Marvel Holiday Special 2007

December 21, 2007

Marvel Holiday Special 2007 (Marvel Comics)
By Andrew Farago, Shaenon K. Garrity, Lou Kang, Fred Hembeck, C.b. Cebulski, Alina Urusov, Mike Carey, Nelson & Ron Lim

This year’s grab bag of Christmas tales from Marvel, with one exception, somewhat fals short. “Piece of Cake”, the lead story, basically deals with Spider-Man ditching the cake he bought for Aunt May’s Christmas party to help Wolverine fight a rogue Sentinel being piloted by a disgruntled Department Store Santa. Cute, but nothing special. Next up there’s an old Fred Hembeck strip reprinted from a 1984 issue of Marvel Age, and then the gem of the issue: “Secret Santa.” This is a Loners story, written by C.B. Cebulski, that basically shows the team trying to re-bond at Christmastime. Cebulski picks up neatly on some plot threads he left dangling in the Loners miniseries, and this story works both to give the characters a bit of closure and to establish them neatly for future use. Finally, there’s the train wreck “The Meaning of Christmas” — a Daily Bugle feature reporter goes on a tour of the universe to allegedly discover the meaning of Christmas, but… I gotta be honest here, I don’t know what he comes home with. It’s totally nonsensical. This book is worth reading for the Loners story and the Ron Lim cover, but other than that, it’s utterly forgettable.
Rating: 5/10