Hallmark Channel
After the wildly successful Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story, set in Hallmark’s home base of Kansas City — and featuring some members of the very well-known Kelce family — Hallmark Channel takes to the football field again for this year’s ‘Countdown to Christmas’ event, Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story, set in Buffalo. Now Buffalo has its devoted fans, but can anyone who isn’t a hardcore football fan name or identify a single player from the team, past or present? It’s like they have to go out of their way this time to identify when a player or coach makes an appearance as characters become wide-eyed and do the ‘you’re so-and-so’, as if they don’t know who they are, and list their position on the team just to bring the average Hallmark viewer up to speed. And that was a bit detrimental to the movie.
Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story features two Buffalo families, the Quinns and the DeLucas — sort of like the Montagues and Capulets from Romeo & Juliet, except these families truly love each other, hanging out together on game days, tailgating and coordinating their outdoor Christmas decorations. Morgan Quinn is a doctor and a huge Bills fan with a terrible dating life. Her most recent date wanted to meet on game night — a mortal sin in her eyes — and he prefers soccer to football. Yeah, that’s not gonna work. Her best friend in the world is Gabe DeLuca, the boy she grew up with who has followed in his father’s construction footsteps and is now spearheading the building of the new Bills stadium, which gives him access to players and coaches, helping make some of Morgan’s patients’ Christmas dreams come true by bringing some players to the hospital. (Morgan’s patients are children, by the way.) What Morgan doesn’t seem to know is that Gabe is terribly in love with her but is terrified to say anything because he doesn’t want to ruin what they have. Gabe is also oblivious to the fact, as is Morgan, that everyone in Buffalo — from family to players to the magical Santa from the previous movie — can see that they both have a romantic connection. But when will Gabe gather up the nerve to say something, and when will Morgan finally admit that she also has feelings?
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They begin to grow even closer after a gift arrives for Morgan’s Uncle Tommy, a Bills ornament (from Hallmark!). Tommy says these gifts have been coming for more than 50 years but he has no idea who is sending them. He relates to them how, when he was younger, he was the father figure for his younger siblings, really the man of the house, and when he was drafted his mother was unable to keep up with the bills and could barely feed the kids, nearly losing her house. But one day, bags of groceries were on the doorstep, a weekly occurrence, and envelopes of money started appearing in the mailbox, helping save the home so Tommy would have something to come back to. After he returned, the food and money stopped but the Christmas gifts kept coming. Tommy shows Morgan and Gabe a box of the gifts, and one vintage ornament catches their eye. It still has part of the price sticker on the bottom and the local store from which it was purchased is still in business, so Morgan and Gabe make it their mission to try to find out who has been sending the gifts as a Christmas surprise for Uncle Tommy. They visit the store and ask the lady who works there, Cyndi, if there are receipts dating back to the 1970s. Cyndi recognizes the ornament and knows what year it was sold, so she takes the pair to the storage room where the old, original receipts are kept. It’s a daunting task ahead as they have to go through them one by one to try and match the date and serial number of the ornament, but they finally do locate what they believe is the receipt … but it’s so old that most of the name and address has faded away, leaving what looks to be an M on the name line, and a partial street name. Morgan has to find out if the person who is sending the gifts still lives at that address, but when they get there it’s now the home of a Bills player, who was born in the 1990s so it was definitely not him. Much later, Gabe and Morgan run into the town Santa (Gabe runs into him many times over the course of the movie, with Santa doing what he can to nudge Gabe into telling Morgan how he feels), and he tells them he’s going to a Christmas party on a street that sounds almost exactly like the street they thought was the location of the gift sender. Could this be the place they should have gone the first time? Morgan and Gabe discover it is the right place, but the person who has been sending the gifts doesn’t want Tommy to know because they don’t want him to feel that he owes them anything. But there is also another, much deeper reason why the mystery gifter does not want their identity revealed, which puts Morgan in a conundrum — she’s accomplished her mission but now that she has the knowledge she can’t do anything with it for fear of hurting the gift-giver.
Meanwhile, as the families prepare for the last Bills game in the old stadium, which culminates in a family photo every year, Morgan’s sister Cathy is very, very pregnant, expecting at any minute. In the days leading up to the game and the family photo, Cathy is doing all she can to get that baby out so she doesn’t miss the photo, eating the spiciest food possible, believing that will induce labor. But as the big day gets closer, she switches her methods to doing controlled breathing exercises to keep that baby in so she doesn’t miss the game and the photo. With the identity of the gifter now known and emotions are running higher than usual, Gabe finally explodes and tells Morgan how he feels … which, even though her sister has told her that she can see Morgan has feelings for Gabe, is a bit overwhelming and she has to walk home alone to gather her thoughts. That makes game day extremely awkward as they try to find a minute to talk but all of the hustle and bustle keeps getting in the way, and when they get to the stadium Gabe is not with the family. But there are a few surprises yet to be had, both on the field and in the stands. Will Morgan and Gabe finally reconcile their feelings? Will Tommy find out who his mysterious gift-giver is? Will Cathy’s baby throw the whole day into disarray? Will they get their final family photo at the old stadium? There are a lot of questions, but not to worry, they all have joyful, emotional and heart-tugging answers.
