Mad Magazine

Mad is the magazine that taught generations to distrust adverts, politicians and Hollywood, usually all three on the same page. Running since 1952, fronted by the gap-toothed grin of Alfred E. Neuman and his motto “What, Me Worry?”, it invented a whole style of American satire: the film parodies, Spy vs. Spy, and the Fold-In on the back cover that you creased carefully to reveal the real joke.

Buy it knowing what it is today. Since 2019 Mad no longer chases the news week to week. Issues now lean heavily on classic material from the archive, with new covers and some fresh pieces mixed in. For a reader wanting topical satire on this week’s politics, that’s the wrong expectation. For everyone else it’s arguably the better deal, since you’re getting the vintage stuff, the Sergio Aragonés margin doodles, the golden era parodies, the artwork that made the magazine’s name, curated into new issues rather than left in a vault.

Who it lands with: anyone who read it as a teenager and wants that exact feeling back, comic art fans who care about the Usual Gang of Idiots as illustrators, and, quietly, today’s teenagers, who tend to find it just as funny as their parents did, much to their parents’ mixed feelings.

A brilliant, slightly chaotic gift. Delivered to your door, no auto renewal, and we’ll nudge you before the subscription ends.