Mr. Natural #1 by Robert Crumb

Let me begin with wow. Just wow. We were warned about the offensive nature of underground comics and I'm no spring chicken but man was this a surprise. I truly did not know what to expect but this was definitely not it. Mr. Natural started off innocuous enough, meditation-ok, racist stereotypes- not ok but not surprising, then weird baby oral- yeah what??? While reading this I found myself asking why, many many times. There's just nothing about this comic that I could relate to or understand or justify. There was no overall moral to the story that I felt made any of it okay. The end's never really justified the means. And the artistry did not really do much for it either, it was fine but it was not anything super impressive or high art. I guess that's the point though, these comics were meant to be something alternative, that do not fit into the model of "acceptability." They are simple, "fun," really bizarre reads meant to entertain, which to many people they did. While I personally did not really enjoy this particular comic, underground comics did do a lot to pave the way for a lot of media we have now. As weird as they are you have to give credit where credit is due.