to say, and maybe it'll catch on, but it was phenomenal. Yeah.

[00:24:01] [SPEAKER_02] Dan, I agree with you about the music aside from one thing that will be in my white web, but we talked about that during the movie too. Um, Tom Kavanaugh, uh, full stop. This guy is, unless he doesn't want to be in stuff, he's criminally underused, which is something you would have never said 15 years ago in the United States of America when it seemed like he was popping up on everything, but he is so incredibly charismatic. I could think of very few people better in the hallmark space to have to film all of these

[00:24:30] [SPEAKER_02] scenes at a desk talking about these clues he's given. Cause he's gone now. He's so good. Like he just, every time he's on screen, it's like you just, you're captivated and he, and it's, he's great. He's great. I love him. And I, and I, I want to see more Tom Kavanaugh in the TV movie space. Cause we don't get enough of them these days.

[00:24:51] [SPEAKER_01] I think this is the most videos from a dead person we've seen in a movie that doesn't feature Nikki to Loach. That's true.

[00:24:58] [SPEAKER_02] That's true. That's true. Somehow she, the patent ran out on that. Apparently it's public domain.

[00:25:04] [SPEAKER_00] I'll take a quick break. We'll come back. We'll get to the way. What's in the, what the hallmarks here on deck, the hallmark. Welcome back. Everybody. We're talking about mistletoe murders. Five, six, uh, let's get to the way. That's where we talk about what's in, uh, these episodes made us go away. What I'll start with you all.

[00:25:30] [SPEAKER_01] Okay. So we opened at the big Christmas party and Glenn comes in to, to do his, his thing with folks. Now there's one of two choices. Either there is music playing loudly and people are dancing in the background and Glenn has to like yell to be heard. Yeah. Or Glenn can speak at a conversational tone of voice and there's no music at all. And people aren't dancing in the background.

[00:25:59] [SPEAKER_01] However, we get Glenn speaking in a conversational tone of voice and people dancing in the background.

[00:26:06] [SPEAKER_02] Can't it's not a both hand situation.

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_01] You know? And I just, I felt bad for those extras. Cause you know, ain't no music playing at all. And they're just like getting their Canadian groove thing on. Well, Tom Cavanaugh is like having speaking in a very modulated tone. And that's the thing that makes me crazy in general. We're like scenes in bars or at dance clubs or wherever, where people are just talking like this and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I was like, no, you have to be.

[00:26:30] [SPEAKER_02] You know, I, uh, Alonzo, I know you're not going to watch this weekend, last weekend's movie, my Argentine heart. Uh, but if you find yourself in need of sleep, you can turn this movie on and there is a scene at a waterfall, not a small, a giant waterfall. Gushing. And you should watch how they speak to each other. It is hysterical. Go check it out. That's just what I'm saying.

[00:26:57] [SPEAKER_01] I'll, uh, I'll keep that in mind. Um, the, the notes. Waterfall. It's a good waterfall. It's a good waterfall. I love it. It's so wet. Go go chasing it. Um, so, uh, the, uh, okay. The, the, the notes in the books all say tomorrow, which is another thing that makes me crazy in movies. Cause like, how do you know exactly when people are going to open this thing? You know, are they going to run home and do it? Or is somebody going to put it under their tree and open it on Christmas?

[00:27:24] [SPEAKER_01] Like, you know, uh, give me dates and times, please. I think there's also a thing where she talks, she tells the cop to like meet her in the morning or something. And I'm like, when this is, this is just not how the world works. Um, okay. So secret compartment, very cool. Granted, but they find his suitcase there.

[00:27:48] [SPEAKER_01] And the suitcase has probably been relatively recently packed because it's got his ticket information and all this stuff on it. There is a layer of dust on that. Like it's Al Capone's vault. I didn't notice it. That's great.

[00:28:03] [SPEAKER_00] I don't know why he had it back there. He's just all dusty back there.

[00:28:06] [SPEAKER_01] I get, I get, you want to stash your thing until you got to leave, whatever, not have people know. And trust me as, as a, as a Southern Californian, I know from go bags, but like, yeah, there's no reason why it wouldn't be un dusty because it hasn't been there that long. Unless it's just kicking up all kinds of, you know, the walls are just dissolving in there. Um, and then, yeah, just the first edition of a Christmas Carol gets thrown around like a hacky sack in this movie. It does like put on some gloves, y'all.

