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I love the Vacation movies, even the Vegas one which many people pan.  I was thinking though, the Griswold kids are always changing, who were your favorites?  If I were to rank them, heres how they'd go for me;

1.) European Vacation
2.) Vacation
3.) Vegas Vacation
4.) Christmas Vacation

I Thought All Of Them Were Great!

When I first saw the Vegas vacation I wasn't too impressed.  Some of the Eddie scenes just seemed like they were trying to hard.  But now I love that movie.  It grew on me!

Here were my rankings for the kids:
Vacation
Vegas
European
Christmas

The only Vacation film I saw in the theater was European, and I really liked it so that one had my favorite Rusty. The last two films were all right, and I don't really remember the kids that well in those so I would have to not include those in a list. The 1st film is a classic, but I just liked them better in European Vacation.

Jason Lively and Dana Hill for me with Anthony Michael Hall and Dana Barron coming in second.
Always had a soft spot for European Vacation even though Vacation is probably the better movie.

I liked the kids from Vegas Vacation best. It's tied for second place with Christmas Vacation as far as the movies themselves go, but Ethan Embry was actually funny  as Rusty/ Nick Papageorgio and Marisol Nichols was pretty OK in those go-go boots.

I loiked the kids from the first movie the most, because it was the first I watched, and I was very disappointed when I saw the kids were all different in the sequels.

Fun topic.

I would put it at a tie between the original and Vegas for the kids. I would lump the other two as a second place tie. As for the movies themselves, I orignally disliked European Vacation because it came off to me as a cheap capitalization off the original, but then years later I realized it was probably more expensive to make (locations) and I just changed my mind in general. There are some really good gags in European, like the berets bit and the waiter in Paris (classic), the driving sequence in London ("Look kids, there's Big Ben, Parliament"), and the bit with the wrong relatives in Austria. Although I put the kids in European tied for second, that Rusty was possibly my favorite, as he was such a lovalble dork, but the Audrey in that one was so annoying she killed the duo.

You hit that nail right on the head.

I would have to put the original Vacation kids first, followed by Christmas vacation, and then European Vacation. This is also the order I'd rank the movies. Can't say where I'd put Vegas Vacation, since it's the most recent, and yet I remember nothing about it, in spite of having seen it. I suppose that in itself makes it a safe bet for last place.

Anyway, the original Griswold Kids were the best, which has as much to do with the quality of writing on that movie as it does with their performances. I think they fit well with the exaggerated-yet-all-too-familiar theme of the movie.