Plop! #10: "The Secret Origin of Grooble Man!"

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A man who has turned doodling into fine art, and a very profitable art as well, Sergio Aragonés first came to prominence in the early 1960s through the pages of Mad. Or rather in the margins of those pages, where his tiny doodled figures were to be seen circumnavigating the page in such a lively way that they often seemed much funnier than the material they were framing. Aragonés soon moved up from the marginal notes and in the early 1980s created Groo.

Born in Spain and raised in Mexico, he migrated to America in 1962. "When I found out how much cartoonists made in the United States," he has explained, "that was that." He was soon gainfully employed employed at Mad. By 1967 Aragonés had added DC to his client list. Besides being a frequent contributor to Plop, he had a hand in scripting Angel and the Ape and Bat Lash.

An outgoing and amusing fellow, one who studied mime as well as architecture in school, he's also had a show-biz career, having appeared, for example, on television in the final season of Laugh-In.

In addition to the long-lasting barbarian spoof, Groo, which is scripted by his friend Mark Evanier, Aragonés has in recent years turned out a variety of other projects. One such, put forth in 1999, was Fan Boy. Written by Evanier, the miniseries kidded a typical obsessive comics fan and had Aragonés working in tandem with such serious artists as Gil Kane, Dick Sprang, and Mike Grell. Mad editor Nick Meglin has said of Aragonés, "He never loses sight of the fact that he is a humorist, an attitude that, perhaps more than any other single fact, is responsible for his great success."








Special surprise bonus : a rarely seen Groo the Wanderer story by Sergio Aragonés:






A spoof of Conan and all similarly inclined comic-book barbarians, Groo the Wanderer, who looked as though he might have stepped out of the pages of Mad, began his sword-wielding career late in 1982 in a twelve-issue run from Pacific Comics. The pudgy barbarian stayed longest with Marvel. From 1985 to 1995 there were 120 Marvel issues of Groo the Wanderer. Since then both Image and Dark Horse have published miniseries. Artwork by the highly productive doodler Sergio Aragonés, scripts by Mark Evanier.


Credits

Script: Sergio Aragones (co-plot) and Mark Evanier (co-plot & dialogue)
Pencils: Sergio Aragones
Inks: Sergio Aragones
Colors: Tom Luth
Letters: Stan Sakai

Reprinted:

• in Groo Chronicles, The (Marvel, 1989 series) #2
  

Doc Stearn...Mr. Monster #3: "Case of the Recalcitrant Refuse"

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Mr. Monster chronicles the adventures of Doc Stearn, a man who tangles with any and every type of occult menace. Michael T. Gilbert is responsible for the art and usually the story, too, but Alan Moore guest writes this issue and a Steve Bissette cover rounds out the entire magazine.

"Now... let's get out there and blast those subhuman vermin to bloody gobbets!"

Case of the Recalcitrant Refuse
Script: Alan Moore
Pencils: Michael T Gilbert
Inks: Michael T Gilbert and William F Loebs



















Basil Wolverton is one of the few comic book artists whose work can legitimately be called unique. Although he created such serious adventure features as Spacehawk, he's best remembered for such non-serious and nonsensical inventions as Powerhouse Pepper, Mystic Moot and his Magic Snoot, and the grotesqueries he later drew for Mad and Plop!

One of the major appeals of Wolverton's space opera was the artwork. He was very good at gadgets, especially the kind that require lots of nuts and bolts. His spaceships had the bulk and feel of ocean liners, the control rooms were as cluttered with pipes and dials as an apartment-house basement.


Swamp Monster
Script: Basil Wolverton
Pencils and inks: Basil Wolverton

Reprinted:

• from Weird Mysteries (Key Publications, 1952 series) #5.

• in Doc Stearn...Mr. Monster (Eclipse, 1985 series) #3.
• in Tales Too Terrible to Tell (New England Comic Press Inc, 1989 series) #9.
• in Four Color Fear (Fantagraphics, 2010 series) #[nn].

Mad #11: "Flesh Garden!"

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In the company of Dale Arden, Flash Gordon embarked for the planet Mongo in 1934. That was in the Sunday funnies in a page drawn by Alex Raymond and written anonymously by former pulp-fiction editor Don Moore. This space opera became one of King Features Syndicate's most popular features, and Raymond's illustrative art was to have a strong influence on many of the young artists who began drawing for comic books in the late 1930s and the early 1940s—Tom Hickey, Sheldon Moldoff, Jack Lehti, George Papp, Mac Raboy, Dan Barry, etc.

Flash Gordon entered comic books early in 1936 by way of reprints in King Comics. His battles with the merciless Ming, a sort of galactic Fu Manchu, unfolded in the magazine from the first issue.

In the early 1940s Dell began issuing now and then Flash Gordon reprint titles. Later in the decade came an occasional comic-book offering Flash adventures "especially written and drawn for this magazine." The artist was Paul Norris, who also began drawing the Jungle Jim newspaper page in 1948.

Harvey Publications tried reprinting the Raymond material in 1950 and 1951, giving up after a few issues. King Features experimented with publishing comic books in the late 1960s. These used original material, and the Flash Gordon book made use of such artists as Al Williamson, a devoted Raymond disciple, Gil Kane, and Reed Crandall. When King quit, Charlton took over and finally Gold Key. The final Flash Gordon comic book was printed in 1982. He reappeared briefly in 1987 as part of a team that included Mandrake and the Phantom in the TV-inspired Defenders of the Earth.

Harvey Kurtzman and Wally Wood spoof Flash Gordon below.


Credits

Cover art: Basil Wolverton
Script: Harvey Kurtzman
Pencils: Wally Wood
Inks: Wally Wood
Colors: Marie Severin

Reprinted:

• in Mad Reader, The (Ballantine Books, 1954 series) #93
• in Mad About the Fifties (Little, Brown & Co., 1997 series) #[nn]
• Tales Calculated to Drive You Mad (EC, 1997 series) #4
  

Below is Frank Brunner's curious spoof from Unknown World of Science Fiction #1: