6 Hilarious Attempts at Brainwashing Kids With Comic Books
As anyone who has read the Spider-Man pedophilia awareness comic knows, comics aren't always the most dignified and subtle medium for conveying a message.
That, however, has not stopped advertisers from trying to shoe-horn their message into the format of a hamfisted comic book. The results are even more asinine than you'd expect.
#6.
Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four and OfficeMax
The Comic's Intended Message:
Teachers are our nation's greatest resource! To the point that supervillains envy students' knowledge!
Its Accidental Message:
OfficeMax is our nation's greatest resource, as superheroes go positively apeshit over the store.
A 2006 promo comic released by Marvel and OfficeMax for Teacher Appreciation Week, Brain Drain! is probably the best-drawn entry in this list. It makes up for this by making absolutely no sense whatsoever.
The story opens with Dr. Doom draining the brains of all of America's brightest middle schoolers. Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four set out to stop Doom's nefarious plot but, before they can depart, the teachers of the "brain-drained" students show up for no adequately explored reason to help out. Their help mostly consists of barking non-sequiturs about OfficeMax.
Fuck your laptop, Superheroes are magic.
Instead of stifling a chortle at the dumbass citizens, the superheroes lose their minds over the whole idea. They hightail it to OfficeMax and grab pencils and rubber band balls and calculators and bring them back to the Baxter Building.
Mr. Fantastic then tosses all that shit in the corner and uses his supercomputer to locate Doom. Sadly, this marks the last appearance of logical thinking in the comic.
Spidey and the F.F. break into Dr. Doom's castle, where Doom womps them and reveals his villainous masterstroke: He will rob America's middle schoolers of their valuable knowledge!
That's right. Victor von Doom, Ph.D., invented an impossibly sophisticated machine in order to learn the secrets of basic algebra--the plot of R.L. Stine's Stay Out of the Basement--and that every boy his age is sprouting strange hair down there.
For brain-draining a bunch of kids whose collective fund of knowledge rivals his own cast-iron skidmarks, Dr. Doom deserves to have his plot foiled by an OfficeMax brand rubber band ball.
The comic ends on a bittersweet note; the children Doom kidnapped are permanently brain-drained. But the teachers are there, and they can re-teach their students!
Of course, they'll be teaching "How Not To Drool and Shit Your Pants 101" until the kids are 25, but that doesn't seem to faze the plucky educators.
Indeed, the saddest part of Brain Drain! is that the real students who entered an essay-writing contest to win a cameo in this comic book make a one-panel appearance as brain-drained imbeciles. Notice how Marvel was kind enough to label each child so bullies knew exactly whom to taunt into homeschooling.
Sorry for bringing this up again, Cody Rhoades.
#5.
The Adventures of Kool-Aid Man
The Comic's Intended Message:
Kool-Aid Man is a trustworthy authority figure. Drink Kool-Aid!
Its Accidental Message:
Kool-Aid Man is a walking, talking high fructose apocalypse and seducer of innocence. Drink fucking Kool-Aid!
As we all know, the Kool-Aid Man is a giant anthropomorphic pitcher of Kool-Aid. His interests include slaking thirst, casual property damage and pretending to have an orgasm wherever he goes.
A typical day in the life.
In the 1980s, Kool-Aid teamed up with Marvel Comics to produce a series of Kool-Aid Man comics. In order to justify the massive amount of collateral damage incurred by Kool-Aid Man's mere existence, the writers came up with a dehydration-themed foe, Scorch. His job was to sort of annoy the hero and leave clues bad enough to make The Riddler facepalm.
When Scorch's foolproof scheme of "telling Kool-Aid Man exactly where I am" invariably failed, he uttered his one and only catchphrase: "Roast My Toast!"
Note the requisite wall-bursting. Incidentally, this appears to be Kool-Aid Man's one and only way to enter an enclosed space. Scope out the scene below.
Look at that. Those kids are so fucking dead, but they're too excited by Kool-Aid Man's arrival to care. At least they'll fatally depressurize with smiles on their faces.
Speaking of which, Kool-Aid Man has a non-stop entourage of eager children. He hangs out with these kids totally unsupervised, makes them drink his own bodily fluids and often invites them to party at his pad.
Leading a bunch of lost, easily confused children through the forest on bikes is sort of weird, but at least he isn't touching the kids or-
Goddammit, Kool-Aid Man. You're lucky your comic ran for only six issues; any longer and you would've ended up on a registry somewhere.
#4.
Liberality For All
The Comic's Intended Message:
If liberals ever get into power, they'll ruin America!
Its Accidental Message:
In an unthinkable dystopian future, a 90-year-old G. Gordon Liddy looks fiiine!
