Cuban Cartoonist Fled from Castro and Created 'Spy vs. Spy' | Hacker News Reader

Cuban Cartoonist Fled from Castro and Created 'Spy vs. Spy'

atlasobscura.com

109 pointssohkamyung26 comments

> Unable to continue finding work, and fearing for the safety of his fellow El Mundo workers, Prohías, unable to speak a word of English, headed for New York.

It's important to note, for those whose only knowledge of the Cuban Revolution is the iconic Che Guevara portrait, that 'fearing for their safety' didn't mean Prohias thought his co-workers might be beaten up: it meant that he was worried that they (and possibly their families) might be shot.

Shot because Guevara had a thing for shooting people.

Yeah I've read Che wasn't a fan of musicians and artists.

So many college students don't believe it.

And I guess the suits the two spies wears are suits popular in Cuba or the time, it explains a lot.

>that 'fearing for their safety' didn't mean Prohias thought his co-workers might be beaten up: it meant that he was worried that they (and possibly their families) might be shot.

Not sure where the parent got this supposedly superior "information" from -- right wing circles/books, for which every non-right regime change is an anathema?

As far as mass movements and revolutions go, this was one of the least bloody ever.

Of course for an cushy westerner in 2016 it's difficult to fathom a movement killing even 10 or 100 persons (of course those are way less than what the police kills in a year in some countries), but for people that live in places with actual turbulent history and bad governments that were toppled (were left or right wing) those things are par for the course. There are a lot of collaborators with the previous order, people the masses hate, ex-police -- including some generally innocent people caught in the comment.

That's true whether it's Romanians rising against Ceausescu or Cubans rising against the Batista regime.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Cuba#Political...

>"According to Amnesty International, death sentences from 1959–87 numbered 237 of which all but 21 were actually carried out. (...) One estimate from The Black Book of Communism is that throughout Cuba 15,000–17,000 people were executed."

So here you have both a low estimate, and the extravagant numbers from the well known anti-communist cold-war style book.

>"The vast majority of those executed following the 1959 revolution were policemen, politicians and informers of the Batista regime accused of crimes such as torture and murder, and their public trials and executions had widespread popular support among the Cuban population. Scholars generally agree that those executed were probably guilty as accused, but that the trials did not follow due process."

Mad is wonderful.. Tom Richmond is one I learn to draw [0] Jack Hamm has the best series, I think, to learn. [0] http://www.tomrichmond.com/

I was most impressed by Mort Drucker's ability to make an instantly-recognisable caricature with only a couple of lines in a small space. There are actors in the background of movies whose names I've never known, but I recognise in the background of his drawings.

Yeah I agree that Mort Drucker was fantastic, I also had a fondness for the more wacky style of Jack Davies and extremely wacky style of Don Martin, oh and Sergio Aragones, damn they had so many great artists on that magazine.

Growing up during the 80s in Sweden, I, as many orthers, played the game on the Commodore 64 a lot.

Until now I had no idea it was a comic strip originally :-)

https://archive.org/details/segasms_Spy_vs._Spy_1986_Sega

The Sega Master System version emulated in your browser.

Until now I had no idea there was a game. :)

This comic strip is the second thing I visualize when I think of MAD magazine.

The first is the drawing of Alfred Newman's face.

It is interesting how different generations are seemingly cut off from different sets of information about the same subject.

When I'm on HN, I think of Donald Knuth: http://www.webofstories.com/people/donald.knuth/8?o=SH

Va ? Läste du inte svenska MAD, skam! ;D

Joking aside, the C64 game (the first one) captured the comic strip very well in my opinon.

Me too! Minus the Sweden. I played in Seattle. BTW here's my favorite theme remix. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gf-M_j5MYQ

Man I loved Spy vs. Spy. Anyone remember the official board game? https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1686/spy-vs-spy

My feeling is that Spy vs Spy got their popularity rather through the games than through the comic strips in Mad. I loved the games on the 8- and 16-bit home computer generation and with another human player they were a blast. But I wasn't really that excited about the comic strips. They had their distinct style which was definitely nice but I preferred stories from other cartoonists in Mad.

I'm confused. You think that a comic strip that's been popular since the '60s owes it to a handful of video games made in the mid-'80s?

Because of the huge reach of Mad they were popular before but they felt more like mediocre filler content within Mad. Yes the style was distinct but the plot was always the same and predictable. With the games they found their real determination: the visual style, the always recurring topic of the spies tricking each one into a trap--the games were the perfect media for Spy vs Spy, way better than the strips.

And it was more than a handful of games. Spy vs Spy was a strong merchandise running over many years with an unique and innovative gameplay then for many platforms.

> they felt more like mediocre filler content ... the style was distinct but the plot was always the same and predictable.

That describes almost any comic that has been going for over 20 years. That doesn't make it bad, just played out. That it lasted decades at all indicates something good about it.

There were three games published in 1984-1986 and sporadically ported after that; they were successful at the time, but obscure enough now that they share one slim Wikipedia page. A fourth game was published for PS2/Xbox in 2005 and sank without a ripple.

Id never heard of the game until your earlier post - Id skip most of mad to read Spy Vs Spy. Predictability isn't necessarily a bad thing - in fact kids seem to particularly love repetition.

I first learned of the characters from the games. For many years I never suspected they might be older than the games.

I did read MAD before having the Spy vs. Spy game (which was cool), but I think that many people actually did learn of Spy vs. Spy through the game - though I agree that very likely far from majority.

While I knew Spy vs. Spy from the magazine. I had no idea there was a game. I also remember MAD TV had Spy vs. Spy in it.

Fan of Spy vs Spy who's never heard of the game here.

> My feeling is that Spy vs Spy got their popularity rather through the games than through the comic strips in Mad.

They were compiled into books before the computer games even existed, so that's probably not the case.

ffs, don't use dislike like a disagree button.

If this is a misconception, tell greenspot

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