Pornokitsch

If you can't partake in unashamed self-indulgence at Christmas, when can you? (Well, if you're Jared in a Comixology sale, pretty much any time.)

For our first ever One Comic Christmas Special we've taken our back-up 3&1 feature and blown it out to be a whole episode that doesn't feature our usual content at all. Like one of the 'stealth pilots' that those sneaky TV people do. Bex, Jared and Jon spend an hour with a cocktail in hand and a list of those comics we'd take on if every actual comic creator in the world mysteriously vanished and Tom Brevoort, Axel Alonso and Co. turned to their next most logical options.

On one hand, this is probably exactly what you think it is. On the other, it's possible that we might have come up with some takes that would surprise you. On yet another, I appear to have developed three hands. Cheers!

Jadwiga found the apartment in Kraków through a chain of email exchanges, eventually contacting another Canadian who lived abroad. A single bedroom, wifi and utilities included, close to the sights. Much cheaper than a hotel and more reliable than a hostel.

The most interesting thing about Star Wars: The Force Awakens has to do with the cultural moment into which it was received. I don’t mean that it has been greeted so rapturously by fans and cinema-goers, that it has already earned a shedload of money, that it is set fair to overtake Avatar as the highest grossing movie of all time—we could all see that coming a mile off. I mean the acute and often panicky paranoia about spoilers this release has occasioned. How angry people get! Spoiling Star Wars became suddenly one the worst things a person could do, just below genocide and just above admitting a fondness for Coldplay.

[Editor's note: ...which is probably the right time to say - "contains spoilers".]

Today's post is from Special Operative Fleur, who is serving in the front line in the battle against furry armageddon. We have only ever known war. /eats bacon sandwich

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One of my favourite film scenes has always been the battle scene in the cartoon version of Animal Farm (1954). Goats being camouflaged as walls, geese ambushing people from haystacks and donkeys kicking people in the face – it's great. I'm a bleeding heart pacifist, war films bore me and you couldn't pay me enough to go paintballing, but there's something about animals reigning terror on man that makes me very happy. 

Animals have always challenged the rule of man, but in 2015 they escalated hostilities. Tell your family you love them, go out and stock up on catnip, and prepare for the animal apocalypse.

With the new generation of consoles finally coming into their own this year, it's been a great 12 months for blockbuster games. Here's the five which gave me the most fun - and in return, I've given them good write-ups. It's actually about ethics in end-of-the-year listicles.

This week's guest is author Kim Curran, helping us end the year with a bang! Take it away, Kim...

2015 has, in many ways, been goddamn awful. Just an endless barrage of humans being utterly shit to each other. Quite often social media is criticised for bringing out the worst in people, of stoking the already ravenous fires of hatred and fear. Studies have shown angry posts spread the fastest across social channels and we all know there’s something about the anonymity offered by the internet that turns even reasonable people into trolls. And then there’s the smuggery. Oh, god, the smuggery.

Agent Carter

Well, OBV.

Tis the season for listicles!

And we didn't want to miss out on the fun, so we asked our contributors... friends... family... strangers... slow-moving housepets... for their 2015 favourites. As you'll see, the results aren't only indisputable and irrefutable, but also exhaustive. If something happened in 2015 and it isn't on one of these lists, it didn't happen.

There are even more lists coming over the next week, because we're lazy super-excited about sharing lists.

“Leon”

Original Air Date: August 28, 1956, from the series The Clock

Thoughts Before Listening

I feel this might be interesting because The Clock seems like a nice name for a series and ‘Leon’ seems like it could be the name of a creepy kid, which is also great. I also remember ‘Leon’ being the name of a furniture store so I feel like it’s totally possible that this could be about a creepy kid made out of upholstery WHICH WOULD BE AWESOME. These are not the best reasons to assume something will be interesting though.