Everything you never noticed about ‘Christmas Vacation’

When I married my wife, she added something into her vows that caught me off guard. She said, “We must watch National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation at least 12 times every Christmas season for the rest of our lives.” I didn’t even hesitate in agreeing, because Christmas Vacation is, and will forever be, the best (also because we probably wouldn’t be married otherwise).

So here we are, our first Christmas season together as a married couple, watching Christmas Vacation almost daily. I won’t say I’m an expert on the movie, but I have watched it twelve times in the past week. So yeah, I guess I’m an expert.

In honor of the best Christmas movie ever made (subjective, I know) and my marriage, here are some interesting things I’ve noticed about the movie that I never noticed before (you know, when I wasn’t watching it multiple times a day).

Too many lights, Clark 

Clark said he put 25,000 lights on his house. The Griswold house was big, but not THAT big. I’m no electrician, but I do know that 25,000 lights would have been far more than a house that size could handle. To get math-y and specific, the typical seven watts per light would have meant 175,000 watts of power on the house. And that just wouldn’t have worked.

“This is our family’s first kidnapping”

When Uncle Eddie kidnapped Clark’s boss, Mr. Shirley, Ellen said, “This is our family’s first kidnapping”. Except no it wasn’t. How quickly she forgot when the family kidnapped a Wally World employee in Vacation and forced him to ride rollercoasters with them.

Those mountains, tho

The Griswolds live in Chicago. And last time I checked, there aren’t any mountains in Chicago. On their way to get a Christmas tree, the Griswolds are driving on a road where mountains are clearly happening in the background. Oops. It’s cold in Chicago  

It’s freezing in Chicago during Christmas time, but miraculously, we never see anyone’s breath! It may have something to do with the movie being shot on the Warner Bros. backlot in Burbank. But still. More breath!

Audrey is all of a sudden older than Rusty

In both the original Vacation and European Vacation, Rusty is older than his sister. But in Christmas Vacation, Audrey somehow ages way faster than Rusty.

The younger than Rusty Audrey from the OG Vacation:

The older than Rusty Audrey at Christmas:

Christmas day never happened

Even though the title of the movie is Christmas Vacation, the movie ends on Christmas eve. So technically, the movie should have been called Christmas Vacation, Hold the Christmas. But that title probably may have been too long and confusing.

Clark and Eddie drank egg nog out of Wally World cups

Note the Wally World antlers on their egg nog cups. Throwback call out!

That’s all for now. I’ll let you know if I come up with anything else (since I’ll obviously be watching the movie at least 36 more times this month).

(Images via Warner Bros. )