# Mexican Historieta (Pepines to Sensacionales)

> The mass newsstand comics of Mexico, read by adults as much as children, whose format shrank from the large pepines of the 1930s to pocket digests. It has two phases: from the 1930s to the 1970s, melodrama, romance and adventure serials such as Memín Pinguín, Lágrimas, Risas y Amor and Kalimán, drawn in tonal wash and printed in one sepia, brown or green ink on cheap paper; from the late 1970s, small full-colour pocket westerns and erotic 'Sensacionales' of caricatured barrio types. Both sold every issue with hand-lettered balloons and a lurid painted colour cover.

- Period: 1934–present
- Where: Latin America & Caribbean
- Origin: Mexico City. Editorial Sayrols's Paquín (1934–1947), Paquito (1935), Chamaco (Publicaciones Herrerías, 1936–1957) and Pepín (Editorial Juventud of José García Valseca, from March 1936, weekly and then daily) made the 'pepines', miscellaneous comic magazines printed in one ink, often sepia or green, each with print runs above half a million. Yolanda Vargas Dulché and Guillermo de la Parra's house (Editorial Argumentos, renamed Editorial Vid in 1979) carried the sepia serial on with Memín Pinguín and Lágrimas, Risas y Amor (1962–1995), whose first twelve issues were 32-page photonovels before it turned to drawn sepia serials, and Kalimán (Editora K, 1965–1991) sold up to a million copies a week. From 1978 Novedades Editores' El Libro Vaquero, the first Mexican comic in a pocket format (13 × 15.5 cm), and the adult 'Sensacionales' of EJEA, Mango and Toukan, small and in full colour, outlived the collapse of the mass comic in the 1980s and 1990s.
- Branch: Pictorial & machine age
- Also known as: Mexican pocket historieta, Pepines, Historieta mexicana, Sensacionales, Historieta eroticómica, Mexican newsstand comics
- Page: https://stylogeny.com/styles/mexican-pocket-historieta/

## Use it with care

Memín Pinguín is drawn in the 'darky' iconography of blackface, and his mother as a 'mammy' caricature; his 2005 Mexican stamps were criticised by the White House press secretary ('racial stereotypes are offensive no matter what their origin'), Jesse Jackson and the Hispanic civil-rights groups LULAC and NCLR, so do not copy his features or use racial caricature of any kind, and give every character the same anatomy and drawing care. Kalimán is an Orientalist figure, a turbaned 'prince of India' and mystic: do not take him as a model for exoticised 'Oriental' types. The Sensacionales and the Libro Vaquero covers sell women's bodies to male readers and are often called machista: draw adults with dignity and consent and leave out the stock 'easy woman'. Memín, Kalimán, La Familia Burrón, Lágrimas, Risas y Amor and El Libro Vaquero are still owned by their publishers and heirs: draw your own characters and mastheads, never ask an image model for these characters or a named artist's hand, and never present a generated page or cover as a vintage historieta.

