Cartoonist and comic strip artist-partnership of Susan Butcher and Carol Wood , the result is the quirky Pox magazine – a parody of and homage to Mad . According to David Nichols, by 1999 Wood and Butcher were seasoned commentators accustomed to taking pot shots at Australian and American culture. The cover of the second issue of Pox featured a naked Wood in a bathtub filled with Mad comics. Wood claimed in her introduction to the issue: “ Mad taught me all about sex, politics, the media and advertising”. Inside, Wood and Butcher reconstruct 'Tales from a lost issue of Mad’ . A 'pin-up’ of Alfred E Neuman is included, dead and putrefying in the manner of the old EC horror comics. Above him, a banner reads: “Wot – me Rot?” David Nichols, who described Pox as parodic, parasitic and satirical, reproduced one of these cartoons in his article.

Kevin Patrick commended the biting satire of their quirky humour comic in his review of Annette Shiell (ed.), Bonzer , in ABC 109 (August 1999), 30, regretting Pox 's omission in the book. Pox 4: The Weird Issue (issued from PO Box 1298, St Kilda South 3182, $3.00) was reviewed in Milk Bar 1998 , but Pox 5: goodbye Future did not appear until May 2000. It included 'Have Rat, Will Travel’, an autobiographic comic dated 1999 – with self-portraits – about Butcher and Wood’s removal from Perth to Melbourne by driving across the Nullabor, leaving Wednesday, 24 June [1998?]. It was published by Unsafe Products, PO Box 1298, St Kilda South 3182.

“Pox” participated in Silent Army , Express Media, Fitzroy Vic, 2002 (“20 of Australias young comic book veterans together for the first time”: Bicycle, Blanden, Brown, Carvan, Conn, Cure, Danko, Dodds, Fikaris, Greenberg, Mackay, Mangan, Mrongovius, O’Donnell, Ord, Pox , Savieri, Schell, Smith, Taylor ). Published as part of 2002 Next Wave Festival with Arts Victoria sponsorshi

Writers:

Staff Writer

Date written:

1996

Last updated:

2007