Christmas Covers - December 25

Experience the nativity in Panoramic 3-D on the cover of The First Christmas (1953).

We hope you've enjoyed twenty-five days of Christmas-themed covers this year. Stay tuned as we finish out December with more appropriately-themed comics covers...

(2009: Topix vol. 9 #12)
(2008: Junior Partners #5)
(2007: Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact #194)
(2006: Treasure Chest of Fun and Fact #35)
(2005: Dell Four Color #1274)
(2004: Treasure Chest vol. 2 #9)

(Polite Dissent's 2010 Comic Book Cover Advent Calendar)
(2010 Comics Should Be Good Advent Calendar)
(Bully the Little Stuffed Bull's Riverdale Christmas)
(The Comics Cube's Christmas Countdown)  
(Brendan McKillip's Comic Advent Calendar 2010)
(Mail It to Team-Up's 25 Days of Christmas)

Cartoon Festivus

Bizarro is brought to you today by The True Meaning of Christmas.

In case you're at home this weekend surfing the net and ignoring the holidays, here are some cartoons to help. Or, if you're completely engrossed in the holiday jamboree, are dressed like a flying reindeer, find yourself between two rounds of caroling and decided to check your favorite blog (why, thank you!) here are some cartoons to entertain your head. Or, if you're sitting in the jungle somewhere surfing the net on some magical device that needs no electricity and have no idea what holidays I'm even talking about, here are some cartoons for whatever reason makes sense in your freakish world. Let's get on with it.

1. Larry is limber and this means nothing at all but I just think it is a very funny, deadpan joke. My wife is very limber (lechers are thinking, "lucky you! woof! woof!") and sometimes does this exact stretching move while we're watching TV at night. I don't mind that, of course, but occasionally she'll do it on a commercial flight and even though I know I shouldn't, I get embarrassed. She has other painful-looking stretching behavior as well, the strangest of which is one wherein she swallows her own foot and leg, poops it out and balances on it as it sticks out of her butt. She says it's a "great stretch."

2. Do you like odd coincidences? Well, I sure do! I wrote this cartoon as sort of a follow-up to a cartoon I did about a "Mothman" super hero back in October. In this case, the insectarian super hero will be called on to eat a sweater that is smothering the city. (When you have stopped laughing, dry your eyes and move on to the coincidental part.) Here's the coincidental part: I wrote this most recent Moth Man cartoon in mid-November, drew it and sent it in to be published on December 15, which just happened to be the next day on my schedule. No other reason that that. Around December 1st, a couple of weeks after I drew this and a couple of weeks before it appeared in papers, I saw a movie called "The Mothman Prophecies." I'd never heard of it before, but it is about a legend that has grown around a fatal bridge collapse in West Virginia back in the 1960s. It had nothing to do with my cartoon but was sort of a fun movie and I didn't think anything about it. On December 16, the day after this cartoon appeared in papers, a woman wrote to me and said her husband lived in that small town in WV when the tragedy happened and he got a kick out of my cartoon appearing in the papers on the anniversary of the bridge collapse! WHAT?! Mothman lives!

Side note, I totally missed the point that cardigan sweaters button up the front. My bad. I think I meant to say Dr. Argyle.

3. Here is another gag by my friend Cliff. He's funny. How does someone in 3 B.C. know that Jesus will be born in 3 years? And I'll bet they didn't even have cartons of milk then. The whole thing is just ridiculous.

4. But wait! Here is another cartoon about expiration dates. What in tarnation? If it were possible for you to know the date of your death, would you want that knowledge? I'm on the fence about it. It would help immensely in planning your finances and career moves and you could engage in all kinds of dangerous behavior with the confidence that it wouldn't kill you. On the other hand, it would loom over you like a damp yak dangling by a thread. No matter what you did, you would never lose sight of that date approaching and even if you could forget it from time to time, you'd still be able to smell it. Hmmm.

5. For those of you sitting in a jungle unaware of the holidays much of the world is celebrating this week (see first paragraph) the term "seats in the nosebleed section" refer to seats in a huge arena or stadium, way up near the top at the back. The idea is that you are so high up, the altitude will make your nose bleed. Well here are nosebleed seats of a different sort! Hahahahahahahahahahahahah!

Hope everyone has a smooth and salubrious holiday weekend. I'm off to Woodstock Sanctuary to hang with my peeps.