## How it works

- Print the story pages of the classic serial in a single ink, brown, sepia or green rather than black, on cheap paper, and model the figures in tonal wash rather than pure line: 'medio tono' means a wash drawing reproduced through a screen, not visible Ben-Day dots (Pepín itself was printed in rotogravure). Lágrimas, Risas y Amor ran 'cinco viñetas por página dibujadas a medio tono', drawn in sepia by Antonio Gutiérrez, 'el maestro del medio tono', and Kalimán and the first Memín Pinguín serial had sepia interiors. The later Sensacionales print their pages in full colour.
- Keep each page to a few plain ruled panels read in order, one long serial chapter after another ('continuará'), with balloons and captions lettered by hand by a letterer.
- Sell every issue with a separate, fully painted colour cover by a cover painter (portadista), not the interior artist: a melodramatic or sexy moment painted to the edges, in wash, like watercolour, and later in smooth airbrush-like paint with gloss on skin and clothes, as Luis Rey did for Lágrimas, Risas y Amor and Jorge Aviña for El Libro Vaquero.
- Crowd the cover with newsstand signals: a bulging outlined masthead with exclamation marks, a cover line in white or coloured capitals in a box or on a blank patch of the painting, a badge or starburst ('2x1'), and the issue number and price in a coloured strip down the edge.
- Tell popular melodrama in stock types the reader recognises from the barrio, the market, the radio serial and the cinema: the poor child with a good heart, the rich-and-poor romance, the masked hero, the cowboy, and in the Sensacionales the bricklayer, the butcher and the market woman, drawn naturalistically or caricatured for laughs.
- Shrink the format as the market changes, from the large pepines of 28 × 43 cm and their small 12 × 15 cm companions (Pepín itself grew smaller and all-sepia in the early 1950s, and Lágrimas, Risas y Amor halved its size from issue 578 in 1974) to the 13 × 15.5 cm pocket book of El Libro Vaquero, and keep the price at newsstand small change.

## Its design choices

Defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

### Layout & composition
- [Framed panels](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/framed-panels/) (defining)
- [Modular grid](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/modular-grid/) (characteristic)
- [Full bleed](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/full-bleed/) (characteristic)
- [Collage & layering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/collage-and-layering/) (occasional)

### Space & hierarchy
- [Sequential narrative](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/sequential-narrative/) (defining)
- [Horror vacui](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/horror-vacui/) (characteristic)
- [Layered information](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/layered-information/) (characteristic)
- [Illusion of depth](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/illusion-of-depth/) (characteristic)
- [Single focal point](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/single-focal-point/) (occasional)

### Typography
- [Hand-lettering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/hand-lettering/) (defining)
- [All caps](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/all-caps/) (characteristic)
- [Ornamented display](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/ornamented-display/) (characteristic)
- [Eclectic mixing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/eclectic-mixing/) (occasional)

### Colour
- [Monochrome](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/monochrome/) (defining)
- [Earth & mineral](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/earth-and-mineral/) (characteristic)
- [Light ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/light-ground/) (characteristic)
- [Full polychrome](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/full-polychrome/) (characteristic)

### Form & shape
- [Naturalistic depiction](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/naturalistic-depiction/) (defining)
- [Distortion & exaggeration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/distortion-and-exaggeration/) (characteristic)
- [Stylised figuration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/stylised-figuration/) (occasional)

### Surface & texture
- [Halftone & Ben-Day dots](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/halftone-and-ben-day-dots/) (characteristic)
- [Painterly brushwork](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-brushwork/) (characteristic)
- [Paper & letterpress bite](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/paper-and-letterpress-bite/) (occasional)
- [Gloss & highlights](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/gloss-and-highlights/) (occasional)

### Ornament
- [Restrained accents](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/restrained-accents/) (characteristic)
- [Emblems & badges](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/emblems-and-badges/) (characteristic)

### Imagery
- [Comic & cartoon](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/comic-and-cartoon/) (defining)
- [Painterly illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-illustration/) (characteristic)
- [Line illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/line-illustration/) (characteristic)
- [Photomontage](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/photomontage/) (occasional)

### Medium & production
- [Pen, brush & ink](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pen-brush-and-ink/) (defining)
- [Offset printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/offset-printing/) (occasional)

### Tone & intent
- [Communal & popular](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/communal-and-popular/) (defining)
- [Romantic & sensual](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/romantic-and-sensual/) (defining)
- [Playful & witty](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/playful-and-witty/) (characteristic)
- [Warm & approachable](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/warm-and-approachable/) (occasional)

Avoids: Generous white space, Non-representational, Experimental & distorted, Typography only, Flat, Straight photography, Pastel, Rational & objective, Calm & contemplative

