Underground Comics - Cheech Wizard by Vaughn Bodē

This week I took a step into the world of Underground Comics, particularly the series Cheech Wizard by Vaughn Bodē. To be honest, when going into this comic for the first time, Cheech Wizard was exactly what I expected from an Underground Comic. Underground Comics were at their height of popularity in the late 1960's-70's. They were small, self-published comic books that, for the most part, focused on forbidden content such as heavy drug abuse and explicit sex, sometimes using popular mainstream characters such as Mickey Mouse and Popeye the Sailor Man, and content such the issues relating to the USSR and America.

The character Cheech Wizard is a wizard who wears an overly large yellow wizard's hat that covers his entire body aside from his legs, which are dressed in either red tights or footy style pajamas. Also, despite usually never seeing them, Cheech does indeed have hands, and possible a beard as well, as shown in certain stories such as when Cheech Wizard is captured by a group of frogs and forced to remove his hat.

Cheech Wizard follows the basic underground formula. Almost every story follows Cheech Wizard in situations that consist of him being highly intoxicated, very abusive to the other characters around him, or having sex or at least trying to pick up women for that purpose. However despite the majority of the stories feeling like they were recycling ideas, there were a few times were Cheech Wizard decided to branch out and try some different stories. For instance, one of the very first stories consists of its own rendition on the Great Space Race, which involved an actual, physical race to the moon between Cheech Wizard and the leader of the American Communist party, though they actually just send other people to do the dirty and risky work for them.

I did notice that while most of the art of Underground Comics is generally pretty bad, as they are made by many people who really aren't actually artists, Vaughn's style is actually quite good and very enjoyable to look at. I found Cheech Wizard to be a much more enjoyable read then some of the other Underground Comics. However, I still wasn't that interested in it as I read through it. Seeing as how Underground Comics were designed to be satirical and a way to stick a knife into the back of society, I feel that many failed in successfully conveying  what an Underground Comic truly is, despite possessing many of the same elements. Cheech Wizard I found, however, to be much more successful in its ability to convey the thoughts of the artist in interesting ways and shows what an Underground Comic should be.

I definitely feel that Underground comics aren't for me. While it was enjoyable seeing the various forms of satire and the handling of issues that would be considered outlawed for comics at the time, I personally wasn't a fan of  how some of the graphic content was depicted in some of these comics. I felt Cheech Wizard to be much more up my alley, and while I don't think I will ever pick it up again and read it, I would definitely recommended it anyone with a budding interest in the world of Underground Comics.