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MAD Magazine Ending After 67 Years

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When I was 12 years old, living on an Army post in Germany, my best friend and I started a Mad Magazine fan club. We had a big trunk full of Mad Magazines.
 
I remember on a talk show,where the editor (Bill Gaines?)
was saying that there was a subscriber in South America,who didn't
renew his subscription,so the flew ALL the staff there,to ask just why
he didn't.
 
I subscribed back in the 60s and had quite the collection.
I did look at recent issues and, well, it didn't work for me at all (perhaps due to so many changes in cultural references).
 
Boink said:
I subscribed back in the 60s and had quite the collection.
I did look at recent issues and, well, it didn't work for me at all (perhaps due to so many changes in cultural references).
Click to expand...

I can't say I've seen the magazine since I was 12 or 13, but back then, I just enjoyed the heck out of it. From the few bits I've seen posted around the internet from today's MAD I sense it leans in a different direction than I do as an adult; but when I was a kid, I just enjoyed the silly humor. I especially enjoyed Spy v Spy and those characters with the long faces and big floppy shoes.
 
Print magazines as a whole seem to be struggling to retain subscribers. I got a renewal request the other day for one, couldn't refuse as it was literally a $5 for the year offer. I've gotten other offers for things that didn't interest me that would only buy a couple issues from a bookstore. Can't possibly cover costs being so low.
 
mikephillips said:
Print magazines as a whole seem to be struggling to retain subscribers. I got a renewal request the other day for one, couldn't refuse as it was literally a $5 for the year offer. I've gotten other offers for things that didn't interest me that would only buy a couple issues from a bookstore. Can't possibly cover costs being so low.
Click to expand...

Both my wife and I have just received notice of publications that are ceasing print... and subscriptions are transferred to other mags. I really do like receiving magazines (not a lot, but key ones). Like newspapers, probably a sign of the times, and the future.
 
Basil said:
I can't say I've seen the magazine since I was 12 or 13, but back then, I just enjoyed the heck out of it. From the few bits I've seen posted around the internet from today's MAD I sense it leans in a different direction than I do as an adult; but when I was a kid, I just enjoyed the silly humor. I especially enjoyed Spy v Spy and those characters with the long faces and big floppy shoes.
Click to expand...

As for the "long faces and big floppy shoes"... that was Don Martin, and I think he was easily the best cartoonist from MAD. There's even an entire Facebook group for him. He passed away some time ago, but those classic sure live on.
 
Boink said:
As for the "long faces and big floppy shoes"... that was Don Martin, and I think he was easily the best cartoonist from MAD. There's even an entire Facebook group for him. He passed away some time ago, but those classic sure live on.
Click to expand...

I have no idea why, but one of those floppy shoe cartoons that particularly sticks in my mind, even after all these years, was: Floppy Shoe guy is in the restroom and washes his hands. He walks over to the towel dispenser which has a sign that says: "Pull Down, Tear Up." In the next frame, the paper towel dispenser in on the floor in a hundred pieces. (He pulled it down and tore it up). I don't know why but that is one specific such cartoon that I remember. I guess at the time, as a 12 year old, I thought it was hilarious.
 
Basil said:
I have no idea why, but one of those floppy shoe cartoons that particularly sticks in my mind, even after all these years, was: Floppy Shoe guy is in the restroom and washes his hands. He walks over to the towel dispenser which has a sign that says: "Pull Down, Tear Up." In the next frame, the paper towel dispenser in on the floor in a hundred pieces. (He pulled it down and tore it up). I don't know why but that is one specific such cartoon that I remember. I guess at the time, as a 12 year old, I thought it was hilarious.
Click to expand...

It's one of his most famous panels! This isn't the original, but it's a remake (I think):

tear up.jpg
 
I also really enjoyed their paperback -
"Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions".
 
There was an entire series of Don Martin books called "Captain Klutz"... loved that stuff.

Yes, going back to the early stuff seemed filled with some clever material. Sergio Arrogones, Don Martin, Al Jaffe, Mort Drucker. Great guys.
 
There's another one I couldn't find (from Don Martin).
A guy is on a diving board... leaps off it for the big dive... realizes he's still wearing his watch (while in the air)… panics... frantically removes the watch while coming down and tosses it just in time (before hitting water)… watch lands on the ground next to the pool... and an guy in a lawnmower immediately runs over it and grinds it up.
 
Red it at about the same age, 10-12, remember Spy v. Spy, cartoon spoofs of movies, lyric spoofs of contemporary songs, Alfred E. Neumann. I also didn't realize it was still around, haven't seen one in many years.

RE: The demise of print magazines. I used to read Road & Track and Car and Driver from cover to cover, now I have to push myself to power through the parts that interest me and catch up on the reading. It seems they are 80% SUVs and superexotics I will never own. The one I did read from cover to cover, Hemmings Sports and Exotic, they dropped.

"Time" which I used to read for in depth coverage of issues, is a shadow of it's former self too.
 
I predict that in a few years nobody will recognize "What, me worry?" :(
 
Love that graphic.

[I suspect many won't know that original reference either!]
 
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