Home Alone/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alternative Character Interpretation: This applies mostly to the second film: is Kevin really just a nice boy looking to do a good deed for Christmas, or a sadistic psychopath? At the end of the film, Kevin lures Harry and Marv from Duncan's Toy Chest, to his uncle's house to put them through hell, and then into Central Park where he calls the police. If all Kevin really wanted to do was stop Harry and Marv from robbing the toy store, he could have lured them directly into the park; instead, he catapults them onto cars, pummels them with bricks, wrenches and bags of cement, shoots them with staple guns, electrocutes them, sets them on fire, throws them through floors, etc. Sounds like stuff Jigsaw would pull. Perhaps he was taking his anger at his family out on the Wet/Sticky Bandits. (After all, his mom, older brother and uncle especially treated him horribly in both films)
    • Additionally, is Marv somehow actually dumber in the second film (possibly due to the head injuries he sustained in the first film and/or additional head injuries he sustained in prison), or is he drunk?
  • Critical Dissonance: Despite being box office successes, the first two films have received mixed reviews from critics.
  • Designated Villain: Natalie in Home Alone 4. We're supposed to hate her just because she's rich, is dating the dad after he divorced the mom, and doesn't want her Christmas ruined.
  • Fanon Discontinuity: The fourth movie, universally agreed on there.
  • Family-Unfriendly Aesop:
    • Hey, kids! Are there burglars in your house? Better try and fight them off then!
    • Do be sure to phone the police, but not until they've made it past all your traps that could have bought you enough time for the police to arrive.
    • The second movie seems to imply that being a parent makes it okay to forget the lessons they learn as well as to lecture their youngest son about being a pest, expecting them to learn about being respectful, while never even noticing that they are part of the problem. It's no wonder Kevin acted the way he did, in both this movie and in the first one.
      • Also from Part 2: If you're marooned in a strange city, don't go to the police station! Go to an expensive hotel. And if you overhear some crooks planning a robbery, alert the cops by smashing the store window while the robbery is taking place.
        • To be fair, after that whole Christmas pageant fiasco, Kevin wasn't feeling too fond of his family at that point.
  • Genre Turning Point: This made family-oriented film-making a much more attractive proposition for studios, in tandem with the animation revival the previous year's The Little Mermaid inspired.
  • Ho Yay: Nothing graphic of course, but you might say that Harry and Marv bicker like an old married couple, and you might also note that (aside from the made for TV sequel, which ignores continuity in many ways, and removes Harry from the story) neither of the thieves mentions having a girlfriend or a wife, or wears a wedding ring. This would also explain why Harry puts up with Marv, since he is certainly not the brains of the operation and not much use for brawn either, being defeated by a child.
  • Jerkass Woobie: Harry and the hotel concierge.[context?]
  • Just Here for Godzilla: Many of the people are watching the series mainly only because of the traps at the second half of the film.
  • Love to Hate: Harry and Marv. Yes, they're bad guys, but they completely steal the show.
  • Memetic Mutation:
    • KEVIN!!!!
    • Marv's girly scream seems to be getting there, too.
    • And of course, Kevin's hands-on-cheeks scream, which is apparently a must for any Home Alone parody.
      • Kevin screaming in general qualifies.
    • Keep the change, you filthy animal!
  • Moral Event Horizon: After they've captured him in the second film, Marv and Harry were going to shoot Kevin.
  • Nightmare Fuel:
    • HELLOOO KEVIIIN!! Doubles as in-universe Nightmare Fuel for Kevin.
    • The basement in the first movie, Buzz's pet tarantula, Harry and Marv to some people, and a few of the booby traps. Kevin walking around Central Park at night in the second movie.
    • Highlights of the booby traps: the nail through Marv's foot, the tarantula, the glass ornament stepping, the scenes with the furnace, and the electric sink. That wasn't Kevin down there in that scene...that was Henry Evans!
    • In Home Alone 2, near the end, when they're standing over Kevin, paint all over them looking like dried blood, crazy slasher smiles...and the line "My, how the tables have turned". Brrrr.
    • Also when Harry first comes up to Kevin in Part 2 and says, "Hiya paaaal!"
    • And when he rises his hand towards Kevin, revealing the burn in the shape of the doorknob in the first movie.
    • The Pigeon Lady standing and watching as her pigeons swarm Marv and Harry, especially when she laughs.
  • Polish Love Home Alone: As noted, the Home Alone films have been popular in Poland.
  • The Problem with Licensed Games: The Angry Video Game Nerd lampshades these two video games based on the first two films, in two separate reviews. One time the Nerd sees in the first NES game review on Home Alone that Kevin McCallister moonwalks, and says, "He must have spent way too much time with Michael Jackson."
  • Retroactive Recognition:
  • Sequelitis
  • They Just Didn't Care: Or, more accurately, they cared about the wrong things. Since Home Alone 4 was meant to lead into a TV series, the focus was on setting that up rather than being a faithful sequel to the first two films. As a result, most of the subplots go nowhere (since the family has to get back together at the end), and Kevin and his siblings had to be cast with very young actors who could be kept for several seasons of the show.
  • What an Idiot!:
    • In the sequel, Marv stealing many things in broad daylight. He doesn't get caught, but considering he just broke out of prison, he might want to be a little more careful.
    • In the first, after falling on the broken glass, he then walks on it instead of simply clearing the way. Really, Marv is just Too Dumb to Live.
    • Remember, Marv is the one that pushed for the "Wet Bandits" motif in the first movie. After being arrested, a cop jokingly thanks him for that, saying, "Now we know which houses you hit."
  • What the Hell, Casting Agency?: Was there any legitimate reason to cast French Stewart as Marv in the fourth movie?
  • The Woobie: Marv, particularly in the second film, considering everything that Kevin does to him and Harry, with the latter being more of a Jerkass Woobie.
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