The defence The Arthouse Gremlin
“Its refusal to behave is the point.”
The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.
Back to trending 
The Mean One
Horror · Comedy · 2022
In a sleepy mountain town, Cindy witnesses the murder of her parents by a blood-thirsty green figure in a red Santa suit. Twenty years later, the Christmas-hating monster begins to terrorize the town once more. Cindy finds new purpose in stopping the creature and saving the holiday.
Movie details
The Mean One
“Slashing through the snow.”
2022 Horror · Comedy 1h 33m
Critical arithmetic
The consensus, allegedly.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
IMDb
3.9 / 10
1.8K votes
Rotten Tomatoes
22 %
Tomatometer
Metacritic
29 / 100
Metascore
TMDB
6.2 / 10
Community rating
External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.
In a sleepy mountain town, Cindy witnesses the murder of her parents by a blood-thirsty green figure in a red Santa suit. Twenty years later, the Christmas-hating monster begins to terrorize the town once more. Cindy finds new purpose in stopping the creature and saving the holiday.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over The Mean One?
For the defence
The Arthouse Gremlin
“The stranger, the better.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Prestige Tourist
“You like your greatness pre-approved.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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After receiving an exotic small animal as a Christmas gift, a young man inadvertently breaks three important rules concerning his new pet, which unleashes a horde of malevolently mischievous creatures on a small town.
The Children
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Where it lives
Watch in your region.
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Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.
Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Steven LaMorte
Written by
Finn Kobler · Flip Kobler
David Howard Thornton
The Mean One
Krystle Martin
Cindy
Chase Mullins
Officer Burke
J
John Bigham
Doc
E
Erik Baker
Sheriff Hooper
Amy Schumacher
Mayor McBean
F
Flip Kobler
Lou
Court is in session
Put The Mean One on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Prestige Tourist
“Oddness is not depth.”
A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.