[00:28:36] [SPEAKER_01] Like somebody like treat.

[00:28:38] [SPEAKER_02] Nobody in movies. No, they, nobody knows what first edition means.

[00:28:44] [SPEAKER_01] First editions, anything valuable. You just like boop-a-doo or just let's go.

[00:28:49] [SPEAKER_00] I thought they finally got it right when it was initially in a glass case. I was like, oh, they figured it out.

[00:28:57] [SPEAKER_02] One of my favorite wait, what's of all time? Not in a Hallmark movie is that Jennifer Lopez movie. Is it boy next door? Is that what it's called? Where he gets the first edition of the Odyssey. The Odyssey. And I couldn't stop crying. Can you imagine? Bring in the stone. The trucks got all these stones. I hope I signed this one. Yeah, the stone tablets are going to be, they might weigh the half. There might be some foundational issues. But I brought it. It's three tons worth of.

[00:29:26] [SPEAKER_02] I know that chisel. I know that chiseled line signature anywhere. I know it. First edition of the Odyssey. It's one of my favorite moments. But Panda and I are in a, yeah, an afternoon showing of boy next door as you are. As you do with best friends. We are crying laughing at a first edition of the Odyssey. It's the best.

[00:29:48] [SPEAKER_00] It's the best. It's the best. It's the best. Carry on. Do you have any more or are you good? No, that was it. I got a few. One, a shout out to Glenn for getting the framing and focus of his videos to be absolutely perfect. Yeah. He's up against it. Yeah. He knows he is going to die. And he says, I am going to get this right. And it is going to be perfectly focused. Dag gum it. But I'm not going to like.

[00:30:15] [SPEAKER_00] So just what he had going on here is no, obviously no one else knew about it. He filmed it by himself. He got the still, you know, got it just right. He's a perfectionist. I love it. You know, you talked about tomorrow on writing down tomorrow. And that is problematic. What's crazy to me is finding a new USB drive and being like, let's get together to look at it tomorrow.

[00:30:40] [SPEAKER_02] That's the wildest part of this movie.

[00:30:41] [SPEAKER_00] You're right.

[00:30:42] [SPEAKER_02] They find more evidence and they go, we'll see you tonight. We're going to do it tomorrow. They wait 12 hours. At one point they find one in the morning. Yeah. And then they wait till the evening. Like guys, what? This is a murder and your inheritance. So what do you, what do you mean you're going to wait till tonight? Put that bad boy in right the seconds.

[00:31:04] [SPEAKER_01] They find the woman in the Noel diaries. Yeah. Evidence of her mother her entire life. But she puts aside her mom's handwritten diaries to read this guy's crappy airport novel. Yeah. Well, I can get back to this. I couldn't believe it.

[00:31:16] [SPEAKER_02] I couldn't believe it.

[00:31:17] [SPEAKER_00] It was crazy. We find out that it was Harry or whatever his actual real name is, but more the hot dog guy who was the one who bugged her, her store and was listening in. But the, the gloves that he was wearing when he was in his own car, looking at this thing are insane. They are so big. There's no way they got the touch screen work.

[00:31:44] [SPEAKER_00] And, but he was navigating it very easily with how big those gloves are. They were crazy. They're like the hot dog fingers and everything everywhere. All it was is just like, yeah, it's crazy. Didn't, it didn't make any sense, but he made it work. Um, and then speaking of, uh, our guy, Harry, when Sam brings him in, he tells him that there's a hit on his fingerprints and he seems surprised by that. And then Sam proceeds to tell him all the things that he found.

[00:32:14] [SPEAKER_00] And it's a lot. What, how is he possibly surprised that the fingerprints brought back some stuff on him? That's crazy to me. If you, if you've done something, you have to assume, yeah, that's going to follow me by fingerprints. It's kind of the whole point of it. So I was very, uh, intrigued by that response by him, Dan.

