#XMAS
Originally published November 30, 2022. Updated August 29, 2026
This one had so much potential, and that’s exactly why it stings. #XMAS came so close to saying something real about social media and about complicated mother-daughter relationships, and then buried both under a romance it didn’t need. Megan and Wendy recap and review the whole thing on the Girls Gone Hallmark podcast — listen below, or keep reading for cast, plot, and our full breakdown of where it went wrong.
What is #XMAS about?
Jen (Clare Bowen) is an interior designer trying to build a name for herself when Hygge Home, a high-profile design brand, announces a contest to find its next resident designer. It’s her shot — except the contest is judged almost entirely on social media presence, and Jen’s feed is all tasteful shots of her work with nothing personal in it. Her posts don’t get shared. She doesn’t stand out.
So with a push from her best friend Max (Brant Daugherty), she enters as a polished family influencer with a picture-perfect home life. Max plays her husband. Her baby nephew plays their son.
She makes the finals.
From there it’s the usual bind: keep performing the perfect family or come clean. And while she’s busy manufacturing a fake life, she ends up building a real one — closer to her mom, closer to her sister, and finally seeing Max as something other than her best friend.
If you’ve been trying to remember the name of the Hallmark movie where she fakes being an influencer with her best friend and her nephew — this is the one. It was originally titled Hashtag Christmas, which, for the record, we think is the better title. Naming a movie after a symbol nobody can type into a search bar is a choice.
#XMAS cast
| Actor | Character | You know them from |
|---|---|---|
| Clare Bowen | Jen | Scarlett O’Connor on Nashville; Hallmark’s Sand Dollar Cove (2021) |
| Brant Daugherty | Max | Noel Kahn on Pretty Little Liars; Mingle All the Way, A Royal Runaway Romance |
| Anna Van Hooft | Ali | Holiday Date, Sense, Sensibility & Snowmen |
| Karen Kruper | Liz | Dating the Delaneys, The Wedding Veil |
| Sebastian Stewart | Charlie | Smallville, Cross Country Christmas |
| Lillian Doucet-Roche | Zoe | The 27-Hour Day, Supernatural |
| Greg Kean | Pete | Psych, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow |
| Matt Clarke | Brad | Convos With My 2-Year-Old |
| Preston James Rocha | Baby Reed |
Behind the camera: Directed by Heather Hawthorn-Doyle, from a teleplay by Emily Baer and Joie Botkin, story by Baer. Filmed in Vancouver.
Hawthorn-Doyle is a prolific Hallmark director with more than 30 credits, including the God Wink movies and Romance to the Rescue.
Botkin’s name has been all over 2022 — Our Italian Christmas Memories, Maple Valley Christmas, Mid-Love Crisis, plus older titles like Project Christmas Wish and Cranberry Christmas. We haven’t loved every one of them, but here’s what we’ve noticed: she likes writing complicated family relationships, and she’s good at it. That’s a real through line, and it’s the best thing in this movie.
Also of note: Brant Daugherty competed on Dancing with the Stars in 2013 and made it to week nine, which is a respectable run.
What we liked about #XMAS
The opening credits. They pop up on screen like text messages, then disappear. It’s a small thing, but it’s a genuine commitment to the theme, and it announced right away that this movie was made for people who live on their phones.
The core message. Not everything you see on social media is the truth. We’ve worked in this space for a very long time — we literally met on Twitter — so we’re the choir here. But Wendy is also having this exact conversation on repeat with a teenager at home, and watching a Hallmark movie say out loud that social media is a big fat lie felt like backup.
The mother-daughter relationship. This is the part the movie actually earns. Liz isn’t a villain. She isn’t neglectful in a dangerous way, she isn’t abusive, she isn’t cruel. She’s just not the mom her girls needed, and she’s a little selfish. That’s a much harder, truer thing to put on screen than a single traumatic incident. Adult relationships with our parents get complicated through a series of small moments, not one big one — a slow accumulation of you’re not the person I can count on. Watching it prompted some real reflection here, both backward at our own mothers and forward at how we’re doing as parents ourselves.
The writing, line by line. There are funny exchanges between the sisters, between Jen and her mom, and between Jen and Max. Somebody on this script knew what they were doing.
The hair and the wardrobe. Clare Bowen and Anna Van Hooft both have gorgeous curls, and Jen’s green velvet dress at the barn dance is very Jessica McClintock in the best way.
Where #XMAS went wrong
It didn’t need a love story
This is the big one. Justice for Max.
Hallmark knows how to tell a story without a romance — the Movies & Mysteries slate proves it every year. But every Christmas movie has to have one, and here, the romance is the weakest thing in the film. #XMAS already had two strong ideas to work with: social media is a lie, and parent-child relationships are complicated. Adding and also I’m secretly in love with my best friend didn’t deepen anything. It diluted it.
Worse, the romance isn’t reciprocal on screen. Max clearly likes Jen more than Jen likes Max. She shows no real interest in him — and then when he mentions taking a job in Portland, she hits him with “you can’t.” Why? Not being able to say I’m in love with you is one thing. Not even seeming to like the guy is another.
