Yellow Submarine

1968, first edition, from New American Library
Max Wilk
Yellow Submarine
Original price 95 cents, purchase price $2.50
Very worn paperback
C+

The text by Wilk, who died last year at age 90, is mostly forgettable, except for the "footnotes" at the end (which would make them endnotes, right?) and an unintended innuendo about Ringo*, but you know you don't watch the movie for the Erich Segal et al. script.  Although, like The Graduate, you're going to miss the soundtrack, at least here you've got "128 glorious full-color pages."  This includes not only the animation cels of the film, but a two-page spread from the cameo of the real Beatles at the end, so the view of the Fab Four is more up-to-date than in Davies's book.  (At this point, only Ringo has a moustache, although in the cartoon Paul's the only clean-shaven one.)  The binding could be better, maybe with whitespace in the gutters, because some details are lost, as with the views of Liverpool.

*"Being a proper switch-hitter, Ringo obeyed."  The "born Lever-puller" pun in the movie is funnier anyway.