BuzzFlash Reviews

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS

For lovers of the Mad Magazine "Spy vs. Spy" feature.

This is the complete collection through 2001.

An online reviewer:

I'd give this book 5 stars regardless, because I've always loved Spy v Spy -- and this book delivers the goods: Every Spy v Spy Prohias worked on in his life.
But, what REALLY sets this book apart is the the wealth of OTHER material: His other MAD features, cover ideas, and a lot of biographical information covering his life in Cuba and the comics he did there. How many of MAD's contributors can say they were chased out of Cuba by an angry mob (with Fidel himself leading the pack)?

But, the bottom line is the material: If you like Spy v Spy, you'll love this book. The extra material is just icing (albeit extremely intersting and diverting icing) on the cake.


From Booklist:

James Bond isn't the only cold war-era secret agent whose career continued to flourish after the fall of Communism. For 40 years and counting, the white spy and the black spy have waged never-ending battle on the pages of Mad. Their creator, the late Antonio Prohias, a political cartoonist who fled Castro's Cuba in 1960, was a font of variations on the theme of having one spy meet violent death at the hands of the other. In the next issue, of course, the deceased had been resurrected to resume hostilities. This collection reprints all 247 of Prohias' strips and selections of those by his successors, who include noted illustrator Peter Kuper....For baby boomers who grew up with Mad, this dossier may evoke nostalgia as well as chuckles, and younger readers may greet the spies' "joke-and-dagger" shenanigans with out-and-out guffaws.

BuzzFlash Note: Although created in the context of the Cold War, the Spy vs. Spy series also illustrates the ludicrousness of the constance evocation of an amorphous "enemy" by the Bush regime.

From Publishers Weekly:

An artist and his legendary comic strip are honored by MAD magazine in Spy vs. Spy: The Complete Casebook. Antonio Prohias's wordless, Cold War-inspired spoof of the agents of international intrigue portrays the twin enemies outdoing each other in elaborately stupid plots to achieve the other's demise. Assembled after Prohias's death, the volume commemorates the cartoon's 40th birthday as well as Prohias's compelling personal story (in 1960 he fled Castro's new regime in Cuba after being unofficially blacklisted for his political cartoons). Comic book fans, especially of the MAD variety, will love this intelligent tribute to an artist. 70 color and 300 b&w illus.

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS