Tom's Mad Blog
January 8th, 2025 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
SotW is back for 2025 (although I did this one at the end of 2024). I’m going back to both my “Classic Rock” series and my hard rock roots with this week’s sketch of the late heavy metal icon Ronnie James Dio. As a kid I was a real metalhead, listening to bands like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, AC/DC and the like. I liked Rainbow with Dio on lead vocals, but it was when he took over as the vocalist for Black Sabbath that I became a big fan. It was always hard to believe that big voice came out of that little guy (Dio… READ MORE
January 6th, 2025 | Posted in MAD Magazine
Welcome to 2025! We are back to normal after the holidays with yet another step on the long and tedious road that has been a look back at my work for MAD Magazine. We are nearing the end of the line in terms of regular new material I did for the magazine. This “movie parody” appeared in MAD #8, Aug 2019. That issue is the penultimate one before MAD officially stopped newsstand distribution, which was really the beginning of the end of the MAD we all knew. I don’t consider this feature a movie parody in the true sense. A movie parody is aimed at… READ MORE
January 1st, 2025 | Posted in General
Don’t let this sourpuss fool you… here’s to a bright and shiny 2025! READ MORE
December 18th, 2024 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
I was definitely not driving a train high on cocaine when I did this week’s sketch, but it might have turned out better if I had been. We return to our “classic rock” series theme this week with a sketch of the late “Grateful Dead” frontman. I’m not sure how grateful he is about it, but he’s most definitely dead. I have to admit I have never really listened to “Grateful Dead”, although I have enough friends who love them to know it is “Grateful Dead” not “THE Grateful Dead”. I try to avoid the all-too-often pessimist’s sneering dismissal of pop culture phenomenons that they… READ MORE
December 13th, 2024 | Posted in General
Just in time for Christmas, I’ve scheduled two new workshops in 2025… Toronto and Seattle! There are still plenty of spots available in Las Vegas also, but only two left in Los Angeles. These workshops are unique experiences and make a great gift to the hard-to-buy-for artist in your life. Visit here for more info on what my workshops are all about! READ MORE
December 4th, 2024 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
Holy Huge Eyeballs, Batman! This week’s caricature sketch subject is the doll-like acting dynamo that was one of the main reasons “The Penguin” tv series was so good… Cristin Milioti! It’s no secret I am a big fan of Batman. While I can appreciate most takes on the character and his rogues gallery of villains (except 1997’s “Batman and Robin”, that was a gigantic piece of steaming garbage) I thought “The Penguin” TV series might be the best depiction of any of Batman’s nemeses to date. The Penguin is an essentially silly character. Attempts to make him formidable or truly villainous outside of a cartoon exaggeration… READ MORE
November 27th, 2024 | Posted in Sketch O'The Week
I was on vacation last week in Orlando with no access to a scanner, so I did my SotW entirely digitally. Here’s Sir Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter from “The Silence of the Lambs”. READ MORE
November 25th, 2024 | Posted in General
What? Another Monday?!? As if the end of the weekend was not bad enough, here comes another step on the rapidly dwindling road that was my work for MAD Magazine! This week was look back as what for a number of years seemed like it would be the final full movie parody to appear in MAD. I’m talking about MAD’s spoof of “Aquaman” from MAD #7 (June 2019) written by my CLAPTRAP cohort Desmond Devlin. The reason this seemed this one might be the curtain call for MAD movie parodies is that it was at this point in the MAD timeline, February of 2019, that… READ MORE
