Zap Comix

Zap Comix
Cover of Zap Comix #1 (Feb. 1968). Art by R. Crumb.
Publication information
Publisher	Apex Novelties (issues #1–3, 0) Print Mint (issues #4-9) Last Gasp (issues #10–15) Fantagraphics (issue #16)
Format	Ongoing series
Genre	Underground
Publication date(s)	February 1968 – November 2014
No. of issues	17
Main character(s)	Mr. Natural R. Crumb Angelfood McSpade Wonder Wart-Hog Checkered Demon Trashman
Creative team
Created by	Robert Crumb
Artist(s)	Robert Crumb, Victor Moscoso, S. Clay Wilson, Gilbert Shelton, Spain Rodriguez, Robert Williams, Rick Griffin, Paul Mavrides

Zap Comix is an underground comix series which was originally part of the youth counterculture of the late 1960s. While a few small-circulation self-published satirical comic books had been printed prior to this, Zap became the model for the "comix" movement that snowballed after its release.

Premiering in early 1968 as a showcase for the work of Robert Crumb, Zap was unlike any comic book sensibility that had been seen before. After the success of the first issue, Crumb opened the pages of Zap to several other artists, including S. Clay Wilson, Robert Williams, "Spain" Rodriguez, Gilbert Shelton, and two artists with reputations as psychedelic poster designers, Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin. This stable of artists, along with Crumb, remained mostly constant throughout the history of Zap.

Labeled "Fair Warning: For Adult Intellectuals Only", Zap #1 featured the publishing debut of Robert Crumb's much-bootlegged Keep on Truckin' imagery, an early appearance of unreliable holy man Mr. Natural and his neurotic disciple Flakey Foont, and the first of innumerable self-caricatures (in which Crumb calls himself "a raving lunatic", and "one of the world's last great medieval thinkers"). Perhaps most notable in the debut issue was the story "Whiteman," which detailed the inner torment seething within the lusty, fearful heart of an outwardly upright American.

For the second issue, Crumb invited S. Clay Wilson, Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin to contribute. Gilbert Shelton joined the crew with issue #3, and Robert Wiliams and Spain Rodriguez joined with issue #4, completing the roster.