‘Happiest Season’ is a problematic nightmare

I once dated a guy who was in the closet. We met on Grindr, hooked up, and that was that. We chatted for a bit as we cleaned up, and mere minutes after he left, he texted me to tell me how great he thought I was. I blushed, naturally, but didn’t really think much more of it. We did hang out a few times after that, and very quickly, I realized how much chemistry we had together. So, when I fell for him, I fell hard. We texted every single day, and he came over just to literally Netflix & Chill many times in the ensuing weeks and months. He was kind, attentive, and funny. He was studying law in Nashville, and his intelligence was never condescending, but rather inviting and warm.

Let’s call him Roger. For all his wonderful qualities, including going all-out for my birthday, Roger closed off a crucial part of his life. Whenever we were out in public, we couldn’t share any public displays of affection, not even hand holding, and it was like he morphed into a person I didn’t reconize or even particularly like. There would be moments when we’d be having dinner that’d he’d flash his silky smile, and I’d swoon for him all over again. After we’d been dating for a few months, I finally confronted him about how I was feeling, and he shared a very real fear his parents would cut him off, financially, if he came out. Originally from Atlanta, he grew up in the church, so there were a particular set of strict religious values and beliefs by which his family had him shackled.

I get it. I know that fear. It throbs out of your chest and lodges itself in the back of your throat, nearly suffocating you. You hold it in and hope no one notices. In dating Roger, I had to cut myself into discrete parts ⏤ compartmentalizing the unapologetically out cis gay man who dressed up as Dr. Frank N. Furter for Halloween that year and the repressed, tortured person living in constant fear of being outed ⏤ thus burying myself alive in the process. I spent 20 years hiding who I was and even play-acting as more masculine (like pretending I wasn’t a Britney Spears stan or that Chad Michael Murry’s abs didn’t make me squeal with delight). Growing up in a Christian, hyper-masculine household required suppression of the truth. When my late father forced me to go hunting, I swallowed my disdain, suited up in whatever camouflage he bought me, and grumbled under my breath that there were worse things I could be doing.

This is all to say: Happiest Season is a steaming pile of problematic trash. When Harper (Mackenzie Davis) invites her girlfriend Abby (Kristen Stewart) home for the holidays, while they’re both atop one of the neighborhood houses and taking in the breathtaking lights displays, the film sets up what could have been a truly wonderful queer Christmas affair with absurd and delightful hijinks. I was wrong. We were robbed. Come to find out, Harper hasn’t come out to her family yet, despite claiming she did months prior, and she waits until they’re literally on the drive up to drop the bombshell. Not only is she not out yet but she’s told her family Abby is just her, get this, orphaned roommate. Abby appropriately responds with disappointment and even quiet anger, and rightfully so ⏤ but Harper bats her doe eyes and manipulates her into it anyhow. They must be straight, and Abby is willing to play the part.

When they arrive, it is as awkward as you might expect, but what I didn’t expect was the full-on rage I’d experience while watching the events unfold. Abby must contend with not only the constant sympathy for her fictionally-dead parents but a swift coldness that descends around her girlfriend. Harper withdraws from Abby, and it’s not exactly right away either; it happens in slow increments, at first, like the fact they can’t share a bedroom because, you know, Abby is just a roommate. Any public displays of affection, or actions that could be construed as such, must be tucked away, so they can both live up to the heteronormative bullshit.

The five-day holiday vacation contains plenty of large gatherings, most of which includes Harper’s ex-boyfriend Liam (Jake McDorman) in attendance, and it’s clear her family would do anything to get them back together again. From extravagant evening dinners with the family to late night drinking with Liam, Harper reverts back to her former life ⏤ it’s truly heartbreaking to witness. Even more, to watch Abby almost have an out-of-body experience, only to see the person she wanted to propose to on Christmas morning transform into someone she doesn’t even recognize is downright infuriating. After the night of drinking, Harper has the audacity to call Abby “suffocating” when she comes to check up on her and then asks for “space.” Girl, what.

It’s one thing to not be ready to come out. We all deserve the time to process and learn about ourselves, but not when it damages and hurts another LGBTQ+ person. And come to find out, this isn’t the first time this has happened. Riley (Aubrey Plaza), Harper’s ex-girlfriend, reveals that after the breakup, Harper told her family and friends that Riley just wouldn’t leave her alone. And Riley was cruelly bullied for it. I don’t need to tell you how wrong that is. That’s not struggling to understand yourself and come out, that’s mentally manipulative and toxic behavior. Years later, Harper repeats this vicious cycle with Abby through five days of absolute hell.

It strikes me as strange and disheartening that Davis, who appeared in Black Mirror‘s defining episode, “San Junipero,” which handles queer trauma and new love with thoughtful beauty, would sign off on Happiest Season. A queer Christmas movie should be gleeful and heart-warming, not potentially dangerous for a marginalized community, many of whom have been tossed out by their parents and become homeless around this time of the year. So, sure, why not wallow in the trauma in such an exploitative way rather than in an intensely emotional, poetic, and cathartic way ala “San Junipero.”

It’s all even more depressing when you look at the cast. I adore everyone here: Alison Brie, Mackenzie Davis, Kristen Stewart, Daniel Levy, Aubrey Plaza, Victor Garber, Mary Steenburgen, Mary Holland. Like wow, what a lineup! Yet alas, the LGBTQ+ community is saddled with a film that reads more like a horror movie than a holiday picture ⏤ which is bizarre because writer/director Clea DuVall is a lesbian. I’m not even sure how this happened and how its very important message of living as your truest self became so garbled and mishandled.

The ending ⏤ from the rebound of the parents to Abby’s abrupt forgiveness of Harper ⏤ is par for the course with Christmas movies, but unlike most, Happiest Season has already squandered any and all good will it could have had. In fact, I was so checked out emotionally by that point and I just didn’t care. My friend Jessye DeSilva put it simply: the film “reinforces codependent and abusive ideas about love.”

Instead, you should go watch 2000’s What’s Cooking?, which, according to friend and colleague Rachel Cholst, is must better in handling queer material and boasts a predominantly BIPOC cast. Sign me up for that!

Oh, and you can also sign me up for more Daniel Levy hijinks and the Abby/Riley fan fic. Maybe a spin-off?!? That’d be something I’d actually love to see. #JusticeForRiley

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