Palette: #ebdfc3, #5b3a24, #3f5b45, #d8282e, #f2c12e, #2a9fd2

Typefaces: Hand-lettered balloon and caption text written by a letterer on each page (El Libro Vaquero still had its balloons lettered by hand in 2012), Bulging, outlined masthead capitals with exclamation marks, drawn as part of the cover (the red, outlined SENSACIONAL DE BARRIOS over a drawn street; ¡ASÍ SOY...! ¿Y QUÉ? in red with a yellow outline), Cover lines in heavy white or black capitals, in a coloured box or on a blank patch of the painting (YA NO ESTÉS DE FISGÓN Y ATIÉNDEME BIEN EL FOGÓN on Sensacional de Barrios no. 95; SOY MUGROSO, OLOROSO PERO BIEN CARIÑOSO on ¡Así soy...! ¿y qué? no. 426), Small set or lettered price and issue figures in a coloured strip down the cover's edge (Núm. 95, $800; Nº 426, N$2.50)

Known for: Pepín (Editorial Juventud, José García Valseca, March 1936 to the 1950s): weekly and then daily, with an issue for each day of the week (Pepín Lunes, Pepín Martes) at about 300,000 copies a day; its name became the common word 'pepines' for all the comic magazines, which Armando Bartra describes by 'su formato extremoso: 28 por 43 centímetros, los grandes, y 12 por 15, los chicos', 'su impresión en una sola tinta, con frecuencia sepia o verde' and 'su proclividad al mediotono y al collage'; José G. Cruz, Adelita y las guerrillas, in Paquín, Paquito and Pepín; from 1943 Cruz drew melodramas such as Carta brava and Percal in photomontage ('el sistema del fotomontaje'), and in 1952 founded Ediciones José G. Cruz, whose Santo, el enmascarado de plata ran for more than thirty years; Memín Pinguín (Yolanda Vargas Dulché, created 1943, first in the serial Almas de niño in Pepín; drawn by Alberto Cabrera and from the 1960s by Sixto Valencia): 372 weekly chapters printed in sepia, reissued in 1952 and the early 1960s and in colour in 1988 (the Spanish Wikipedia gives colour reprints in 1963 and 1988); Lágrimas, Risas y Amor (Editorial Argumentos, later Vid, 18 November 1962 to 25 November 1995, 1,690 issues; scripts by Vargas Dulché and Guillermo de la Parra): its first twelve issues (1962) were 32-page photonovels before it turned to drawn sepia serials, printed 'en tinta café o sepia', five halftone panels to the page drawn by Antonio Gutiérrez, covers by Luis Rey; its serials María Isabel, Yesenia and Rarotonga became films and telenovelas; Kalimán (Editora K, November 1965 to 1991): a radio serial hero from 1963, sold weekly for 26 years without a break, 1,308 original issues (1,351 counting reprints) with sepia interiors and up to a million copies a week; La Familia Burrón (Gabriel Vargas, 1 December 1948 to issue 1616, 26 August 2009): the cómico-costumbrista humour of a family in a vecindad on the Callejón del Cuajo, which reached 500,000 copies; El Libro Vaquero (Novedades Editores, from 23 November 1978, later HEVI Editores): the first Mexican comic in pocket format, 13 × 15.5 cm, Old West romances made by Mexican writers and artists, each issue drawn by one illustrator with balloons lettered by hand and covers painted in wash, for over twenty years by Jorge Aviña, and by 2012 its colour done digitally; about 1.5 million copies a week in the 1980s; The Sensacionales of EJEA (Sensacional de Barrios, de Mercados, de Traileros, de Luchas; Los Sensacionales Maestros, Las Chalanas y Demás Chambitas; ¡Así soy...! ¿y qué?) and of Mango and Toukan, 1980s–2000s: adult humour and erotica about market, barrio and building-site workers, selling 300,000 to 500,000 copies a week and Sensacional de Traileros a million; covers of Sensacional de Barrios set the red, outlined masthead over a drawn street, a crowded painted scene of caricatured figures, a white-lettered cover line in a coloured box, a '2x1' badge and the number and price in a red strip down the left edge

## Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

- Influenced by: [American Four-Colour Comic Book (Golden to Bronze Age)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/american-comic-book.md) (1934–1993)
- Alike in its design choices: [Filipino Komiks](https://stylogeny.com/styles/filipino-komiks.md) (1929–1999), 83% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Turkish Weekly Humour Magazines (Gırgır to Uykusuz)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/turkish-humour-magazines.md) (1972–2025), 71% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Underground Comix](https://stylogeny.com/styles/underground-comix.md) (1968–1982), 68% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Bonelli Fumetto (Italian Popular Adventure Comics)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/bonelli-fumetto.md) (1948–present), 68% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Amar Chitra Katha Comics](https://stylogeny.com/styles/amar-chitra-katha.md) (1967–present), 64% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Arab Independent Comics (Samandal, TokTok, Lab619, Skefkef)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/arab-independent-comics.md) (2007–present), 61% alike

## Sources

- Wikipedia (es): 'Historieta en México' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historieta_en_M%C3%A9xico: Paquín (Sayrols, 1934–1947), Paquito (1935), Chamaco (Herrerías, 1936–1957), Pepín (1936–1958 per this article); print runs above half a million; 'pepines' as the common name; Armando Bartra's description of their 'formato extremoso: 28 por 43 centímetros, los grandes, y 12 por 15, los chicos', 'impresión en una sola tinta, con frecuencia sepia o verde' and 'proclividad al mediotono y al collage'; Novaro from 1949 with the American comic-book format; Vargas Dulché and de la Parra's house from 1956; Kalimán '1351 números consecutivos'; the Sensacionales from 1978 'en un formato pequeño y a todo color, con atractivas portadas')
- Laura Nallely Hernández Nieto, 'Notas para el estudio histórico de la revista Pepín', 9ª Arte (São Paulo), vol. 13, 2025, e239227 (https://revistas.usp.br/nonaarte/article/view/239227: in 1940 Pepín had 68 pages and cost ten centavos; 'se imprimía en rotograbado en la Cooperativa de producción de Artes Gráficas Cuauhtémoc'; from the early 1950s melodramas 'realizadas con técnicas como el medio tono y fotomontaje', the magazine reduced in size and 'su impresión pasó a ser completamente en sepia'; serials ending in 'continuará')
- Wikipedia (es): 'Pepín (revista)' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pep%C3%ADn_(revista): Editorial Juventud of José García Valseca, from March 1936; weekly, then daily with an issue per weekday; about 300,000 copies a day; first American material from King Features Syndicate, then exclusively Mexican by the late 1930s; 'pepines' for all comic magazines; closed in 1954 per this article)
- Wikipedia (es): 'Lágrimas, risas y amor' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1grimas,_risas_y_amor: 18 November 1962 – 25 November 1995, issue 1690; Editorial Argumentos, Editorial Vid from 1979; 'impresa en tinta café o sepia', 'con cinco viñetas por página dibujadas a medio tono', 'dibujadas en sepia por el maestro del medio tono, Antonio Gutiérrez', 'con las portadas a cargo de Luis Rey'; first twelve issues 32-page photonovels; 32, 48 and 64 pages; size reduced almost by half from issue 578 in 1974 and later restored)
- Wikipedia (es and en): 'Memín Pinguín' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mem%C3%ADn_Pingu%C3%ADn and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mem%C3%ADn_Pingu%C3%ADn: created 1943, first in Almas de niño in Pepín; Alberto Cabrera and Sixto Valencia; 372 weekly chapters printed in sepia; reissued in 1952 and 1961 (en) or 1952, 1963 and 1988 'esta vez a color' (es), colourised in 1988 (en); the 'darky iconography'; the 2005 stamps and their critics, the 2008 Wal-Mart withdrawal in Texas)
