| Cult of Mac

Spirited with Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds becomes holiday hit for Apple TV+

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Ryan Reynold share a new enthusiasm for tap dancing in the teaser for the Apple TV+ musical
Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell share a new enthusiasm for tap dancing in the Apple TV+ musical "Spirited."
Photo: Apple TV+

Spirited, with Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds starring in a comedy musical version of A Christmas Carol, is pulling in a sizable audience. It was one of the top five most-watched streaming shows last week, despite premiering halfway through the week.

The Christmas special is available now on Apple TV+.

Spirited will haunt you with the ghost of Christmas crap [Apple TV+ review] ☆☆☆☆

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Spirited review Apple TV+: There's plenty of singing and dancing in ☆☆☆☆
There's plenty of singing and dancing in Spirited, but do you really expect jokes in your musical comedies?
Photo: Apple TV+

TV+ Review Spirited, the Apple TV+ musical comedy remake of A Christmas Carol, is a depressingly literal, overly sarcastic and nightmarishly unfunny look at the lives of the people who work from beyond the grave to make Christmas cheer.

In the film, which hits the streaming service today, Will Ferrell plays a spirit who’s lost his mojo when he meets a man who’s more persuasive than he is. The laughs never start and the songs never stop in this gaudy waste of money and talent.

Ferrell and Reynolds get their musical Scrooge on in Spirited trailer

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Ryan Reynold share a new enthusiasm for tap dancing in the teaser for the Apple TV+ musical
Ryan Reynold share a new enthusiasm for tap dancing in the teaser for the Apple TV+ musical "Spirited."
Photo: Apple TV+

How many times have you watched the many-and-varied film-and-TV versions of the Charles Dickens classic, A Christmas Carol? You know, Scrooge, Tiny Tim, Bob Cratchit, bad dreams, redemption. Well, if you haven’t heard, the story has once again clawed its way out of the grave.

Apple TV+ dropped a teaser trailer Wednesday for its new version, the comedy-musical Spirited set for release in theaters November 11 and on the streaming service November 18.

This time it looks like a contemporary take, with Ghost of Christmas Present Will Ferrell trying to drag corporate-executive-looking Ryan Reynolds into a vision that includes big dance numbers.

Apple TV+ movies sizzle reel shows a network at less than peak performance

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Apple TV+s Luck
Luck, which features a dragon voiced by Jane Fonda, is just one of the star-studded films coming to Apple TV+.
Photo: Apple

Apple kicked off Tuesday’s Peek Performance event with a look at the upcoming Apple TV+ slate of movies — and it’s not a very pretty picture.

You can look forward to the kind of forgettable, star-studded stuff that Netflix has become so adept at providing a rapacious public, most of whom seem just as eager to forget these types of movies exist. While promising Martin Scorsese film Killers of the Flower Moon remains free of both a release date and a trailer, the Apple TV+ sizzle real showcased several upcoming movies that don’t inspire confidence.