Back in the day when you were a kid that hit puberty one of the first things that shorted your circuits and flipped your hormones out were nudie mags. Oh my God, girls look like this? Where? How? Wait, was Miss May at my Bar-Mitzvah, she looks familiar. Playboy was the mag of choice for most pre-pubescent boys as far I knew. It was the Centerfold that gave you palpitations and froze you into a slack-jawed drooling mess. Nobody gave a shit about the magazine, you just flipped to the part with the Miss Babe of the Month and stared. The only thing that might have caught your eye were the cartoons for a second but that was it.
Penthouse was the next level up in the nudie mag department. It was raunchier and way more graphic. Most older brothers didn’t have Penthouse stowed away in their closets. The first time you laid your eyes on a Penthouse mag was probably at camp or at a sleepover at the house of the kid with the dysfunctional family that had an older brother who rode a motorcycle and had a pack of cigarettes rolled up in his shirt sleeve. As for Hustler, well, that was full out nasty dirty porn and way too much for most kids. Hustler was always way the top on the magazine racks at the corner store. You would squint and raise up on your Keds to see what was going on up there and it was always a bit shocking.
Anyway, seeing something comic book related being put out by Penthouse definitely took me back to middle school days. I had no idea there were any ‘comics’ in old school Penthouse mags and if there were, I was intrigued. Were they great? Were they just sexy or were the stories actually good? Did any of the babes ever dress up as Batgirl? Playboy was definitely a Super Girl nudie mag. Penthouse a potential Batgirl nudie mag. Hustler was a Scarlet Witch with crotchless panties whipping a naked Vision Dude hung upside down with a dildo protruding from his forehead nudie mag; you know I'm right.
I’m usually not into anthology type comics but with the magazine format and price tag I assumed there’d be enough page count to have it actually present a major chunk of a story and hey, nothing wrong with a naked chick in a photo shoot to bring back memories of the simpler days of nudie mags and spin the bottle parties; so I pulled an issue. It was a little off putting having to see like, ten NSFW variants being offered. It’s one thing asking your LCS to pull the XXX Sex Criminals variant. It’s another to decide which naked chick appeals to you the most and then ask your LCS to make sure they get her for you. Yeah, that feels a little dirty. That’s walking into a 42nd Street XXX Store in the 90s vibes, for sure.
So how was it? Well, it was pretty bad, BUT I think there’s potential here. Let’s break down this Poon-thology comic tit by tit:
The Dream - A sex club is the opening scene for the mind-numbingly bad story drawn by one of the great artists of the industry: Guillem March. I love March’s work. His 'Karmen' book was one of my absolute fave books of 2020. That book had a lot of panels where a naked girl was flying around Spain, what’s not to love? This however, I mean, blecch. Some Adonis looking dude hung like a horse bangs his girlfriend on stage at a sex club. Some reporter shows up to the club. The same night, some hot heartless Asian who’s the daughter of some gangster shows up as well. After the show, her Goons attack the girlfriend/stage sex partner of the Adonis dude outside. They kick her in the ribs repeatedly. Umm what? The dude then is forced to go with the Asian and he ends up on some bluff where she tells him to bang her. She also tells him to enjoy it while he can because she’s gonna get tired of him eventually and dump him. And I’m supposed to root for who exactly? And I care about any of this, why? Who’s the sympathetic figure here? The Adonis who left his girlfriend with broken ribs on the street? The reporter who did nothing about it? The Asian twat-aroonski who demands Adonis meat? This is like an atrocious plot for one of those late night Cinemax movies that you watch when you’re a teenager simply because you’re waiting for the sex scenes. That might work when you’re a raging hormone horndog but not when you’re reading a comic book with your coffee in the morning. Trash. March is amazing and he kicked ass on the art but I’m pouting after this story and so is my dong.
Verdict: Flaccid
Gun Crazy - This may be one of the worst stories of any genre that I’ve read in a while. I’m befuddled as to how this was allowed to go to print. Perhaps the Lesbo sex and copious titty shots were supposed to blind us from the text we were reading. Two chicks who met in the army in Afghanistan fall for each other and then actualize themselves as full on Lesbians. Fine. Then, I dunno, they meet some Afghan Lesbian and then, they all bang and then, I dunno, somehow the two American chicks end up up with concealed guns in a redneck titty bar. They proceed to dance seductively for the rednecks in ‘Trump Country’ who look goofy, ugly and stupid as all get out. They’re wearing make-up all over their body to conceal the fact that they’re Black and Latina. Due to them sweating while shaking their T&A the make-up wears off and of course all the racists, which you must be if you’re a redneck in a bar with a torn off jean jacket, scream foul and pull their guns on them – because that’s obviously what racists do when they find out that the girls dancing for them aren’t actually White. Oy vey. This gives the Lesbians justification to take out guns that somehow were concealed on the bottom of their shoes and murder everyone in the bar including killing a guy with a swastika on his arm with an axe to his head. How fucking ridiculous. Why. Why. Why. Hey hot Lesbian girlfriend, let’s fake out some rednecks so they think we’re white so we can kill them when they realize we’re not. That’s your plot? Am I supposed to be rooting for these girls? Why? Because they became who they were meant to be sexually? What absolute drivel. Now mind you, the art was actually terrific. It’s a shame that Jef (that's who they say the Artist was, feels like a pseudonym and I don't blame him) worked on this. I hope he gets better assignments because it was beautifully drawn. But my goodness, what a shitty story.
