Twelve Days of Comic Book Christmas: Day Six!

Welcome back! We're halfway through the countdown and, for this blog, six consecutive days of posting IS a record!

Each of the issues I'm featuring is a favorite, but today's has a special place in my heart. It's an anthology, so I won't be spending too much time on each part. Instead I'll list the creative team and a summary. Mostly just an overview. I have a problem with rambling and no one wants this one to get out of control...

EDIT: It got out of control.

Marvel Holiday Special #1

December 1991

Cover Artist: Art Adams

"A Miracle A Few Blocks Down from 34th St"

Writer: Scott Lobdell

Artist: Dave Cockrum

Inker: Joe Rubenstein

Colors: Paty Cockrum

Letters: Roxanne Starr

Talk about talent: check out those credits! Whatever you may think of Scott Lobdell's work now, there's no denying he was THE X-Men writer of the 90's. And it's my opinion that he's one of the best ever. Yeah, I said it. Do something.

If you're an X-Men fan, you'll gather by the costumes that this story takes place in the past. The story itself alludes to somewhere right after X-Men #97, which has that iconic cover featuring Cyclops and his brother, Havok, facing off in front of a destroyed airliner. Chronologically this means this team has just gotten together and the tale here reflects that.

The story is quick and light with these all-new X-Men trying to locate the "most powerful mutant ever registered" by their mutant tracking computer, Cerebro. They go to the source of the signal and end up fighting the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, of course. This super powerful mutant ends up being Santa Claus himself, who intervenes in the clash between teams by shrinking the bad guys down to size. Action figure size, that is.

"A Christmas Coda" 

Writer: Walt Simonson

Artist: Art Adams

Inker: Al Milgrom

Letters: Brad Joyce

Colors: Marie Javins

This tale revolves around the son of Reed and Sue Richards, Franklin, as he comes across a ghost in need of help. Franklin has to give up everything in his possession, including the cool Christmas ornament his mother bought him, to free the ghost from shackles.

Franklin succeeds and is rewarded with an antique box. Inside is the ornament he gave up and an original British shilling from 1843! The very first page notes: "With apologies to Charles Dickens" and the entire story references A Christmas Carol successfully.

Another quick and light story, but with a cute and sentimental touch from the perspective of the child of two members of the Fantastic Four. Excellent creative team here, as well.

"Midknight Drear"

Writer: Steven Grant

Artist/Inker: Klaus Janson

Letters: Phil Felix

Basically, The Punisher is watching a deal amongst two gangs go down. He takes advantage of the situation and chases down the worst of the two groups. Fortunately for him he doesn't have to do a whole lot because the briefcase these guys just exchanged with the other gang explodes in the trunk. It was a setup the whole time.

The car is engulfed in flames and careens off a bridge to the ground below. As it does, money rains down into the hands of the homeless living beneath the bridge. 

 As evidenced by Day Two of this little countdown, I do love Punisher holiday tales and this one is no different. It manages to put a slightly dark, but oddly heartwarming spin on the Christmas season. The conflicting nature of the story is compelling and sits well among the other stories in this book. 
But, really... what says Christmas more than ultra violence at the hands of a vigilante?

Nothing. That's what.

"Twas a Mid-Winter's Night"

Writer: Tom DeFalco

Artist: Sal Buscema

Letters: Roxanne Starr

Colors: Glynis Oliver

I'm gonna get this out of the way first: I LOVE Sal Buscema's art. Maybe it's because, as a kid, I cut my teeth on a lot of Spectacular Spider-Man or maybe it's just simply because it's awesome... or both. Whatever, I love it.

The story begins with a man named Sigurd, lost at sea during a hefty storm. We find his love, Sia, praying to Odin that Sigurd arrives home safely. However, Sia's mother thinks the Gods have more things to worry about than her wishes.

In Asgard, Odin and Thor are worried about an approaching asteroid. The evil Grylak the Greater appears and taunts them about HIS asteroid. Fast forward and Thor destroys this asteroid, which causes a great brightness in the sky. As a result, Sigurd sees this and is able to find his way home! 
I also shouldn't forget to tell you that Odin manipulates much of this to make himself into a Santa Claus-like being. That guy... a master of multitasking.

"Precious Gifts"

Writer: Len Kaminski

Artists: Ron Lim & James Sanders

Letters: Roxanne Starr

Colors: Marie Javins

While the Punisher story certainly has my vote for awesomeness, this one grabs my vote for sentimentality. We catch up with Steve Rogers, Captain America, volunteering at a soup kitchen. Turns out the lady running this kitchen, Rebecca Proctor, has a long, lost brother that Steve was very familiar with. You see, Proctor is her married name, but Barnes was her maiden name. This shocks Steve to his very core, having never known Bucky had a sister. She wishes she knew what happened to him and only heard rumors of his demise. They parted company on bad terms, which she greatly regrets.

Steve verifies her story via the Avengers' computer and shows up at her house in full costume. She and her family are shocked to have Captain America at their door, but Cap's come for a very specific reason: to let her know how heroic her brother was and to give her one of his uniform patches.

She insists he stay for dinner and tells her he has a place for Christmas anytime he wants it.

LOVE this story. Heartwarming and drawn well.

 "Ghost of Christmas Present"

Writer: Howard Mackie

Artist: John Hebert

Inks: Al Milgrom

Letters: Michael Heisler

Colors: Evelyn Stein

Like the Punisher tale, this one's definitely not your run-of-the-mill Christmas story. No, this one features Ghost Rider and is equally awesome.

A blind child is kidnapped from his bed on Christmas Eve, but manages to escape his kidnappers and flee into the woods. He ends up in a graveyard, of course, and is saved by none other than Ghost Rider himself. The child thinks GR is Santa. That sounds insane, but it's pulled off really well.

GR does his Penance Stare to the bad guys and returns the child home and all is excellent.

"A Spider-Man Carol"

Writer: Danny Fingeroth

Artist: Ron Garney

Inks: Mike DeCarlo

Colors: Steve Buccellato

Letters: Richard Starkings

Peter Parker meets J. Jonah Jameson at a local hospital to photograph him giving the place a $1 million dollar check courtesy of the Daily Bugle. Pete snaps the pic and gets a great idea. He hurries away and returns as Spider-Man to entertain the children, all while J.J.J. is present and attempting to get him to leave.

Throughout the story Jonah tells the children Spidey is a menace (shock), but each one of the children give a reason why he's not. What makes this special is each of these children, or one of their relatives, have been saveD by Spider-Man in the past. I don't mean these saves were made up for this story, either. Nope, they actually reference issues of Spidey's books! The brother of Tim Harrison of "The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man" (one of the greatest Spidey stories EVER) from Amazing Spider-Man #248 shows up to recountS a bit of that story. 

 Now, of course, this being a Marvel book, some bad guys arrive and the wall-crawler takes care of them. The story ends with Jonah being convinced by the children and Spidey's actions to lay off of him... at least for the time being!

Like the X-Men story, this one touches a lot on the past, but does so within specific established continuity. It works quite well too and it's a great way for Marvel to wrap up this special book. 

It's also time for me to wrap this up. My words do it very little justice, but I hope my enthusiasm for it infectious enough to get you hitting the back issue bins at your local store!