Christmas With The Super-Heroes C43

Santa’s Super Helpers

Christmas With The Super-Heroes 
DC Limited Collectors Edition C43
DC
ISBN 761942387284

I recently reviewed one of the new treasury sized facsimile editions of the various DC treasuries which have ben released over this last year (my understanding is that their next two releases will be the two Spider-Man VS Superman Marvel crossovers, which I still have from the 1970s but, I look forward to getting new foil cover variants). Their December release is yet another I didn’t have as a kid although, I have talked about two of the stories here as they were reprinted in A DC Universe Christmas (reviewed here) but, it’s nice to read them at the size they were reprinted at during the 1970s (both those tales are from the 1940s).

The first of those two starts off this volume and is an untitled Superman story. This is where he shows a spoiled, rich kid those worse off than him at Christmas and also gets involved in a scheme of two villains trying to sabotage Christmas at the North Pole, coming to both Santa and Lois Lane’s rescue. And it’s a nice, positive tale which re-enforces childrens’ ideas of Santa Claus and also sees the last son of Krypton replacing the gassed and unconscious reindeer, by transporting Santa on his sled on Christmas Eve. 

The Second story here, which is a really great and moving one, is The Silent Night Of The Batman, where Batman is approached by the spirit of the season as a hallucination of Commissioner Gordon and his fellow cops. While Batman is convinced to stay with them at the police station and sing Christmas carols with them, we see various crimes and tragedies taking place, with absolutely no dialogue... and then right themselves to a series of positive resolutions, all without the intervention of The Batman. It’s actually a pretty heart warming sequence of pages, relying solely on the artwork of both the great Neal Adams and industry veteran Dick Giordano. 

Then we have a short story from House Of Mystery called Night Prowler. It’s a three page quickie which doesn’t actually contain any horror, just a sense of threat before the obvious identity of said night prowler is revealed to one of the characters... it works really well. 

Next up is the first of the usual activity pages which were the blessing/curse of the treasury editions put out by DC. It’s a double page spread of 8 circular artworks of various DC characters and a Christmas message from each entitled Christmas Greetings From The Super-Heroes. 

Then the second of those stories I’d already read comes in and it’s the brilliant, untitled  1940s Wonder Woman tale where it’s all narrated from the point of view of a friendly Christmas tree, who helps Wonder Woman out by giving her the information necessary to save the lives of a family and find a Nazi base. Luckily, Diana Prince is able to talk tree speak and, obviously, saves the day. 

After that we have Santa’s Scrambled Super List wordsearch, which invites you to find a load of super-heroes hidden in the grid, along with the names of a few of the creators too.

Then we get the last strip in theis selection, The Sandman in Santa Fronts For The Mob. This is the 1970s version of The Sandman and his sidekick, both in yellow super-hero costumes and not really remembered by many comic book readers these days (is my guess). But it’s a nice story about a bunch of criminals using a shop Santa, played by a heavy weight boxer, to cover up for their crimes... but, of course, when the boxer finds out what’s going on, he saves The Sandman’s life and helps him break up the racket. 

After that we have a two page spread highlighting the lyrics of six Christmas carols called Sing Along with the Super-Heroes and then a maze page called Santa’s Super-Deliveries… where you have to find Santa’s route to each of the characters waiting in the maze for their presents. 

On the inside back cover we have Season’s Greetings From The DC Editors, with drawings of them and a little bit of promotional blurb for each and, on the back cover we have, not a cut out diorama this time but just a nice holiday scene. 

And that’s me done with Christmas With The Super-Heroes - DC Limited Collectors Edition C43, I think. I really enjoyed reading this one and, it has to be said, none of the tales were in any way a let down. Just good, wholesome holiday reading for kids and ‘young at heart’ adults alike. And a nice addition to the treasury shelf, it has to be said.