[00:32:34] [SPEAKER_02] Uh, the big way one of this movie is, and it's really not the fault of the per the people making mistletoe murders, but it, it's impossible to have someone like Tom Cavanaugh in this movie and not wonder why we haven't seen him before now. Like this guy is like charming, bigger than life personality. It's very clear. He's a big part of this small town so much so that they have to write lines. Like this is why I banned you from the diner.

[00:33:03] [SPEAKER_02] Like they have to write lines to explain why you haven't seen Glenn from the bookstore. Like it's very clear that Sarah Drew's character loves books. The fact that we don't have any knowledge of Glenn before these two episodes is like, it's criminal. It really is like we, you can't, you can't bring someone in. That's not from out of town. That was my big problem was it was like, where, why have I not seen this guy? Like, why have I not seen him?

[00:33:32] [SPEAKER_02] We meet everybody in this small town. How have I not met him over the course of my time here in Fletcher or wherever it is? I think it's Fletcher. Is that right? Um, not a weight, not a weight. What per se, but snoga. I hate it. I, you know, what's great. A great time to be twisting your back around is like, if you get out there and like sub zero, that's when you hot yoga, but yeah. Yeah. Hot yoga makes sense. Loosen up those muscles a little bit. Cold yoga. I don't, there's a reason it doesn't exist.

[00:34:01] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, I'm sure it does exist somewhere, but it's not mainstream at one point twice. They find evidence with video or something and they're like, we'll do, we'll deal with it later. It's just evidence. Move along. And at one time they have all these clues they find at night. Like we have all these clues that we now have found. I think it was when she uses the light. I can't remember. She's like, all right, let's get cracking on this tomorrow. And I'm like, bro, put the coffee on. We can't do this. But then the next day they get a bulletin board out and they put them on the board.

[00:34:31] [SPEAKER_02] And this movie has some really great music in it and like Christmas themed. And for all of a sudden these six people get together to crack the case of murder. And the music is like wacky, fun times. What if we put this piece right here and we do this thing? And you're like, where did this come from? I wonder how he died. A man is dead. A man is dead. That's exactly right.

[00:35:01] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Like everyone else, every other scene in this movie gets the assignment, understands like

[00:35:06] [SPEAKER_00] He got stabbed in the heart and it was a bummer.

[00:35:08] [SPEAKER_02] Maybe we'll solve it. It was crazy. It was crazy. Also, guys, if you want me to believe that this person is not the killer, do better than hot dog man. Just do better than everyone else is related or our main character. And this guy comes in with cane, wig and hot dog cart story.

[00:35:35] [SPEAKER_02] It's almost like they wanted to make it so obvious that we were supposed to like look the other way on this thing. And I'm still confused. And maybe this you can help me out or someone who's a bigger fan than I am as to why the lawyer decided this was the time like a lawyer's job is to keep secrets and to like keep things. You know, you trust a lawyer for this very reason is there. It's confidentiality.

[00:36:01] [SPEAKER_02] But for some reason, when Tom Cavanaugh hands these envelopes to her, she decides this is the moment where I'm going to break the seal of his envelope, see what this is about and then hire a hitman.

[00:36:13] [SPEAKER_00] And well, she watched. So she watches the video. Correct. She watched the video beforehand, knew what he was planning to do, that he was either giving away the first edition. She's like, I've always wanted this.

[00:36:23] [SPEAKER_02] So even if you get to the point where she's like, I've always wanted it. So I'm going to plan this thing out. The lawyer opened the letter unsolicited, which she is like, what was the impetus of that? What's the motivation of this lawyer to break every creed she knows and every client's trust to just go, you know what? Something feels feels because it might have something to do with that first edition that I'm curious.

[00:36:50] [SPEAKER_01] Curiosity killed the cat as much tails all this time.

[00:36:53] [SPEAKER_02] As much as I had with the movie, I desperately wanted the killer and the motive to be better than it ended up being. And that was a little bit of a disappointment. And it is what it is. Beth says maybe she always opens the letters. This one just paid off. This one just paid off. She opens all of them. Yeah. Jack's on. So the other thing they bring in several people early in the movie, like the brother Jake Epstein and then the wife who's a nurse. Yes.

[00:37:19] [SPEAKER_02] And her explanation of why she did the things she did is only something that a guilty person would say. Like she comes across a dead body and then decides to leave the body, but take like the Santa suit. Yeah. There's a bunch of what she does when she Tom Cavanaugh is alive when she runs into him and then he dies while she's watching him.

