![]() ![]() ![]() Alternatively, Jaffee produced several original collections of popular strips which are easily found and affordable. Even if your answers were not that great, they’ve got to be better than Homer Simpson’s.Ĭheck out Doug Gilford’s Mad Cover Site to find out which issues of Mad Magazine contained Jaffee’s Snappy Answers To Stupid Questions. For many would-be comedians, I like to think that the strip helped refine their zingers. Here, readers could come up with their own snappy answers. Jaffee would open the strip to audience participation by including a blank dialogue space. In return, a character would respond with a range of sarcastic answers. This single-panel strip would set up a scenario where someone would ask a question so stupid that it should be obvious. Snappy Answers To Stupid QuestionsĪfter the fold-in, Snappy Answers To Stupid Questions is Jaffee’s next famous contribution to Mad Magazine. Snappy Answers To Stupid Questions panel from Mad Magazine #486 by Al Jaffee. Alternatively, some of Jaffe’s fold-in have been collected in books such as 1997’s Mad: Fold This Book and The Mad Fold-In Collection: 1964-2010 box set. This should help inform which back issues you should track down. Want to read some of Al Jaffee’s fold-ins? You can find out which ones Jaffee did with the excellent Doug Gilford’s Mad Cover Site. It’s better to make a comment about the world around us.” When asked by Vulture about the political slant to the fold-ins, he said “…sometimes it became an outlet. It would become an outlet for political statements about politicians (Richard Nixon was targeted multiple times) or serious topics like the Vietnam War or gun control. Sometimes these would be light things, like sports. Jaffee would often use these fold-ins to comment on hundreds of topics. While it wasn’t well received by editors at the time, it has since gone on to be one of the defining factors of Mad Magazine. With that in mind, Jaffee’s idea was to invert the concept. ![]() The fold-in was inspired by the fold-out pages that had become popular in many magazines by 1964 – especially the famous Playboy Centrefold. When the reader folded the image, with the first third and the last third joining at the borders, it would create a brand new image (made up of existing elements) that was also the punchline. For those unfamiliar, It would feature a scene accompanied by some text down the bottom. However, he’s best known for the fold-ins on the inside back cover. Mad Magazine Fold-InsĪs I mentioned, Jaffee did all kinds of cartooning for Mad Magazine. It became so synonymous with Mad Magazine that it would be hard to imagine the magazine without it.īelow is a small selection of Al Jaffee’s work from throughout the decades to give you a better understanding.Ĭover art for Mad: Fold This Book by Al Jaffee. Jaffee created the feature and crafted hundreds of them over decades. This is most evident in the fold-ins, which require the reader to fold the back cover to reveal a punchline. The legendary cartoonist also used the physicality of the magazine as part of his work. Jaffee used each style to adapt to the strip, best serving the theme of the comic or gag. Other times, his work was fully painted, applying more depth and colour range. Sometimes he implemented rougher strokes, such as in the Hawks and Doves strips. While he preferred rounded lines and shapes, he implemented that through many different aesthetics and tools. Jaffee didn’t stick to one visual style during his long tenure at Mad Magazine. This also gave him the world record for longest career for a cartoonist. He contributed to the legendary magazine, with sharp satire and wit, from 1955 all the way up until 2020, when he retired at the age of 99. However, Jaffee is most famous for his long tenure on Mad Magazine, becoming what they affectionally refer to themselves as the Usual Gang of Idiots. From there, he bounced around to several humour comics for Timely Comics (now known as Marvel Comics) and others. Mad’s The Vastly Overrated Al Jaffee cover by Al Jaffee.Īl Jaffee began his cartooning career in 1941 when the legendary Will Eisner gave him a chance in the pages of Military Comics. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |