Every year, a few conversations begin to occur simultaneously before, on, and after Thanksgiving and continue through the new year. There are things you can expect to talk about with friends, family, coworkers, and passing acquaintances. Most are safe but, like all things holiday-related, are accompanied by a certain level of mild controversy and the potential to boil over until genuine disagreement.
Here are a few of the American holiday conversations one can be sure to experience annually:
- “Can you believe _____ put up their Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving?”
- “Guess which radio station already started playing Christmas music?”
- “What’s your favorite Christmas song?”
- “What’s your favorite Christmas movie?”
- “We don’t say Happy Holidays in this house! It’s Christmas, damn it!’
It’s two of those that demand further inspection in this moment. Before answering the question of favorite Christmas song or favorite Christmas movie, we have to give further consideration of what constitutes a Christmas song or movie?
The Rise of the Unconventional Favorite Christmas Movie
Over the last few years, society has realized and embraced that Die Hard is a Christmas movie. This began, by most accounts, with a Cracked dot com article and now stretches across conversations, advertisements, and the internet. (My mother texted me this week that even an Xfinity ad recently highlighted Die Hard as a holiday favorite).
In response to this, it has become a meme to identify other unconventional Christmas movies, with examples including:
- Batman Returns
- Die Hard 2
- Gremlins
- The Thing
- The Thing (1982 remake)
- Lethal Weapon
- The Shining
- Eyes Wide Shut
- LA Confidential
This conversation has been tackled by various blogs and writers, some of whom have tried to put the conversation entirely to bed by writing pieces like 538’s “The Best Movies That Are Kind Of About Christmas” or Vulture’s “10 Great Christmas-Adjacent Movies That Aren’t Die Hard”.
Music, meanwhile, works differently. It seems there is a clear line about whether something is or is not a Christmas song. It appears to be more straightforward: Christmas music is music for and about Christmas. (However, there are a few occasional comedic takes on what it is to be Christmas music, including popular comedian Brock Wilbur claiming every Ben Folds song is a Christmas song.)
Which brings me to the question I’ve asked here today…
Let’s Talk About “Happy Xmas (War is Over”) by John Lennon
This post is prologue so far. Here’s what I really want to talk about, what the top of the page exclaims, what I’ve been thinking about for years: is the song that begins with John Lennon whispering Merry Christmas to children really a Christmas song?
Originally I intended this to be a parody of such reads as “is gremlins a Christmas movie” and my own “why die hard 2 is a better christmas movie than die hard” or the recent, delightful “Is Holiday Classic It’s A Wonderful Life Secretly (or Actually) a Sci-Fi/Fantasy Movie?”
However, as I set out to write this, I realized that wasn’t the article I was writing. Continue reading “Is Lennon’s “Happy Xmas (War is Over)” a Christmas Song?”