Spy vs. Spy

Posted in Uncategorized by admin on October 12, 2009 No Comments yet

My Favorite part of Mad Magazine was always the comics on the side, especially Spy vs. Spy.

Since I haven’t seen the magazine in some time, I’d forgotten all about this series, but a cameo in a recent episode of Family Guy reminded me how much fun and clever these comics were.

Apperantley, Spy vs. Spy was supposed to be symbolic of the Cold War (something that went well above my head as a five year old)

The concept of the comic has been the same since it originated in 1961; it features two spies, one Black and one White, that are constantly battling one other, and coming up with increasingly sophisticated methods to defeat the other. A plot in a typical strip would have one spy setting up a treacherous booby-trap for the other to fall into. Sometimes the trap would work successfully, but the other spy would sometimes come up with a brilliant counter plan of his own and then defeat the first spies plan.

The comic always featured two identical looking spies, one black and one white. They are constantly battling one other and coming up with increasingly sophisticated methods to defeat the other (reminisent of The Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner )

A plot in a typical strip would have one spy setting up a treacherous booby-trap for the other to fall into. Typically, the other spy would come up with a better counter plan of his own and then defeat the first spies plan.

I remmember seeing animated versions of the these comics on MadTV (like the one below) in the early days. But the cartoons fell short, as these normally do and were removed. Here is a video example below:

Leave a Comment