This strip serves three full purposes; it ends the Christmas continuity, it slakes your Gremlin-related hunger for another few days, and it makes a handsome Christmas card for the members of my family. Now that's a Holy Trinity I can wholly endorse.
Our regular readers understand that we never know how a continuity is going to end before we start creating the comics. We have an idea of where we want to wind up, sure, but it's less like saying, "Let's go to New York" and more like saying, "Drive North." I think the fact that this whole thing ended in wanton destruction and a total opposition to the commercial nature of Christmas speaks volumes of our collective characters, and the imagery is just plain funny.
In an ironic twist, I printed out these Christmas cards for the family at Wal-Mart. Beautiful, affordable and full-page prints. Featuring a dead Santa Claus and the word "shit" and the phrase "consumer whores." The ladies behind the photo desk were patently unamused.
One extremely unpleasant aspect of returning home is the fact that simply seeing people, places and things from my past can remind what it was like for me in the early years. You know the years I'm talking about, and I bet you hated them too.
But one thing that was nice about years past was the perceived quality of Christmas presents. They were toys for toy's sake. The presents that actually posed a utility, like socks or sweaters, were looked upon with derision, while the useless things you could enjoy right away were just plain awesome.
My brother-in-law-to-be works with small aircraft, and so I bought him one of those tiny remote controlled helicopters. I know, it's lame seeing them being flown around the mall by those disinterested sales-kids with their dead eyes, but fuck if it isn't really fun to fly. I honestly think it's only fun because it was a gift, and while surrounded by cheering family members, you try and make the thing just stay off the ground.
I miss getting presents like that.
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.