- Wikipedia (es): 'Kalimán' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalim%C3%A1n: radio from 16 September 1963; comic from November 1965 by Editora K; 'interiores en color sepia'; up to a million copies a week; '1351 números consecutivos, de los cuales 1308 son originales y el resto reimpresiones'; 'un príncipe de la India' with a white turban; cancelled 1991)
- Wikipedia (es): 'La Familia Burrón' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Familia_Burr%C3%B3n: Gabriel Vargas, first edition 1 December 1948, last issue 1616 on 26 August 2009, cómico-costumbrista, Callejón del Cuajo, 500,000 copies) and 'José G. Cruz' (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_G._Cruz: Adelita y las guerrillas in Paquín, Paquito and Pepín; photomontage from 1943; Ediciones José G. Cruz from 1952)
- México Desconocido, '"El libro vaquero", ¿parte de nuestra cultura?' (https://www.mexicodesconocido.com.mx/el-libro-vaquero.html: first issue 23 November 1978, Novedades Editores, 'la primera historieta mexicana en tener un formato de bolsillo (13×15.5 cm)', 1.5 million copies a week in the 1980s, Novedades closed 31 December 2002, HEVI Editores) and Expansión, 'El Libro Vaquero, el western mexicano más leído', 22 April 2012 (https://expansion.mx/entretenimiento/2012/04/22/el-libro-vaquero-el-western-mexicano-mas-leido: one illustrator per issue, balloons lettered by hand, covers painted in wash by a separate artist, Jorge Aviña for over twenty years; 'el color sí se hace de manera digital')
- Rafael Alarcón Medina (El Colegio de la Frontera Norte), 'Neoliberalismo sexacional', El Tlacuache, suplemento cultural del Centro INAH Morelos, no. 1230, 15 May 2026 (https://inah.gob.mx/images/suplementos/tlacuache/1230/web/20260515_Tlacuache_1230.pdf: the 'historieta eroticómica' or Sensacionales of EJEA, Mango and Toukan; Sensacional de Barrios, Mercados, Policías, Terror, Luchas, Maestros; 300,000–500,000 copies a week, Sensacional de Traileros a million; 'páginas a colores'; scriptwriters, artists and 'portadistas'; reproductions of covers of Sensacional de Barrios nos. 67, 95, 125 and 459, Sensacional de Mercados and ¡Así soy...! ¿y qué? no. 426, examined for the masthead, cover lines, '2x1' badges, price strip and the smooth, glossy painting of the later covers)
- NBC News / Associated Press, 'U.S.: Mexican stamp fuels "racial stereotypes"', 29 June 2005 (https://www.nbcnews.com/id/8410111: White House press secretary Scott McClellan, 'Racial stereotypes are offensive no matter what their origin')
- The Christian Science Monitor, 'Mexico's Literature for the Masses', 8 February 1993 (https://www.csmonitor.com/1993/0208/08131.html: historietas 'about one-third the size of a US comic book', 4–6 million copies a week, El Libro Vaquero about 1.5 million; Sensacional as a soft-porn line with lower-middle-class characters; Juan Manuel Aurrecoechea and Alfonso Morales)
- Anne Rubenstein, Bad Language, Naked Ladies, and Other Threats to the Nation: A Political History of Comic Books in Mexico (Duke University Press, 1998) (https://www.dukeupress.edu/bad-language-naked-ladies-and-other-threats-to-the-nation: comics' wide readership from their first appearance in 1934 and the government censorship office)
- Armando Bartra and Juan Manuel Aurrecoechea, Puros cuentos. La historia de la historieta en México, vol. II, 1934–1950 (CONACULTA–Grijalbo, 1993), cited in the Tlacuache article; not consulted directly

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From Stylogeny (https://stylogeny.com/), an atlas of graphic-design styles by Van Riel Online Services. How it is made: https://stylogeny.com/about/. Cite as: Stylogeny, “Mexican Historieta (Pepines to Sensacionales)”, https://stylogeny.com/styles/mexican-pocket-historieta/