5 Best Christmas Comics You Have to Read This Season, Ranked

The holiday season is upon us, that time of year when people start celebrating the season with their favorite traditions, sharing good tidings and merriment with family and friends. For many, those traditions include revisiting the spirit of Christmas through movies and television, but that’s not the only form of entertainment where the holiday shines. Comics also has plenty to offer during the holidays, with there being a wealth of Christmas-themed comics for readers to enjoy over the years.

With everything from a very superhero take on a Charles Dickens holiday classic to a selfish creature learning about the joy of the holiday to even a completely unexpected take on Santa, comics has a little something for everyone at Christmastime. Here are five comics with Christmas themes — if not outright about the holiday — that you need to read this year. Maybe it will even start a new tradition for you and yours.

5) “The MBC Wintertime Winter Friends Winter Fun Special” (Hawkeye Vol. 4 #17)

While Matt Fraction and David Aja’s Hawkeye run is an absolute must-read if you somehow haven’t already, when it comes to the holidays issue #17’s “The MBC Wintertime Winter Friends Winter Fun Special” story needs to immediately go onto your annual traditions list. The story sees Clint Barton/Hawkeye doze off in front of the television while watching “Winter Friends” and, as sometimes happens when we fall asleep watching television, his dreams take him on a wild journey. In this case, Clint ends up dreaming that he and his friends are actually a group of dogs with the mission to save the day when the evil Mr. Sun shows up and melts the snow, killing all the snowmen.

What makes this a great Christmas story — other than the fact that we basically get the Avengers as dogs and the Tracksuit Mafia as the Tracksuit Dingoes — the book uses the holiday special framework to deal with some actual introspection on Steve’s part. His dog hero is the one pup in the group with no powers and spends a good chunk of the story trying to insist that he doesn’t need help but eventually, accepts that he does. It gives the whole “here’s a life lesson in a heartwarming tale” vibe in the best and most bonkers way possible.

4) Marvel Holiday Special (1991)

The Marvel Holiday Special was such a fun book. An anthology series, it was a regular staple of the ‘90s and featured various Marvel characters in Christmas and holiday-themed stories. The stories covered a wide range of things over the years — and in later years there were a lot of reprints of those earlier stories — but it’s the first special from 1991 that is the most notorious and is a must read. It’s the issue that established that not only is Santa real in the Marvel universe, but he’s a mutant as well — and the most powerful Omega-level mutant of them all.

The story that this gem is revealed in comes from writer Scott Lobdell and sees the X-Men decorating for the Christmas holiday when Cerebro alerts that the most powerful mutant ever registered has appeared. This sends the X-Men to Rockefeller Center and there they find the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants up to shenanigans as they are also there for this crazy powerful mutant. They want to recruit him for evil purposes. However, the Brotherhood end up transformed into toys and that’s when the powerful mutant is revealed: it’s Santa! Suddenly, how Santa is able to get toys to all the boys and girls in the world in one night suddenly makes so much sense. Honestly, it’s a delightful little story, even if a touch cheesy.

3) Batman: Noel

You can think of Batman: Noel as the Dark Knight version of A Christmas Carol. Written and illustrated by Lee Bermejo, the story follows a struggling man, Bob, who is delivering cash for the Joker on Christmas Eve in Gotham City. However, a cynical and lonely Batman intercepts him, demanding that Bob reveal where the Joker is. Batman lets Bob go after the poor man insists he has no idea, but Batman secretly tracks him as he goes home to his sick son, Tim. Deciding that he will use Bob and Tim as bait to capture Joker, he goes back to the Batcave to work, but is sick from a virus and ends up having his own version of being visited by three ghosts. In the end, the Joker is apprehended, Bob gets a fresh start, Bruce feels better and gets some rest, and Bob tells Tim the story of A Christmas Carol. Yes, more happens but you should read it for yourself.

It’s a very interesting take on A Christmas Carol — and if Dickens’ original isn’t for you or you don’t care for most of the story’s adaptations, this one makes for a nice alternative. There are few moments that are a little too on the nose, but it’s honestly a very good Christmas tale (and a good Batman story, too.)

2) Green Lantern: Larfleeze Christmas Special

If you ask me, Larfleeze is the best Lantern character and doesn’t get nearly enough appearances, but he does have his own Christmas special and it’s a great one so I guess it works out in a quality over quantity sense. In the Larfleeze Christmas Special, the one and only member of the Orange Lantern Corps learns about Santa Claus. However, because the Orange Lanterns wield the orange light of avarice (aka greed) my guy Agent Orange here wants Santa to give him everything he desires so he makes a list.

On the surface, the Larfleeze Christmas Special sounds like just a silly, fun little story about a goofy gimmick Lantern doing goofy gimmick things. However, it’s actually a surprisingly serious story. Geoff Johns somehow manages to pull of some major character development for Larfleeze in the book. While Larfleeze doesn’t end up on some redemption arc because of things, the story does see him grow a bit as a character thanks to learning about Christmas. It’s a fantastic story.

1) Klaus and the Crying Snowman

Technically, this is a recommendation for all of Grant Morrison’s Klaus comics, but if we’re going to be Christmas specific, Klaus and the Crying Snowman is the one-shot that has the most holiday vibes. Klaus started out as a seven-issue miniseries from BOOM! Studios written by Morrison with art by Dan Mora. The series largely functions as the Santa version of Batman: Year One and makes Santa Claus (Klaus) an independent trapper/shaman sort in the 16th century on a mission to restore the sacred holiday of Yuletide.

Klause and the Crying Snowman in particular sees Klaus help an absentee father who just so happens to be a snowman as he seeks to make amends before melting away for good. In the process they battle an alien threat with a connection to the Norse gods. It’s not exactly a Christmas story, but it very much has the Christmas spirit — and it’s Morrison. You absolutely cannot go wrong here.

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