Sunday, February 28, 2010

SUNDAY FUNNIES - MAD's WONDER WOMAN


(click on pictures to read balloons and see the details)

This time MAD Comics took on WONDER WOMAN to lampoon. This is the last story in MAD no. 10. It was written by editor Harvey Kurtzman and illustrated by Will Elder.

All us that read comics, and many who didn’t, know the basic story of WONDER WOMAN. She was/is a woman that belongs to an all female tribe in the Amazon area, which if you are studious you might recognize some Greek mythology embedded in the story line. It dealt some with women’s lib and she had a secret identity and was a regular Army WAC…. The bottom line was to the little adolescents that bought WONDER WOMAN comics was that she was leggy in her super hero outfit and sometimes had big boobs.

She was an easy target for MAD to satirize.

WONDER WOMAN was created by Dr William Moulton Marston (Psy. D.) and first appeared in All Star Comics #8, December 1941, just in time to give the GIs a hand in WWII.

All Star Comics was co-owned by Max Gaines. Max Gaines also started EC Comics later. After Max Gaines died his son Bill Gaines took over EC and went in a different direction. To shorten the story, EC Comics owned MAD comicbook. And when MAD made fun of WONDER WOMAN, it was in a sense biting the hand that fed them. Which was apparently, OK.

As I said, this is the last story of MAD #10. except the ads in the back of the comicbook, which are included in this article also.





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