First of all, what are you doing this Christmas if you haven’t seen the movie “Home Alone” yet?
Second, we’re willing to bet that you didn’t catch the most important reason why Kevin McCallister’s family left him behind when they went to France for Christmas. A lot of people are just starting to notice it this year, so it’s understandable that you didn’t.
The story of the classic Christmas movie is about Kevin, who has to defend his home from Marv and Harry while the rest of the McCallister family is on vacation. Kevin has been accidentally left home alone (duh), and he has to fight off the burglars.
But how could Kevin’s parents and the rest of his crazy-big family have forgotten all about him?
The first and most obvious thing that comes to mind is that Kevin did something wrong the night before they left for France and had to spend the night alone in the loft as a punishment.
After that, a storm in the middle of the night turned off the power at the McCallister house, so all of the family’s alarm clocks had to be reset.
When they heard the airport taxi service knock on the door, the family rushed to get their bags, tickets, and passports ready. Kate, Kevin’s mom, asked her niece Heather to count how many kids there are.
Heather’s count is wrong because there are two extra people in the room.
First, there’s Kevin’s older brother, Buzz, who yells out random numbers to confuse Heather.
And then there’s Mitch Murphy, who lives next door to the McCallisters. Mitch is a young boy about the same age as Kevin, and he often hangs out with Kevin and his siblings right before they leave for vacation. Heather’s counting is wrong because she counts him even though she can only see the back of his head.
As soon as it looks like they’ve found everyone, the family rushes to the airport and flies to Paris.
But wait, if the McCallisters had checked in with an extra passenger, wouldn’t they have been allowed to board the plane? That alone should have been a clue that Kevin had gone missing, don’t you think?
When it all comes down to it, this is where the not-so-obvious detail comes into play. A split second that happened so quickly that many people who had seen Home Alone before had not even noticed it.
You see, Kevin got into trouble the night before the flight because he and Buzz got into a fight because Buzz was eating Kevin’s cheese pizza. Because of this fight, Kevin got into trouble. Because of the fight, a liter of milk was poured all over the table, which soaked the pizza boxes, the family, and most importantly, the plane tickets.
After Peter, Kevin’s dad gets some paper towels to clean up the mess, he throws away one of the plane tickets by accident. This would explain why Kevin isn’t missed until the McCallisters are halfway to France.
This year, one person saw the famous movie from the 1990s for the first time and noticed the small detail for the first time. He couldn’t believe he had never seen it before.
I’ve seen Home Alone ~25 times and it wasn’t until this most recent time I realised the dad threw away a plane ticket when cleaning up spilled milk at the beginning.
That’s why they never had an extra ticket.
Taking everything into account, can the McCallisters be said to be a particularly bad example of how to raise children? Or was there something more going on than just a series of bad luck?
Also, when everything is taken into account, Kevin being left at home by himself turned out to be the best thing for the rest of his family.
Imagine that he was remembered and the whole family went to the airport, where they found that one of the plane tickets was missing. Not only that, but while they were gone, the Wet Bandits would have ransacked and stolen everything of value from the McCallisters’ house.
The question is whether or not the traumatic event caused Kevin any long-term damage. Sure. Especially after what happened in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, in which Kevin got separated from his family again.
Still, in the end, everything worked out for the best of everyone. We hope you kids have a great Christmas.
