Ride ’em Kringle! The Top Seven Alternative Methods of Transportation for Santa Claus.

These titles are getting longer, just like the nights.

With the price of gas, the concern for the environment, and the need to be ahead of the hipness curve, people are talking about alternative transportation.

Therefore, so are we.

THE TOP SEVEN ALTERNATIVES TO SANTA’S TRADITIONAL SLEIGH.

Number #7

THE  SNOWMOBILE

What makes this Dennis the Menace cover from 1967 an outstanding example of the commonplace sleigh-Skidoo-switcheroo genre is the gleeful mix of reindeer abandonment and felony kidnapping.

Number #6

 The Grim Toboggan.  

The man in the top hat knows that the night of swallowing uppers, bathtub gin, and the lies of a red-suited lumberjack have led to this… their deaths on a plummeting toboggan.

Number #5

The Sex Rocket

With two balls of spitting fire and a control basket jammed tight up into Father Ho-Ho’s man-business, Dell’s Santa Claus Funnies #66 produced an image from my childhood I’ve never been able to un-see.  Whatever madness gripped their cover artist to produce this Freudian nightmare, thank god it never happened again.

Number #4

The Sex Jeep.

He’s riding the steering wheel with his balls!   His BALLS, people!  How is this going to happen?   Once Santa realized how ill fitting this jeep was for his ungainly physique, he simply wouldn’t have started the engine.  Use logic!   Think of the children!

Number #3

 The Future Tech Cyborg Hovercar Thing, Mounted with the Severed Head of Rudolph, Kept Alive by Cruel Science

That’s what I see here.  I might be wrong, but I think that’s the hellish dystopia that lays ahead for Rudolph in the world of Archie 3000.   I truly hope this is saving a lot of gasoline or something, or it’s just a tragic waste of a glowing deer.

Number #2

FEAR.

Fear gives you the wings that Red Bull only promises you, and it  gets you two blocks away faster than a bus.  The people terrifying St. Nick here include a serial killer, a demon with hell-born powers, a homicidal rage addict shouting death threats, and a pagan deity with the power to summon lightning.  RUN,  Santa!  Don’t slow down for Blitzen, he’s already lost!

Number #1

Human Enslavement.

Kids: If looking at this makes you ticklish, see a doctor.

When the reindeer are on strike, or have been recently eaten (in this economy, meat is expensive), Santa turns to people with super-powers, and enslaves them to his will.

It was a either a life of servitude, or be put to the fire.

Bwah hah hah! You must do my bidding Superman! I control your very WILL!

Tune in tomorrow when we look below the phony beard and uncover the legion of Imposter Santas!

Ty the Guy OUT!

Now, your BONUS Alternate Transportation Santas:

It’s Jerry Garcia from the Grateful Dead. He’s taking a trip without the sleigh, get it? Get it? It’s that 70s drug humor that Chevy Chase made famous.

Okay then, we’ll leave you with this.

Why do I find this funny? It's because it's a Vortex comic, right?

Click below for more Christmas joy:

SANTA WARS IV: He Knows When You’ve Been Sleeping WITH THE FISHES. The Top Seven Dead Santa Covers

Ask not for whom the bell jingles. It jingles for thee.

Whew.  That might be my longest title ever up there, but what can you do with sequels? Once there’s a set of Roman Numerals involved, things get ungainly.

After a few days of wholly inappropriate images of homicidal Santas,  monster Santas, and beaten, hogtied Santas, we arrive at the inevitable fate for these poor icons of the winter solstice…

I warn you, this is not for the kiddies.  You think I’ve had some inappropriate images before?   There’s a couple here you don’t want your eight year old to see….  You’ve been duly warned, but I can’t help myself, I’m in the holiday mood and I want to share….

THE TOP SEVEN DEAD SANTA COMIC BOOK COVERS.

#7

I have a newsflash for all concerned:  Santa loses the match.  The cover is a bit of a giveaway, as the Santa I know would be fighting back a little harder while that Zombie lady rips out his throat, unless he was already dead.   At least the brains will keep fresh at the North Pole.   This is an indy comic, so you might not have seen it, but it has the dead Santa spirit in such evidence I was charmed into including it.    The following indy comic…

…doesn’t give you a good enough look at Santa’s remains for it to have made the cut.  It’s nice to see the indies getting in on all the dead Santa fun, but you got to bring me the flesh if you want my vote!

#6

No matter how cute and amusing we may or may not think Casper the Friendly Ghost is, we must never forget that he’s the spectral remains of a dead child, held to this Earth by an unsolved murder, or some other never-resolved trauma of unimaginable sorrow.

And in this issue:  He’s Santa!

#5

We’ve ruled out a robbery, the murderer left behind a dolly and a toy drum, both as valuable as diamonds on Christmas Eve.

Is it just me, or does the entire Justice League seem to be waving their crotches at the dead Santa corpse.  They’re posed awfully strangely.  Maybe it’s just me.  This is a personal treasure of mine, as I still own the copy I bought when I was twelve.  Dead Santa good times.

#4

This delightful image of the Santa corpse stuck in the chimney ( seared into our brains by the movie Gremlins) is rendered here in loving detail by Joe Jusko, Conan cover artist of the Eighties.  One of the better Marvel Holiday issues of this era, mostly because it didn’t have Dazzler in it.

#3

Nick Cardy (who drew my favorite Christmas comic cover of all time, we’ll get to that one in a day or so…) gives us this unquestioned masterpiece of the Kris Kringle Korpse genre.  The best part:  The skeletal remains are still fat, no matter how much of the body has rotted off the skull.  Ah, the joys of the holidays.  Why are people reading this sick, sick, entry?

#2

This special one shot was a spin-off from the series SOUTHERN KNIGHTS, produced in the late Eighties.   No, Carl and Larry are not gay, they’re just carefree assassins with a good attitude and a strong work ethic.  Get your mind out of the gutter and just let the men do their job.  This cover is subversive in every way, isn’t it?  One of those images that most artists only aspire to.  Why are museums usually so empty of these kinds of scenes on the wall?

Okay, next one’s not for the squeamish, but that’s why you’re here.

#1

There’s actually a few lovely dead Santa covers for this LIVING DEAD  series, but in all the other ones, Father Christmas is up and walking around like a zombie.  At least for this one, Santa’s corpse has the decency to sit still and that earns it my number one spot.   If you’re going to be dead, keep in one place, this is not Weekend at Bernie’s, it’s a holy holiday.

If you think any of these made you squirm, come back here tomorrow for the top seven INAPPROPRIATELY SEXY CHRISTMAS COMIC BOOK COVERS.  Until then —

Ty the Guy OUT!

Go HERE for the Top Seven Homicidal Santas.  Go HERE for the Top Seven Monster Santas, and HERE for the Top Ten Santas going down in defeat to super-heroes.

Here now, your Dead Santa Claus moment of zen:

It's Jerry Garcia, get it?

If you’re too young to know who Jerry Garcia is, then I’m too old to be making jokes about him.  And that’s MY moment of zen.