From Joshua Tyler
| Published
Will Ferrells Eleven is the most-watched Christmas film of modern times and one of the best Christmas films of all time. It’s a simple story told so straightforwardly that Buddy Elf’s father, Walter Hobbs, is the only character to have a story arc.
At the beginning we were told that Walter Hobbs (played by James Caan) was on the list of naughty characters. When Buddy meets him, everything seems designed to confirm that he deserves to be there. It is Walter’s character arc that drives the story, not Buddy’s. Buddy is the same person at the end of the film as he was at the beginning. But Walter supposedly makes the transition from villain to loving father who accepts the spirit of Christmas.
But that doesn’t happen at all. Walter Hobbs was never a villain. He shouldn’t have been on the naughty list. He is the real hero of Elevenand I will prove it.
We’ll start by looking at each supposed example of Scrooge-like behavior individually.
Walter Hobbs only cares about his job
We get to know Walter Hobbs early on as a workaholic who devotes all his time to his career and neglects his family. At some point his son humiliates him and accuses him of only caring about money. His wife also attacks him and accuses him of neglecting his son.
However, that doesn’t happen on screen. The Walter Hobbs we see in Eleven is home in time for dinner every evening. Sure, once, after he’d had a really difficult day, he wanted to go eat in his man cave. The guy was under a lot of stress. Apparently this isn’t the norm, as his son responds to his decision to eat alone as if it were a novelty by asking if he could emulate his father’s behavior.
Eating alone one night doesn’t make Walter Hobbs the devil.
In fact, it’s pretty clear that Hobbs doesn’t care about his job at all. The quality of his work is absolute garbage. He was caught intentionally copying bad type, a clear sign that he doesn’t care and hates the work there.
Every time we see him at his desk, Walter looks like he wants to die.
So why is he there? Someone has to pay the bills.
Walter Hobbs gets up every day and works a job he hates to support his family. He is home every evening for dinner, which he apparently almost always eats at the table with his family. What a monster.
Walter Hobbs doesn’t accept Buddy
When Buddy Eleven shows up in Walter’s office, he’s understandably confused. Out of shock, he throws Buddy out a few times. He has no reason to believe him. The guy is dressed like an elf and talks about Santa Claus. Apparently he’s some kind of mentally ill weirdo. Any sensible person would have thought he could be dangerous.
To make matters worse, Buddy tries to convince Walter that he is his son by sending him sexy lingerie. This must have made Walter wonder if Buddy’s true intention might have some strange sexual connotation. Almost anyone else would have called the police, but not the kind-hearted Walter Hobbs. Instead, he decides to give Buddy a chance.
Walter bails Buddy out of jail, takes him to a clinic and has him tested. A sensible course of action when a 40-year-old man you’ve never seen before shows up on your doorstep claiming to be a close relative. When the test proves that Buddy is his son, Walter does a U-turn and invites this person he doesn’t know at all to his home.
This all happens as Buddy continues to exhibit bizarre behaviors that, had he claimed a less kind and empathetic person as his father, would likely have resulted in him enlisting. It’s not Buddy’s fault, of course. He means well, but Walter can’t know that.
Despite Buddy’s craziness, Walter sees through the person he has inside him and decides to trust him with the family. Walter is so forgiving that, aside from a joke about how much Buddy likes the snow, he doesn’t even bat an eyelid when Buddy starts destroying his house.
His solution to Buddy’s destruction is not to throw him out, but to find a way to care for him. He asks his wife to stay at home and watch him. When she can’t, Walter Hobbs takes his adult son to work.
Walter puts his friend in the mailroom
Buddy Elf is an unemployed adult with no home and no prospects. He needs a job, so Walter Hobbs uses his corporate influence to get him one.
Buddy has no work experience and no experience, meaning he is not qualified to work anywhere other than the mailroom. Walter gets him a job there.
In some ways it is a success. Buddy is having a great time in the mailroom, doing new things Friends and gets a paycheck. However, he also embarrasses his father by getting drunk and dancing on tables.
Walter doesn’t overreact. He puts his head down and moves on through life as best he can.
Walter yells at Buddy
Walter’s job is on the line, and he knows it. He’s been struggling for years through a thankless career in an industry he’s clearly not suited for, and it’s starting to take its toll.
Walter’s employees are useless and lazy, but he has a solution. At great expense, he hires a top author who gives them the pitch they need to write a bestseller.
At the worst moment, Buddy bursts in, who would have been busy in the mailroom earning his own paycheck if he hadn’t gotten drunk. Then, for no apparent reason to Walter, he begins to insult Walter’s guest. Soon it goes beyond shouting and into a full-blown physical confrontation. All Walter can do is watch in horror.
Walter’s pitch meeting is now ruined, his son was involved in a robbery on company premises and it all happened in front of his employees. Add another workplace humiliation to his reputation.
It’s only in this moment, after days of shame, abuse and downright creepiness from a grown man he barely knows, that Walter Hobbs finally becomes angry. He yells at Buddy to go away, and after Buddy leaves, he tries to find a way to save his reputation and career.
Walter Hobbs works on Christmas Eve
Ok, but what about his disinterest in Christmas? When Walter goes to work on Christmas Eve, everything spirals out of control.
However, Walter never wanted to be there. When his boss tells him he has to work on Christmas Eve, Walter immediately protests. He tries to refuse, but his boss threatens to fire him. His choice is to go to work or roll the dice to see if he can find another job to support his child. Nobody wants to be unemployed at Christmas, so he did his job. This isn’t grinning behavior, this is being a responsible adult.
Then his youngest storms in and complains that Buddy Eleven ran away. Despite being shamed in front of his boss, Walter remains steadfast. He defends his son when his boss speaks rudely to him.
Buddy Elf is now a grown man. A grown man who proved he could take care of himself by literally walking all the way from the North Pole to New York. He’s wandering around New York again, for the fifth or sixth time in the film, and there’s no reason to believe he’s in danger.
The boy eats too much and Walter knows it. He also understands that his son is worried, so he tells him that he will take care of it and calmly asks him to wait outside until he is finished. His son refuses to obey his father and starts yelling at him, adding another work humiliation to his resume.
Any other parent would have thrown their son out of the room after this tirade and grounded him for a year, but the compassionate Walter gives in. As he is humiliated and degraded by them, he gives up trying to make a living and gives up.
The Real Villains of Elf
Walter Hobbs is not a villain. He is an introvert who doesn’t share his feelings, but that doesn’t make him a bad person.
Walter Hobbs is abused and humiliated, yelled at and touched inappropriately by a grown man in pantyhose who decides to tickle him unwantedly. Walter never falls apart. He keeps it together and marches on. After weeks of abuse, he experiences a minor outburst and immediately tries to make amends.
Eleven is full of terrible people. Miles Finch is a delusional egomaniac. Walter’s crack writing team is made up of lazy sycophants. His secretary is a kitten-killing psychopath. His boss is an idiot.
And then there’s Santa Claus, who knew who Buddy’s father was all along, but took him to an elf to raise him instead of telling Walter Hobbs that he had a son. To make matters worse, Santa puts Walter on the villains list and spends a few decades allowing the elves to deceive Buddy into thinking he is one of them while placing lumps of coal under Walter’s tree every year.
There are villains Eleven. Walter Hobbs is not one of them.
