The Guardians of the Galaxy: Holiday Special

 "I'm sorry! GoBots killed his cousin!"

This is one of the finest Christmas sitcom episodes- for that is what this is- that I've ever seen. It's superb. And not only for the fact that the eponymous Kevin Bacon is seen watching Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. I like the bloke already, even if he is one of those disgusting actor folk.

The plot may be cheesy- Mantis and Drax feel sorry for Peter Quill at Christmas so they, er, kidnap Kevin Bacon, much hilarity ensues, and Mantis finally tells Peter that she's his sisater. Aww. Heartwarming. Yet the whole thing is gleefully silly, does a lot of violence to the fourth wall, and gets its humour from its well-crafted funny characters. Drax we know well, but Mantis is really fleshed out here, and she's bloody likeable.Kevin Bacon is, of course, awesome, but not as awesome as Mantis and Drax getting rat-arsed from their cosplay money in Hollywood.

Yes, the dodgy ethics of just kidnapping a Hollywood star and, you know, assaulting a few police officers is handwaved away, but why not? That's the tone.

That song about Christmas at the start is a highlight- that Santa Claus chap sounds terrifying. So is "this is human trafficking". But the whole thing is awesome. This is the greatest science fiction holiday special since 1978, despite the lack of Wookies. Plus, Groot as a Christmas tree is a perfect ending.

Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

"I don't believe that anybody could be 100% dick..."

I'm an old-fashioned Marvel geek in that I bought a ridiculous number of titles up until around 1994, when most of my favourite runs were winding down, Mark Gruenwald died and I started building up my record collection, which left less budgetary room for comic books. I know an awful lot about Marvel up to that point (I had a lot of back issues going way back) but I'm patchy thereafter. I do, however, remember Jim Valentino's run on Guardians of the Galaxy, a title set a thousand years on the future and with characters called things like Vance Astro and Charlie 27. This film isn't based on any of that, but a load of Marvel's cosmic characters, many of them associated with the great Jim Starlin.

We have fanwanky Marvel goodness aplenty. There is Drax the Destroyer, Rocket Raccoon(!), Ronan the Accuser, Thanos(!), a strange cyborg version of Nebula who hears no relation to the character as written by Roger Stern in The Avengers back in the mid-'80s, the Collector, the best Stan Lee cameo yet and even footage of a Celestial!

But this isn't a po-faced epic film; it's  witty, fun action film full of funny and charismatic rogues turned heroes, a cross between Star Wars and Firefly. Chris Pratt stars as Peter, a transplanted human with mysterious parentage and the Han Solo of the film. Karen Gillan disappoints vaguely as Nebula. But the best thing in it is Bradley Cooper's Rocket.

This is a superbly plotted and scripted sci-go action film with wit, action, top tuneage (we get Bowie's "Moonage Daydream" and the Runaways' "Cherry Bomb"!) and an amazingly realised space opera world with some of the best CGI I've ever seen. If you haven't seen it, do so now. It'll be on at cinemas for a good while. 

Oh, and remember, this is a Marvel film. Stay to the end.