With the holidays upon us, we’re going to switch gears this week with the official “COMICS 101 Holiday Gift-Giving Guide,” a few last-minute shopping suggestions for both the comics fan and newbie alike, as well as a few non-comics recommendations, just because I think they’re cool. If there’s a DC fanatic on your shopping list, pick up THE DC COMICS ENCYCLOPEDIA: A DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO THE CHARACTERS OF THE DC UNIVERSE. This is a monster. Exhaustively researched and lavishly illustrated, the DC COMICS ENCYCLOPEDIA is an absolute must-have for any comics fan with even the slightest interest in DC Comics.

Writers Scott Beatty, Bob Greenberger, Phil Jimenez and Dan Wallace do an outstanding job distilling decades of history and characterization into bite-size summaries, and even manage to make sense of some of the more befuddling knots in DC continuity, while still referencing the Golden Age comics through inference and properly placed artwork. As for the art, it’s all pulled from various works from throughout DC’s history, with some recognizably re-used from DC’s earlier “Who’s Who” series. Sure, some of the entries, like the Legion of Superheroes and Green Lantern, are already hopelessly outdated, and there are a few mistakes that snuck in here and there (Since when is Green Arrow’s real name Oliver McQueen?), but those are mere quibbles that shouldn’t deter you from picking up this bad boy. Heck, with this around you might not even need your humble Professor…

For the Jack Kirby aficionado, Marvel has helpfully compiled this fine hardcover collection, MARVEL VISIONARIES: JACK KIRBY, which collects some of the King’s finest Marvel work under a single cover.

Some of the work Jack is most famous for is naturally included, such as the three-issue Galactus debut from FANTASTIC FOUR and Captain America’s return from AVENGERS #4, balanced out with harder-to-find Kirby rarities like his first Marvel work in RED RAVEN COMICS and his 1970s work from THE ETERNALS. And if we’re talking about a hardcore Kirby fan, they’d probably have a heart attack at the prospect of a replica MASK OF DOCTOR DOOM, now manufactured by CAS Iberia, and available though Diamond at any comic shop

The Doom mask, in life-size scale, is solid steel with leather straps, and comes with Doctor Doom’s trademark green cloth hood and big gold medallions. At a retail price of around 300 bills, it’s not cheap, but it’s a beautiful piece of geek art.

Got any comics-reading friends who are still crushed by the events of IDENTITY CRISIS? Well, you can either cushion the blow or rub salt in the wounds with these very cool new JLA ACTION FIGURES from the good folks at DC Direct.

You can choose from grieving widower the Elongated Man, potential murder suspect the Atom or doomed martyr Firestorm. Collect them all! There’s also a pretty sweet Adam Strange figure in the set, but as he didn’t get abused, murdered, maimed or otherwise emotionally wrecked in IDENTITY CRISIS, that’s neither here not there. These are available at most comic-book shops, and it also wouldn’t surprise me to see them at other specialty outlets like Suncoast Video or Tower Records. The DC Direct figures are usually a little pricey at about $15 bucks each, but where else are you going to get an Elongated Man action figure? Just look at it as an obscurity tax.

If you’re looking for comics for the younger crowd, Jeff Smith has published THE COMPLETE BONE, a massive 1,300-page edition that collects the entire 13-year run of his Eisner-award-winning fantasy adventure series.

Written and drawn by Smith, BONE is the story of the three Bone cousins and their exploits in a world not their own, making new friends while on the run from dangerous enemies. BONE is exciting, heartwarming and funny, a charming mixture of LORD OF THE RINGS and Walt Kelly’s POGO. It’s just plain good comics, no matter what your age.

Got any wrestling fans to buy for? You can’t go wrong with THE RISE AND FALL OF ECW, an excellent documentary from WWE Home Video. Clocking in at just about three hours, the doc explores the history of the now-infamous Philadelphia-based wrestling promotion, best known for its incendiary storylines and unrelenting violence, which wound up permanently changing the face of professional wrestling.

The piece talks to many of the promotion’s former stars, and it’s surprising to see how many of the WWE’s best current workers got their start at Extreme Championship Wrestling. You’d expect a WWE-produced documentary to be somewhat biased in its look at history, but instead it’s remarkably even-handed, revealing how the influence of ECW’s “mad genius” Paul Heyman is directly responsible for much of the “WWF Attitude” that made Vince McMahon’s company such an incredible success in the 1990s. Watching the documentary made me wish I’d been able to see more of the company’s output, but the promotion folded in 2001 after losing their television broadcast partner when TNN signed a deal with WWE. Hopefully the already high sales of this DVD will prompt Vince to start churning out more compilation discs. Even for people who’ve never heard of Heyman or ECW, this is a compelling documentary, and worth checking out.

Any Warren Ellis fans on your list will certainly be happy with ABSOLUTE PLANETARY, a hardcover edition collecting the first 12 issues of PLANETARY, the outstanding pulp-influenced conspiracy thriller by writer Ellis and artist John Cassaday.

PLANETARY expertly weaves familiar pulp, sci-fi and superhero pastiches into something entirely new and original, with every issue paying homage to a different style or genre, while still fitting into the overall mosaic of Ellis’ larger, original mythology. Ellis’ ability to so perfectly recapture the various tones and styles from issue to issue is matched by Cassaday, who manages to effortlessly jump from Steranko-inspired psychedelia to a sepia-tint Doc Savage flashback, all while retaining his own trademark style. Often Ellis’ work can leave me cold, but PLANETARY is by far his greatest achievement, and one of my absolute favorite comics.

