Wonder Woman visits Jerry Lewis (march 1970)

[glaurung]

Once upon a time, DC comics understood that comics don't have to be always serious grimdark heavy drama involving lots of gratuitous violence and rape. That was a good thing, but the less serious comics that DC put out weren't always worthwhile. Today it seemed appropriate to post 8/23 pages from issue 117 of the mercifully forgotten "The Adventures of Jerry Lewis" comic, an issue worthy of note today only because it guest starred Wonder Woman in her "mod" phase.



I thought of posting excerpts with a summary of cut pages as usual, but found that trying to read the issue was making my head bleed, so here are pages 2-9 of the story, which gives you the setup.



















The past was a different country, one in which it was possible for there to be over 100 issues of a Jerry Lewis comic.

ETA: the last page includes a statement of management and circulation. in 1970, "The Adventures of Jerry Lewis" was selling 175,000 copies every month. Do you think maybe, just maybe, going after ever more grimdark crossover events might have been a mistake on DC's part?

Giving this the crack tag, I guess? And the misogyny tag, because Jerry Lewis.

Comments

[alicemacher]

Every single "joke" in this story is so forced, it must've been written at gunpoint.

[glaurung]

The comedy has definitely not aged well. I know Jerry Lewis was once seen as a really funny person, but none of his movies seemed the least bit funny to me (or watchable, for that matter).

[alicemacher]

In fairness, he himself didn't write the comic. This story for example was the fault of one Alan R. Riefe, according to comics.org.

The thing is that Lewis's style of comedy really doesn't translate well to the printed page. It relies on the whole package, including his voice and movement, timing and such. It's hard to imagine even actual fans of his comedy--even his devoted French fans!--finding stuff like this comic entertaining, though. I don't know...maybe DC kept it going as long as it did out of respect for the showbiz veteran?

[glaurung]

They kept it going because it sold. Why, I cannot say. The comic's humour appears to have aged even more poorly and the real Jerry Lewis's humour.

I will admit that I am one of those feminists who doesn't find sexist humour funny, so that may be keeping me from appreciating Lewis's work.

[alicemacher]

Really, I find certain characters he inspired much funnier, like Professor Frink of The Simpsons and the director in that Animaniacs short parodying Apocalypse Now.

[leoboiko]

The level of misunderstanding of Wonder Woman's entire concept is astounding.

[glaurung]

YES. Even by the pretty loose standards of "mod" era WW.

[randyripoff]

The comics market was very, very different back in 1970/
For instance, there were no comics shops. However, comics were everywhere--drug stores, grocery stores, news stands, etc.
There were also a lot more publishers. Marvel and DC were king, but there was also Charlton, Harvey, Archie, etc. Lots of different genres too. Humor, war, romance, horror, sports.
Because there were no comics shops, it was hard to follow particular titles. There was a greater emphasis on done-in-one stories.
On the business side of things, comics were returnable. If a news stand only sold 10 copies of Batman even if they'd ordered 100, they could just return them. which is one of the reasons comics were all over the place. It didn't really cost the retailers much if the comics didn't sell.
Oh, and there were only 3 channels on TV (perhaps 6 if you count local and PBS) and there was no internet. So there was much more interest in other types of entertainment.

[tcampbell1000]

Do you think maybe, just maybe, going after ever more grimdark crossover events might have been a mistake on DC's part?

Well, I don't think Infinite Jerry Lewises would have sold better in the 2010s.