Welp, that wraps up another holiday season. (Pun intended.) I sincerely hope that the last week was at least pleasant for all of you. Everyone deserves a nice Christmas. (Or whatever it is you personally celebrate.)
Welcome to the annual Christmas Fallout post, where I share the bounty of goodies that I've been blessed with this December by my loved ones. You're all also free to join in via the comments, of course. We're inching toward 2024's finale, so let's see if we can't squeeze out one last little bit of holiday goodness. On to the booty!
Starting off with the stocking filling, in addition to a generous supply of sweet treats (which include Hershey's Kisses, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, M&Ms Minis, Nerds of all kinds, a buildable Hershey's Chocolate Santa, and a plastic candy cane filled with gummy Krabby Patties), I also received 20 bucks of eShop cash to spend however I wish. (I used it to score DLC for one of the games mentioned in the next section, as well as a temporarily discounted Persona 4 Golden. This'll be my first time playing any version of P4, so I'm excited to finally see what all the hubbub's about.)
This year's gaming haul promises to keep me busy for quite a while. On top of my FAVORITE RPG SERIES EVER returning this year, 2024 also saw Shadow raising Sonic Generations to new heights with his own solo campaign, Mario Party's latest (and supposedly greatest) shindig, Nintendo's two biggest leading ladies embarking on adventures of their own, a comprehensive collection of Marvel vs. Capcom's greatest hits, a GOTY-winning full-length sequel to probably the greatest free pack-in game ever, and the Mutant Mayhem Turtles taking to the streets in their very first video game outing. Just those first two alone are sure to keep me smiling well into spring, so I'm really excited to start digging into everything.
On to a little DVD and Blu-ray action, Viz actually released more than one Pokémon set this year, so I was able to add two-thirds of the Kalos arc to my shelf all at once. (Should make for very appropriate 2025 entertainment, what with the region returning in Legends form next year.) Joining those is the final Sgt. Frog collection from Discotek, promising 153 MORE EPISODES (!) of procrastinating space frog fun. (Kululu also FINALLY got his spotlight on the spine of this one, meaning that Dororo can't even catch a break on Blu-ray packaging. 😂)
Moving on to some new reading material, my annual IDW Sonic fix is a bit lighter this year, but these two trades are still packed with plenty of Hedgehog-flavored goodness, including Sonic's 900th English comic adventure overall, a "beach episode" co-starring the Babylon Rogues, a Chaotix Halloween treat, as well as a handful of smaller stories either serving as fun one-offs or as setup for the next major arc of the book. (Which you'll likely see here next Christmas.)
Keeping the licensed comic train a-going, these two hardcovers finish off the "Mighty Morphin/Power Rangers" era of the Boom MMPR comics, alongside Ryan Parrott's tenure as the book's main writer. Only two arcs remain uncollected in Deluxe Edition form, so we're heading toward this universe's climax! (Hopefully, Prime lasts long enough to receive its own collections like these. I need all the new Power Rangers fiction that I can get.)
Topping off this year's reading pile is this beautiful hardcover collection of Marvel and DC's classic crossovers. Given how both companies are these days, I NEVER thought that they'd collaborate on anything EVER again, but I'm VERY happy to be proven wrong. Now I can finally add these legendary team-ups to my shelf and read them all for the first time. (I'm especially interested in checking out the two times that Bats and Spidey crossed paths.)
My family also surprised me with some TMNT goodies! First off, a couple new faces for my growing NECA figure collection: Bebop and Rocksteady in their delightfully silly vacation outfits from the episode, "Napoleon Bonafrog: Colossus of the Swamps." These guys are actually the very first Bop and Rock that I've gotten from any of NECA's Turtles lines, so it's very fitting to finally add them to the shelf in such a unique way.
I was also gifted a set of Funko's adorably tiny Bitty POPs. They're like what would happen if you shrank the regular TMNT POPs down to the size of a quarter, and they can even be removed from their tiny plastic boxes! The only thing that I'm not super crazy about with them is that this Collector Pack only includes the "common" rarity figures from the overall set, meaning that you awkwardly have three out of four 8-bit Turtles and Rocksteady without Bebop (not to mention no Leatherhead). Still, they're pretty fun little things and will make for a cool display regardless.
My sister's family also treated me very well. They not only added to my reading pile with the latest Gravity Falls book exploring the innermost thoughts of professional weirdo, Bill Cipher, but also contributed to my gaming backlog with a sandbox adventure starring everyone's favorite incredibly dense starfish. I look forward to diving (literally, in Patrick's case) into both eventually.
That wraps up 2024! Thank you all so much for reading, and I'll see you in 2025!