Also: they live in Astoria. Portland is about an hour and a half away. This is not a long-distance crisis.
The premise falls apart the second you poke it
The fake marriage and the fake baby would not survive contact with the actual internet. There are sleuths out there who would blow this story up in a hot second. And forget the internet — she lives in a small town with small-town customers. Those people know that’s her sister’s baby. Somebody is getting on Instagram to say so.
The frustrating part is the movie didn’t need any of it. Jen could have been a fake influencer without a fake husband and child. Let her be the fabulous, put-together single lady with a close-knit sister and family and a business partner she adores. Look how well we all work together. Same lie, same stakes, and it doesn’t collapse under its own weight in the first act.
Instead we get the baby getting passed through a window, and:
- Hygge Home executives staying overnight in a stranger’s house. No. They would not.
- An Airbnb where you remove all of the owner’s furniture. Also no. And your neighbors would absolutely call. If people notice a dog at an Airbnb, they’re going to notice a moving truck.
- No nursery. You went to all this trouble and didn’t put a pack-n-play in the bedroom? Say you co-sleep. Say anything. There was a better lie available.
It was uncomfortable to watch
A more complicated note. Jen spends most of this movie afraid of her own shadow — anxious, self-doubting, wound tight. We both found it genuinely hard to sit with, and neither of us could relax while watching.
Here’s why that’s complicated: we both live with anxiety, and our first instinct watching her was snap out of it — which is exactly the useless thing people say to us. That’s not how brains work. So on one hand, credit to Hallmark for putting a character on screen who’s struggling with perfectionism and self-doubt, because plenty of viewers will see themselves in her. On the other hand, we didn’t love how the movie made us feel, and we’re genuinely curious whether a viewer who doesn’t ride that line was bothered by it at all.
Tell us. We want to know if this was just us.
Did you see that?
- The mystery voiceover. Early on, when the sisters post their first video, you hear them say “hashtag Xmas” — but you only see the backs of their heads. That is a dub if we’ve ever heard one.
- The movie poster. Go pull it up on Hallmark’s site. The Christmas tree behind Jen and Max is decorated with emoji ornaments, Facebook thumbs-up ornaments, and Instagram hearts. Jen would never. She is far more chic than that.
- The talking baby. Reed is six months old and says “mama.” We looked it up: possible, but seven to eight months is more typical, and most babies say “dada” first because it’s developmentally easier.
- The iPad on a tripod. The Hygge Home team films their content on an iPad. On a tripod. Nobody is shooting brand content on an iPad, and if it isn’t live — which it usually isn’t — it’s being pre-shot and edited on a phone.
Where to watch #XMAS
#XMAS premiered Friday, November 25, 2022 at 6 p.m. ET/PT on Hallmark Channel, as part of Merry Thanksgiving Weekend during the annual Countdown to Christmas.
[VERIFY BEFORE PUBLISHING — Hallmark’s library left Peacock on May 1, 2025, so any older “stream it on Peacock” advice is now wrong. Confirm whether it’s currently on Hallmark+.]
It also turns up in Hallmark Channel’s holiday rotation most years — check the Countdown to Christmas schedule for airings.
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Breaking Hallmark News
- According to US Weekly, Candace Cameron Bure has unfollowed Jodie Sweetin on Instagram. Sweetin reposted Holly Robinson Peete’s recent post about inclusivity. Do we think this was the catalyst for the unfollow?
About #XMAS
- This movie was directed by Heather Hawthorn Doyle who has 33 directing credits including this year’s “The Secrets of Vista Bella,” “A Splash of Love,” and “Romance to the Rescue.”
- Joie Botkin who has written this year’s “Our Italian Christmas Memories,” “Maple Valley Christmas,” and “Mid-Love Crisis.” co-writes with Emily Baer
- Clare Bowen stars as Jen. She played Scarlett O’Connor in the country music series “Nashville.”
- This is her second Hallmark movie. She previously starred in a 2021 Summer Nights movie called “Sand Dollar Cove” with Chad Michael Murray.
- Clare is a cancer survivor. She was diagnosed with a nephroblastoma (a rare kidney cancer commonly seen in children) at 4 years old. Doctors gave her a few weeks to live though she underwent experimental treatment and surgery which damaged one of her kidneys, part of her diaphragm and “some of her guts” – according to this 2017 article in the Tennessean.
- This is her second Hallmark movie. She previously starred in a 2021 Summer Nights movie called “Sand Dollar Cove” with Chad Michael Murray.
- Brant Daugherty plays Max. He is known for his role on “Pretty Little Liars” and competed on “Dancing with the Stars” in 2013.
- He was also in a “Royal Runaway Romance” earlier this year.
- Karen Kruper plays mom Liz Taylor. She has was in this weekend’s “Time For Him to Come Home for Christmas.”
- This movie was originally titled HASHTAG CHRISTMAS.
