Mad Revisionist Westerns

Love the revisionist westerns of the '70's, me. After years of boring old John Wayne on every Sunday afternoon, we suddenly got exciting, 'Now' westerns like Little Big Man, Jeremiah Johnson, Soldier Blue, High Plains Drifter and the one us kids were safely allowed to watch, Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid. 
Remember the end of term, where instead of lessons, we got to watch a film in the assembly hall before breaking up for summer holidays? It was always Butch & Sundance at our school.

Mad only got round to doing a couple of those, sadly, so no Jerkymiah Lonesome or Sobber Boo Hoo, but we did get Botch Casually & The Somedunce Kid:

And Dustbin Coughman in Little Dull Man:

The Six Million Dollars, Man & The Moronic Woman

Like everybody else, I had a massive crush on Bionic Woman Lindsay Wagner in the '70's, and always ran around the playground in slow motion like Steve Austin. Mad, as usual, were having none of it.

Paul Coker Jr.

I loved the work of Paul Coker Jr. whenever it appeared in Mad. It was maybe easy to not notice how great he was, him being surrounded by people like Don Martin, Mort Drucker, Sergio Aragones and the rest of the usual gang of idiots.

But he might actually be my favourite Mad artist of them all. He's a master cartoonist and animator, with a style I can't get enough of. So here's some of my favourites of his.

The Milking Of The Planet That Went Ape

Here's The Usual Gang Of Idiots taking on, and laying waste to, every Planet Of The Apes movie at the time ( except Battle, which presumably wasn't out yet, and who cares, 'cos it was rubbish ).
Arnie Kogen's script is spot on, while the incomparable Mort Drucker is so great, you actually have to stop and look, having always taken his greatness for granted.
Mark Evanier tells a brilliant story about Drucker in one of his books, by the way: Apparently, sometime in the '80's, Evanier was at a con and overheard a group of then hot young artists ( who I assume were Rob Leifield, Todd McFarlane and the like ) all loudly arguing about which one of them was The Greatest Comic Book Artist In The History Of The World Ever.
Evanier sidled over, and said: ' I've just been talking to the greatest comic book artist in the world.'
When this gaggle of fools puffed themselves up and demanded to know who he was talking about, Evanier pointed to Mort Drucker.
And shamefaced, they all muttered 'er...yeah...' and shuffled away...

Kung Phew / Kung Fooey / Kung Fool / Kung Fooey

Seeing as how the Bronze Age humour mags usually focused on the same movies and TV shows each month, have you ever compared and contrasted how each one parodied a specific show, like say Kung Fu?
Huh? What's that you say? Who's got that amount of free time? Hush your mouth.

That was John Severin of course, with his version for Cracked. Now here's Stu Schwartzberg & Mike Ploog, from the premiere issue of Crazy:

And here's Mad's take, courtesy of Dick De Bartelo & Angelo Torres:

And because we're gluttons for punishment, let's close with Crazy's second go at the same material, by Marv Wolfman, Marie Severin & Herb Trimpe. I'd say this one's got the best script, while Ploog's has the best art. How 'bout you?