I know, same! When I was watching I was like, oh, wow, they’re daring to go past the kind of vague mild nothingness you usually get at this point in these stories, they’re actually giving it weight and character, like, of course I also winced and was mad at Harper for what she was doing but I was supposed to? And then seeing her fight to overcome that then meant more.
I was so excited for the response and just didn’t expect what we got at all. I get that this is a mix of more classic romcoms (where the poor behavior mostly involves lying) and family holiday movies (where people treat each other badly till they get to the root of whatever) and thus involved both the bad parts, but like….damn. Just really had no clue people were going to take it the way they did. And like you, I’m sad that there’s no room to enjoy it collectively now, I actually straight up blacklisted it and have been avoiding my activity feed for any comments on posts related to it, Mackenzie Davis in other media, or holiday media in general. Not looking forward to the renewed discourse next Christmas either.