Best Disney Plus Christmas movies and shows: get festive with Disney+

KEVIN! The original and the best Home Alone is a must-see for Christmas. Following the exploits of Kevin McCalister (Macaulay Culkin, an unknown actor who you probably haven't’ heard of) who makes his family disappear, by not waking up for a flight and his family accidentally going without him. While he’s - looks to camera - home alone, he does battle with a pair of hapless thieves, played by the dude who did the voiceover for The Wonder Years and Joe ‘Like I’m a Clown?’ Pesci.

“Light the lamp, not the rat, light the lamp!” Most Muppets movies are fun, but The Muppet Christmas Carol is a stunning achievement and gold-standard when it comes to Christmas watching. Michael Caine is perfect as Scrooged and has the look of a prestigious actor wondering what the hell he’s doing with a bunch of puppets throughout. But these are no puppets, but controlled by the deft hand(s) of the Jim Henson Company and because of this, the movie is an absolute wonder.

The ultimate non-Christmas Christmas movie, Die Hard is a firm favourite at this time of year. The movie follows the story of off-duty New York cop John McClane (Bruce Willis) who gets caught up in an LA skyscraper during a heist orchestrated by the (now infamous) Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman). It's a fun one to watch with the whole family, particularly if you know the quotes. "Don't shoot the glass!

Santa Clause, geddit? That small pun - where the person who injures Santa Claus has to take his place - spawned a number of sequels but it’s the original we like. Yes, the real Tim Allen is infuriating with his politics but he’s great here as the Everyman whose job it is to make sure Christmas runs on time. Unsurprisingly, the director of the movie helmed Alan through many a series of Home Improvement. *Enter Tim The Toolman Taylor Grunt Sound*.

Director Henry Selick did a wonderful job with The Nightmare Before Christmas, creating a stop-motion fantasy that’s now rightly seen as a classic. Taking the story and characters from Tim Burton and breathing life into their cold, dead bones he masterfully showcases a tale about Jack Skellington, the master of Halloween Town who becomes besotted with Christmas.

It was a toss up between this festive Marvel adventure or Iron Man 3, which is also based around the holiday season. Hawkeye won out, mainly because of the massive Christmas tree that becomes integral to the plot in the latter episodes. If you haven’t seen this Marvel-ous show yet, then watching it over the festive season is an absolute must.

It is always great to get time with The Guardians and here we are given a lovely slice of holiday warmth, thanks to a Marvel story that not only interlocks with the movies but also adds Kevin Bacon into the mix. In fact, the Footloose actor is central to the plot as he is the Christmas present Mantis and Drax give Peter Quill to cheer him up.

If you are after a short, sweet heartwarming tale then this is for you. It’s three short movies laced into a Christmas cracker of a movie, all threaded together by the dulcet tones of Kelsey Grammer. Given Disney seems to have side-lined Mickey for other things, it’s great to see the character have a lot of fun here.

It's a little bit darker than we were expecting but Jim Carrey nails it as Scrooge in this animated adaptation of A Christmas Carole. Robert Zemeckis does his mo-cap best with the animation and while it was originally meant to be seen in 3D, it's fantastic to watch in plain-old 2D.

Don’t go into this one expecting Muppets Christmas Carol levels of brilliance, but this 2008 one-off show is a lot of fun, with The Muppets celebrating the festive season with a host of US celebrities. They include: Whoopi Goldberg, Richard Griffiths and Nathan Lane. There is a plot: Gonzo screws up sending letters to Santa so the crew have to go to the North Pole to deliver them but it’s more just to set up the myriad cameos.

The Simpsons, in its prime, made the best TV specials. While it’s best known for its TreeHouse of Horror Halloween episodes, its Christmas ones are well worth a watch, too. There are loads on Disney Plus but our pick is Marge Be Not Proud, as it showcases the relationship between Bart and his mom so well. The premise is Bart gets caught trying to steal a videogame but there is so much fun, warmth and tears throughout that it’s Simpsons at its best.

This 1953 classic is a real old-school gem. Pluto and Mickey go searching for the perfect Christmas tree. They find one, cut in down only for it to be the home for Chip’n’Dale. It’s only 7 minutes long, but there is a huge amount of warmth in this festive animated short.

This short film, at just 25 minutes long, is a Christmas delight. It’s a CGI movie but designed to look more like a traditional stop-motion film, and tells the story of a little owl who finds himself transported to the middle of New York. He is found by a girl names Luna, who tries to help the owl find its way home. Director Alfonso Cuaron worked on the story, while it’s directed by David Lowery, who made the brilliant The Green Knight and, closer in style, Pete’s Dragon.

This 2018 movie was a bit of a flop, and has been largely forgotten by many as a result. But it’s really not all that bad. A young girl is transported to a fantasy world, based roughly on the story o the famous ballet. There’s a full-on ballet section in here too. While not a narrative masterstroke, you can tell the amount of work (and money) that went into the lavish set design. A proper big-screen confection, now available for your living room.

We were hoping that this would be more of a pastiche of the original Star Wars Holiday Special but it’s entirely its own thing, and it’s a lovely ode to all nine movies in The Skywalker Saga. While key players’ voices are missing, this is still a huge amount of fun and it even makes the whole Rise of the Skywalker gene twist make, well, sense.

Olaf is the best thing about Frozen so it was fun to see him get his own spin-off in 2020. This short sees Olaf (Josh Gad) weaved into the first movie beautifully as he tries to figure quite why he is now a living, breathing snowman.

One of the newer movies on this list and, if we’re honest, if it wasn’t for the fact it stars Bill Hader, Shirley MacLaine and Anna Kendrick it probably wouldn’t be on this list but they brilliantly elevate the story of Santa's daughter who should be taking over from the big guy but doesn’t feel up to the task.