Mad (stylized in all caps) is an American humor magazine that was launched in 1952 and currently published by DC Comics, a division of Skydance Themed Entertainment, which is owned by Skydance Corporation. Mad was founded by editor Harvey Kurtzman and publisher William Gaines, launched as a comic book series before it became a magazine. It was widely imitated and influential, affecting satirical media, as well as the cultural landscape of the late 20th century, with editor Al Feldstein increasing readership to more than two million during its 1973–1974 circulation peak. It is the last surviving title in the EC Comics line, which sold Mad to Premier Industries in 1961, but closed in 1956.
Mad publishes satire on all aspects of life and popular culture, politics, entertainment, and public figures. Its format includes TV and movie parodies, and satire articles about everyday occurrences that are changed to seem humorous. Mads mascot, Alfred E. Neuman, is usually on the cover, with his face replacing that of a celebrity or character who is being lampooned. From 1952 to 2018, Mad published 550 regular magazine issues, as well as scores of reprint "Specials", original-material paperbacks, reprint compilation books and other print projects. After AT&T merged with DC's then-owner Time Warner in June 2018, Mad ended newsstand distribution, continuing in comic-book stores and via subscription.
History
Mad began as a comic book published by EC, debuting in August 1952 (cover date October–November). The Mad office was initially located in lower Manhattan at 225 Lafayette Street, while in the early 1960s it moved to 485 Madison Avenue, the location listed in the magazine as "485 MADison Avenue".
The first issue was written almost entirely by Harvey Kurtzman, and featured illustrations by him, Wally Wood, Will Elder (Also known as Bill Elder), Jack Davis, and John Severin. Wood, Elder, and Davis were to be the three main illustrators throughout the 23-issue run of the comic book.
To retain Kurtzman as its editor, the comic book converted to magazine format as of issue No. 24, in 1955. The switchover induced Kurtzman to remain for one more year, but the move had removed Mad from the strictures of the Comics Code Authority. William Gaines related in 1992 that Mad "was not changed [into a magazine] to avoid the Code" but "as a result of this [change of format] it did avoid the Code." Gaines claimed that Kurtzman had at the time received "a very lucrative offer from Pageant magazine," and seeing as he, Kurtzman, "had, prior to that time, evinced an interest in changing Mad into a magazine," Gaines, "not know[ing] anything about publishing magazines," countered that offer by allowing Kurtzman to make the change. Gaines further stated that "if Harvey [Kurtzman] had not gotten that offer from Pageant, Mad probably would not have changed format."
After Kurtzman's departure in 1956, new editor Al Feldstein swiftly brought aboard contributors such as Don Martin, Frank Jacobs, and Mort Drucker, and later Antonio Prohías, Dave Berg, and Sergio Aragonés. The magazine's circulation more than quadrupled during Feldstein's tenure, peaking at 2,132,655 in 1974; it later declined to a third of this figure by the end of his time as editor.
In its earliest incarnation, new issues of the magazine appeared erratically, between four and nine times a year. By the end of 1958, Mad had settled on an unusual eight-times-a-year schedule, which lasted almost four decades. Issues would go on sale 7 to 9 weeks before the start of the month listed on the cover. Gaines felt the atypical timing was necessary to maintain the magazine's level of quality. Beginning in 1994, Mad then began incrementally producing additional issues per year, until it reached a monthly schedule with issue No. 353 (Jan. 1997). With its 500th issue (June 2009), amid company-wide cutbacks at Time Warner, the magazine temporarily regressed to a quarterly publicationGustines, George Gene (January 23, 2009). "Sad News for Mad Fans". The New York Times. before settling to six issues per year in 2010.Mad, Issue 504, p. 4.
Gaines sold his company in 1961 to Premier Industries, a maker of venetian blinds. Around 1964, Premier sold Mad to Independent News, a division of National Periodical Publications, the publisher of DC Comics. In the summer of 1967, Kinney National Company purchased National Periodical Publications. Kinney bought Warner Bros.-Seven Arts in early 1969.Retrieved on February 24, 2016. from the original on July 18, 2012. As a result of the car parking scandal, Kinney Services spun off of its non-entertainment assets to form National Kinney Corporation in August 1971, and it reincorporated as Warner Communications, Inc. on February 10, 1972. In 1977, National Periodical Publications was renamed DC Comics.
Feldstein retired in 1985, and was replaced by the senior team of Nick Meglin and John Ficarra, who co-edited Mad for the next two decades. Long-time production artist Lenny "The Beard" Brenner was promoted to art director and Joe Raiola and Charlie Kadau joined the staff as junior editors. Following Gaines's death in 1992, Mad became more ingrained within the Time Warner (now WarnerMedia) corporate structure. Eventually, the magazine was obliged to abandon its long-time home at 485 Madison Avenue and in the mid-1990s it moved into DC Comics's offices at the same time that DC relocated to 1700 Broadway. In issue No. 404 of April 2001, the magazine broke its long-standing taboo and began running paid advertising. The outside revenue allowed the introduction of color printing and improved paper stock. After Meglin retired in 2004, the team of Ficarra (as executive editor) Raiola and Kadau (as senior editors), and Sam Viviano, who had taken over as art director in 1999, would helm Mad for the next 14 years.
