Your enjoyment of THE SANTA CLAUSE 3: THE ESCAPE CLAUS, will hinge on how merry & bright you feel about Martin Short. As a huge fan of Short's, I had plenty of holiday fun, while admittedly feeling the film stretching for anything fresh in the second sequel.
Short brings his manic energy to the role of Jack Frost, yearning for another chance to prove himself among the holiday legends. When you're in the shadow of Aisha Tyler as Mother Nature, Peter Boyle as Father Time and Kevin Pollack as Cupid flying around the workshop, it's not easy to shine.
Santa Claus (Tim Allen, still having fun in the role) decides to give Jack another chance. He needs the break, as he and Mrs. Claus (a winning Elizabeth Mitchell) have decided to host her parents for the holiday. Her Dad, Bud (Alan Arkin) isn't a fan of Scott/Santa, thinking that Scott is never home, and Scott better be soon, as Mrs Clause is ready to deliver a new bundle for the holidays.
Her Mom Sylvia (Ann Margret) at least pretends to like Scott....
The Clause's have even more house guests coming, Scott's ex-wife Laura (Wendy Crewson) and her husband Neil (Judge Reinhold, as funny as ever) and their daughter Lucy. They know that Scott is Santa, but Bud and Sylvia don't. Watching Short direct a band of elves to disguise the North Pole as Canada generates more than a few laughs.
While Santa is distracted with the impending little one and all his house guests, Jack Frost devises a plan to strip Santa of his powers and take over as St. Nick.
Part 3 really hits its holiday stride in this part of the story line, with time jumps back to the original film and several plot twists that will keep kids of all ages entertained.
Tim Allen brings his good-natured comedic chops to the film in a role that he's very comfortable in after three films.
As holiday family entertainment, PART 3 brings gentle humor and suspense, but is decidedly the weakest of the three films. The characters and story would lie dormant for 16 years until the creation of the very enjoyable Disney+ series, "The Santa Clauses" which ran for six episode series in 2022 and 2023.
We'll give this 2006 final film entry a C+. If you aren't a Short fan, your stocking will be much more empty than ours!
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