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Popeye Classics Volume 5

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  •  
    Todd Jordan
    Smut is good.

  • Popeye Classics Volume 5



    Published by: IDW Press / Yoe Books!
    Released: Jan. 21, 2015
    Writer: Bud Sagendorf
    Artist: Bud Sagendorf
    Cover artist: Bud Sagendorf
    Purchase at Amazon

    Yoe's latest collected volume of Popeye Comics reprints puts issues 20 through 24 all in one place. As per the previous volume, a Bud Sagendorf scrapbook starts off the book, providing newspaper clippings, collectables, and some Dutch Popeye Comics material. From there it's on to the comics and if you're a fan of Popeye comics, you know exactly what to expect from Mr. Sagendorf's work: consistency, 50s style corniness, and some really entertaining pages, whether you're a kid or an adult.

    Issue #20
    “Here Comes the Bride” has Popeye vacationing in the wastelands of the desert. The fact that he decides that the desert is the place he goes to get away from it all isn't so much the odd thing about how this one starts. What's weird is that it mentions Popeye owns a ship AND a railroad. Popeye owned a railroad?? Well, things heat up when he's attacked by “wild Indians” who mutter things like “ugh” and “glubdub”. They mistake him for a turkey, try to cook him, and then have him marry the hottie of the teepee village. Olive Oyl senses something is up with her Popeye and his cheating ways, and she finds him in no time, handing him his dignity in a poop scoop.

    This next tale has a double title: “Little Kids Should Have Ice Cream” or “Swee'Pea Gets It”. Little Swee'Pea wants another ice cream, so he tries to con Popeye into buying him one. That doesn't work, and neither does pitching a fit, so the tyke cries himself to sleep and dreams of Ice Cream Land. He tries stealing from a cone farm and gets apprehended by a giant policeman, landing himself in jail. He quickly realizes this jail made out of ice cream bricks and he eats his way to freedom but it becomes a nightmare of pain and discomfort. Guess what happens when Popeye gives in and lets him have all he wants? Yep.

    “Sherman”, Bud's own creation, decides to make his measly $1 bill look like a big ol' bank roll by wrapping it around a roll of paper, in “Rolling Along.” Sherman's wad (of cash) catches the eye of a car salesman who tries to swindle the kid out of his money. Taking it for a test drive with the salesman, Sherman crashes into a tree and hands the salesman the wad paper and takes off. Then he dumps salt on the guy's wound by offering him a ride back to the dealership on his bicycle.

    Issue #21
    “Interplanetary Battle!” puts Popeye in a heck of a predicament. No one, but NO ONE, can beat Popeye in a prize fight, his bread and butter, and because of this there is no one left to fight him. Everyone is afraid to challenge him. His fat buddy Wimpy helps out by putting an ad on the radio, promising a big purse to anyone who can beat ol' Squinty. The radio broadcast reaches Mars, and they send their very best. This alien can change size and shape and is more than a match for Popeye. In fact, he has the sailor by the short hairs and Popeye is worried. Fight night: the alien knocks Popeye out of the arena and into a big patch of spinach (of course). As we all know, Spinach makes Popeye superhuman, but what will it do to the alien?

    “Paper and Paste” is a doozy. Popeye's insane jealousy scares away (actually, he beats up) the wall paper hanger and leaves Olive Oyl in a bind: her parent's will be home from vacation soon (they live with her parents?) and the paper needs hanging. That guy Popeye assaulted was going to do it for a mere $500. Popeye, ever the cheapskate, ain't having none of that. He and Wimpy can do it for the cost of materials. After wasting valuable time with making a cake out of the paste, they learn hanging paper sucks and is worth every damned penny to have some other schmuck do it. But since that's not an option, Popeye falls back on his one true vice, which in this case seems more like speed than spinach.

    And finally on Sherman, the little turd ties his dog Winky to the doghouse instead of bringing him along for a walk and to play. Sherman's mother doesn't realize the dog in sleeping in the doghouse and has someone take it and the dog to the dump. Meanwhile, Sherman is accosted by the local bully and gets a pummeling, until Winky finds him and saves his dumb self from further pain and degradation. There's a moral in there somewhere, I'm sure of it.

    Issue #22
    In “Spinach Farm!” Swee'Pea goes to fetch the mail from the box out front, and notices a lot of bills were in the stack of mail. He doesn't want to give them to all Popeye at once, afraid the sailor will blow his top, so he decides to give Popeye one bill a day, to ease the top blowing. Too bad the one bill he gave Popeye is the most expensive one, and it's his bill for spinach. Pissed, Popeye confronts his dealer and decides: screw it; he'll just have his own spinach farm. After paying someone two grand for a farm the guy didn't own, he buys it from the right guy, then plows the field using his own face, and plants his spinach seeds. Olive and Wimpy decide the spinach needs daisies planted amongst it, but they muff it up. Six weeks later, Popeye assaults Wimpy with a rake.