Throughout the years, Mad has remained a unique mix of adolescent silliness and political humor. In November 2017, Rolling Stone wrote that "operating under the cover of barf jokes, Mad has become America's best political satire magazine." Nevertheless, Mad ended its 65-year run in New York City at the end of 2017 with issue No. 550 (cover-dated April 2018), in preparation for the relocation of its offices to DC Entertainment's headquarters in Burbank, California. Bill Morrison was named in June 2017 to succeed Ficarra in January 2018. None of Mads New York staff made the move, resulting in a change in editorial leadership, tone, and art direction. More than a hundred new names made their Mad debuts including Brian Posehn, Maria Bamford, Ian Boothby, Luke McGarry, Akilah Hughes, and future Pulitzer Prize finalist Pia Guerra. Scores of artists and writers from the New York run also returned to the pages of the California-based issues including contributors Sergio Aragonés, Al Jaffee, Desmond Devlin, Tom Richmond, Peter Kuper, Teresa Burns Parkhurst, Rick Tulka, Tom Bunk, Jeff Kruse, Ed Steckley, Arie Kaplan, writer and former Senior Editor Charlie Kadau, and artist and former Art Director Sam Viviano. The first California issue of Mad was renumbered as "#1." In 2019, the rebooted magazine earned two Eisner Award nominations—the first such nominations in Mad's history—for the Best Short Story and Best Humor Publication categories.
AT&T acquired Time Warner in June 2018. Morrison exited Mad by March 2019, during a time of layoffs and restructuring at DC Entertainment.Bill Morrison at LinkedIn.com. Retrieved on November 23, 2020. from the original on November 23, 2020. "VP Executive Editor, MAD Magazine, Jun 2017 – 2019. Art Director, Seriously Digital Entertainment, Mar 2019 – Nov 2019." After issue No. 11 (Feb. 2020) of the new Burbank edition, Mad began to consist mostly of curated reprints with new covers and fold-ins, although some new articles have been periodically featured, including parodies of The Batman ("The Bathroom") and Elon Musk's tenure at Twitter (in a Dr. Seuss parody called "Free Speeches on the Beaches"). Distribution to newsstands stopped, with the magazine initially becoming available only through comic-book shops and by subscription, although in 2022 distribution expanded to Barnes & Noble via a series of compilation issues dubbed The Treasure Trove of Trash. Since late 2024, Spy vs. Spy and "A Mad Look at..." have resumed, with the magazine producing roughly 25% new content per issue. For the 50th issue of the rebooted magazine (Aug. 2026), Mad reverted to its legacy numbering, marking it as issue No. 600.
Influence Though there are antecedents to Mads style of humor in print, radio and film, Mad itself became a signature example. Throughout the 1950s, Mad featured groundbreaking parodies combining a sentimental fondness for the familiar staples of American culture—such as Archie and Superman—with a keen joy in exposing the fakery behind the image. Its approach was described by Dave Kehr in The New York Times: "Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding on the radio, Ernie Kovacs on television, Stan Freberg on records, Harvey Kurtzman in the early issues of Mad: all of those pioneering humorists and many others realized that the real world mattered less to people than the sea of sounds and images that the ever more powerful mass media were pumping into American lives." Bob and Ray, Kovacs and Freberg all became contributors to Mad.
In 1977, Tony Hiss and Jeff Lewis wrote in The New York Times about the then-25-year-old publication's initial effect:
Mad is often credited with filling a vital gap in political satire from the 1950s to 1970s, when Cold War paranoia and a general culture of censorship prevailed in the United States, especially in literature for teens. Activist Tom Hayden said, "My own radical journey began with Mad Magazine."Herman, Jan (December 5, 2007). "MAD Magazine + Tom Hayden = SDS". The Huffington Post. Retrieved December 26, 2015. The rise of such factors as cable television and the Internet has diminished the influence and impact of Mad, although it remains a widely distributed magazine. In a way, Mads power has been undone by its own success: what was subversive in the 1950s and 1960s is now commonplace. However, its impact on three generations of humorists is incalculable, as can be seen in the frequent references to Mad on the animated series The Simpsons. The Simpsons producer Bill Oakley said, "The Simpsons has transplanted Mad magazine. Basically everyone who was young between 1955 and 1975 read Mad, and that's where your sense of humor came from. And we knew all these people, you know, Dave Berg and Don Martin—all heroes, and unfortunately, now all dead." In 2009, The New York Times wrote, "Mad once defined American satire; now it heckles from the margins as all of culture competes for trickster status." Longtime contributor Al Jaffee described the dilemma to an interviewer in 2010: "When Mad first came out, in 1952, it was the only game in town. Now, you've got graduates from Mad who are doing The Today Show or Stephen Colbert or Saturday Night Live. All of these people grew up on Mad. Now Mad has to top them. So Mad is almost in a competition with itself."