Bazooka Joe

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For the British punk rock band, see Bazooka Joe (band).

Bazooka Joe comic, in Hebrew

Bazooka Joe is a comic strip character, featured on small comics included inside individually wrapped pieces of Bazooka bubble gum. He wears an eyepatch, lending him a distinctive appearance.

One of the more recognizable advertising characters of the 20th century—and one of the few identifiable ones associated with a candy—Bazooka Joe is joined in his various misadventures by a motley crew of kids including Pesty, a kid with a 1950s cowboy sombrero, and Mort, a kid who always wore his red turtleneck sweater over his mouth. The comics generally consist of soft, kid-friendly, notoriously cheesy jokes, as well as small ads for kitschy merchandise you could purchase with enough comics (and a few dollars). From the very beginning in 1954, the bottom of the comics included "fortunes", like the ones you'd find in a fortune cookie but usually with a comic bent. As with almost all ad characters of the 20th century who had any sort of longevity, the style of the Bazooka Joe comics changed with the times, with Joe eventually adopting more of a 'hip-hop' look by the 1990s, complete with low-slung, baggy jeans.