You didn’t think we’d celebrate the holiday season without at least one Christmas sweater, did you?  Iron Man artwork by Marco D’Alfonso.

Marvel was on the marketing move in 1984. In addition to its Secret Wars line the company licensed the rights to color its creations with a couple activity books including this one. The only thing rarer than seeing the Rhino peeking through the holly is finding an edition untouched.

Marie Severin didn’t date this pin-up, but I’d put it somewhere between 1970 and 1972 based on the characters in evidence. This may be the only time Conan experienced Christmas.

This Christmas comic comes with some baggage. Not too much, but readers may find themselves scratching their heads as Tony Stark/Iron Man conducts business this issue.

Good news is Taskmaster is the villain of the month, though he keeps a hands off approach to business.

The long and short, Iron Man 254 sports a nice cover, but a mediocre story and hackneyed ending.

Marvel Holiday Special (1992)

As I said, the 1990s were bleak for comic books in general. One shining beacon were the early Marvel Holiday Specials.

Stan “the Man” Lee himself returned to pen the Spider-Man story, the first time since issue 200 outside of the newspaper strip. Barring Lee’s story, the star is Doc Samson’s revisionist origin of Chanukah. Even his ridiculous pony tail and post-Village People jump suit couldn’t spoil the fun.

Thanos’ touching tale of parenthood comes off as anything but contrived as do all the stories, featuring Wolverine, Punisher, New Mutants, Ironman and Daredevil.