[00:37:47] [SPEAKER_02] And the nurse doesn't. She checks the pulse. That's all she does. She doesn't ask for help. She doesn't call that. She is not acting as a nurse. She's acting like a murderer. Like if you go back to that interrogation scene, you will find that that is the person in every CSI episode that does it. That is who that is. That is who that is. And I couldn't believe that that was just like a.

[00:38:10] [SPEAKER_00] So, yeah, but like, so her explanation was that everybody, like if people saw her coming out, they would have accused her because they knew that she had a rocky relationship with him. So she covered. You just scream. You immediately go call that somebody called. She thought that people would accuse her.

[00:38:26] [SPEAKER_02] She didn't want to deal with. I thought that her explanation was terrible. Yeah, it was really, really bad.

[00:38:32] [SPEAKER_00] I'm just saying, but then I've never come across a dead body. That's all I got.

[00:38:36] [SPEAKER_02] I will say how I'd react or a secret passage or a secret passage. Had this been a bigger deal, we'd have definitely done some sort of bit where one of us act like a hot dog man. Right. Right. If we watch this in real time, like I come in with a wig on giant fake beard.

[00:38:51] [SPEAKER_00] So this is what I got dogs here. This is what I would caution everyone with is if you see someone on screen who looks like hot dog man, don't IMDB. Who's the actor? Because then you'll see the actor and you'll be like, oh, he's doing a bit. Oh, he's doing a bit. He's doing a bit.

[00:39:07] [SPEAKER_02] He's doing hot dog man bits. They could have made him definitely. They could have made him anything they wanted. Yeah. And they went with hot dog man. I know all the rest of you are here because your close friends are family, but I was his dedicated weenie salesman. Outside of his office, I sold him his daily dog.

[00:39:27] [SPEAKER_01] It's a big city thing, Daniel. You wouldn't understand.

[00:39:30] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, really? You think a lot of hot dog guys are in wheels? You think a lot of hot dog guys are in wheels? All the time. All the time.

[00:39:37] [SPEAKER_01] They build very close bonds. Yeah.

[00:39:39] [SPEAKER_00] So this does bring me to my what the hallmark, which is the hot dog guy because hot dog guy was a real guy. Yeah, he was a guy who had a stand outside of his bookstore for a long time and then he retired to Florida. It's I hit the guy who is now playing hot dog man somehow found this out or the lawyer or the lawyer. Yeah, that there was a hot dog guy. But if OK, so if it's the lawyer, then either way, though, it doesn't make any sense.

[00:40:08] [SPEAKER_00] But if it's the lawyer, which would be nice, then somebody at least told him about, hey, there was a hot dog guy outside.

[00:40:13] [SPEAKER_02] He said I did my research. He says that he did the research.

[00:40:16] [SPEAKER_00] Because the lawyer. Yeah, I don't know as a hit man. The problem here is I just don't know how he knew about hot dog man and then how no one else in town knew that he wasn't a hot dog man that sold hot dogs outside of the bookstore for a long time.

[00:40:37] [SPEAKER_01] He wasn't hot dog man in Fletcher's. No, he wasn't. When he had a store in the correct.

[00:40:42] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, OK, well, that's great. That's very nice. Yeah, I missed that. But I thought it was hot dog man.

[00:40:48] [SPEAKER_01] How did the lawyer know about hot dog man? Like, did it come up in conversation?

[00:40:51] [SPEAKER_00] I wouldn't even know how to begin finding out about hot dog man. If I knew you at one point had a bookstore in the city, I don't even know the searches that I would it would take me to get to. There was once a hot dog man outside.

[00:41:07] [SPEAKER_02] We found Tom Cavanaugh's journal in every page is about hot dog.

[00:41:12] [SPEAKER_00] Today. Today, no relish.

[00:41:14] [SPEAKER_01] No, yeah. Alonzo, any any of the Hallmarks for you? Well, yeah, just bold, bold move of Hallmark plus to leave us on this much of a cliffhanger. Like I was shocked to find out we weren't getting any more episodes in last time they did that.

