Merry Christmas, Roseville!

Merry Christmas, Roseville!
Published	November 18, 2019 (2019-11-18)
Page count	12
Major characters	Mike, David
Minor characters	Paulo
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Merry Christmas, Roseville! is a non-canon Bittersweet Club International-exclusive holiday comic, a twelve-page what-if in the mold of It’s a Wonderful Life, in which David appoints himself Mike’s guardian angel and sets out to prove that somebody, somewhere, would miss him.

Partial synopsis

Mike stands alone at the railing of a snow-covered bridge above the dark water. David soon appears, crouching on the railing beside him and announcing that he will jump in so Mike can rescue him. Mike rejects the plan. He says he does not want to die, but adds, “It’d .. just be nice not to live anymore.”

David asks why Mike feels that way and introduces himself as Clarence, Mike’s guardian angel. Mike answers that Lucy hates him, Sandy won’t talk to him, he has pushed everyone away, and nobody would miss him. David insists that isn’t true and says he can prove it. With a sunny smile, he tells Mike, “You were never born.” He then leads a dumbfounded Mike off the bridge to tour a Roseville in which Mike was never born. David expects the job to earn him his wings.

Armed with a “divine map”, David leads Mike toward the first familiar name on it, confident that this stop will prove his point. The tour has other plans for him. The people Mike left behind turn out to be doing remarkably well for themselves, and David keeps having to explain why each stop doesn’t count. He remains convinced the next name on the map will be the one that misses Mike. There are a lot of names still to go...

Character dynamics

The guardian angel arrives, ready to stage his own emergency.

• Mike and David: Mike meets David’s questions with disbelief, snapping an incredulous “Why would you even care?!” David presses on by naming himself Mike’s guardian angel. He borrows Clarence’s name and expects the job to earn him his wings.

Trivia & observations

• The comic parodies It’s a Wonderful Life. David calls himself Clarence, shows Mike a world in which he was never born, and expects the job to earn him his wings. The launch newspost made the comparison explicit. “It’s supposed to be a wonderful life, but maybe it isn’t if you’re Mike.”
• The story launched alongside other holiday features. The site adopted a “nondenominationally festive” redesign, and Patreon backers who joined before December 23, 2019 were mailed a specially painted greeting card.

Related chapters

• Witch Hunt: In this Halloween chapter, Sandy stopped replying to Mike’s texts, and a phone call ended with the unexplained “I know I haven’t been good to you”. The rest of the group later walked away from him. These events provide the immediate background for Sandy’s silence and Mike’s claim that he has pushed everyone away.
• Love Again: Lucy attempts suicide in the main continuity after deciding that everything would be better without her. She jumps from the roof of the old furniture place. Here, Mike likewise stands alone above a drop in falling snow and says that nobody would miss him.