[Ojay]

Murder Can Be Fun by John Marr
Requirements: CBR Reader. 197 MB
Overview: Each issue of Murder Can Be Fun contains a series of several (eight to ten) stories of unusual or noteworthy deaths. In much the same vein as Malcolm Forbes' best-selling "Whatever Happened To..." series of books, MCBF looks at a different theme each issue. Issue 1 is all about great or strange disasters in history (the crash of the Hindenburg as well as the Great Boston Molasses Flood). Issue 2 is about the unusual deaths of famous celebrities, including Jayne Mansfield, Bruce & Brandon Lee, and Ernest Hemingway. Issue 3 (due in August) will be about postal worker rampages, with a "samurai mailman" cover from Andi Watson.

Each issue of Murder Can Be Fun contains a series of several (eight to ten) stories of unusual or noteworthy deaths. In much the same vein as Malcolm Forbes' best-selling "Whatever Happened To..." series of books, MCBF looks at a different theme each issue. Issue 1 is all about great or strange disasters in history (the crash of the Hindenburg as well as the Great Boston Molasses Flood). Issue 2 is about the unusual deaths of famous celebrities, including Jayne Mansfield, Bruce & Brandon Lee, and Ernest Hemingway. Issue 3 (due in August) will be about postal worker rampages, with a "samurai mailman" cover from Andi Watson.






Murder Can Be Fun

Cover by Jhonen Vasquez, Don M. Haring Jr,by F. Andrew Taylor, Garret Izumi, Kyle Hunter, Gregory Benton, Zander Cannon, Scott Saavedra, Andi Watson, Jeff John, Postal Employees , John Marr.
Notes by John Marr.
Publisher: Slave Labor Graphics (SLG) Publishing (1996)

Murder Can Be Fun is the infamous zine of bizarre death, murder, mayhem, crime, disaster, weird books and even weirder people.

John Marr began publishing the zine in 1986 out of San Francisco, CA. This long-running zine has been in existence for more than twenty years. For each issue Marr painstakingly researches murders and deaths, documenting them in an entertaining way. Topics have included Karen Carpenter's anorexia, assassination attempts on Andy Warhol, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, historical cannibals, faith healing, Fatty Arbuckle, Cornell Woolrich's fiction, and many more bizarre subjects not often addressed in the mainstream media. This digest-size, photocopied zine started at 16 pages and grew to 48 pages in later issues.


Fascinating as only the truth can be, John Marr collects and assembles the facts and histories behind each case, then leaves the scripting and pacing up to the individual artists and the editing up to the versatile Craig Pape, with results ranging from excellent and sharp ("The Croak" in issue 2) to short and sweet (Zander Cannon's one-page "4 Classic Disasters" in issue 1), from captivating slow-motion calamities ("Target: Andy Warhol") to somewhat unfocused ("Post Chicago Fire"), but almost all are universally fascinating.

Since each issue is an anthology of short stories from various artists, it is not surprising that the art styles vary dramatically even within a single issue. Consistently good art comes from established creators like Zander Cannon, Scott Saavedra, and Garrett Izumi (plus, of course, the wonderful covers from Jhonen Vasquez and Evan Dorkin), great one-pagers from F. Andrew Taylor (see a sample to the left) and quality work with solid pacing and really nice flow from people like Don Haring Jr. and Gregory Benton.

Unfortunately, sometimes less-than sterling pieces find their way in, like the confusing "Nashville Train Wreck", but in an anthology one necessarily expects some hits and misses -- and MCBF has a higher hit-to-miss ratio than most, especially in issue 2 (definitely the better of the two issues printed so far) due to the morbidly fascinating subject and the interesting variety of artists. Seeing Garrett's picture-show square frames in the same issue as Zander's loopy, super-deformed Warner-Bros-esque stylings is an experience not to be missed.
Most of the first 16 issues included an eclectic mix of content, except #7 (sports) and #11 (disasters). Contents of specific issues included:


Issue 01: high school cheerleader murder, Thomas Thurmond's lynching, teen guilt novels, book and moview reviews.
Issue 11: I (heart) Disasters issue, featuring the Boston Molasses Flood, the Port Chicago Explosion, and other mishaps.
Issue 12: The Art of Murder, featuring Wallace/Qualtrough, cannibal Sawney Beane, murder connosseur Thomas de Quincey, 1989 San Francisco quake, and book reviews.

Murder Can Be Fun was featured in The Factsheet Five Zine Reader that was published in 1997, as well as in 1992's The World of Zines.
Murder Can Be Fun is included in the Sarah and Jen Wolfe Zine Collection at The University of Iowa and the West Coast Zine Collection at San Diego State University.

Download Instructions:
Murder Can Be Fun 01 (SLG 1996)
Murder Can Be Fun 02 (SLG 1996)
Murder Can Be Fun 03 (SLG 1996)
Murder Can Be Fun 04 (SLG 1996)
Murder Can Be Fun 05 (SLG 1997)
Murder Can Be Fun 06 -- Missing
Murder Can Be Fun 07 (SLG 1997)
Murder Can Be Fun 08 (SLG 1998)
Murder Can Be Fun 09 (SLG 1998)
Murder Can Be Fun 10 (SLG 1998)
Murder Can Be Fun 11 (SLG 1998)
Murder Can Be Fun 12 (SLG 1999)

[andree]

Nice release, jay!11x5 WRZ$ rewards. Category : Comics.