Verdict: Scared Turtle
Miss October - Next there’s this noir story. I don’t think it’s noir. I think it’s more like mud. Yeah, it’s a new genre called Mud. How it works is you start reading the first few pages and then you get stuck, because you don’t know what the fuck is going on or why. You keep reading but then you keep turning back to the page that you got stuck on, it’s really cool! You’re like, ‘Wait, what the fuck? Who is who now? How did – huh? Kudos to this creative team for inventing a completely new literary experience. Dude, I have no idea. Like, there’s this hot babe in the early 1960s and she’s robbing some expensive artifacts from UCLA. She gets caught by a cop but then doesn’t. She knows him but then we jump back a couple of years and, is this the same guy? He’s not a cop anymore or is he? There’s somebody killing playmates one by one. Is she also a character? I don’t know. Is the cop her ex? I don’t know. Everybody kind of looks the same. The art is sweet but, I’m lost.
Again
if this was Cinemax in the 80s or 90s or The Hitchhiker on HBO (oh my goodness
do yo guys remember The Hitchhiker show??? Major Late Night Boners) you wouldn’t
give a shit about the plot because you were a horny teen just jonesin (does
anybody even say Jonesin’ anymore? I do!) for some titties. But there's no fast
forwarding on Cinemax so you have to endure the bad writing but it in a way it
makes it hotter because all the girls are sexy and they’re wearing sexy clothes
and you know you’re gonna see tits eventually so you relax and somehow enjoy
the bad acting. Yet, I’m not a horny teen and this is a comic book, so,
yeah this is pretty wack. Kudos again to the Artist for drawing up a storm. I really enjoyed the art.
Verdict: Major Shrinkage
After reading a trio brain cell obliterating stories the first thing I obviously want to do is a Word Search where I get to locate my fave Porn Stars. Thank you Penthouse Comics for making that happen. Usually you see people working on Word Searches on a subway or a plane. I can’t wait to ask my next seat neighbor to help me find Rotten, especially when I tell them it’s the name of an up and cumming nudie starr. Seriously? C'mon XXX Industry, you called a girl Rotten? You couldn’t use Nasty, or Trollop or Devious? Rotten??? Who’s next? Despicable? Yucky? Mold?
Next up was a breakdown of the budget
of porn films throughout the years. I'm not sure why they felt this was necessary for a comics anthology. Are they trying to secure funding for this book? Are they making a new movie called 'Shrinkage: Curse of the Scared Turtle'? This was filler if I ever saw filler, but, I dunno, interesting. I guess they're saying, look we can drop less than 1m and make a huge profit on our films. Maybe Disney should take notice and just release the subliminal dick versions of all their movies where the dicks are clearly displayed. Maybe if they charge an arm and a leg for those releases they can make another Star Wars film that ruins your childhood more.
There's an article on the success of their 'Pirates of the Caribbean' sex parody. Not sure why this is in here but the names for other popular parodies were listed as well and my goodness these are fucking fantastic: Assventure Time, Hand Solo and Spongeknob Squarenuts, hahahahahahahahaaaaa. I dare you to Google Spongeknob Squarenuts.
Finally there's a Nudie Photoshoot to finish you off. Yeah, hmm, this girl, I dunno, not for me. This chick has sooo many tats it's bonkers. I'm just not into tats. I looked her up when she's not glossed over and photo-shopped and, wow, she's really cute. Maybe posing her in a Mechanic Shop didn't do it for me. I mean, a babe placing wrenches and car gear over her naughty bits, not a turn on for me.
You know what would've been a turn on? If she was posing with paid invoices for expensive auto work! Like, here's a paid invoice for the transmission you need fixed on your classic car (which I need fixed). Ooh yeah, baby, I took care of it. Now, I'm a blubbering mess. Maybe that should be an idea for a sexy photo shoot: Women and Invoices marked 'Paid'. For the record, I looked for an image of a Babe holding a paid invoice over her body and could not find one. This is a niche that needs filling!
Anyway, long deep sigh. Look, I think this has the makings of a great format, I really do. Despite the fact that the stories were atrocious the art for all of them was exquisitely done; each with a distinctive style. Maybe Artists are like ‘Hell yeah I’ll draw some tits’ but maybe Writers are thinking ‘I’m not sure I wanna be associated with Penthouse’, so they’ve declined an invitation.
You know who Penthouse should recruit? Sean Murphy! It's a perfect match! DC has basically dumped him and he's toiling with a low visibility publisher right now putting out mnyeh not-so-great comics. His hot wife writes erotica, c'mon Murph! Show us your naughty side! Or better yet bring your wife in and put out some world class sexy stories.
I'm down to check out one or maybe two more of these Nudie Comixxx Anthologies but for 10 bones a pop you're gonna have to drop a story or feature that brings the turtle out of his shell, na'mean?
Rating: 5.6
Verdict: Worth another Pull but not a long Yank.
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