20 years ago, The Onion paid tribute to Mad magazine
We also look back at airport baggage scanners, moms struggling to understand the internet, high school sweethearts breaking up, and a column about guns.
Welcome back to The Onion: 20 Years Later, where we review the print issue from 20 years ago, find out what’s still funny and examine the cultural impact. Today, we revisit June 12, 2002.
I’m over COVID, although it took me 9 days to test negative. Thanks for sticking with me through the last 2 columns, which took more effort than usual.
In this issue, we revisit one of the post-war era’s great comedic influences, Mad magazine. I subscribed to Mad for many years as a kid. The feel and tone of Mad has stuck with me, even if I’ve forgotten most of the actual jokes and bits.
This was a fun chance to revisit features like Spy vs. Spy and the work of Sergio Aragonés, Mort Drucker, Al Jaffe and countless others.
What issue is this?
This was Vol. 38, Issue 22, the 106th new Onion issue of the 2000s. Here’s what the website looked like in 2002, 2012 and today.
The front-page headline “Life-Sized Cutout Of Brent Spiner Folded In Half, Placed In Dumpster” is no longer online. The movie “Star Trek: Nemesis” was released in December 2002, but I’m guessing this is a random joke.
What was the top story, and other impressions?
“Body Of Missing Mad Magazine Reporter Found In Blecchistan” is a love letter from The Onion to Mad magazine — a funny yet touching piece for fans. And if you don’t know Mad, the article is still a decent parody of wartime journalism.
Phil Fonebone was kidnapped in March 2002, and his whereabouts were unknown until his body was discovered. His career is described by The Onion in the most Mad-like way:
Widely admired by colleagues in the field of malaprop journalism, Fonebone, 32, won a 2002 Pee-yew-litzer Prize for his coverage of the Blecchistani crisis. He also earned praise for reportage on such stories as the rise of Ayatoldya Soslayme in Iranaway and the hunt for terrorist leader Whoah-Ahma Big-Loudmouth.
I’m sure I’ve missed some of the Mad references in this article, but here are just a few:
Fonebone’s body is found in Potrzebie, a Polish word used as a non sequitur by Mad from 1954 onward. The city of Drucker is an homage to longtime contributor Mort Drucker, and the country of Harvikhurtzman references early Mad editor Harvey Kurtzman.
Phil Fonebone and the city of Klutz are references to Don Martin’s “Captain Klutz” recurring feature, whose main character is Ringo Fonebone.
Fonebone going up in Mad’s dirigible to get a “Berg’s-eye-view” is a tribute to Dave Berg, who died in May 2002. Berg’s “The Lighter Side Of …” column is also referenced, along with Mad’s most famous catchphrase, “What, me worry?”
"It is clear that Fonebone's irreverent coverage of 'the lighter side of international terrorism' earned him many enemies in Blecchistan," Mad editor Melvin Coznowski said. "But even in the face of death threats, he remained brave, saying with a wry smile, 'What, me worry?'"
The “al-Jaffi terrorist network” is a nod to Al Jaffe (who is still alive and is 101!). Those terrorists are committing “the devastating Snappy Answers To Stupid Questions Atrocities,” which name-checks Jaffe’s long-running “Snappy Answers …” segment.
The Spy Vs. Spy comic strip is referenced as “reports suggest the involvement of one or more mysterious, trench-coated espionage agents dressed in either all-white or all-black clothing, and described as ‘angular, birdlike males with wide-brimmed, pointy hats.’"
Spy Vs. Spy’s creator, Antonio Prohías, gets a callout as the mastermind of Fonebone’s death:
“A recently leaked memo from the State Department also confirms the interception of a Morse-coded message suggesting that the plot may have been masterminded by a shadowy figure known only as "Prohias." This same figure may have been responsible for an elaborate swivel-turret backwards-firing cannon found at the scene of the dirigible attack.”
It’s worth noting that Mad magazine responded in late 2002 with a retort called “The Bunion.” Mad’s satire feels more aggressive to me.
Area People doing Area Things
“Thousands Of High-School Sweethearts Prepare For Post-Graduation Breakup” feels timeless. High school’s changed a lot in the past 20 years, but surely high-school sweethearts are graduating and getting ready to break up.
I love the handwritten breakup letter (above) from Ronny Peltz, who emphasizes he’s not breaking up with Rachel Wohle because of other women, but because “we are adults now & need to be thinking about our futures.” Peltz is worried about making the football team and thinks her college friends won’t like him.
