A 2022 holiday actioner that had no business being as good as it was delivers some season’s beatings on streaming

They may never eclipse the timeless classics like It’s a Wonderful Life, but cheeky genre fare has nevertheless been fusing itself with a festive flair for some time now. Indeed, transgression is simply the natural order of things in the arena of artists, which is how we’ve gotten Santa Claus as a horror villain, a combative magician, and a drunk.

And yet, it wasn’t until 2022 that Saint Nicholas properly suited up as an action hero at the behest of Violent Night. This, however, turned out to be best-case scenario, because by that time, David Harbour was the perfect age to embody the scrappiest Santa ever put to screen, and after making nearly quadruple its budget at the box office, Violent Night is taking advantage of the holidays to rise up on streaming.

Per FlixPatrol, Violent Night is awaiting its milk and cookies at eighth place on Prime Video‘s worldwide film rankings at the time of writing, finding itself among a curious collection of fellow charters. There’s seasonal brethren like Jack in Time for Christmas (sixth place) and Illumination’s The Grinch (10th place), while Gladiator rides the coattails of its legacy sequel‘s sturdy theatrical haul in second place.

Violent Night stars Harbour as Santa Claus, who happens to be delivering presents to the wealthy Lightstone estate when it’s attacked by a group of mercenaries, who hold the family hostage as they ransack the mansion for valuables. Allying himself with the family’s youngest daughter Trudy (Leah Brady), Santa double-checks his naughty list for the names of the mercenaries (yes, this is an actual plot beat), and prepares to make visions of sugar plums dance in their heads.

Now, turning Santa Claus into an action hero is the sort of premise that emerges on a sleepy afternoon immediately after the words “I’m bored, let’s make a movie” are uttered. Luckily, if Violent Night was indeed schemed up out of boredom, then that certainly didn’t translate to the proceedings; the holiday-themed fight choreography and Harbour’s thoroughly entertaining turn as Kris Kringle make for some pleasantly diverting action fare, even if it ends up taking itself a bit too seriously for its own good.

For example, we find out during the film’s midpoint that, before Santa Claus became Santa Claus, he was an ancient Viking warrior known as Nikamund the Red, who was known for pulverizing his enemies with his trademark warhammer. Now, by no stretch does this revelation sink the plot, but this isn’t a film where you need to justify the combat prowess of your protagonist with a backstory that strikes fear into the hearts of his soon-to-be enemies; the simple act of making Santa Claus an action hero is more than enough for audiences to buy into, and a better version of Violent Night would have recognized that and subsequently taken better advantage of the tonal/narrative freedom that the premise allows.

But at the end of the day, Violent Night has enough awareness towards its cartoonish power to jingle all the way, and with a sequel confirmed to be in development, we can only hope that that gets honored even more next time.