Better than the THOH. I feel like this episode would have stood well on it's own without the last act. I liked how they setup all the conflicts between the family members in the beginning and through dream segments was able to have the characters learn something. I thought it was a neat, psychological concept other than just random story after random story. Of course, after the Martha Stewart story, all conflicts are resolved and we get the breakfast in bed scene. Everyone's happy and although Homer's song there was kind of lazily written, it was still a nice way to wrap it up.
I guess the puppet segment was meant to be the fun, icing on the cake type of segment where it's just a callback to Maggie's DVD. While it wasn't as bad as I speculated, (where now I'd say that both those previews we were given yesterday were not as bad as they seemed once viewed in a fuller context) it still wasn't as strong and had some pretty awkward parts. At the same time, I liked a select few of the gags here and I'm always down for that cheesy sitcom-like satire as well as some good Muppet homages like the statler and waldorf references (Always loved those guys and I'm glad they had grandpa and Jasper use some relevant criticism) and Homer and Lisa sniggering at the stereotypical items they were packing. The Katy Perry scene didn't seem as focused as I thought it would be, but there was some iffy parts here. The scene tagged in during the credits was a bit strange.
My favorite segment was the first one with Bart. It was a nice twist on the Polar Express having harsh reality pose stress upon Christmas. I liked Bart having to use the warehouse elevator and the music montage was welcomed by me personally because I enjoyed the animation and you can't go wrong with The Doors. Overall I enjoyed this first act. It didn't drag and got the story across well.
As for the second segment, there was nothing necessarily bad here. The Inglorious Bastards parody was cool, although I was expecting Marge's face to appear on the movie screen and tell them they're all going to die or something. Everything else was fine and I'm glad they called attention to Lisa's environmental side and replaced it with her getting into the spirit of Christmas.
As for Marge's dream, while not remarkable it was alright. Martha Stewart can really suck the energy out of a character though, especially when that character is supposed to be like super-festive. I did smile at the snowflake decorations she was putting on the windows using Maggie's head to trace it, since that seems to be a staple with her to begin with on several of her home projects.
Overall, it was neat how each segment had the freedom to go all out because of the dream concept, but actually had a point to each, because of what was set up in the opening scene. Of course, there was the usual missed jokes here and there, and the end was kind of just there, but as far as late Jean standards go, this wasn't half bad. 3/5
