Trolls Holiday Special – Trolls Holiday (2017)

Directed by: Joel Crawford | 26 minutes | animation, comedy, family, fantasy, musical | Original voice cast: Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Zooey Deschanel, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, James Corden, Ron Funches, Kunal Nayyar, Aino Jawo, Caroline Hjelt, Walt Dohrn, Kevin Michael Richardson, Curtis Stone, Mike Mitchell

An explosion of bright colours, glitter and music; that’s pretty much the summary of the animation film ‘Trolls’ (2016), from the DreamWorks stable. From a story point of view, it wasn’t all that much, but that was nicely obscured by the swinging soundtrack in which old and new songs were expertly tied together and in which the sweet-voiced voice of Justin Timberlake played a leading role. The superstar also scored the summer hit of the year with the infectious ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’, written especially for ‘Trolls’. The music is therefore the great strength of the film, in combination with the excellent voice cast that, in addition to Timberlake, includes Anna Kendrick, Zooey Deschanel, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Russell Brand. Because ‘Trolls’ doesn’t have to rely on subtlety, a strong story, impressive animations or original characters. It doesn’t matter to the young target group, because they thoroughly enjoy the hysterical parade of craziness that DreamWorks presents them.

Building on the success of the feature film, a short film entitled ‘Trolls Holiday Special’ (‘Trolls Holiday’) (2017) has now been released. The approximately 25-minute video picks up where ‘Trolls’ left off, looking back at the events through the scrapbooking method worked out in a simplified animation style. That could have been original, were it not for the fact that just about every animated film that incorporates a flashback uses this approach these days. The Trolls and the Bergens have made peace, and Troll Poppy (voice of Anna Kendrick) and Bergens mild-tempered Bridget (Zooey Deschanel) are best friends these days. While the Trolls have something to celebrate almost every day, the Bergens have lost their only holiday – Trollhappen – by burying the peace axe. Feeling sorry for this, Poppy drums up Branch (Justin Timberlake) and her other friends to offer the Bergens one of their holidays. But while they’re super busy pitching all those different holidays for Bridget and King Gristle Jr. (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), Poppy doesn’t realize that her friend isn’t looking forward to all that busy stuff.

The story of ‘Trolls Holiday Special’ is, if possible, even less than the full-length animation film on which this short is based. Nevertheless, the writers have managed to incorporate a moral – not too original – (‘listen carefully to each other’) and to emphasize the importance of (celebrating) holidays together. The contrast with Pixar’s shorts – which are often significantly shorter – is enormous, both in terms of content and artistically. For many people, however, the no-nonsense style of ‘Trolls’ works. They are catered to in that regard, because ‘Trolls Holiday Special’ is more of the same. That means 25 minutes packed with a kaleidoscope of color, glitter, energy and music. The voice actors almost all trot out again for a reprise of their (little) role and again the music is the only thing that gives this film its added value.