Watch with Father at Christmas - 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt', 'The Snowman' and 'The Snowman and the Snow Dog'

It was at this point that we, as a family, collectively lost our shit.

Christmas is traditionally a time for family, for good cheer, and for animated adaptations of beloved children's books. No Donaldson and Scheffler this year (although we did break out the Stick Man DVD at last after nine months of Arya refusing to watch it,) but we did watch all-time classic The Snowman, surprisingly effective reboot The Snowman and the Snow Dog, and Channel 4's new offering: We're Going on a Bear Hunt.

For those who don't know, We're Going on a Bear Hunt is one of the modern classics of children's literature. Penned by Michael Rosen - like Julia Donaldson a former Children's Laureate - and illustrated by Helen Oxenbury, it's a simple, repetitive poem about a family going on a bear hunt through various unfavourable terrain, then fleeing the object of their hunt back through the same obstacles. Back in the day, it was one of Arya's absolute favourites, and we saw the stage version when it came to Cambridge last. Like the stage version, the Channel 4 adaptation adds considerable material; unlike the stage version, the original text is almost absent, referenced in parts only, and the expanded story is fucking heartbreaking.

Four children, a baby and a dog go for their bear hunt while one in particular is keenly mourning the pre-Christmas loss of their grandfather; thanks for that, 2016! They find a bear who might be a reincarnation of sorts of grandpa and the girl befriends him, before being dragged away by her siblings, and we end with the lonely bear slinking sadly away from the house. This is not what I was expecting from We're Going on a Bear Hunt, but I'm not going to say that it's a bad thing. The stage show had participation and songs, but there's only so long a TV adaptation can be sustained by a repeating pattern of eight lines or so. The resulting short film is by turns amusing and deeply poignant.

"Is there room on the Snowman for a dog like me?"

The Snowman is an absolute classic, of course, and thanks to the DVD extras I was able to introduce my family to the David Bowie intro (as well as the Mel Smith as Father Christmas intro and the original Raymond Briggs intro that I'd never seen before.) The Snowman and the Snow Dog came out a couple of years ago (2012, for the 30th - bloody hell - anniversary of the original,) and is a bit of a weird beast.

Its purpose, as much as it has one beyond 'let's make another Snowman, that movie was ledge,' is to bring the story into a realm that a modern audience will recognise, with the isolated house of the original now in the middle of an estate. Like We're Going on a Bear Hunt it throws in some loss, with the protagonist, Billy, losing his elderly dog in the opening scenes. He writes to Santa for a new dog before stumbling on the Snowman's hat, scarf and facial accessories, inspiring him to recreate the titular mayfly of a hero. After a baffling gathering of the Snowmen of Many Nations, Father Christmas presents Billy with a collar which magically transforms the Snow Dog into a real beast. The Snowman still melts of course.

For me, the most notable thing about this film is that, when the Snowman takes off for the North Pole (before stopping to steal a propeller plane, because he's getting on I guess,) I find it jarring that it goes into soft rock number 'Light the Night' instead of 'Walking in the Air'. It's almost exactly the same sense of wrongness I get every single time I watch an episode of Star Trek: Enterprise(1) and the music under the cold open goes into 'Faith of the Heart' instead of a proper, orchestral bit. There is also a cross-country race against various Snowpersons and a penguin on skis, who presumably traveled all the way up the globe to participate, only to lose to a snotty kid and his imaginary dog.

(1) So, not that often.