Hey, friends, Happy countdown to Christmas season.

We originally recorded these reviews of the Mistletoe Murders season one episodes over the summer, and we are re airing them in honor of their debut on the Hallmark Channel as part of the Countdown to Christmas lineup.

We will of course be reviewing the new episodes in season two when those drop as well.

Enjoy the reviews.

This is a bramble Jam podcast.

Welcome to Girls Gone Hallmark, a Hallmark review podcast.

I'm Megan and I'm a longtime Hallmark fan.

I'm Wendy.

I'm a former Hallmark hater.

Today we are starting the second semester of the Girls Gone Hallmark Summer School series, and we are beginning our reviews of Mistletoe Murder and we are starting with combining episodes one in two Poison and a Paratree Parts one and two.

A little more on that in a minute.

Hang out with us when the podcast is over.

The best place to find us first, it's probably Instagram, where we are Girls Gone Homark.

Hey.

We are on Facebook in Facebook groups in particular, if you are looking to join a Hallmark friendly Facebook group with cool people who like to talk Hallmark and they know their stuff over there.

Yeah, it's called Girls Gone Hallmark in Facebook groups.

As mentioned, just a quick schedule adjustment.

We had initially planned to review each episode of Mistletoe Murders separately, and then upon watching them, we thought maybe that wasn't the best idea because we realized I didn't know this ahead of time, that each mystery spans two episodes.

Yeah, I didn't know either, and we thought we would just combine them and do them kind of like a movie.

So minor schedule adjustment.

Yeah, this will only run for three weeks as opposed to six weeks.

Right, so the episodes every other week?

Oh, is that what we're gonna do?

Oh?

You want to do him back to back?

Yeah?

I just figured we would just drop them the first three weeks, the first three Thursdays, Oh interesting, okay, And in August we'll just leave those Thursdays empty because you guys be kind of scenes.

August is busy.

It's busy, but we're also preparing for the onslaught of Christmas content, so we're gonna take a little break.

Great, let's start with a synopsis.

Christmas shop owner Emily Lane investigates a murder at a tree Farm.

That's all I Got.

Missletow Murders was created by Ken Cooperis, and he is credited with writing the first two episodes of the series.

He was executive producer of the Mistletoe Murders podcast series, which the TV was based on.

He's also been a writer and a producer on the Hallmark adjacent series Hudson and Rex Hudson and Rex Sarah It Is Again.

Grant Harvey directed the first two episodes of Mistletoe Murders for Hallmark.

Grant has also directed fourteen episodes of The Way Home.

His additional directing projects include Heartland and Orphan Black.

The One and Only.

Sarah Drew plays Emily Lane, our shop owner with a missteria's past.

Sarah has fifty three acting credits, including two hundred four episodes of Grey's Anatomy as April Kepner.

For Hallmarks, she has appeared in Branching Out One Summer and Guiding Emily.

Peter Mooney plays Detective Sam Wilner.

Peter must have big cop energy because among his acting credits That was Really Good Megan includes roles like Ricky Blue and Burden of Truth.

Sierra Marilyn Riley plays teenager Violet Wilner.

This was her very first acting project, and she has since appeared in the series Motorheads.

Kylie Evans play's Town busybody Brook Carmichael.

You might recognize Kylie s Stephanie from the series Good Witch.

Lara Amercay plays June Hubble murder suspect and Emily's best Ye.

Laura has had roles in Work and Moms, as well as the Prime video series Cross David who Litt plays Ray, the furniture sales person with a shady side hustle.

David has a deep resume.

His longest running role was on Stargate Atlantis, where he has appeared in ninety nine episodes.

Steve Lund plays Marcus Donovan.

Steve was in all four Hearts Around the Table movies and is appearing in season three of Sullivan's Crossing.

Mistletoe Murders is based on the Audible original podcast by the same name.

We are going to take a quick break and we're gonna come right back with our first impressions.

Hey, Wendy, what is your first impression of Mistletoe Murders?

Quid in a pear tree?

Oh?

Sorry, this mystery did not come to play, and neither did Emily Lane, who My first impression is I've heard the term cozy mystery tossed around, and I think Hallmark nailed it here a great can I tell you hold on a second.

I really want to make an edit.

I have to ask my seventeen year old how to exactly do that, But I want to make an edit of like Emily Lane to this song.

Do you know what'sngbo?

No, it's I did something bad by Taylor Swift from their reputation.

Oh.

I think about while I'm watching this is like Emily has this sort of like baddie energy.

