Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
It is the grin of someone who has decided that nothing is worth panicking about, and Mad used it as the magazine's whole attitude: cheerful disrespect for adults, advertisers and authority. Politicians have been drawn as Neuman ever since, and the phrase is still the quickest way to mock leaders who shrug at a crisis.
Context reviewed
In context
Spoilers for MadShow the scene
The motto is older than the character who wears it. A gap-toothed, freckled grin of this kind sold painless dentistry in the late nineteenth century, and similar faces and slogans turned up in ads and humour magazines for decades, including a 1923 college joke caption and a World War II bomber's nose art reading "Me Worry?". Mad made it famous: the face first appears on Mad #21 (March 1955) in a mock ad, and when Mad became a magazine with #24 (July 1955) its border carries the line, written as "What? Me worry?". Editor Al Feldstein named the boy Alfred E. Neuman in 1956 and put him on the covers.
Sources (1)
- Wikipedia: Alfred E. NeumanLead; Origins; Mad appearancesReference checked
Context reviewed