Recurring Features in Mad (magazine) - Go Fetch!

Go Fetch!

Blurring the line between advertising and content was Go Fetch!, a 2005-06 list of newly released media products such as videogames, DVD releases, music albums and books. Each product listing had The Hype and The Snipe, in which its good and bad qualities were expounded. Each Go Fetch! also promoted "the Must Have", an idiosyncratic (but real) product which no Mad reader should be without, such as cold galvanizing spray, or a pneumatic jackhammer. Go Fetch! was an odd cross between the wise-ass Mad mentality and the sort of product ratings generally associated with Rolling Stone. It was an overtly commercial feature, with some one-liners thrown in with the apparent hope of making it more palatable. As such, Go Fetch! was heavily criticized by many of the magazine's loyal readers as a betrayal of the magazine's original satiric mission. In its year of existence, Go Fetch! appeared in eight of 12 issues, but the feature has been defunct since June 2006.