Reviews for Utterly Mad: Mad Reader, Volume 4

The average rating for Utterly Mad: Mad Reader, Volume 4 based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-11-06 00:00:00 Kendal Dittmer What a gas from the past! When I was a little kid I, like most kids, loved comics - not just superhero comics, but Sunday funnies, single panel cartoons, Edward Gorey, Gahan Wilson, etc. etc. Heck, I even had a collection of single-panel cartoons from PUNCH magazine (notorious in my memory because it had a few naked ladies in it!) I loved studying the drawings and made many unsuccessful attempts to learn to draw. One of those things that I think any smart alec kid who liked comics went through in their youth was a MAD MAGAZINE phase - in my case, I was visiting my Grandmother in Brooklyn in the late 70s, with only the local library to keep me occupied outside of television. Luckily, said library had quite a nice current collection of MAD MAGAZINES and I soon learned the sarcastic ins and outs of "snappy answers to stupid questions, "shut ups", Spy vs. Spy, marginalia and all the rest. I would also occasionally run across some of the many MAD PAPERBACKS that were available at the time (I remember a Don Martin one had me in stitches for a whole weekend). But when I picked up this one at a flea market, I was instantly struck by how different it was. The comedy was less quippy and popular-culture referencing. The art - my God the art was incredible - so detailed and FUNNY! Later I would realize that this was material from MAD'S early heyday - the EC years - but at the time I studied it closely. Not all of it worked for me - some of the parodies and references meant almost nothing to me at the time - but some of it was just amazing. In particular BOOK! MOVIE!, FRANK N. STEIN, G.I. SCHMOE, THE RAVEN and especially SUPERMARKETS really rocked my young world. Reading it again, I'm amazed at how certain jokes lodged in my memory ("I gave you life, boy!"or "Blood (pant), the ceiling (pant), the walls (pant), the floor (pant), my suit (pant), my pant (suit), my coat (tie)...BLOOD!"), how sexy some of the women were and, still, how funny SUPERMARKETS is because instead of being a parody, I intrinsically understood that I was reading about something being made fun of when it was new but by the time I was reading it had now become a part of everyone's life. Also, a lot of the comics in here are quite good illustrations of how to handle comic timing when presenting cartoon humor. A very funny collection. With an adult's knowledge, I especially appreciated the jabs at LITTLE ORPHAN ANNIE'S fiscal concerns!

Review # 2 was written on 2020-03-28 00:00:00 Ronald Chin The MAD version of Frankenstein was great, but the other stories included show how the magazine was still trying to find its footing. It's probably a matter of taste though.