Yes, and I'm loving it.

I love love love.

Let's talk about Sarah Drew and the character she plays Emily's.

First of all, I'm all in on Sarah Drew.

It was really the movie One Summer that we recently reviewed that like was the tipping point for me.

Yeah, she's so good in Guiding Emily Though.

She is very good.

She's very good in that movie quite frankly as April Koepner.

Like, she's good.

I didn't watch Grays oh know her as that character at all.

She's a good actor.

I have a suggestion for you new TikTok fanatic, Just search April Kaepner on TikTok and you'll get some of her iconic Gray's anatomy.

I mean, she has this heartbreaker of a storyline.

She's so good.

Oh I'm excited, I will, but she's so good in this.

She's so good in this.

The way she delivers dialogue is like how you and I would talk to each other.

I feel like there's she's of course, she's like natural and warm, but she's just a little bit sarcastic too.

And the way it's delivered is like chef's kiss.

So good.

Yeah, here's one thing I like about her.

Look, we are familiar with this setup, right, We've got the cop Sam and then we've got the amateur sleuth.

But Emily Lane is not your average Ridge Hallmark heroine.

Yes year, we know she's got some sort of mystery past.

She clearly knows her stuff.

I mean, look the hidden briefcase moment with the passports, her lock picking skills, the explosion.

I love her, and I love that her character's got a lot of depth.

She's not just like I'm a Christmas tree shop owner who happens to be crime a Jason, and I'm going to solve this crime because it involves my friends.

She has a reason.

Yes.

So my notes about Emily Lane are that I think she's Hallmark's most intriguing lead.

Like ever, oh uh huh.

When I was watching it, I was like, Okay, she's giving me Alias energy.

Yes for that, you know, like, of course she's not a spy.

I don't think she's a spy, but like the lead character in Alias was a spy, and like it's that sort of kind of like I mean that briefcase with the multiple passports is giving spy something.

And what I also find super intriguing is is she hiding in plain sight here?

I'm a Christmas shop owner?

Yeah, Like, what's the backstory here?

I love it.

I love it so much.

I have in my notes that she's not just like a nosy amateur sleuth here, like she brings a skill that we're not fully aware of yet.

It's more Amy Winslow than Hannah Swinson.

Yes, and I love that.

This is a good thing.

Question are you more anxious for the reveal of Emily's backstory or were you more anxious for the Emily and the Amy and Travis Kiss.

I'm more anxious to learn about Emily Lane's backstory because and this is no shade to mystery one on one, I it was a series I really enjoyed, But with that said, it was very Hallmark.

Mistletoe Murders to me, feels elevated to a level of in quality terms similar to The Way Home.

Production wise, director wise, like that kind of level.

And also I think that because it's based off of a successful podcast, the storytelling was already there.

The storytelling is already there.

But I also I don't feel like they're trying to dumb anything down from the audience.

And sometimes I feel like Hallmark might be a little watered down in terms, especially with the mystery stuff.

This felt different level to me.

I think one thing they do nicely is balancing the tone in this movie, Like there is some sinister stuff, gambling, dead's blackmail, shade business deals, and yet they balance it and they've found the piece that makes it Hallmark.

And I have not listens to the podcast, but you have you know your hot Chocolate tastings.

You have Emily runs this shop that would go to business ten and a half months out of the year, but still manages to be her bread and butter somehow, and part of me is knowing a little bit about her backstory, and like, it is it a front?

Is it a sham?

I don't think it is.

I think, you know, Hallmark is the only place where this could work.

But I think they are balancing the mistletoe and the murder piece of it nicely.

I agree.

And while watching this, you know, I'm not a huge fan of Christmas, and I know it's called mistletoe murders, it feels to me like it's just operating like during the holiday season.

It's not like a part of this not bashing you over the head with it.

Yes, I it could stand alone, even if it removed the holiday element from it.

I agree.

I imagine it's not going to I imagine season two is going to pick up during the holiday season.

Sure as well.

I really enjoyed the story where we have all these clues the baseball, Like all these clues start to reveal themselves, right, and they're almost they're coming to Emily.

I know she's out in pursuit of information, but it's like these clues are falling into her lap a little bit, like when she's at the bank, and she sees the baseball and then she puts the name the player names, the fake name together, and when Lizzie comes in and Lizzie's looking for a specific cookie, and she's starting to put like the pieces together of Oh, Lizzie must have been with Marcus that night, et cetera, et cetera.