Note the cursive writing and the mention of a CD player. I doubt breakups today involve any of that.
The actual article has several other couples talking about their impending breakups. At least some of the breakups are motivated by the thought of college hookups.
"Jenny [Sykes] is the most beautiful girl in this school," said Brent Decker, a senior at Lake Winola (PA) High School. "But our school has only 220 students, and Penn State has, like, 40,000. There's no way she'd be the most beautiful on that campus."
“Getting Mom Onto Internet A Sisyphean Ordeal” reminds me of filling out FAFSA forms for college more than 20 years ago. My mom’s actually gotten pretty good the past 20 years with computers, but back then, literally every part of the computer was “Microsoft” to her.
This poor woman is struggling just to figure out the differences between the Internet and email, a keyboard and a typewriter, and a browser bar and a search engine.
But I want to defend Lillian Widmar. After all, the 2022 internet is much closer to her incorrect 2002 perceptions than we want to admit. For example:
“She's still afraid to click on pictures because she doesn't know where it's going to take her,” says daughter Karen. Most photos online nowadays are clickable! You probably won’t cause harm by clicking, but still.
Lillian is typing searches in the browser bar instead of Yahoo’s search bar. You can do that today and it brings you to a search engine!
“She goes apeshit whenever a pop-up window comes up.” Well, pop-ups are terrible.
Lillian freaks out over porn spam, which I think is reasonable if you’ve never encountered it before.
She’s also worried about viruses and her computer taking pictures of her. Those are real fears nowadays, especially if you don’t know what you’re doing!
It’s harder to defend this one, as I’m stuck on the idea of pagers:
“And one time, she paged me because she got a message about accepting cookies. She was all freaked out because now she thought she was being charged for actual cookies."
I have a lot of sympathy for the daughter here. That said, the internet of 2022 is pretty dangerous! Maybe Lillian was accidentally on to something.
“Best Years Of Area Man's Life Apparently Never Going To Happen” is a story I remember from 20 years ago.
Poor Frederick Videk has always chased possessions and accomplishments to make him happy, rather than finding true happiness within:
Over the course of Videk's life, each time he reached a milestone, he believed that his best years were about to begin. Among these life events were losing his virginity, getting married, fathering his first through fifth child, having his children move out, buying a better house, and getting his overbite fixed. None of these events, however, made the slightest impact on his overall happiness.
Videk also has failed to bowl 250, play harmonica, travel widely or even make shift supervisor at the factory.
This article hits the right tone of self-realization and self-pity. The writing is wonderfully detailed, and not just through narration. Videk’s voice comes through as he realizes his shortcomings. The tragedy, of course, is that his life hasn’t been meaningless — he’s served his country, he’s had a steady job, he’s raised a family!
Videk’s plight kind of feels like Red from “That ‘70s Show” if he was written as a sad sack.
Other Area People stories include:
“Kline Not Sure He Fits In At Oppendahl, Oppendahl, Kline & Oppendahl” is a simple joke about law firm names, but it made me laugh. Poor Kline has been a partner for 18 years and still has imposter syndrome!
“Line Cook Learns Leaving Restaurant Industry Not That Easy”: This short article literally has the line "Just when I think I've made a clean break, they pull me back in.”
“Colonoscopy Offers Non-Fantastic Voyage Through Human Body”: This was the era where Katie Couric was getting a colonoscopy on TV, so I’m guessing that’s part of the origin story here.
Real-life people in the news
The front-page photo “Bush Extremely Proud Of New Suit” is a decent throwaway joke, especially because it looks like every suit any president has worn in the past 30 years.
“Canadian Immigration Under Fire” confused me because I don’t remember this being a controversy. That said, you didn’t need a passport to go to Canada in 2002, and now you do.
The Onion last week was deferential to the FBI but here directly mocks its pre-9/11 failures:
"Why would terrorists need to go through Canada to get to the U.S.? It's not like the FBI would catch them if they came straight here."
Louis Chambliss • Systems Analyst
We also have:
“Fixin's Added To Food Pyramid”: Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman appears for the 2nd time in 6 weeks. Some of the eligible fixin’s include “cole slaw, mashed potatoes, steak fries, baked beans, and mac 'n' cheese." I’m a Northerner, but all of this sounds delicious.