This 2005 comic posits two thought-provoking hypotheticals: "What if the Democrats had won the 2000 U.S. presidential election?" and "Would America still have the same problems that exist today?" Sadly, Liberality For All, a comic from conservative comic publisher ACC studios, answers these questions in the stupidest way possible.
The comic takes place in 2021. If you're wondering who the two people on the right are, that's President Hillary Clinton and Vice President Michael Moore. They are glad-handing with Ambassador Osama Bin Laden. If you think this is bad, check out what's happened to America's most venerable news network.
"Wait a second," you say. "This is all moronically over-the-top, but how is it different from any other ham-fisted political cartoon?" Well, hold onto your hats, this comic is about to get... extreme.
Did we mention he has a robotic arm?
He fights the forces of left-wing evil with this guy. Hint: he's not a Bizarro version of Gordon from Sesame Street.
That muscular gun-toting badass is actually G. Gordon Liddy, conservative talk show host and famed Watergate conspirator. He and Hannity run the underground Freedom Of Information League, or F.O.I.L. They spend their time killing cops.
Now, we understand that ideologies of all stripes use idiotic cartoons for propaganda purposes, but Liberality For All takes the retarded cake by taking these two doughy talking heads...
... and turning them into goddamn Nick Fury and the Punisher... 11 years from now.
Wow, Cody Rhoades didn't look very dashing after Doc Doom drained his brain.
ReplyWell, in the future be on the lookout for democrats running on the 'won't let sean hannity have a powerful robotic arm' platform. I believe that is far more important in preserving the future of our country than anything else.
ReplyI remember when I was a kid and some ancient Romans touched my junk. Then there was that hate crime against Caeaphus and he had to move to another school.
Replyhaha i went to school with one the kids in that bottom picture of #6 entry cody rhoades, kind of lived up to being "brain-drained imbeciles" he is one the biggest stoneers i know haha dont take that the wrong way cuz so am i haha
ReplyNo one likes you.
Go away.
4 was just so ridiculously over the top that I couldn't help but laugh. Is that really how the more fundie conservatives view themselves?
ReplyYes.
I bought "A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity" and it gave me laser vision.
Sean Hannity, you have a robotic arm that shoots lighting. With that kind of power, it shouldn't take you more than two weeks to bring down the government...yet you still haven't done it after two decades. Maybe instead of wasting all your time making stupid HAM radio broadcasts, you should just melt Osama's face off with 20 million volts.
ReplyReading that Spiderman pedophelia comic...holy s**t man, Peter
ReplyParker...fuck
The uncomfortable knowledge that crappy comics of this magnitude exist is the hope that they will be future kindling for Atop the fourth wall!
ReplyWhere bad comics burn? :D
The Threadless tee girl in the "Everybody Poops" top looks like she's taking a dump herself
ReplyOh my gosh, I was laughing the whole time reading about the Kool-Aid man comic.
ReplyI have just developed a profound fear for Brent Rinehart
ReplyAm I the only one that noticed that Kool Aid man is naked? There is one picture where he wears pants. Rest of the time... nothing.
ReplyI was just thinking that, though it does kinda fit in with the pederast theme they got going
HOLY GOD!!! I actually DID feel a prickly sensation in my skull when I say Hannity with a robo-arm. It may have been my ability to exaggerate committing suicide, I felt something.
ReplyI had the Kool Aid man comic. It was one of my first and I was so proud of it. We were poor ad it was free so it ranked right up there with my copy of Action Comics #1 reprint. (It was a really good reprint with the only difference being the back cover had an add for Qwik strawberry milk....refreshing.)
ReplyIs it just me or is "roast my toast" one hell of a catchphrase.
ReplyLet me guess: Stephen Colbert is a spy who turns traitor for actually fairly valid reasons?
Reply"Satchel Lieberman." Satchel? Was this kid named by Michael Jackson? And could appearing in this comic possibly have made his life any worse than being named Satchel?
ReplySatchel Paige was a badass. Watch yourself..
I was wondering if anyone was just going to that slide...Satchel
It must have been worse when the Hangover came out
You missed the best (and longest running) propaganda comics, those little comics produced by Chick Publications that seem to wind up in highway rest stops across the US. They're all borderline Westboro Baptist batshit crazy but the art in them was always surprisingly good.
Reply"Batshit crazy" is an understatement. My favorite one was about the diabolical dangers of playing Dungeons & Dragons.
"Speaking of which, Kool-Aid Man has a non-stop entourage of eager children. He hangs out with these kids totally unsupervised, makes them drink his own bodily fluids and often invites them to party at his pad."
ReplyNeed I reference the "Sonic Says" clip? That's like the second pedo-joke I've run across on this site.
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