A couple of years ago I reviewed the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special (1978) for one of these Christmas reviews and I have never forgotten. It is notorious for very clear reasons as it is one of the worst things I have ever laid my eyes on. Genuinely, it is horrendously bad. Suffice it to say Lego Star Wars Holiday Special is not even close to being as bad, and I would go so far as to say it is actually good, at least in that it is a fun time for kids kind of way. The film, like the original holiday special, is set on life day, which is the Star Wars equivalent of Christmas, and finds Rey (Helen Sadler) trying to train Finn (Omar Benson) to be a Jedi. When she feels like she is failing to do so she heads on an adventure to find an ancient artefact that she believes will help. This artefact turns out to be a key that allows Rey to travel space and time and visit moments from several Star Wars movies to gain experience. Meanwhile, the rest of the gang stays on the Millennium Falcon in an attempt to throw the best Life Day party ever.
As you can tell from the synopsis, the film takes on the format of a sitcom episode rather than a feature film in that it has both its A and B plot lines, with the A plot line being much more fleshed out than the B one. The plot line involving the life day party feels like it is only there so that the film can feel more like a holiday special and have the generic ‘the holidays are about family and love’ message that is prevalent in these kinds of films. And because of this, I had zero interest in these moments, so whenever it jumped back to these parts I lost all interest. I can see them keeping kids’ attention because these moments are used pretty much entirely to deliver jokes. And to be fair to the film, there were quite a lot of jokes that landed, mostly because the film did a good job of using the fact that it is a LEGO film.
As I said up top, I think this film is good. Despite it being obviously aimed at kids, there was plenty for me to enjoy as a Star Wars fan. The general premise of Rey hopping around different moments from Star Wars media allowed for some fun moments and a way of sneakily hitting at my nostalgia as well. I laughed more at the moments where the film pokes fun at some of the issues of the other Star Wars films rather than the moments where Rey got directly involved in them. The film also takes up the classic comedy of the LEGO games which, again, hit me in my nostalgic feels. But what I appreciated about the film is that it used the fact that it is a LEGO film to its benefit. There were several moments where a character would lose their hair and just put it back on because their LEGO, or someone would break an object and it would break into several LEGO pieces. It is a small touch, but it was appreciated. The fact that the film is LEGO also allows for plenty of slapstick, and I think this was where I found the film to be its best. Although the film is aimed at kids, slapstick comedy is a way of breaking that divide because it is funny for all ages.
I went into this film with the expectation that it would be pretty decent, and it effectively met those expectations. Despite it being aimed at kids there was enough here for me to enjoy, and I had a good amount of fun watching it. If you’re not a fan of Star Wars it will do nothing for you, and even as a Star Wars fan, I think it would have become grating if it was any longer than its 45-minute runtime. If you have a Disney+ account and you like Star Wars it's probably worth putting on if you want something short and sweet.
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