#popculture84: “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” Debuts Amidst a New Wave of Independent Comics

Turtle power! The original incarnation of the heroes in a half shell was in a creator-owned comic book that took off in a big way.

by Rich Watson 

The eighties saw a wave of independently-produced comic books hit the market, created by entrepreneurial artists of wildly varying talent. Many went unnoticed against the likes of Spider-Man and Superman.

One that launched in 1984 was an odd martial arts book with a cumbersome title—Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

It became a juggernaut.

#popculture55: EC Comics’ “Mad” Becomes a Magazine

The sophisticated humor comic from the most diverse comics publisher of the 50s took off when they catered to the magazine industry.

by Rich Watson 

I didn’t buy Mad Magazine as often as I did regular comic books, but when I read it, I thought it was hilarious, of course. The fold-in pictures on the back cover (a second image made from the first by folding it in on itself) struck me as clever and inventive and I always wondered how they did it.

Mad was created during a time when comics were under great public scrutiny. They adopted a magazine format in 1955.

They never looked back.