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Mad Around the World
vintage Mad Magazine comics
192 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1979
9 people want to read
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April 24, 2010
This is one great big giant turkey of a book.
It's a humour book. Some examples of the xenophobic jokes include gay slurs, ethnic slams, and cultural stigmas. Of the less-bigoted variety are jokes such as "Don't you hate... lost baggage?" and "Don't you hate... jet lag?" complete with a rudimentary illustration courtesy of Austrian-born artist Paul Peter Porges.
A real riot.
Frank Jacobs is better known for his spot-on spoofs of famous poems and lyrics. He is lesser known for his brilliance in writing straight-up humour or jokes. MAD Around the World is evidence as to why.
Porges' brand of humour works in a single-panel sight gag. It does not work sequentially, as featured herein.
Inside are "Traveller's Phrases" deemed necessary in various parts of the world. The obvious targets of violent New York, historic Pennsylvania, snooty France, etc. are beaten to death. These are not funny - they're far too blunt and obtuse to classify as "humour." Each "phrase" is a riff on the exact same joke, and this goes on interminally.
There are also jokes about terrorism, both in-flight and on land; jokes about airplane crashes; jokes about oddly-shaped luggage... Nothing is sacred in MAD Around the World. Nor is anything especially funny.
This book has no reason to exist. There is no rationale as to why it was cranked out. It remains pure, jejune cynicism... too dull to adequately prod its targets, and too insipid to even pass as satire. It remains the kind of book a grade school child might read in lieu of the ubiquitous "joke book," with the subject matter remaining too lugubrious and bleak to elicit even a polite laugh.
If you find this book in a flea market somewhere, try and convince the seller to simply give it to you for free. Then promptly flush the goddamn thing down a Greyhound Bus toilet. Truly, MAD Around the World, or at least the U.S.
It's a humour book. Some examples of the xenophobic jokes include gay slurs, ethnic slams, and cultural stigmas. Of the less-bigoted variety are jokes such as "Don't you hate... lost baggage?" and "Don't you hate... jet lag?" complete with a rudimentary illustration courtesy of Austrian-born artist Paul Peter Porges.
A real riot.
Frank Jacobs is better known for his spot-on spoofs of famous poems and lyrics. He is lesser known for his brilliance in writing straight-up humour or jokes. MAD Around the World is evidence as to why.
Porges' brand of humour works in a single-panel sight gag. It does not work sequentially, as featured herein.
Inside are "Traveller's Phrases" deemed necessary in various parts of the world. The obvious targets of violent New York, historic Pennsylvania, snooty France, etc. are beaten to death. These are not funny - they're far too blunt and obtuse to classify as "humour." Each "phrase" is a riff on the exact same joke, and this goes on interminally.
There are also jokes about terrorism, both in-flight and on land; jokes about airplane crashes; jokes about oddly-shaped luggage... Nothing is sacred in MAD Around the World. Nor is anything especially funny.
This book has no reason to exist. There is no rationale as to why it was cranked out. It remains pure, jejune cynicism... too dull to adequately prod its targets, and too insipid to even pass as satire. It remains the kind of book a grade school child might read in lieu of the ubiquitous "joke book," with the subject matter remaining too lugubrious and bleak to elicit even a polite laugh.
If you find this book in a flea market somewhere, try and convince the seller to simply give it to you for free. Then promptly flush the goddamn thing down a Greyhound Bus toilet. Truly, MAD Around the World, or at least the U.S.
Displaying 1 of 1 review