All New Underground Comix #3 gives us two long-form comic stories in one 52-page book. Unlike most back-to-back comics, this one is truly two distinct entities, so they are reviewed separately. The Mountain is the front half of the book, indicated by the cover art that declares "Presents in a Special Double Issue" (unlike the flip side of the comic). The Mountain also takes up 29 pages of the book, whereas High School Funnies is only 23 pages long. The Mountain is also the better half of the comic.

The Mountain features David Silverberg's tale of a communal campsite that is founded and developed upon a spiritual mountain. As the campsite attracts hordes of followers, the government takes notice and conflict becomes inevitable. This is a fine story that could have benefitted from better sequential presentation (e.g., picture boxes) and certainly better cover art. Still, this is recommended reading.



HISTORICAL FOOTNOTES:
Last Gasp printed approximately 20,000 copies of this comic book. It has not been reprinted.

COMIC CREATORS:
Ron Turner (editor)
David Silverberg - 1-29