UNDERGROUND AND ADULT COMICS 651
more freedom, and by a new distribution model that circumvented the Comics Code
and encouraged independent publishers. Most recently, the Internet has become an
important vehicle for the on-line distribution of these successors to the underground
comix.
Tijuana Bibles sometimes featured gay or lesbian orgies, but the GLBT comic book
genre began with underground comix such as Come Out Comix (1972), Dynamite
Damsels (1976), and Gay Heart Th robs (1976). In 1980 Howard Cruse edited the
Gay Comix anthology for Kitchen Sink. Th e anthology not only featured the work
of pioneering underground cartoonists such as Mary Wings, Roberta Gregory, and
Trina Robbins, but also provided an outlet for the work of up-and-coming cartoonists
such as Donna Barr and Sam Kieth. Cruse only edited the fi rst four issues, but the
anthology continued for 25 issues and helped insure that transgressive comic book
work survived beyond the demise of the underground. For example, in 1991 Roberta
Gregory introduced Midge or Bitchy Bitch in Naughty Bits and Diane DiMassa began
combining outrageous violence and dry wit in Th e Hothead Paison.
Comic books by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender creators have matured in
content and have found an audience far beyond the GLBT community. Some of the
most critically acclaimed graphic novels have been produced by GLBT cartoonists.
Howard Cruse spent years crafting the semi-autobiographical graphic novel Stuck
Rubber Baby that was eventually published by DC’s Paradox Press imprint in 1995.
Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home was a fi nalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle
Award and Th e Guardian included Fun Home in its list of 1,000 novels everyone
must read.
Th ere were a handful of underground comix, for instance the earliest off erings
of Turner’s Last Gasp Eco-Funnies, that were intended to educate about and advo-
cate for social issues. Some of these works were no doubt an inspiration to Leonard
Rifas when he put together All Atomic Comics in 1976. Rifas established EduComics
and also pursued other projects, such as Corporate Crime Comics and Tobacco Comics
that went beyond the visceral anti-establishment attitude of underground comix to
make reasoned attacks on hegemonic institutions. In 1980, Seth Toboman and Peter
Kuper channeled the ideological spirit of the underground comix when they created
the activist anthology World War 3 Illustrated.
Except as an object of parody, undergrounds generally eschewed genre fi ction, but
even as the underground comix movement was getting underway there were comics in
magazine format that combined mainstream genres with the more prurient aspects of
the undergrounds. Th e horror, science fi ction, and fantasy magazines published by
Warren Publications, Skywald, and others contained little of the social commentary
of the underground comix, but because magazines were not subject to the restrictions
of the Comics Code Authority, they provided plenty of nudity and gore. Warren’s fi rst
magazine comics anthology, Creepy, appeared in 1964, followed two years later by Eerie;
the erotic Vampirella debuted in 1969. At the end of 1970, Skywald entered the maga-
zine comic book market with Nightmare. Also in the 1970s, Marvel launched an array