    “Swee'Pea's Vacation!” starts with the little guy bummed out because he has two weeks' vacation and doesn't know what to do. Oh, the stress of being a baby. King Blozo invites Swee'Pea to his castle and a little two-seat plane shows up to get the kid, but Blozo blooped by giving the boy the royal power of commanding the plane pilot to do whatever he says. This ends in disaster after he drives the plane himself and bombs the castle. Locked up for two weeks with just bread and water, his vacation ends with Popeye getting a bill for all the King's stuff Popeye's kid wrecked.

    In this issue's Sherm story, “The Long Way Home!”, the kid has to get home to his mother from Mrs. Twee's house. He chases pussy, gives Mrs. Jones his package, cries in the woods, rides a bus, pisses off a dog, and can't find his key to get in his house. But the treat with this story isn't with the inept humor, but with the maze on every page. Yes, in this interactive tale you get to help Sherm out.

    Issue #23
    “Boom! Boom!” or “Pirates is Rodents!”…Popeye hears on the radio that pirates have been attacking ships and that just rubs Popeye the wrong way. He hates pirates, and until now thought he freed the world of all pirates. Seems they have regrouped and off the sailor goes to take care of the problem. Unpacking all his pirate-killing gear, include a dull sword he sharpens with some spinach juice, he gathers his crew: Wimpy and Olive Oyl (who faints at the very word “pirates”, as she is so scared of them. Curious thing: she only faints the one time to hit home the joke). In round one, the pirates get the best of Popeye. After round two, they'll probably cower in fear when served spinach in jail.

    In “Ship Shape!” Popeye hasn't had a customer to charter his vessel, The Good Ship Spinacher, in months and is hurting for money. He tells Olive that every time a potential customer boards the ship, he gets cold feet and Popeye loses the job. Determined to help, Olive boards the ship herself and sees why: the Good Ship Spinacher is more like a garbage barge. The reason for the mess is simple: Poop Deck Pappy is living on the boat. The old salt doesn't like Olive and the hatred is mutual. After some mean words and violence, Olive leaves the ship and vows not to speak to Popeye until he cleans it up. And when you are out to sea and have a boat full of trash, the only natural thing to do is throw it overboard. At least that's how the father-son team does it. Foiled by the law, they have to come up with another way to clean up the ship and all the bean cans. It isn't a very good idea though.

    In the Sherm episode this time around, “Snow-Father”, Sherm goes outside without a jacket to build a snowman in the freshly fallen snow. The boy genius realizes he can make faster work of it if he rolls the snow down off the roof, but in doing so he buries his father in the snow as the old man is exiting the house for work. Sherm climbs down, finishes the snowman, encasing his father and condemning him to a slow death. A missing persons report later, and a fat cop trying to impress Sherm with his pitching arm, dad is discovered, frozen stiff under the snowman snow. And his wife is a bitch about it, too. Nice family.

    Issue #24
    “Golden Street” starts the issue with guest-star Pappy, the bane of Olive Oyl's existence. The old codger decides to exercise his right to dig for gold wherever he feels like it, and he feels like digging right in the middle of the street. The sheriff can't do a thing about it, as he fears Pappy, so he runs to the mayor who also happens to be the president of the bank. Pappy won't listen to that mucky-muck either, so they make a command decision to drown the bastard by filling his gold hole with water. It is not what that sounds like: there are no enemas in Popeye comics. Maybe in the Tijuana bibles, but not here. Pappy has a solution to his problem: use a diving suit. And gold he finds, a lot of gold, which changes the tune of mayor who puts on his banking hat and wants to house the gold Pappy keeps finding. Maybe he already DOES house that gold…

    “Hole in the Mountain” brings Popeye and Swee'Pea to an uncharted island via rowboat, and Popeye decides it is a good idea to leave the baby in the boat alone while he goes off to explores this new island. The boat is in a river and the floats away, down the lazy river and into a cave under a mountain. The English-speaking natives warned all trespassers to keep out, but Swee'Pea is snoozing and misses the polite warning signs like “This way to death.” Once inside the kingdom of Caveolla, he's thrown into captivity by the king who looks just like Swee'Pea. Ga! The baby sends a message via bottle to Popeye who then makes his way to rescue the lad. But seeing the baby king/Swee'Pea look-a-like throws the squinty-eyed sailor for a loop and he reacts with violence. He's thrown in jail with Swee'Pea, but thanks to spinach they bust out and kick the king's baby butt. Let's just hope the right baby goes back with Popeye…

    And then there's Sherm. He's going to win first prize of $500 in an auto race with his engineless go-kart. It turns into a maze-on-every-page story, and sucks. And the kid wins. The lawn mower engine he stole from his dad was the key to his victory.

    It's tough not to enjoy these comics on one level or another, and Yoe keeps pumping them out one at a time, once a month, spreading out the Popeye cheer throughout the year. Whether that's a necessary thing, rather than publishing just four or five issue collections like this one, can be argued, but let's just be glad someone is keeping these fun books from comic obscurity. These collections are a great time killer when looking for a quick, uninvolved read and Sagendorf was very effective at creating good slapstick on a comic page. You can't go wrong snagging any of these Popeye volumes, even if you have just a passing interest.











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