How many times you have settled on spending your Sunday afternoon watching an original movie on the Hallmark Channel purely based on its title? If you are a sucker for puns like me, you probably have seen (or at least browsed the catalog of) your fair share of Hallmark movies.
We are far from the holiday season at this time and this year has already seen more than enough punny movie titles from the Hallmark Channel, such as Crossword Mysteries: Abracadaver (the third in a series starring Lacey Chabert) or Dylan Neal's return as Gourmet Detective in Roux the Day: A Gourmet Detective Mystery. In fact, many of the following features that span much of the last decade have nothing to do with romance under the mistletoe (which, I think, is the title actual Hallmark movie, too).
So, which of the Hallmark Channel's original flicks is the punniest? I shall figure that out with my choices of the Top 10 best Hallmark Movies, ranked purely by title.
10. Mingle All The Way (2018)
To prove her app for busy professionals to find dates to important events without romantic commitment is a success, inventor Molly Hoffman (Jen Lilley) joins it herself around the Christmas season, only to be matched with a disastrous past date (Brant Daugherty).
Get It? The title of the film and the social networking app it is named after is a play on the traditional Christmas tune “Jingle All the Way,” which itself is actually the title of a 1996 holiday family film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. Be sure not to get these confused.
9. Love At First Bark (2017)
Interior designer Julia (Jana Kramer) enlists the help of dog trainer Owen (Kevin McGarry) with wrangling her newly adopted dog, which then turns into a business partnership, and then into a friendship that could be blossoming into something more.
Get It? Some people like to say that their romance with their partner was like "love at first sight," which must have been what it felt like between Julia and Owen, but since there is a dog in this movie, all it took was a mention to the animal's signature sound perfect the title.
8. Fir Crazy (2013)
After losing her job, Elise MacReynolds (Sarah Lancaster) is forced to work at her family's Christmas tree lot, where she finally finds a new appreciation for the holiday season and a potential romance with a frequent customer (Eric Johnson).
Get It? Elise feels "stir crazy" by her reluctance to sell a symbol of the holiday she initially detests and "fir" is the genus where said traditional pine trees come from, so I cannot imagine why Hallmark felt the need to later change the title to Oh Christmas Tree when they clearly struck gold the first time.
7. Murder, She Baked: A Chocolate Chip Cookie Mystery (2015)
In the first of several Hallmark movies based on the novels by Joanne Fluke, Alison Sweeney stars as Hannah Swensen, a small-town baker who takes it upon herself to solve the murder of her friend and longtime delivery driver.
Get It? While Fluke's books are commonly referred to as the Hannah Swensen Mystery series, Hallmark took inspiration from the long-running TV series Murder, She Wrote, starring Angela Lansbury as a writer turned amateur sleuth, to name their feature-length adaptation and its subsequent entries.
6. Window Wonderland (2013)
While vying for the same window decorating job at a popular department store during the holiday season, series Sloan Van Doren (Chyler Leigh) and easy-going Jake Dooley (Paul Campbell) begin to realize they are not so different from each other after all.
Get It? Polar-opposite rivals turned lovers Sloan and Jake compete to create the most festive winter wonderland (like the song) from behind the front window of their Manhattan store. Who wants to bet the title came first?
5. Battle Of The Bulbs (2010)
Bob Wallace's (Daniel Stern) tradition to decorate his home with the neighborhood's best Christmas light display is threatened by the recently moved-in Stu Jones (Matt Frewer) whose even more elaborate decor incites a war to be the best and brightest.
Get It? While its plot bears a strong similarity to the 2006 film Deck the Halls, starring competing suburbanites Matthew Broderick and Danny DeVito, I believe the this Hallmark Channel original has the much better title: a play on the infamous "Battle of the Bulge" during World War II.
4. Love, Fall And Order (2019)
Attorney Claire Hart (Erin Cahill) tries to save her father's annual festival celebrating the fall season while working a case against a lawyer she has faced in court before (Trevor Donovan), but it may end up being Claire's heart that her longtime rival wins this time.
Get It? The last three words in the title of this autumn-set romance between two law-practicing professionals sounds an awful lot like Dick Wolf's long-running courtroom procedural drama Law & Order, does it not?
3. Eat, Drink & Be Buried: A Gourmet Detective Mystery (2017)
In the fourth of several Hallmark movies based on the novels by Peter King, Dylan Neal stars as Henry Ross, a San Francisco culinary expert who, once again, teams up with detective Maggie Price (Brooke Burns) to investigate a death within a feuding wealthy family.
Get It? Unlike Hallmark's other gastronomically related mystery franchise Murder, She Baked, the punny titles of the Gourmet Detective movies are actually the brainchild of the author whose work they are based on - the best of which, in my opinion, is this morbid play on the phrase "eat, drink, and be merry," which Hallmark would later take inspiration from again with the 2019 romance Eat, Drink and Be Married.
2. It’s Christmas, Carol! (2012)
Dispirited, heartless publishing executive Carol Huffler (Emmanuelle Vaugier) is warned by the ghost of her former boss (Carrie Fisher) to help her rediscover the true meaning of Christmas.
Get It? This is not the Hallmark Channel's first modern-day, gender-swapped adaptation of the Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol (the first being 2003's A Carol Christmas with Tori Spelling), but a far-better pun this title has, if you ask me.
1. Flower Shop Mystery: Dearly Depotted (2016)
In the third of several Hallmark movies based on the novels by Kate Collins, Brooke Shields stars as Abby Knight, a lawyer turned flower shop owner turned amateur sleuth who takes it upon herself to solve the murder of an uninvited guest at the wedding she was serving as a reluctant bridesmaid for.
Get It? Like Hallmark's other cross-occupational mystery franchise The Gourmet Detective, the punny titles of the Flower Shop Mystery movies are actually the brainchild of the author whose work they are based on - the best of which, in my opinion, is this floral take on the phrase "dearly departed," which is easily the most delicious pun among any Hallmark movie I have seen yet.
Honorable Mentions
Of course, there were many, many great, punny Hallmark movie titles to choose from and the following are the best of what did not make the Top 10 cut:
Ice Dreams (2010)
Annie Claus Is Coming To Town (2011)
A Christmas Wedding Tail (2011)
The Seven Year Hitch (2012)
All’s Fair In Love And Advertising (2013)
The Nine Lives Of Christmas (2014)
Flower Shop Mystery: Snipped In The Bud (2016)
Death Al Dente: A Gourmet Detective Mystery (2016)
Write Before Christmas (2019)
Love On Iceland (2020)
What do you think? Are these the punniest titles in Hallmark movie history, or is the joke on me? Let us know in the comments and check back for more updates on Hallmark movies here on CinemaBlend.
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