By John Corrado

The first trailer (and poster) for Ebenezer has just been released online, following its unveiling at San Diego’s Comic-Con today. Ti West (X, Pearl, MaXXXine) directs this new take on the Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol, starring Johnny Depp as Ebenezer Scrooge in what is being hyped up as the actor’s big comeback role. I guess we’ll see if he’s still a box office draw; his fans (and defenders) will certainly be showing up.

This trailer is built entirely around Depp, giving us our first look at his transformation, and even calling back some of his most iconic roles. I’m curious what the tone of this one will be, since the trailer shows some comedy, but West is primarily known as a horror filmmaker. This is also oddly being sold as sort of a prequel to the Dickens classic, with the trailer calling it “the name you know, the story you don’t” (not to mention the poster’s somewhat bizarre tagline “before he was Scrooge, he was Ebenezer”). I’m curious what this all means.

I love Christmas movies, and have a soft spot for different adaptations of this story, so will be seeing it regardless. The film opens exclusively in theatres on November 13th.