It's like enough to keep me like interested, but I'm not like trying to piece it together and put it together myself.

I think a huge piece of that is the voiceovers, because we don't have to guess what she's thinking.

She's like, Oh, that means x Y and Z.

I think one of our complaints about mysteries is they give us so much information that's sometimes it is hard to follow.

And because she is piecing it together in her head and we hear that inner monologue, it helps us keep up with what's going on.

Yeah, so you don't need the big explanation at the end of the episode.

Yeah, yeah, I want to talk about Violet, the daughter Violet.

Yeah, scene stiller for me.

I loved her.

She makes She has this line when her dad comes into the Christmas shop and they're talking about perhaps maybe a killer on the loose and she says, do I look like Final Girl material to you?

I just was like, I love the writing, I love this actor.

I can't believe this is like her first project.

I thought she was really good.

She vibes nicely with the guy that plays her dad, and she's a not She doesn't feel the role of best friend and like, obviously Emily has like the best friend who gets in trouble in this episode, she doesn't get in trouble, but is suspected in this episode, but she's you know, the the sounding board at work, yep, and it just works.

Yeah, she uses the line resting cop face great, it's great.

I love it.

Speaking of supporting character.

Is a big fan of Detective Sam.

I like his dry wit, but it's also balanced by the fact that he's really warm with his daughter and very actively participating and trying to make it so that like their life has changed, but her life doesn't have to, and then takes the chance to listen to her when she's like, look, we can adapt, we don't need our life doesn't need to be a carbon copy of what it was before, and he hears her and adapts to what she needs, and obviously you see him kind of warming to Emily and the skills that she brings.

Like he's mildly annoyed that she's running her own investigation, as he should be, quite frankly, but acknowledges, you know, the help that she's offering kind of softens towards her.

Obviously we see where this is headed.

I'm really enjoying Detective Sam.

I agree with you, he's attractive.

I don't love the trope of I'm annoyed at this amateur, amateur sleuthe story.

And maybe it's just because we've watched a lot of mysteries.

Yeah, but she also stops in and she's like, give me this information.

He's like, get the heck.

Yeah, no, I agree.

I love when he clocks her and he's like, not all investigations are an Agatha Agatha Christie you know story or whatever.

Yeah, except bro, you're living in one.

Yeah, exactly exactly.

My final like is and we talked about at the top this two episode arc.

Very smart move, yes, so smart.

I love it, and it ties in with my final link.

The final scene we get that kind of wraps up all of these storyline.

It's told without dialogue.

Lizzie's telling Trent the true truth.

We see Gordon waking up in the hospital, Sam and Violet doing their career.

Like we're wrapping up all these storylines.

Emily and June are at the bar.

Emily exchanged gifts with Ray.

Uh, you know it gives us like closure, but then opens the door to the next thing.

Yeah, I'm curious to see because I have not watched episode three yet.

Do we get new characters introduced at all?

We would have to because I can't imagine the cat to the DP.

This pool of people are not gonna have another murder.

Yeah, I would hope not.

So.

Yeah, I imagine we'll still see June.

Right.

Our best friend Tom Kavanaugh joins the cast in season two.

I think, oh in season two?

Is that what it is?

I think?

So okay?

Interesting?

That feels like heavyweight.

Yeah, who has a lot of experience.

We didn't talk about it, but the character of Ray and I put this on our Instagram stories.

Yeah, or a few of you who knew what I was referencing.

But is he not Jonesy from Beverly Hills Niners.

As soon as you said it.

As soon as you said it, I was like, shady side, hushole, good guy.

Maybe doing some not so good things.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I loved it.

I loved it too.

I loved it.

I really like him.

Let's talk wishes, Let's talk wishes.

I know very few.

Yeah, me too.

My first one is it's kind of a yes I do, but no, I don't.

I want more information about Emily's backstory, But then again I don't.

I'm like, give it to me just in breadcrumbs.

It makes it more enjoyable that way.

So yeah, I mean that final scene in the first episode where they show the flashback to her all in black and the explosion behind her, Like, that's great, that's super interesting.

It was the end of the episode two when she like pulls out that Yeah, the gift from Jonesy, it's right, gun, right, I know, that's what it's My wishes too, Like what is it?

Is it a gun?

Is it a burner phone?

I don't know?

Yeah, what is it?

I don't know.

I'm dina no, but I feel like a gun's too obvious and what could it be?

I don't know.

But yeah, I'm really enjoying her backstory.

I'm enjoying the slow reveal.

Another thing I want more of.

