Mad #508 (John Ficarra) - Justin Bieber Issue - April 2011

I have never heard Justin Bieber sing but I am sure he is very good at it.  Mad writer Desmond Devlin does a great job with the autobiography of a 16-year-old who needs to stretch his sentences to fill a book ("100% Superficial Justin Bieber - First Step 2 Obscurity: My Story").  According to amazon.com, the "official" biography of Mr. Bieber is First Step 2 Forever although they also sell dozens of unauthorized biographies.  Cover artist Mark Fredrickson thinks that Bieber looks like our Alfred E. Neuman with just a bit more hair.

The other star of this issue is Donald Trump who has a similar hairdo.  See "ChiaBieberPet" and "ChiaTrump" on page 56.  Mad artist Tom Bunk is not known for caricatures but he does a good job of capturing the moods (mostly surly) of The Donald in "Undercover Boob."  Bunk is not the most talented of artists but I cannot fault him for lack of effort.  He draws the most cluttered panels since the early days of the great Will Elder  (1921-2008).  However, much of the Bunk clutter consists of random body parts that seem to be strewn around as if the local morgue had recently exploded. [JAM 2/3/2011]

The best drawing of the issue is Bob Staake's Conan O'Brien getting the boot from the NBC peacock on page 10.

Look for pigeons smoking cigarettes in "Sad Men."

Fake department is "Mind Over Bladder - What If Everyone in Mensa Suffered From Incontinence?"

Departments:
Random Acts of Mindless - The Fundalini Pages
The Silence of the Ham - A Mad Public Service Announcement
It's an Ad, Ad, Ad, Ad World - Sad Men
What's Up, Docs? - What We Really Learned From WikiLeaks
There Will Be Blood Libel - Mad's Moronic Outtakes from Sarah Palin's Alaska
Serge-In General - A Mad Look at Murder
Joke And Dagger - Spy vs. Spy
Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow - Justin Bieber: First Step 2 Obscurity
The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Lame - It's a Recession, It's a Depression
Sensor And Sensibility - Wild, Unfounded Rumors Surrounding the Xbox Kinect
A Real S.O.B. Story - John "Boo Hoo" Boehner - "The Weeper of the House"
Pen And Stink - The Mad Strip Club
Workers' Condescension - Undercover Boob
Rall of Fame - 7 Periods Closer to Death
Assail to the Chief - How Obama Stacks Up Against the Other 42 Presidents
Hair Apparent - Chia Bieber Pet

Fold-In - Xbox