Santa is Elon Musk Now, I Guess
Or maybe Jeff Bezos? Rumination on Red One
Picture this: Christmas morning. You throw off your thick duvet covers, creep down the wooden stairs, hoping not to make a creak. The sun has not risen above the horizon—the birds have not chirped yet. But you peer over the bannister for a glimpse at the tree, and what’s below it? A shining array of brightly wrapped presents… and me. Sitting on my leather armchair, feet kicked up, scotch in hand, there I am. And I say to you, “Kid, for a special Christmas treat, I’m gonna dump on one more cash grab CGI nightmare before the year is up.”
And you squeal with delight and glee, right? Right?
So anyways I watched Red One (ill-advised) and genuinely got a migraine from looking at it. It’s a poorly conceived weird Christmas movie that resembles Marvel far too closely (did Marvel destroy film forever? Survey says maybe…) and I could not begin to guess who the target audience is for this movie, but that’s not what I’m here to talk about. What I’m here to talk about is the characterization of Santa, played by J.K Simmons.
Santa is… a shredded tech mogul who runs the North Pole much like an Amazon factory. In the beginning of the film, Mrs. Claus is watching him work out in an giant, Christmas themed gym(?) and goes “aaand 500 pushups! In just five minutes!” I don’t know. I need a drink.
I’m not gonna craft a PhD level thesis here, but I merely worry that our shifting representation of Old Saint Nick is going in a… weird direction. I saw a Target commercial the other day starring a “Santa” who could not have been older than 45. Santa is becoming less geriatric and grandpa-y, and more… sexy?
In Red One, Santa has a six-pack, the elf has a six-pack, the anthropomorphic polar bear has a six-pack, Krampus has a six-pack, the godforsaken snowmen have a six-pack. It’s weird. I don’t know who this appeals to—it feels like AI generated masculinity. Was Christmas too girly for the executives that produced this? Did we need to inject 30-metric-tons of Reddit-sourced Testosterone into it? Was the magic, joy, and kindness of Christmas too closely associated with “femininity” so we needed to make it about violence and strength? Is this, perhaps, how tech moguls see themselves, as the Apex predator / summit of manhood (conquering humanity, I guess?) Is that why the only female characters in this were literally 1. the one-dimensional villain who was brutally killed at the end 2. the head of security (it’s ok to be a woman if you are an arm of The State), and 3. Mrs. Claus (it is also ok to be a woman if you are a homemaker). There’s probably a more cogent reason for this that I could pinpoint here, but truth be told I’m tired. Everyone has a six pack and everything sucks.
On top of this, Red One explains everything Christmas-wise in terms of really advanced technology. Santa’s sleigh looks like a Tesla cybertruck / spaceship. The factory has assembly lines and conveyor belts and machines and gadgets. And I ask you this—do we not believe in magic anymore? Santa’s whole schtick can be explained very easily: “he’s magic”. Boom bam done. He sprinkles pixie dust and can fly in a sled. His reindeer? Magic. His elves carve rocking chairs in his workshop. Everything fits in his sack because he’s magical, goddamnit, not because he has quantum-physics shrink-technology to make the presents really small. Why do drones have to be involved? Must everything emit carbon emissions?
Santa acts more like a CIA operative in Red One, and with all the security jargon, governmental similarities, and red tape (ha ha ha—or should I say ho ho ho), I’m astounded that a group of creative minds got together and could not imagine, in their wildest fantasies, that the fake magical man we invented could be anything but … bureaucratic?
I miss the Santa of yore. And I do think that Jeff Bezos / Amazon’s huge role in Christmas, the increasingly capitalist / consumerist nature of the holiday, the infinite TikTok gift hauls, our current political climate and the frightening position of power that Elon Musk keeps ending up in… I think it’s all related to depicting Santa as a young, fit tech mogul, right out of Silicon Valley.
Maybe I’m just being really nihilistic this Christmas, but I wish we’d just let Santa be 80 again. And give J.K Simmons enough employment to not take another job like this.
TLDR: This movie was too weird not to comment on. I’m overusing parentheticals again. Merry Christmas Armchair Nation.