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On paper, Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story sounds like it should really score well since the previous movie was so enjoyable. But something about this one feels a bit forced, especially when they have to shoehorn Andrew Walker in as a bartender who gives Morgan some dating advice just to have a familiar Hallmark face, and have a quick cameo appearance by Tyler Hynes and Hunter King from Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story just wandering through Buffalo for no reason. The inclusion of the magical Santa should have been enough to link the two movies, but just to make it clear the pair also have to cross paths with him. Again, it just feels a bit forced. The whole romance angle between Morgan and Gabe also takes so long to finally get somewhere, to the point that there is a secondary love story that almost takes precedence as another couple actually gets to have a major kiss moment before Morgan and Gabe. This almost makes the Hallmark formula feel a bit over-played. Why not try something different, let the two besties just be friends, and allow them to make someone else’s love story come to fruition? I was actually more emotionally invested in that story than I was Morgan and Gabe’s, even though it didn’t really come into focus until nearly the end of the movie (although you certainly have the feeling that there is something brewing). That kiss on the field was actually such a genuine, warm, emotional moment that it almost made Gabe and Morgan’s kiss not that important because we know, because of how Hallmark movies work, that their kiss was inevitable. Mix things up a little! I would have been perfectly happy if Gabe and Morgan just stayed friends. Their relationship was just getting tiresome as it dragged on and Gabe was thwarted at every attempt to tell Morgan how he felt, while Morgan remained completely oblivious to how Gabe is always there, always has time to help, and always looks at her with his puppy dog eyes. This story just missed that spark of romance that makes the final connection between the two destined lovers feel earned. And that is weird because the other couple, who only finally came together at the end after zero interaction throughout the movie, felt more genuine. The writing just lets the main characters down.
Holland Roden is very good as Morgan. She is devoted to her career, and will show up at the hospital at the drop of a hat to help one of her kids, and she has a very big heart when it comes to wanting to do something special for the uncle who basically raised her and her sister. She has a wonderful chemistry with Matthew Daddario’s Gabe, but she is always just giving best friend vibes. It takes her sister basically hitting her over the head to make her question if they are more than friends, but even then she still goes on as friends with him until he unloads his feelings in the middle of Buffalo, leaving her stunned. Daddario is wonderful as Gabe — even if he does give a bit of Joey Tribbiani, but smarter, when his New York accent becomes more apparent. He makes us believe he knows what he’s talking about when it comes to constructing a stadium, he’s very generous with his employees, and he totally wears his heart on his sleeve when it comes to Morgan. The moments where various people tell him his feelings are so obvious, which he doesn’t even realize, give the movie some of its humor because of his reactions. It’s funny because even on the artwork for the movie, he’s gazing at Roden to show Gabe’s feelings while she stares straight ahead (although her hand on his thigh speaks louder than anything Morgan does in the movie). But they both have really great chemistry as friends, and Daddario really makes us root for him to finally say what he needs to say and get the girl he’s always loved, even if she’s a tough nut to crack.
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Joe Pantoliano — who stepped in at the last minute to replace Tony Danza — is wonderful as Uncle Tommy. He makes Tommy a man with a big heart, someone who will help anyone while not expecting anything in return (that’s where Morgan gets it from), deeply devoted to his family and friends, but making it obvious that even though he says he’s given up on finding out who keeps sending the gifts, he really wants to know because he really has no clue. He’s also a wonderful father figure to Morgan, and just makes Tommy that person you’d want in your life, making you hope that he does find the answer he’s been looking for. Patti Murin gets most of the movie’s comedic moments with her various attempts at inducing and preventing labor, and Patrick Mulvey is also funny as husband Jeremy, who is ready to throw himself onto a table at the drop of a hat. The rest of the family members are made up of some well-known names including Tracy Pollan as mom Joanne Quinn (although someone should have done some last looks on her before filming because her make-up is severe, not doing her any favors), Caroline Aaron as Gabe’s mom Ricki (Ghosts fans will recognize her as Pete’s wife), and The Sopranos‘ Steve Schirripa as Gabe’s dad Frank. Aaron and Schirripa have some funny bits of business as she does all she can to keep him from eating high cholesterol foods, always slapping his hand away and handing him a carrot or piece of celery. These two make some comedy gold in their moments together. Abraham Benrubi returns as Santa, trying to guide Gabe and Morgan in the right direction. It’s nice that there are references to how he seems to be everywhere. Mary Stout is fun as the store employee Cyndi, who turns out to have her own little secret that is revealed at the end. Of course there are the prerequisite appearances by members of the Buffalo Bills, past and present, some more natural at acting than others but they do bring some humor as they all make comments about how obvious Gabe’s feelings are for Morgan. Unless you’re a real fan, you’re not likely to know who any of them are until someone lists their credits to them (but for the benefit of the viewer).
Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story never manages to reach the level of enjoyment that Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story did. Maybe it’s just that the love story takes too long to get moving, or the other love story that is more obscure until the end is actually more emotional. There is one pretty funny moment when Morgan and Gabe visit friend Trish to help find the gifter that comes right out of The Godfather, almost word-for-word, so the writers certainly know how to be clever. The movie actually succeeds more in the comedic moments, and Joe Pantoliano really delivers in all of his scenes, while the hidden love story packs more of a punch than the one we’re supposed to be invested in. The cast is generally wonderful, but this one just lacks that spark that elevates it to the heights of the best Hallmark romances. Maybe Hallmark rushed this one into production too quickly on the heels of the success of the previous movie, so instead of churning out another football movie next year, take a break, develop a really good story and revisit the franchise at a later date (and keep Santa but ditch the cameos — like why are the Chiefs characters in Buffalo in the first place?).
Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story has a run time of 1 hour 24 minutes, and is rated TV-G. An extended version of the film that runs about 1 hour 27 minutes is streaming on Hallmark+.
Preview – Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story
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Listen to songs featured in Holiday Touchdown: A Bills Love Story – I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm by Frank Sinatra, This is Christmas by The Goo Goo Dolls & Holiday (Featuring Jonas Brothers) by Jimmy Fallon