Review: SuperKlaus is ho-ho-ho-hum

I love this time of year, because I love watching Christmas movies. Between watching classic favorites -- It's a Wonderful Life, Tokyo Godfathers, A Muppet Family Christmas -- I also love to pepper in, let's say, "junk food" Christmas movies, the sort of silly rom-com stuff that Hallmark, Netflix, and others churn out to give us a few laughs and a healthy dose of holiday cheer. Of course, I'm also always excited to check out the newest animated Christmas offerings, and there are usually at least a few. This year, one that popped up sort of out of nowhere is SuperKlaus (it shows up on Amazon here in the States as SuperClaus, but the in-universe spelling goes with the "K," and thus, I will, too).

You know when a particularly buzzy movie trailer drops, and it sets the internet on fire? Something like the Cats trailer? Well, in SuperKlaus, just such a trailer has dropped. It's for the third (and final, unless it makes a ton of money, obvi) movie in the eponymous franchise, in which an everyday mall Santa gets super powers due to a leakage of radioactive candy cane syrup (so good). Suddenly, he's a beefy hunk of a superhero waging war against the nefarious Grumpus.

I guess we don't know for sure if the movie is a massive worldwide phenomenon, but it certainly feels that way judging by the way a couple specific people react. The first is young Billie, a girl whose oft-absent scientist parents leave her in the care of a guardian robot (Arco, is that you?). Billie's parents want her to make some human friends, stop looking at screens all the time, your usual parent worries. The second is the actual, real-life Santa, who spends his free time playing with SuperKlaus figures and imagining he's that powerful himself. Honestly, it's a little crazy the real Santa seemingly doesn't have any meaningful magic powers. Like, sure, I don't expect his beard to operate like a stretchy third arm, but this dude doesn't seem to have anything going for him.

While watching the new trailer, Santa bumps his head and suddenly believes he actually is SuperKlaus, and sets out to find Grumpus. Instead, he crosses paths with Billie, who makes it her mission to help return him to the North Pole in time for Christmas. She's joined by Leo, one of Santa's loyal elves, and Albert, a second-tier reindeer, on her quest, which brings them into conflict with evil capitalist Frank Fafnir.

Frank Fafnir deserves his own paragraph, because he's quite an enjoyable villain. He is the embodiment of every bad thing about capitalism. His company churns out junk products that easily fall apart, and he's super proud of the planned obsolescence. He says that families are only good for buying stuff. When he's trying to use his company's tablets to input some commands, they keep breaking, over and over again, in one of the film's best gags. Sure, he doesn't have much depth, but he's a fun foil to Santa, who is obviously a threat to him since toys made at the North Pole are sturdily made.

SuperKlaus has a fine set-up, but it unfortunately doesn't provide much excitement. It's only a 90-minute movie, but it moves along quite sluggishly. The pace matches the animation, which has an odd lethargic quality to it. Even in the action scenes, there's a heaviness to the characters (and not just Santa) that makes you feel like they're moving through syrup. On top of that, this isn't a particularly good-looking movie. It's the kind of generic art direction you see a dozen times a year, without much artistic flair giving it personality, or a distinctive flair.

There's also the issue of Billie as a main character. She's just...obnoxious. And for supposedly being so smart that her scientist parents want her to help them finish a robotics project, she regularly comes across as being pretty dumb. She keeps "forgetting" that Santa isn't actually SuperKlaus, imploring him to use his stretchy beard and peppermint breath. Like...come on, kid. Do better.

On the Christmas movie spectrum from joyful classic to trashy fun, SuperKlaus falls firmly at the latter extreme. I wish it were livelier, a little lighter on its feet, but for what it is, it provides enough dumb silliness to slot into the Christmas watchlist, if you want something smooth-brained and unchallenging. It's certainly not a ho-ho-homerun.