Customer Reviews

Mad Archives: Volume 2 (Archive Editions)

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Well, at long last...Volume Two !!!
The Mad Archives: Volume 2. This One contains Issues 7 thro 12 of Mad Magazine. Almost everything here was written by the Creator of this American Instution of Lampoons: Harvey Kurtzman. The Artists featured are Bill Elder, Jack Davis, Basil Wolverton, John Severin and The Great: Wally Wood.

For me, Mad really hits it's stride here with Great Spoofs on Comic Books: "Bat Boy & Rubin", "Starchie", Newspaper Strips: "Little Orphan Melvin", "Flesh Garden", Movies: "From Eternity Back To Here", "Sane", and TV Shows: "Dragged Net", and even a Stab into the Heart of Edgar Allan Poe, with: "The Raven".

Born into the EC Comics Company run By Bill Gaines, Mad was the only Comic Book Title to Survive the great Comic Book Witch-Hunt of 1953, when Senate hearings labeled Gaines', Horror Comics as corrupting America's Youth and he had to cancel all of them.

But, Bill Gaines had a Winner on his Hands with "Mad", and an Publishing Empire was Built around this Little Comic Book. The Influence of Mad Magazine is HUGE, and along with: "Playboy" it is considered One of The Fore-Runners of Sixties Pop Culture that would change the way America viewed her Values & Morals. Sex and Humor got us out of The Nuclear Cold-War Years and everything was about to be very Different.

Right here in these pages, it is Hard not to Laugh at loud at: "Woman Wonder" and "the Lone Stranger". These Stories hold up as American Folk-Tales more than Fifty Years on, the Art is too Good to be believed. from those Weird Creatures of Basil Wolverton: "The Mad Reader" to the Sexy Broads, drawn by the Fantastic, Wally Wood in "Flesh Garden", this is a Feast for the Eyes.

Again, this is The Comic Book that CHANGED America, and let us Laugh at ourselves....My Highest Recommendation.
Let's hope we don't have to wait another ten years, for Volume Three !!!

As soon as i received Vol 1 of Mad Archives and went through it , I immediately ordered Vol 2, the reason being the first edition of Vol 1 was out of print and I had to wait 12 ( that's TWELVE ) whole months to receive the second edition. Both volumes are a comic lovers delight, especially from a historical perspective. The artwork and coloring is so fresh and eye catching; good job of restoration, not to mention the layout and binding... all for only USD50. Will definitely become a collectors item very soon, if it hasn't already. What you waiting for? GO FOR IT !

If you're reading this review, then you're probably already a MAD fan and are wondering if you should buy this book. If so, then rest assured that if you do, you won't be disappointed. Contained within these pages is a priceless slice of comic book history from the 1950s when a humor magazine that took the mickey out of other popular titles was a novelty and when legends like Bill Elder, Jack Davis and Harvey Kurtzman cut their teeth and in the process, forged the template for hundreds of followers in the decades since. The best part of this vol (and Vol 1) is that you can re-read the stories again and again and still find something funny you'd have missed in previous readings. The humor is straightforward funny - whacky, zany and maybe even slapstick at times. But I'm sure that almost every MAD fan will find them all entertaining. Well worth the investment.

Sure, I read New Yorker and with a Martini in my hand can picture myself in John Cheever's 50s. I've read Time. I learned to read, and ended up employed for a while as a television programmer, because of TV Guide. In terms of cultural significance, they are all piffles next this giant mountain of cultural commentary.

The issues in this volume are where its original creative team caught their wind and set sail for the very heart of satire and deconstruction. The earlier volume is great, but this one is a molotov cocktail handed to the young and open-minded of post-war America to assault complacency. The roots of nearly anything great the baby-boomers did (the Beatles read Beano, Zimmy read this) lie here.

The greatest comic ever made in a fabulous reprint. Can't wait for vol. 3. Mad rules!!!

I collect Mad mags now and then, but the earliest issues are too expensive for my tastes. With these mad archives, you get an experience pretty close to if you had purchased the original collectible issues for a fraction of the price. Can't beat 'em...

No really, I don't. I've been reading Mad Magazine since I was a little kid, I keep buying every issue thinking this is the one that will finally be funny. One of these days I'm gonna stop buying this stupid trash. Oh well.