Good morning. I’ll get right to it: The numbers are bad. We are losing our target audience of straight, white women in droves. Initially, we responded by dipping our toes into inclusivity: a couple of Ikea gays here, a light brown Santa there. But our crushing grip on the market from the first whiff of pumpkin spice through New Year’s is still slipping. It’s like whatever soul-selling bargain we struck to make holly and gingerbread cookies into American women’s low-key secular but Christianity-adjacent kink has run out. Cheryl-Anne has been whining for months that we’re losing market share to these “romantasy” books, like A Court of Thorns and Roses. But yesterday Ken said the same thing in a much lower voice and it made sense.
Here are some of the movies my team and I are working on to make women who are horny for elves and fairies horny for the holidays again.
Many of these romantasy novels have fairy or elf heroes, but not like Tinkerbell/Keebler; they’re more like elves in Lord of the Rings or fairies from scary Irish mythology — really just masculine beauty and power without, you know, men. So let’s start with elves.
In A Workshop of Toys and Candy, big-city arctic researcher Sara gets lost in the North Pole, where she’s rescued by hot toy-making elf Len. Unable to leave after trespassing into Santa’s kingdom, she becomes embroiled in the deadly political intrigue of the workshop. It hits all the romantasy beats: love, danger, otherworldly beings, graphic sex on a wooden rocking horse — you get it.
A Touch of Jolliness also takes place at the North Pole, but this time Greta, an ambitious journalist (who’s more than she seems) is captured by the intense and despotic Nicholas. Will she escape their bargain or allow herself to be drawn into his red velvet embrace to become … Mrs. Claus? Very dark romance, Beauty and the Beast. It’s got daddy issues, light kidnapping and graphic sex with weird power dynamics on a sleigh.
How about adventure? Lotta romantasy features heroines on quests more dangerous than picking out the perfect Christmas tree. Fourth Hoof follows Tarah, a gifted magical reindeer-rider who is drafted onto Santa’s team with her frequently shirtless archrival Sven. (Vikings test very high and we have a line on a Skarsgård second cousin.) Fourth Hoof has passion, horse-girl vibes, battles, competition and hate sex on a totally different sleigh.
Ladies also love magic. We’ve had the market cornered on holiday magic, but we need to blend it with fantasy enchantments. Slutty magic. I know what you’re thinking: Hot Frosty. Sure, we could go back to that well and have a muscular snowman come to life as a boyish hunk for a woman to chastely mommy. But some of our viewers are making three meals a day for their families and working full time with little help. A grown man’s childlike wonder and charming ineptitude isn’t going to froth anybody’s eggnog.
But what if a working woman’s Christmas wish and a swirl of snowflakes yielded a competent boyfriend and some of that sweet, sweet unpaid labor? In The Gingerbread Man, big-city chef Kayla struggles to keep the small-town bakery she inherited from going under … until she bakes a fantastic smelling gingerbread man who comes to life ripped and ready to bake. But what about the ethical implications of their burning attraction given that she’s exploiting and sexualizing him as his creator? Kidding. They definitely have graphic sex in a cloud of flour.
Now let’s talk horror, specifically monsters, which have lately been promoted to boyfriend material. We’ve seen the coffin-loads of cash vampires can bring in, and if the Frankenstein thirst and freefalling marriage rates have taught us anything, it’s that living human men are a marketing failure. It sounds nuts but listen, if you’re thinking your Tinder date might kill you, the leap to a monster with a skull face or fins isn’t that far. At least the swamp creature or whatever has never heard of podcasting.
The Yuletide has its roots in paganism and it’s chock full of monsters just waiting for the dark romance treatment. Top of the list has to be Krampus. He’s got horns, a provocatively long tongue and a mission to punish the naughty. In Once Upon a Krampusnacht, CEO Brayla returns to her hometown for the annual festival and is snatched by the bad boy of honor. Can she fix him? Does she even want to? Oh, it’s definitely toxic but that’s what it takes to make some of our audience feel alive these days. They might have run screaming a decade ago, but in 2026 it’s gonna be, “Throw me in your sack and drag me to hell, Daddy.”
Jennifer Fumiko Cahill (she/her) is the managing editor at the Journal. Reach her at (707) 442-1400 ext. 106 or jennifer@northcoastjournal.com. Follow her on Bluesky and Instagram @JFumikoCahill.
This article appears in Through Mark Larson’s Lens 2025.