Elves

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*****HAPPY NEW YEAR!*****

Hey there, gang! A new year, and a shiny new episode of Here Be Spoilers to cram into your earholes!

As one final nod to the guys' #HolidayMoviepalooza, they sat down to watch 1989's Elves, a film that rivals Steel Dawn in the high levels of confusion and anger it generated among the crew.

Oh, sure, it "stars" Dan Haggerty of Grizzly Adams fame as a burned-out, possibly retired detective (he smokes a lot)...

One of only three non-smoking pictures I could find.

...but it has little else to offer. According to Jake, it was supposed to be about a bunch of elves trying to resurrect Hitler for some unexplained reason. Instead, it's actually about one poorly-made elf puppet that cannot emote, and the former Nazis that want it to breed with one of their granddaughters.

Seriously...This is the "monster" of this movie. That's his expression the whole time.

A group of "anti-Christmas" girls accidentally summon the elf while performing an unspecified ritual, and one of them spills her own blood on the ground. The main girl's (fake Rosanna Arquette's) grandfather is a cranky wheelchair-bound German guy, and her mom looks like Debbie Harry. Dan Haggerty starts the movie as a jobless guy who appears to have been evicted from his travel trailer, and then goes to work as a department store Santa Claus. Sneaking into the department store late at night causes these two lunkheads to team up and fight the Germans (who may or may not be trying to protect the girl), and Haggerty gets to shoot at people.

The NRA sponsored this product placement.

When that fails, the director tries to make him look like some sort of action star, letting him punch elderly Germans and spout witty quips like, "How many teeth you got? *PUNCH!* How many now?" It's no "Yippy-kay-yay, motherfucker," but then, he's no John McClain. Instead, he looks like an angry, chain-smoking, partially-shaved bear. (Which ties him back into Grizzly Adams!)

"GIMME ALL YOUR CIGARETTES! NOW!"

Larry is disturbed by how much Haggerty smokes. Jake is angered by the number of things that appear to be going somewhere, and then completely fail to do anything at all. Derek is visibly shaken by the elf puppet that appears to have had some kind of stroke. And all three of them are made terribly uncomfortable by the super-fey Al Franken simulacrum and the department store manager in the Pee Wee Herman bowtie.

There's also some interesting discussion about Sam Raimi, the rumored upcoming Star Wars standalone Han Solo film, Larry's List, and odd facts about Hitler. (Did you know he came up with the idea of the blow-up doll? That is messed up.)

So tune in and dig on the weirdness of Elves! And Happy New Year from all of us at The Ugly Couchcast and Here Be Spoilers!

NEXT WEEK: The Undertaker and His Pals. (Finally!) See you then!