You’ve probably already heard that Hot Frosty, the new Netflix original Christmas movie that began streaming today, snuck in a Mean Girls reference from star Lacey Chabert, aka actor known for her role as Gretchen Weiners in the 2004 comedy with Lindsay Lohan. But perhaps you haven’t yet heard that Hot Frosty also includes a cheeky reference to A Christmas Prince, aka the hit 2017 Netflix original Christmas movie that arguably ushered in a new era of Netflix original Christmas movies, which have begun to rival Hallmark’s holiday line-up.
Directed by Jerry Ciccoritti, with a screenplay by Russell Hainline, the premise of Hot Frosty sounds like a 30 Rock joke: A lonely woman named Kathy (Lacey Chabert) places a magical scarf around a snowman—or, more accurately, a chiseled humanoid ice sculpture—and transforms him into a human man. A hot, dumb human man, who goes by the name Jack and is played by Schitt’s Creek actor Dustin Milligan. It’s absolutely ridiculous, but it leans far enough into its silly premise that it’s a joyful, entertaining sort of absurdity.
It makes sense, then, that the movie would include a winking reference to A Christmas Prince, another ridiculously joyful Netflix Christmas movie. Here’s how it goes down: After Jack informs Kathy he’s a snowman-turned-himbo, Kathy takes him to a doctor to get checked out. After seeing that his internal temperature is below freezing, the doctor suggests to Kathy that maybe—just maybe—Jack is telling the truth. Maybe he really was magically transformed from an ice sculpture into a human!
“Sure, right. And I’m the queen of Aldovia,” Kathy replies, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
Aldovia, you say? True Netflix Christmas movie heads will recall, of course, that Aldovia is the name of the fictional kingdom where Rose McIver met her handsome Christmas prince, played by Ben Lamb, in A Christmas Prince.
If Lacey Chabert in Hot Frosty knows about Aldovia, does this imply that A Christmas Prince and Hot Frosty take place in the same universe? Is this some sort of extended NCCU (Netflix Christmas Cinematic Universe)? Or is it simply that Chabert’s character has a Netflix subscription, and has seen the Christmas Prince trilogy enough times for it to penetrate her everyday vernacular? After all, she is seen briefly watching Netflix’s Falling for Christmas on TV later in the movie. (Hence the reference to her old Mean Girls costar, Lindsay Lohan.) Clearly, she’s a NCCU superfan!
In fact, this is not the first time Netflix has implied its Christmas movies belong to an interconnected universe, and it likely won’t be the last. Per Screenrant, Aldovia was also mentioned in 2019’s Knight Before Christmas, and Belgravia (the fictional country in The Princess Switch) is mentioned in the 2019 Christmas Prince sequel, A Christmas Prince: The Royal Baby. Then 2020’s The Princess Switch: Switched Again included a full-blown Christmas Prince cameo from Queen Amber (Rose McIver), King Richard (Ben Lamb), and their baby, Princess Elleri.
Just how many times can Netflix reference its own holiday catalog in their original Christmas films? Well, to quote the star of Netflix’s Falling for Christmas: The limit does not exist.