[00:41:29] [SPEAKER_02] Jill Wagner went to GAC.

[00:41:31] [SPEAKER_01] Right. Exactly. It's like, let's let's let me want that's that's that's that's you know, that's eggs basket. I've got some metaphor here. I don't know what, but that just seems that just seems crazy to leave that dangling for this long, but I guess they just figure, you know, we'll it'll just keep us on tenterhooks for all of 25 until this rolls back around.

[00:41:50] [SPEAKER_00] How confident do you have to be about your new project to be like, hey, we're going to end it with a cliffhanger. Have they announced it? Do you know? I have no idea. Like that's a bold level of confidence to be like, it's going to be good. And you're going to want more of it. And you're going to wait for it. That's a bold level of confidence.

[00:42:08] [SPEAKER_02] It's like staring down the hatch, opening the hatch and then not tell us what's inside of loss. Yeah.

[00:42:13] [SPEAKER_00] Yes. But that it's like, it's just, it's Hallmark. You don't do that. No one has bold, bold level of confidence about anything on Hallmark. So that's crazy. That's it. I loved it. I love the move.

[00:42:24] [SPEAKER_02] Dana. Yeah. Early in this movie at the party with the inconsistent audio that Alonzo talked about, the owner of the diner says, I think it's the owner of the diner says the Fletcher, it's the Fletcher real estate party. It's legendary. Okay. I would love to hear about this. I would love to hear a three story minimum of how the Fletcher real estate groups Christmas party has become legendary in the town of Fletcher. I want to hear, I want to hear the stories.

[00:42:53] [SPEAKER_02] I want to hear all of it. I want to hear about receipts, please. Cause clearly they didn't have a problem securing a venue. Like how legendary are we talking here?

[00:43:02] [SPEAKER_00] I would love to hear more. I do just, I forgot to mention this during the wait, what, but, um, I did find it really funny. They're going around and she's telling everybody, Hey, here's what you get Brooke. And she opens up and she's like, or I'm getting books, but I don't really need them anymore, but whatever. Um, and everybody else got something. What the diner person got was a, Hey, your chili is actually really good. Yeah. That's true. It's like a thumbs up on chili. That's right. And I'd be pretty bummed if that's all that I got.

[00:43:31] [SPEAKER_00] I'd, especially if she had been there for the whole, uh, you know, the whole journey there. Imagine doing this whole thing and all you find out is, Hey, be sure to drink your own.

[00:43:42] [SPEAKER_02] Be sure to drink your own.

[00:43:44] [SPEAKER_01] That's exactly right. A coming commercial for my chili. You could have left me five stars on Yelp. I know. Yeah.

[00:43:51] [SPEAKER_00] I know. I actually, I, uh, the chili is really good. That's what I'm leaving you with that. Uh, we did everybody. Congratulations to us. We're going to, we're going to keep hanging out on Hallmark plus for a little longer, which you can, uh, once again, add to your, uh, filo as well. And you can watch our episodes on there, but we're going to be, uh, heading into holidays next week. So we'll do holidays episode one. So come on back. It's going to be a lot of fun. Um, or not. I don't actually know anything about it. It could, it could be real bad. It could be not fun. I don't know. I think you'll enjoy it. Okay. Yeah. All right.

[00:44:20] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. And I'm not sure.

[00:44:21] Okay.

[00:44:22] [SPEAKER_01] Fair.

[00:44:22] [SPEAKER_00] Um, all right. We'll be back next time. We'll be the first to wish you a Merry Christmas deck.

[00:44:28] [SPEAKER_02] The hallmark is a Bramble jam podcast is produced by Aaron Shay. For more information on deck. The Homer you can go to deck the hallmark.com for information on the deck. The hallmark family. You can go to Bramble jam plus.com deck. The hallmark is presented by Philo TV for a free trial of Philo. Go to philo.tv slash DTH.

[00:44:51] [SPEAKER_00] You're about to hear some ads that help keep the lights on here in the old studio. Thanks for listening or don't listen. It's really up to you at this point. It's at the end of the show. I mean, you're listening to me. Hi, but here they come. I promise they're coming. Yep. Here they are. Happy day. Bye.

[00:45:10] [SPEAKER_03] . .

[00:45:10] . Thank you.