The Comicon Advent Calendar 2022: Day 24 – It’s Christmas And Their Kooky

It’s very nearly Christmas Day, just one more night’s sleep to go – so here’s the final entry in this years’ Christmas Advent Calendar, with a creepy and kooky Christmas with the Addams Family…

Oh yes, Christmas Eve, a night where children go to their beds all excited and can’t sleep and a night where parents around the world have very little sleep – I remember it well. My record, one Christmas Eve/Christmas morning was something like 20 minutes between sorting everything and Molly waking up shouting ‘He’s been, he’s been!’

Yep, that morning I could certainly empathise with Gomez and this…

Charles Addams, master of the macabre gag, great cartoonist and, of course, creator of the Addams Family. It’s criminal that so many people around the world know the characters but don’t know where they came from.

The fictional family appeared in a series of cartoons, although probably fewer than you’d think, many of which ran in The New Yorker from 1938 to 1964, and then gained worldwide fame through the 60s TV show and the movies from the ’90s onwards. In fact, of the 1,300 or so New Yorker cartoons he drew, only 58 of them featured the family, none of them named until the TV show.

For me, the Addams Family always triggers memories of seeing the Penguin Charles Addams in my dad’s study – one of very few comics or comic strips he had – others were Mad Magazine, Giles books, and Fred Bassett. But the Addams Family just had me absolutely engrossed, that delightful mix of darkness and comedy, the quirky idea of a family completely against the norm yet still sublimely happy.

So, it just seems perfectly right to celebrate all things Addams Family her for Christmas. And remember, no matter what your family is, no matter how many, no matter where they are, if the Addams Family can find happiness at Christmas and beyond, then so can you.

And don’t forget, if you’re able, this Christmas would be the perfect time to think of those who aren’t as fortunate as you are… so here’s the details for a few organisations that will be grateful for your help or your donations this year…

UK – donate or volunteer – Shelter, Crisis, St Mungos.

USA – donate or volunteer – Covenant House, National Coalition for the Homeless.

So, from all of us here at Comicon, have a very Merry Christmas, whatever version of it you celebrate, or even if you don’t make sure you have a peaceful and relaxing end of year. Be good to yourself, be good to others, wrap up warm… you know the drill by now.