Review: DC Universe Holiday Special #1

I am a sucker for comic Holiday issues. Call it my inner child. Or maybe it is the fact that the holidays are the one time when my inherent pessimism fades and becomes some meager glimmer of optimism ... I still well up a little bit at the end of 'It's A Wonderful Life' ... but I always buy these issues. Usually the stories are throwbacks to a simpler time when humanity seemed inherently good.



Occasionally there is a real gem of a story like the famous 'Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot' in Christmas With The Super-Heroes #2 from 1988. That was the famous post-Crisis 'I am Kara' story, a story I thought about reviewing here but it seemed too obvious. Maybe next year.

This year, I was impressed with 'A Day Without Sirens' in the DC Universe Holiday Special 2008 .

The issue opens in Gotham with Commissioner Gordon hearing about a proposed 'Day Without Sirens' throughout the city. Gordon shrugs it off knowing that in the time just before the holidays there are innumerable crimes. There is no way that the criminals of Gotham would heed such a calling.

And yet, the day proceeds in the Police Department with an almost preternatural silence. At first the officers can't believe it. They keep checking the phones. They are called out only once to save a cat from a tree.

The news begins to spread throughout the city. The police officers put on holiday music and order lunch. They are seen smiling and laughing with each other, a welcome change from the usual grim business.

At 11:59PM, Commissioner Gordon holds a press conference applauding the fact that indeed there was a 'Day Without Sirens' in Gotham.

In a short but poignant speech, he says 'The only explanation that I can come up with is that grace still lives in our city. We should all walk away today ... carrying a little hope in our pockets."

And isn't that what the holidays are all about, that hope that things will get better. That humanity will work together to make this world a better place for the future. That Hope and Grace are alive in all of us and not outdated concepts in this dingy world.

But the day ends. At 12:01AM the emergency line lights up. There is a double homicide. "Party's over."

Still ... there was that day. Gordon reflects it with Batman, saying if it can happen once it can happen again. That the city can strive for that.

And, in what has to be a true Christmas miracle, Batman actually cracks a joke.

If the story ended there, I would have been happy. Heck, it was a near perfect ending. And I probably would have reviewed it here. I was that struck by it.

But there was one more page!

Turns out that the city had a guardian angel on duty during the 'Day Without Sirens'. Oracle was having all emergency calls forwarded to her during those 24 hours. And when a call came in, she sent out Supergirl as the response team.

Kara looks exhausted, saying she is going to shower for a week and then sleep for a week after this day. So she probably handled the usual pre-Holiday Gotham volume of calls.

But Oracle tells Supergirl that she did something special, that she gave Commissioner Gordon, Batman, the whole city a gift of hope.

The inclusion of Kara in such an inspiring story was a little Christmas gift to me. Sometimes hope has to be earned through hard work. And the fact that she and Oracle ... that anyone ... would work so hard for the good of others, with no chance of reward or recognition, well that was this story's 'It's A Wonderful Life' moment of holiday splendor.

And perhaps the most shocking thing of all ... the story was written by Joe Kelly! Joe Kelly !!!

Could it be that Joe Kelly, whose run on Kara's title I have consistently trashed, wrote a story with Supergirl that I absolutely thoroughly enjoyed? That he wrote an altruistic hard-working Kara who toiled simply for the good of mankind? Now that, my friends, *IS* a Christmas miracle!

So ... Mr. Kelly ... if you should see this ... Happy Holidays and Season's Greetings !!! Thank you for a wonderful story!