| Wonder Wart-Hog | |
|---|---|
 Wonder Wart-Hog: the Hog of Steel #1 (Millar Publishing Company, 1967). | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Millar Publishing Company Print Mint Rip Off Press Last Gasp |
| First appearance | "Fearless, Fighting, Foulmouthed Wonder Wart-Hog" in Bacchanal (Mar. 1962) |
| First comic appearance | Feds 'N' Heads (1968) |
| Created by | Gilbert Shelton & Tony Bell |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Philbert Desanex |
| Species | Phacochoerus |
| Place of origin | Squootpeep |
| Notable aliases | The Hog of Steel |
| Abilities | Flight, super strength, invulnerability |
Wonder Wart-Hog (the "Hog of Steel") is an underground comic book character, a porcine parody of Superman, created by American cartoonist Gilbert Shelton and first published in 1962.[1] Over the years, Shelton has worked on the strip in collaboration with various writers and artists, including fellow UT Austin alums Tony Bell, Bill Killeen, and Joe E. Brown Jr.
The humor of Wonder Wart-Hog works on many levels. Fundamentally, it is slapstick comedy in which excessive force is a constant theme, but it also parodies the McCarthyism and violence of the far right. Wonder Wart-Hog is a pro-establishment, law and order type personality, often gone overboard. For example, he's willing to kill a lady driver talking on her cell phone because she might cause an accident.
Wonder Wart-Hog's rogues gallery includes "Super-Fool, Super-Hypnotist, the Masked Meanie, Super-Patriot, the Plastic Man, the Granny of Gruntville, the Bad Brainbender, Pie Man, the International Order of Bomb-Flinging Fiends, the Amazing Meanie Fuel, the Famous Rushin' Bear, Evil Weevil, the Mafia, the Zymotic Zookeeper, Smiling Sergeant Death, the Elusive Chimerical Chameleon, and the Pigs from Uranus, among others".[2]
The zany showdowns involve contests such as backward motorcycle races (who can go the slowest) or exposing some villain running a fraud scheme such as comet insurance. Wonder Wart-Hog dispatches his enemies in various ways, such as grinding them into sausage, flinging them into orbit, or crushing them with his immense bulk. But on one occasion he punished a lynch mob by giving them Cadillacs and TV sets, and then banishing them to Mississippi.[3]
Gilbert's humor occasionally crosses the line into violence of a sexual nature, but the emphasis is more on the absurdity of the situation than the act itself.
- ^ Rovin, Jeff (1991). The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Cartoon Animals. Prentice Hall Press. p. 288. ISBN 0-13-275561-0. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
- ^ Becattini, Alberto (2019). "Super-Animals". American Funny Animal Comics in the 20th Century: Volume Two. Theme Park Press. ISBN 978-1683902218.
- ^ Shelton, Gilbert. "Wonder Wart-Hog Meets Super-Patriot!", Texas Ranger (University of Texas Student Publications, Nov. 1962).