MAD About GROO!

If you haven’t read any of Sergio Aragonés and Mark Evanier‘s “Groo the Wanderer” comics, then you are missing out on on one of the greatest humorous comics ever created, and that is most definitely NOT hyperbole.

Groo’s been around for over 40 years, and his adventures have been published by five differents labels over the decades, currently Dark Horse Comics. There are a LOT of Groo comics out there, including a 120 issue run published by Marvel/Epic from 1985-1995, and many, many multiple issue mini-series. Fortunately they are all enjoyable stories in themselves so you need not start at his first appearance. In fact, once you “get” who Groo is as a character, it’s all just great comics fun. Right now there is a “Groo Meets Tarzan” miniseries on the stands.

Anyway, I’m posting this today because I actually make an appearance in “Groo Meets Tarzan #2”!! Part of the story takes place at San Diego Comic-Con, and in a panel on page 14 you see me drawing away at my booth as Mark and Stan Sakai, who is the letterer on “Groo” (colors by Tom Luth), walk by. In his usual manner, Sergio actually drew my comic con booth including the backdrop, my illustrated table throw, copies of MAD for sale and my booth babe/business manager/slave driver The Lovely Anna! It’s amazing Sergio knows what my booth looks like, because while we are set up directly across from each other in an aisle at SDCC, he can’t ever see my booth because of the huge crowd of his fans that stand in front of him all day every day.

Anyway that’s great fun and was a real surprise. Maybe Sergio’s paying me back for making him one of the train passengers getting gunned down in the second “Bounty Law” parody I drew for the special mini-MAD that was included in the Super Special Collectors edition Blu-Ray of “Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood”: