This week, Marvel Studios unleashed its most terrifying, spine-tingling, bone-chilling trailer yet: a teaser for the Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special that was released days before Halloween.
It seems the eternal creep toward an earlier and earlier Christmas and holiday season is even happening in the Marvel Universe. And weirdly enough, in Marvel Comics, there might actually be a reason for that.
Because in the Marvel Universe - the core, mainstream, Earth-616 Marvel Universe - Santa Claus is a real person, and what's more, he's one of the most powerful mutants ever identified.
You know ... mutant, as in the X-Men.
Seriously.
As you can imagine, with over 60 years of stories under its belt, Marvel Comics has featured Santa in more than a few Holiday tales over the years - it's hard to name a piece of ongoing fiction that hasn't at least used the symbolism of Father Christmas at some point.
Over those six decades, Marvel's Santa has teamed up with everyone from the Invaders to fight against Adolf Hitler ... (we're going to give you a second on that one) ... to Deadpool, Howard the Duck, Spider-Man, Captain Marvel, and more.
But as you may also imagine, Santa comes across a little differently in a world of reality-altering cosmic beings and all-powerful superheroes, and as such, there have been a few different supernatural origins told for Marvel's Santa - including a connection to Odin, or a magical being brought into existence by the power of goodwill.
But 1991's Marvel Holiday Special one-shot comic offered another explanation, that's the one we're going with here not only because it's, well, quite a lot of fun, but also because it's been referenced a few times since.
In the Holiday Special one-shot, Professor X's mutant locating device Cerebro detects, to that date, the "most powerful" mutant ever sensed by the machine, meaning at least an Omega Level Mutant. At the same time, Professor X and the X-Men learn that the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants have also discovered the new, extremely powerful mutant signal - only for both teams to arrive and realize they've stumbled on the actual Santa Claus, and he's a mutant.
The story ends with a charming resolution, and, of course, Santa wins everyone over with the power of kindness and a little bit of Christmas snow.
But the end result is that Santa Claus is now officially a mutant in the Marvel Universe, whose powers are apparently near incalculable and enable him to perform all the feats of Christmas magic he's known for.
Will the MCU adopt a mutant Santa Claus as an ongoing concept starting with the Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special? Probably not.
But for now, we'll comfort ourselves with the thought that the ongoing push of Christmas to overtake Halloween in retail aisles and media outlets earlier and earlier just might be a manifestation of Santa's mutant power.
Santa Claus may not show up on Krakoa anytime soon, but there's a whole sackful of new X-Men comics on the way in 2022 and beyond.
