Tim Allen is back in the red and white suit in The Santa Clauses (Picture: Disney+/Planet Photos)
A joke Tim Allen makes in The Santa Clauses has sparked some backlash from viewers.
The Hollywood star is back as Father Christmas himself, in a festive new six part Disney+ series 16 years after the trilogy came to an end with 2006’s The Escape Clause, but one line hasn’t sat well with fans.
The first two episodes dropped earlier this week, Scott Calvin – Allen’s character who became Santa Claus in the original 1994 classic – is asked if something is bothering him.
He insists that ‘saying “Merry Christmas to all” has suddenly become problematic’.
Plenty of people have taken issue with the line, including filmmaker Scott Weinberg, who shared the ‘actual dialogue’ in a tweet to his followers.
He later added: ‘It just struck me as a truly weird thing to put in a kid’s series. “<Someone> wants to stop us from saying Merry Christmas!” is not some random campaign.
Tim Allen and Elizabeth Mitchell both appear in the new show (Picture: Disney+/Planet Photos)
‘It’s a low-key effort to vilify anyone who doesn’t celebrate this holiday. In a grown-up movie I’d just groan and ignore it.’
Others fans pointed out that ‘Happy Holidays’ isn’t a new term, with the phrase even used in the song of the same name in 1942.
Another person pointed out: ‘We don’t say [Happy Holidays] to not offend. We say it to include. We say it because we acknowledge that there might be things out there we don’t personally observe. Has nothing to do with offence.’
Tim Allen’s joke sparked a bit of backlash (Picture: Chelsea Lauren/Shutterstock)
And a different Twitter user added: ‘Number of people I’ve seen take offence to “Merry Christmas”: 0. Number of conservatives I’ve seen take offence to the idea they made up that people take offence to “Merry Christmas”: So freaking many.’
Still, one person replied to the post and claimed to have been given a ’10 minute lecture’ after they ‘accidentally’ wished someone a Merry Christmas.
The Santa Clauses creator Jack Burditt recently admitted he actually anticipated the backlash over Tim’s joke, and went back and forth on whether or not to keep it in the script.
He told Deadline: ‘Yeah, we did. This is something that I just think is silly but then I’m like, I don’t know…
‘I mean, look, we also had a joke at one point where Santa is on his rounds, they’re going in for a landing and somebody’s shooting something up at him. And Noel the elf [who rides with Santa], says something like, “A war on Christmas!” I’m like, yeah, I don’t wanna go that far.’
The first two episodes of The Santa Clauses are available to stream on Disney+.
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The Hollywood star is back as Father Christmas.
