Mad Magazine, the 66-year-old humor publication, has been in free fall for years — in terms of both circulation and cultural relevance.

This month, however, people as varied as the comedians John Hodgman and Patton Oswalt, as well as Lee Unkrich, a co-director of “Coco,” were heaping unlikely praise on the magazine known for anarchic satire aimed at the rich and powerful. The reason? A four-page comic strip appearing in the Halloween issue depicting 26 children, one for each letter of the alphabet, who were or would soon become victims of a school shooting.

“As damning and dark as it is beautiful,” Mr. Hodgman wrote on Twitter.

The strip, “The Ghastlygun Tinies,” is a homage to “The Gashlycrumb Tinies,” the 1963 work by the American illustrator Edward Gorey, which depicted the grisly and strangely comic deaths of children in alphabetical order. “Sadly, times have changed and there’s basically one way most kids seem to die now,” an introduction to Mad’s strip said.

It begins innocuously: “A is for ALICE the young science whiz.” But by the time “D is for DANA who had a hall pass” is introduced, an ominous shadow lurks outside the child’s classroom door. Soon come three drawings that make the message of the strip clear — “F is for FRANK, more than a statistic”; “G is for GREG who was caught unawares”; “H is for HIRO who needs more than prayers.”