I want more Brooke and more Sue.

I'll be shocked if we don't find Brooke Carmichael at the center of one of these mysteries this season.

She plays the perfect little town busy body.

We didn't really get enough of her, in my opinion, in these first two episodes, but they do set her up nicely to be kind of getting in the middle of something sticky coming up.

I thought so too.

So I also like Sue, you know, the diner owner.

I think she could be involved in a bigger way as well.

I like her.

She's real funny, she's real dry.

So here's the thing that we see in a lot of mysteries, and that is that the murder is someone who often we don't know a lot about.

Not always the case, but sometimes they'll introduce this character and then we won't see them or they'll be like really peripheral and so we don't suspect them.

And they did that in this case, and it's Rowan, And I felt sometimes I find like it's maybe maybe too easy, like it felt a little bit like he came out of nowhere, Like I did feel like he was suspicious from the moment.

Yeah, he shines her in the woods.

Yeah, but we don't get enough about him until we, you know, discover that he's sleeping in the loft and all of that.

So you just just came out of nowhere.

Do you wish it was somebody more obvious, maybe somebody who is like a bigger player in the maybe in the story.

Yeah, yeah, I hear you, I hear you.

That's it.

Well, let's talk.

Did you see that moment I have to okay and they're not to Did you see that?

They were just stand out moments?

Yeah.

Same.

The first one is when Emily is pressing Anna the daughter about your dad is tech challenge.

He wouldn't know how to send an anonymous And it's a really it's an acting choice that Sarah Drew makes like she's asking her a question, and then she goes like this with her eyes like and you guys obviously were on a like an audio podcast that I just did.

But her, I said, go ahead answer me.

You don't have any answer.

I just thought it was a really good, good scene.

What do you have to say to that?

Yeah, it was just so good.

She just like it's almost like when you like make oh my daughter are so long, when you like make a person flinch, like yeah, you know what I mean, It just it was really good.

It was really good.

The other scene has to do also with Emily, and it's when she's confronted with Rowan up in the barn rafters and Rowan says, you shouldn't have come up here, and she Emily looks possessed to me in this moment and she's like, he says you shouldn't be here, and she says, I should say the same thing to you, and she like goes for him, and then that's when she crashes through the rafters.

I was like, what is happening?

I need to know the backstory of this battie.

Yeah, that's great, because what's funny is that scene.

To me, The remarkable thing to me was the fall was so good.

It was so well executed, the way she hits the ground and comes out of that.

But you're right, it's like we're starting to get a hint of who she is and what she's capable of, but she's interrupted by the floor giving away.

That's great.

Yeah, you know, like you there's not a lot of real dig you see that moments for me.

But I would like to say one thing I noticed I found the inside of Ray's office to be very incongruous with the outside.

Like his office is very nice, it's well a point, it's clean, everything's organized.

The front of his building is like dilapidated and falling down.

You know, this discount furniture is kind of like a front for whatever other shady dealings he's got going on.

I just found the two to be an interesting contrast to each other.

Interesting.

Is he running guns through his business?

Is that what's happening?

Guns and passports?

And I don't know.

I don't know because to me, I'm like he's kind of like the bad guy with a heart of gold.

Yeah.

Like when he talks to Emily and he's like, how did you know what I was into?

And she says game recognizes game, and he goes, I don't know what that means, but I'll take it.

Like he just he doesn't give me like sinister, you need to be afraid of me, bad guy vibes.

I'm afraid of Emily.

Yeah, That's who I'm afraid of.

Yeah, I'm like, please don't be like a terrible bad person that I can't you know that show you were oh uh huh.

Joe Goldberg is a murderer, but you're like, I'm enamored with Joe the murderer because he's so charming.

Yes, I'm like, is that what's going to happen with Emily here?

Are?

Is she going to be like a Robin Hood situation?

I don't know.

Hey, what did you rate this first two episodes?

I gave it four point seven five stars.

I gave it.

Five stars, acknowledging that my patients for Emily's backstory and the Emily and Sam Slowburn might run out, but evaluating these two in a vacuum, thought it was great, so good.

I haven't told my husband.

I was like, numerous times, I go, this is really good.

This is really really good.

Uh huh, he won't watch it.

No, my husband wasn't interested in watching it either, but I was like, I think you'd like it.

Hey, thank you for listening to this episode of Girls Gone Hallmark.

We'll be back next week with our reviews of Mistletoe Murders episodes three and four.

We'll see you next time.

Goodbye bye.

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