Cookie Monster

Few characters capture the anarchic, pop-culture-skewering spirit of Mad magazine quite like Cookie Monster, who crashed onto the Bronze Age comics scene in 1978 courtesy of creators Dennis Snee and Paul Coker Jr. Over a publishing span stretching more than three decades, this beloved blue presence turned up in the irreverent pages of Mad alongside an absolutely wild roster of icons — Fred Flintstone, Princess Leia Organa, Big Bird, and Alfred E. Neuman himself — which tells you everything about the gloriously chaotic company he keeps. With appearances in Mad Star Wars Spectacular and the prestigious Mad's Greatest Artists: Mort Drucker collection, Cookie Monster's footprint in the catalog may be compact, but it's choice — the kind of curated, knowing presence that makes a Mad completist's pulse quicken.