Christmas Covers - December 24

Pooh, Piglet and the rest of the gang from the 100 Acre Woods fill in for Santa Claus on the cover of Ole Brumm Julehefte 1993.

For each day of December until Christmas I'm featuring a Holiday-related comic book cover. (Click on the image to get a larger version.)

Come back tomorrow, and every day this month, for a new Christmas cover.

Just 1 more 'get-up' until Santa!

(2009: Ninja High School #156)
(2008: Tommy og Tigern Julehefte 2007)
(2007: Action Comics #105)
(2006: Dell Four Color #666)
(2005: Dell Four Color #1274)
(2004: Captain Marvel Adventures #19)

(Polite Dissent's 2010 Comic Book Cover Advent Calendar)
(2010 Comics Should Be Good Advent Calendar)
(Bully the Little Stuffed Bull's Riverdale Christmas)
(The Comics Cube's Christmas Countdown)  
(Brendan McKillip's Comic Advent Calendar 2010)
(Mail It to Team-Up's 25 Days of Christmas)

Amazon Top 50

Here are the Top 50 Graphic Novels on Amazon this morning. All the previous caveats apply.


1 (-). Diary of a Wimpy Kid 5: The Ugly Truth
2 (+2). Dilbert: 2011 Day-to-Day Calendar
3 (+2). The Walking Dead Compendium Volume 1
4 (-1). Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
5 (+1). 40: A Doonesbury Retrospective
6 (-4). Diary of a Wimpy Kid Box of Books
7 (-). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 1: Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life
8 (-). Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Boxset
9 (+1). Serenity: The Shepherd's Tale
10 (-1). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 2: Scott Pilgrim Versus The World
11 (-). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 3: Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness
12 (-). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 4: Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together
13 (-). Scott Pilgrim Volume 6: Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour
14 (N). Odd Is on Our Side (Kindle edition)
15 (+1). Scott Pilgrim Volume 5: Scott Pilgrim vs The Universe
16 (+4). Walking Dead Volume 13
17 (-). The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
18 (+3). The Walking Dead, Vol. 1: Days Gone Bye
19 (-1). The Walking Dead, Book 1
20 (-6). Dork Diaries 2: Tales from a Not-So-Popular Party Girl
21 (+1). Fables Vol. 14: Witches *
22 (+1). Superman: Earth One
23 (N). Dork Diaries (Kindle edition)
24 (-9). Dork Diaries: Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life
25 (+16). V for Vendetta
26 (+7). Witch & Wizard: Battle for Shadowland
27 (-1). The Walking Dead Book 2
28 (N). Superman: Secret Origin
29 (N). Dork Diaries 2 (Kindle edition)
30 (-6). The Walking Dead Volume 2: Miles Behind Us
31 (-6). The Walking Dead, Book 6
32 (-2). Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
33 (+1). Serenity, Vol. 2: Better Days
34 (-6). Walking Dead Volume 12
35 (N). Tron: Betrayal
36 (-1). Odd Is on Our Side
37 (R). Watchmen
38 (+5). The Walking Dead Volume 11: Fear The Hunters
39 (-20). Big Nate: From the Top
40 (R). Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History
41 (+5). Batman: The Killing Joke
42 (-10). The Walking Dead Book 5
43 (+4). The Walking Dead, Vol. 9: Here We Remain
44 (-4). The Walking Dead Book 3
45 (-1). Serenity, Vol. 1: Those Left Behind
46 (R). Brightest Day, Vol. 1
47 (+2). The Walking Dead, Vol. 10: What We Become
48 (-19). The Sandman Vol. 1: Preludes & Nocturnes
49 (-22). The Walking Dead Volume 3: Safety Behind Bars


Items with asterisks (*) are pre-order items.

N = New listing appearing on list for first time
R = Item returning to the list after having been off for 1 or more weeks


Commentary:

* The Wimpy Kid slides a bit further on the overall chart to #9. The #2 item on the comics chart, the Dilbert desk calendar, is at #80 on the overall chart.

* Several Kindle editions show up for the first time; not sure if this is due to a surge in interest for Kindle books or just a reclassification of these items by Amazon. I'd guess the latter.

* Two actual debuts this week, Superman: Secret Origin & Tron: Betrayal

* Dead Watch: Thirteen Walking Dead collections on the top fifty chart this week.

* The #50 book is at #1,861 on the overall chart this week.