Tom's Mad Blog
August 6th, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
We have to pause our “Classic Comedians” series to do a tribute caricature to the recently passed “Godfather of Heavy Metal”, Ozzy Osbourne! I was a serious metalhead in high school. In fact I was once briefly suspended from La Crescent High after an air band competition in which our band, “Eddie and the Back Doors” hid and ignited banned pyrotechnics during our set, scorching the ceiling of the cafeteria, filling the place with smoke, and causing the fire department to be called in. Our roadie Rob was a little overzealous with the flash powder. He graduated valedictorian of our class, by the way. The… READ MORE
August 4th, 2025 | Posted in MAD Magazine
We’ve reached another milestone in our ongoing trek looking back at my career with MAD, but this is one of the depressing ones. I both wrote and drew this two pager for the ongoing feature “The Wisenheim Museum” for MAD #15, Aug 2020. This piece was significant for me for several reasons. It was the first piece I ever both drew AND wrote for the magazine. I’d do one more a few years later (another remembrance sort of piece), but at the time this was a first for me. It came about when following the passing of the great Mort Drucker in April of 2020, MAD… READ MORE
July 30th, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
We continue our new “Classic Comedians” series with one of the greatest of all stand up comics, the late George Carlin! Any list of the top 10 stand up comics of all time that does not feature Carlin (and frankly in the top three) is not a legitimate list. He is constantly cited as one of the most influential comedians to ever pick up the mic. He was not only hilarious, but his humor addressed the human condition and social issues with razor sharp insight and understanding. He didn’t just make people laugh, he made them think. READ MORE
July 23rd, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
We’re starting a new series for the “Sketch o’the Week”… classic comedians! We have a pretty good start already with our recent Monty Python run, and there will certainly be no shortage of fodder. This week we are going to go with The Lovely Anna‘s suggestion of one of the greatest of all female comics… Lily Tomlin! Ms. Tomlin has had a career that has spanned over 50 years, and she’s done significant things in all of those decades. She started out doing stand up and off-Broadway performing in the 60’s, became a household name in early 70’s on TV in “Martin and Rowan’s Laugh In”, and… READ MORE
July 21st, 2025 | Posted in General
Come see me at San Diego Comic Con this weekend at a NEW location: Exhibitor Table I-07! READ MORE
July 16th, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Superman Spoiler-Free Review: The short version is, I loved it. IMO it’s by far the best treatment of Superman in film since the Christopher Reeve/Richard Donner movies. Gunn really understands the Superman character, everyone was perfectly cast and did a fantastic job in their respective roles, and it was a fun ride to boot. I’m one of those people who can appreciate different takes on a character like a comic book superhero, even if they don’t match my idea of that character. That’s why I can enjoy the sixties “Batman” TV show and Christopher Nolan‘s “Dark Knight” trilogy in equal measure. The former is a… READ MORE
July 9th, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
I’ve run out of Pythons! Back to more random subjects, and this week I am generating absolutely no Good Vibrations at all with this sketch of a young Brian Wilson of “The Beach Boys” fame. Wilson of course, just recently passed away, leaving a truly enviable legacy in the world of popular music. READ MORE
July 7th, 2025 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Here we go with yet another entry in our intrepid and insipid diary of the work I did for MAD magazine. In this episode we look back at a two page Al Jaffee homage done for MAD #14, August 2020 called “Cheat Your Way to Olympic Gold!” written by Desmond Devlin, plus a bonus piece of art I did for the issue. Here’s page two: MAD #14 was a tribute for Al Jaffee, who officially retired with the appearance of his final original Fold-In in the issue. Actually Al really stopped doing the Fold-Ins with the one that appeared in MAD #6 (April 2019), since… READ MORE
