If you’ve been friends with me within the past two years, you’ll know that I have oddly strong opinions about the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies.

It all began during the 2021 holiday season when I decided to rewatch the movies, not anticipating the can of worms that would burst open in my brain — for the sake of focusing on the holiday theme, we’ll just be diving into the first one and all of its ridiculousness.

Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007) follows three chipmunks, Alvin (Justin Long), Simon (Matthew Gray Gubler) and Theodore (Jesse McCartney) as they go from living in the forest to finding a new home with their human songwriter-turned-adoptive-father, Dave (Jason Lee).

The first scene features the three chipmunks storing nuts in their tree. We can tell they’re down on their luck, because they’re singing Bad Day by Daniel Powter. I cannot make this up. Even if you never watch this movie again, I strongly encourage you to listen to this cover.

The facial expression I made upon first hearing it remains indescribable, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t go kind of hard. There's something absurd about sitting down at 1:30 a.m. and taking notes on a film featuring three chipmunks sadly singing pop music, though I found it to be oddly comforting. Yes, I was having a bad day. I saw myself in those Chipmunks, and I think I should be worried.

They end up at Dave’s house after their home is used as a Christmas tree for JETT Records. Dave initially kicks them out, but he discovers something special about them: They’re exploitable. They win him over with their rendition of Only You by The Platters, and honestly, it won me over at first, too. I was ready to believe they had produced an unironically good cover, but I judged it too soon. How could they both make me cringe and give me chills in a matter of seconds? Such is the duality of munk, I suppose.

Dave realizes they’re what he needs to become a serious songwriter. In a pre-sleep rush of motivation, Dave writes The Chipmunk Song (Christmas Don’t Be Late).

Soon, the chipmunks’ careers take off and they’re picked up by the chief executive of JETT Records — a.k.a. the backbone of these movies — Ian Hawke (David Cross). He makes them perform music that’s not their style, rendering me speechless in the process. Hearing a chipmunk sing the lines “Iced out, rocks hot / Droppin' dollars, ladies holler "Hey" / Gotta get that cream” is a scene that never quite leaves your mind.

The movie ends with Dave finally admitting that the three chipmunks are his family after repeatedly denying it for most of the film. I think the movie pushes the idea that Dave’s reluctance to say so is because of his commitment issues, when it should be the fact that they are literal rodents and he is a human man. I guess you could consider this a found family story, so if that’s up your alley, this could be a new fave.

Unfortunately, this movie had many moments I found embarrassingly relatable and kind of funny. Watching Dave deal with the mess of his life in an unusually calm “this is fine” sort of way hits differently now than it ever did before. It’s worth a rewatch this holiday season, if you can withstand a little absurdity.

Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel for the Nintendo DS is The Squeakquel to the original DS Alvin and the Chipmunks, as you’d expect. It’s also a rhythm game, as you’d expect. I was one of the very few people that thought that game was just kinda ok and not horrendous or anything. Naturally, that begs the question – is this game better than that one?

The answer is actually yes! Though the gameplay is in the same genre, it’s a bit different. In the first game, you had 4 columns with notes going from top to bottom and you had to tap them, with occasional distractions, like shouting in your mic. In this game, there’s only one window in the middle of the screen, but the notes fly from different directions. You have to tap them or swipe in the same moving direction, or swipe & hold if the note is continuous. There are also occasional mini-games, like avoiding volume columns or tapping stars as they appear. There are only 3 different mini-games like that, and they’re pretty inconsistent, and aren’t that enjoyable. Especially the last one, which I have NO idea how you keep your combo in. The problem is that the tutorial doesn’t even explain these. The game says you’ll learn as you go, but was it so difficult to actually explain them in the tutorial? It’s just baffling.

The difficulty curve is surprisingly steep. The game gradually becomes more insanely difficult. About first 5 levels are easy, then they get more and more difficult as you go. If I didn’t have prior experience at rhythm games, I doubt I would be able to beat the last level, it cranks the intensity pretty high. And the game isn’t even at its hardest! There are two difficulty options – normal and expert. Expert is unlocked as you play the game on normal, and as you can imagine, it’s pretty tough from the very first level. I honestly cannot imagine what the last level on expert is like. Thankfully, I didn’t bother with completionism or anything, just beating all levels on normal is enough to bring credits.

The presentation is about average. The only notable thing I noticed is that the tutorial uses an animated talking head of Alvin, and it looks REALLY awkward, it's like they just edited the same frame to look like they talk, but it just look weird. The game does feature a healthy dose of voice acting, which is nice.

I would unironically recommend this game if it had more compelling characters, story and all of its mechanics were intuitive. I also think the mini-games could’ve used more variety and interesting mechanics. The game is definitely more enjoyable and challenging than Alvin and the Chipmunks DS. At the end of the day though, I wouldn’t call this title exceptional, it’s still kind of average, but as far as rhythm games go, it’s not a bad pick.