The artwork ranged from excellent to utterly crude and the stories were explicit sexual escapades, usually featuring well known cartoon characters, political figures, or movie stars, without the subjects' consent.

They went into a steep decline after World War II and by the mid-1950s only a small trickle of new product was still appearing on the market, mainly in the form of cheaply printed, poorly drawn and tasteless little eight pagers which sold for 10 cents each in run-down candy stores and gas stations, circulating mainly among delinquent teenagers.

[2] In the United States, pulp magazines such as Harry Donenfeld's Spicy Detective featured comics on heroines who lose their clothing, such as Adolphe Barreaux's Sally the Sleuth which debuted in 1934.

Fox Feature Syndicate eventually began publishing Phantom Lady where she was drawn by Matt Baker, one of the most famous 'good girl' artists.

Harvey Kurtzman was one of the key writers for EC, and artists such as Wally Wood or Al Williamson began to do research for each new story far beyond what had been seen in titles published up to that time.

[citation needed] In the 1950s Irving Klaw published a line of underground fetish and bondage comics by artists like Eric Stanton, John Willie, and Gene Bilbrew.

These never achieved widespread popularity but were kept in print for many years, sold through Klaw's mail order catalog to the same customers who bought his bondage photographs of Bettie Page.

EC publisher William Gaines was called before a Senate committee to testify, but he remained defensive saying that he was already censoring the more extreme things from his books.

[citation needed] In the mid-1960s, Playboy magazine started including a multipage strip called Little Annie Fanny by EC alumni Harvey Kurtzman and Will Elder with an occasional assist from artist Frank Frazetta.

Annie had trouble keeping her clothes on, a trend seen also in the strips The Adventures of Phoebe Zeit-Geist, Wallace Wood's Sally Forth, and Penthouse's Oh Wicked Wanda by Ron Embleton and Frederic Mullally.

[citation needed] In 1974, Larry Flynt came out with Hustler Magazine, which featured a strip called Honey Hooker with art originally by James McQuade and later by Tom Garst.

The underground comics movement was spearheaded by creators such as Art Spiegelman, Robert Crumb, Harvey Pekar, Kim Deitch and Spain Rodriguez.

Recruiting star creators from among his friends, witzend featured one-off strips on a wide variety of themes by the likes of Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Frank Frazetta, Gil Kane and Art Spiegelman.

[citation needed] Canadian Dave Sim began publishing Cerebus in 1977, and Richard and Wendy Pini put out Elfquest starting in 1978, initially through their own WaRP company.

[citation needed] Antarctic Press was founded in 1984, and publishes American manga and independent creators, notably Terry Moore's Strangers in Paradise.

Its first comic book was the adult-oriented anthology, Dark Horse Presents, which published Frank Miller's noirish Sin City, later made into a feature film.

These mature readers titles included The Shadow (1986), The Question (from #8 1987-), Slash Maraud (1987-8), Swamp Thing (from #57 1987-), Vigilante (from #44 1987-8), Wasteland (1987-), Batman: The Killing Joke (1988), Green Arrow (#1-62 1988-92), Haywire (1988-9), Hellblazer (1988-), Tailgunner Jo (1988-9), V for Vendetta (1988-), Blackhawk (1989–90), Deadman: Love After Death (1989), Gilgamesh II (1989), The Sandman (1989-), Doom Patrol (1990-), Shade the Changing Man (1990-), Twilight (1990), World Without End (1990-1), Mister E (1991), Animal Man (1992-), Deadman: Exorcism (1992) and Mighty Love (2004).

Notable Vertigo titles include the Eisner Award winners, Fables, 100 Bullets, Preacher and The Sandman as well as several books that have been adapted into feature films, Hellblazer, A History of Violence, Stardust and V for Vendetta.

Omaha the Cat Dancer by Kate Worley and Reed Waller combined sexually explicit material with a melodrama featuring anthropomorphic animals.

[citation needed] Early comics produced for gay and bisexual male readers often focused on sexual situations, such as Kake by Tom of Finland and Harry Chess by Al Shapiro.

[citation needed] The French comics anthology Pilote was published from 1959 to 1989, and featured the work of adult-oriented creators such as Jean Giraud (Moebius), Guido Crepax, Caza and the American Robert Crumb.

By 1974, Jean Giraud and some of his comrades had become dissatisfied with Pilote, and broke off to found the Metal Hurlant magazine to showcase adult comics in the science fiction or fantasy genres.

[citation needed] In France in 1962, Jean-Claude Forest started producing a strip called Barbarella, set in outer space, but where the heroine found herself losing her clothing or ending up in sexual situations.

[citation needed] In England, in 1969, writer Jo Addams and artist Luis Roca started publishing the Scarth A.D. 2195 strip in the newspaper, The Sun.

In 1982, Raymond Briggs tried to give British comics a more serious tone with works such as When the Wind Blows about an older couple trying to come to terms with the aftermath of a nuclear attack.