Dwayne Johnson Slaps a Krampus In The Face in The Red One Trailer

Woof, so, uh, this is apparently what $250 million will get you in today’s economy. Johnson stars in “Red One” as Callum Drift, who’s tasked with overseeing security for Red One, aka Santa Claus (a bench-pressing, muscled-out, bearded J.K. Simmons, which is to say a regular J.K. Simmons), only for the big man to find himself Santa-napped. The ensuing rescue op pairs Drift with Chris Evans’ Jack O’Malley, who’s somehow the only one capable of saving Mr. Claus despite being a “Level 4 Naughty Lister.” Along the way, the two encounter talking polar bears and killer mutant snowmen, with Drift getting slapped by Krampus (“Game of Thrones” alum Kristofer Hivju) at one point, albeit not the one from Michael Dougherty’s “Krampus,” which would automatically make this a much better movie.

Setting aside “Fast & Furious” veteran Chris Morgan, who’s credited for penning the screenplay based on Hiram Garcia’s idea, essentially merging the “Santa Clause” movies with Johnson’s “Hobbs & Shaw,” the whole thing looks depressingly bad — as in, it literally looks bad and not like something a studio sunk hundreds of millions of dollars into making. With the “Jumanji” films and the likes of “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story” under his belt, Kasdan’s track record speaks for itself, but this “Red One” trailer doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. Mercifully, however, we already have a terrific Santa Claus movie starring J.K. Simmons. It’s called “Klaus” and you can watch it on Netflix right now.

Lucy Liu, Kiernan Shipka, Bonnie Hunt, Nick Kroll, and Wesley Kimmel costar in “Red One,” which will open in theaters on November 15, 2024.