Who doesn’t like robots? Nobody, that’s who. I’ll confess to be somewhat taken with ROBOSAPIEN, the new personal robot produced by the unfortunately named company Wow Wee, simply on the geek factor alone.

I mean, who doesn’t want their own robot monkey? Purportedly designed by robotics physicists from NASA, Robosapien can walk, pick up items, throw things and even perform a little Kung Fu. Sure, ultimately, he’s a little useless, but you’ve got admire the fact that we live in a world where a hundred bucks buys you your own robot monkey. God bless America.

For the Spider-Man fan on your list, well, it’s a bounty of riches this Christmas season. For the purist, you can’t go wrong with 40 YEARS OF THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN from Topic Entertainment, a digital archive that offers all 500 issues of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN on 11 CD-ROM discs.

Movie Poop Chief Chris Ryall covered this in some depth in his column a few weeks back, so I won’t belabor the details save for several points of agreement. While reading comics on your computer is never going to be as intuitive and convenient as actual, printed books, the sheer amount of historical material included here, including covers, letters pages and even the original ads, makes this an incredible bargain, with over 11,000 pages of comics coming in at about the price of a new video game.

For the more hands-on Spidey fan, the SPIDER-MAN 2 video game is a must-have, combining the amazing action and graphics from the previous game with the ability to roam freely throughout the entire island of Manhattan.

Think of it as “Grand Theft Spidey.” Sure, there’s a plot here to deal with, but it’s more fun to simply explore the city, webslinging low to spot street crimes and take them out, or leaping high above the streets and climbing the tips of the highest skyscrapers. And believe me, the view from the top of the Empire State Building is gorgeous. SPIDER-MAN 2 is available for XBOX, PlayStation 2 and GameCube.

Finally, for those who prefer their Spider-Man “old-school,” there’s SPIDER-MAN: THE ’67 COLLECTION, a six-disc DVD box set that contains the entire production run of the 1967 SPIDER-MAN animated series from Grantray-Lawrence.

The digitally restored episodes look sharper and clearer than ever before, although the set is shockingly free of any sort of extras or special features. Still, with over 52 episodes, you’re getting your money’s worth, particularly if you order through Amazon or one of the other online DVD discounters, where you can pick the set up for about 45 bucks. And come on – it’s got the best cartoon theme song ever written.

Got any friends who still believe in psychics? Or alien abductions? Even the value of bottled water? Well, you can shatter their belief system (but in a good way) with the DVD box set of the first season of the Showtime original series PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT!

In these 13 episodes, the infamous magicians go after the bullshit artists of the world with a vengeance, expertly exposing the half-truths, exaggerations and outright lies used by all kinds of people (and corporations) to separate you from your money. Penn Jillette explains the show’s title and goals perfectly in the very first episode:

“I'm Penn, this is my partner Teller and this is "Bullshit!" That's the name of our show. We're gonna hunt down as many purveyors of bullshit as we can. Sure, we lie, cheat and swindle. We've been known to deal a bit of bullshit ourselves, so some of you may ask: why pee on someone else's parade? One important difference – we tell you we're lying. You'll notice more obscenity than we usually use. That's not just because it's on Showtime and we wanna get attention. It's also a legal matter. If one calls people liars and quacks, one can be sued and lose a lot of one's money. But motherfuckers and assholes - it's pretty safe. If we said it's all scams, we could also be in trouble. But bullshit, oddly, is safe. So forgive all the bullshit language. We're trying to talk about the truth without spending the rest of our lives in court because of litigious motherfuckers.”

Particularly powerful is Penn Jillette’s visible anger over the methods used by TV “psychics” like John Edward and James Van Pragh to “talk to the dead,” who take advantage of people in their weakest moments, capitalizing on their grief and loss. But don’t think you’re only gonna get preached at – PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT!, despite trying to make some very serious points, is a damn funny show.

Finally, I’m going to do something I’ve never done in this column before: I’m going to shill my own work. For any classic animation fans on your shopping list, check out THE HANNA-BARBERA COLLECTION from Toynami, a series of fantastically detailed action figures based on Hanna-Barbara’s beloved adventure cartoons from the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s.

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Available are Birdman and his sidekick Avenger, the Blue Falcon and Dynomutt, Thundarr the Barbarian & company and the Herculoids. Each action figure is fully articulated and includes all kinds of accessories and action features. Working on these represents about a year and a half of my life, and I’m awfully proud of ‘em. But don’t just listen to me. Take it from the folks who know toys, the editors of Wizard’s TOYFARE MAGAZINE, who recently named Toynami’s Hanna-Barbera Collection “the Best Cartoon Toy Line Ever.” You can order any of the toys from the good folks at Toynk.com. (And just so that our beloved Chief doesn’t feel left out, why not head over to IDW Publishing’s online store and check out some of the fine comics that Mr. Ryall is currently laboring to create?)

To everyone reading this, my best wishes for a merry Christmas. It means a lot that you all have stuck around with me for another year; I appreciate it. Cheers.

Scott Tipton still vividly remembers the year that Batman’s Wayne Foundation skyscraper from Mego showed up Christmas morning. Now that was a Christmas. Thanks to the Poop’s own Scott Bowden and Carr D’Angelo at Earth-2 Comics for gift suggestions. If you have any questions about comics, send them our way, at stipton99x@comics101.com.

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