MERRY MOOSEY CHRISTMAS

Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer decides he wants to stay home for just one Christmas Eve, so a Moose takes his place, with mixed results.

Rudolph and Santa work together to find a replacement animal, settling on a huge moose as the best choice. The moose doesn’t have Rudolph’s special gifts and can’t seem to acquire them through positive thinking as the reindeer suggests. The moose knows how to shop, however, and he acquires a headlamp, a jet-pack rocket propeller and a GPS to strap onto his antlers. On Christmas Eve, Santa and his team crash-land on the roof of Rudolph’s house because they forgot to instruct the moose on landing procedures. Rudolph saves the Christmas delivery mission when he flies the team back to the store to acquire skis for their landings. The ending is rather confusing as it’s not quite clear who gets the skis (only the moose and Rudolph are shown wearing them) or how the skis solve the moose’s landing issues. The story is a little too long and tries a little too hard to be funny, without much success. Large-format, cartoon-style illustrations provide some comic relief with funny expressions on the faces of Rudolph and the moose, but the premise of the replacement moose falls flat.

Stick with the original story of Rudolph and his redeeming red nose, with two new versions available in 2014.