“Ted Nugent Talks That Way Even When Buying Socks”: Nugent is portrayed as “cranky old rocker” and not “divisive political figure.” I do love this quote: “Life is too short, man. Whether it's socks or shoes or whatever, you gotta bite into life like it's a great big ol' hunk of bison.”
Were the infographics good?
My 1st flight was a couple of weeks after 9/11, so I never experienced an airport before all the added security. And I forgot that these larger, fancier machines weren’t in place right away.
“The Bomb-Detection Machine” is appropriately skeptical and cynical — especially the “confidence-boosting $8 million price tag” and the idea of “swarthography.” I also like the machine eating a pretzel1 while being inactive and mopey, just like a human security guard!
The Onion’s front-page infographics were always challenging because it’s such a small space to fit several jokes. “Where Is That Goddamn Remote?” is a good one because it takes a universal premise and riffs on it.
“By now, clear across the county line” makes me laugh. I can’t explain it.
What columnists ran?
As someone who just recently quit my job to go freelance, “I Should Start Some Sort Of Huge Corporation” has a different feeling. Thankfully, I’m not making $6.55 an hour working security at Rite-Aid like our columnist, Brian Mappert.
Mappert’s understanding of business is superficial, but it’s not entirely wrong. He knows that you want to sell things for a profit, that name recognition matters, and that you don’t even need to manufacture anything if you’re a retailer like Wal-Mart or Home Depot.
Mappert also recognizes that technology companies are hot, and that banks are rich just by moving money around. And innovation matters!
So, Rule Number Two is: Give people something new. Break out of the mold. The first time someone came out with an eye-laser machine, I'm sure people said, "What the fuck? You want to stick a laser in people's eyes? Nobody's gonna want that." But the guy stuck to his guns, and now Lasik is huge. I see ads for them all over the place.
Mappert also believes that international business is important because “you don't have to worry so much about having high standards of quality when you're selling to foreigners, which is nice.” Somehow, China is not mentioned in this column.
Our other column is “Guns Are Only Deadly If Used For Their Intended Purpose,” which I guess is sort of an early ancestor of “‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens.”
This column is an example of splitting hairs to make your point while sidestepping the question. The Onion succeeds here by being very focused. Our columnist solely talks about on the idea that guns kill people and how that’s wrong because it’s a person using the gun:
My point? No child dies just because there is such a thing as guns. They die because one of these guns is used.
In all my years of fighting for the cause of gun rights, not once have I ever come across a case of a gun killing a person. In every instance, the real killer has been the bullets that come out of the guns. So if you're going to insist on pointing fingers, point them at the bullet makers.
What was the best horoscope?
This week’s Pisces horoscope reminds us that Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger were in the midst of divorce proceedings 20 years ago.
Pisces | Feb. 19 to March 20
No matter how hard you try, nothing you ever do or achieve will please Alec Baldwin.
What holds up best?
“Body Of Missing Mad Magazine Reporter Found In Blecchistan” is a classic parody/tribute. If you’ve never heard of Mad magazine, it’s a starting point for understanding this little magazine that influenced the culture for the 2nd half of the 20th century.
What holds up worst?
I really like this issue. “Line Cook Learns Leaving Restaurant Industry Not That Easy” is a retread joke, but if that’s my biggest complaint, I’ll take it.
What would be done differently today?
That gun column is interesting to me. I don’t know whether it’s a perfect fit for 2022’s Onion or a terrible one. Either way, it’s accidentally relevant for today’s discourse.
As always, there would be more political news today. Pride Month is getting coverage this month but (probably) wouldn’t have 20 years ago.
Thank you
We’ll be back next week before taking a monthlong break, as The Onion didn’t publish between June 19, 2002, and July 17, 2002.
As it happens, yesterday I bought a Mad "collector's edition" of sci-fi parodies which goes back to the 70s or so-- another look at changing standards in comedy and satire. But I'd forgotten about Blecchistan and the Onion-Mad Beef! I must admit that the "Area Man Finds Headline Amusing, But That's It" article isn't totally unfair.
As you know, I'm a lifelong Mad Magazine fan, and I haven't forgotten some of the pieces that made me howl with laughter. You are correct that there is a sensibility to that type of humor that sticks with you across genre's. Here's one: In naming "The World's Thinnest Books", one was "Neil Simon's Flop Plays", but the best one was "The Impact of the Nehru Jacket On Men's Fashion".