mook

Portmanteau of magazine and book.

Spike Lee's character in "Do the Right Thing" is named Mookie. Recently saw that movie again for the first time since it came out in 1989, and man, it aced the test of time. It's great.

I learned the word on PBS's now-infamous Frontline report The Merchants of Cool. The Mook is a made-up character presented to teenagers as real; he's the male counterpart to the female Midriff.

I always thought it was a cultural slur against Italians, like guido, but I'm happy to be wrong in this case, cause it's a cool-sounding word.

M. SCORSESE et al. Mean Streets (film script: first draft) 86 JOHNNY (Interrupting) We won't pay...because this guy (pointing to Jimmy) is...a mook!... Nobody knows what a mook is... JIMMY (angrily) A mook. I'm a mook. (pauses) What's a mook?... You can't call me a mook.

The OED says a mook is a stupid person, but I always understood it to be someone overly gullible or, you know, just a palooka or galoot (hey, those are cool words too!)--with an affectionate connotation to it rather than a pejorative one.