Today it's artist Gilbert Shelton and a page from his 60's masterpiece, Wonder Wart-Hog. Yes, that's "Wonder Wart-Hog." Here, the Hog of Steel is on a mission that involves a crushing special delivery to a villain named Pie-Man and a visit to LBJ, or, for the younguns out there, Lyndon Baines Johnson, for what promises to be an interesting chat with the then President of the USA.
Wonder-Wart Hog was a superhero parody that appeared in Drag Cartoons
and two glorious issues of his own magazine back in the day. Shelton, a
contemporary of R. Crumb and the underground comics, was also the
creator of The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, Fat Freddy's Cat and per
Wikipedia he was one of the co-founders of Rip-Off Press, an early
underground publisher.
For what it's worth, I thought Shelton was one of the most genuinely funny cartoonists of that era. Humor is relative, of course, but I can remember issues of WWH and the Freak Brothers that l had me laughing so hard I was gasping for breath. Beyond that, I can't tell you how subversive this stuff was to a young comic book fan. Wonder Wart-Hog was definitely one of the milder titles to come out in that era, since it was published by Millar Publications for a broad newsstand audience. But if you want to talk gateway drugs, it was this book that led me to the serious, mostly "adults only" undergrounds like Zap, Insect Fear, Legion of Charlies and many many others that completely scoured my young mind.
Those books could be
ultra-violent, nasty, utterly fearless and unfortunately were sometimes
sexist as hell, but they were definitely an antidote to the more anodyne
books from Marvel and DC. For me, the route to always doubting and
questioning authority can be traced directly from Mad Magazine to Drag
Cartoons/Wonder Wart-Hog to the undergrounds. The conservative powers of
the day were probably right, this stuff should have been snuffed out.
But wherever there was a well-stocked head-shop, freedom reigned, baby!
For what it's worth, I thought Shelton was one of the most genuinely funny cartoonists of that era. Humor is relative, of course, but I can remember issues of WWH and the Freak Brothers that l had me laughing so hard I was gasping for breath. Beyond that, I can't tell you how subversive this stuff was to a young comic book fan. Wonder Wart-Hog was definitely one of the milder titles to come out in that era, since it was published by Millar Publications for a broad newsstand audience. But if you want to talk gateway drugs, it was this book that led me to the serious, mostly "adults only" undergrounds like Zap, Insect Fear, Legion of Charlies and many many others that completely scoured my young mind.
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