Dope Rider

Few comics characters have staked out such genuinely singular territory as Dope Rider, the surrealist creation Carlo de Paoli unleashed on readers of High Times Magazine back in 1975. Born in the heart of the Bronze Age counterculture, this enigmatic figure made his home in the pages of the most unlikely of comic venues, delivering psychedelic Western strangeness to an audience that was absolutely ready for it. What's remarkable is the sheer longevity — de Paoli kept Dope Rider riding across an astonishing 46 years, from 1975 all the way to 2021, a testament to the character's weird, enduring grip on the imagination. Collected in Dope Rider: A Fistful of Delirium, this is underground comics history worth seeking out — a one-of-a-kind artifact of an era when the fringes of the medium produced some of its most unforgettable work.