Summary
- Enjoy Gary Larson's funniest Far Side comics from June 1984.
- Larson imagines a slug god, the Loch Ness dog and more, in this month that included a hilarious misprint.
- Don't forget to vote in our end-of-article poll for your favorite strip from June 1984, and see which comic other readers elevated to #1.
Gary Larson's some Far Side gem has its birthday.
Here are the ten funniest comics that just turned 40, originally published in June 1984. This is midway through the comic's very first year, and yet many of Larson's biggest obsessions are already present, and his comedic voice already on point. In fact, Larson came out of the gate so strong that this list includes one of the most iconic Far Side strips ever. Don't forget to vote in our end-of-article poll for your favorite strip from June 1984, and see which comic other readers elevated to #1.
16 Funniest Far Side Comics Starring Gary Larson's Best Recurring Character, The Detective
Gary Larson's recurring detective character is the best in Far Side history, playing the perfect straight man to a world of truly bizarre crimes.
10 "The Stupid Thing Swerved to Miss Him"
The Far Side Comic Published 13 June
Larson loves dropping animals into human situations while maintaining just enough of their instincts to keep things bizarre. In this comic, a hound proudly displays the 'head' of a car he wants his guests to think he chased down and killed, only for his doggy wife to reveal the truth. Larson used the idea of dogs chasing cars a lot - in fact it was the subject of one of his most controversial comics ever.
The strip above shows a dog dreaming of finally catching a car, howling triumphantly while standing atop its fallen prey. However, due to confusing art, some readers thought that the strip was implying carnal relations between canine and carburetor, leading to mass complaints.
The June 13 strip bears some similarities to Stephen King's favorite Far Side comic (below), which he named in his foreword to The Far Side Gallery 2. King noted that his favorite thing about Larson's comics isn't how they work individually, but the way they compound to create a hilarious world the reader can visit, stating, "he does what artists and humorists are supposed to do: he sees what I could see if I could have his eyes. I don't have them, but thank God they are on loan."
15 Far Side Comics That Prove Gary Larson Is Obsessed with Cats
Gary Larson's The Far Side applies a surreal eye to animals, with cats starring in some of the franchise's funniest comic strips.
9 Slug God
The Far Side Comic Published 8 June
This comic was actually given a new caption post-publication, and we're crediting the version on the left as the funnier of the two. Larson nails depicting a salt shaker as a 2001-esque religious monolith, but it's the concept that really makes this comic great, with the casual "of course" instantly positioning the reader in a truly bizarre situation. While the chanting caption communicates the same idea of freaky slug worship, it's simply not as pithy. However, every Far Side fan should be glad it exists because of how it affected the comic that was published the next day...
8 Infestation
The Far Side Comic Published 9 June
Just as the slug comic imagines animals performing an inherently human activity, worshiping their terrifying idol, this comic treats kids as household pests, with a homeowner calling in a pest control expert because her tree has become infested with neighborhood kids. Larson's eye for 'humans as animals' is pitch perfect here, treating the treehouses the kids are playing in as the 'nests' of an invasive species.
10 Funniest Far Side Comics That Prove It's Obsessed with Nursery Rhymes
Gary Larson's Far Side found macabre gold in parodying popular nursery rhymes, exposing the dark side of everyone from Humpty Dumpty to Old MacDonald.
However, when the strip was published, pretty much no-one enjoyed it. This wasn't because Larson's bad joke was in any kind of bad taste, but because a printing error meant that the caption from the slug cartoon appeared again the next day, creating the confounding hybrid comic below:
The worst part was that in a world without social media, Larson had no way to let readers know what had happened, leading to a flood of letters before any kind of correction or explanation could be published. A similar mishap happened when Larson's Far Side had its captions swapped with Dennis the Menace, creating a suspiciously perfect combo:
In The Prehistory of The Far Side: A 10th Anniversary Exhibit, Larson notes that he doesn't quite buy that the Dennis mix-up happened accidentally, although he readily its that, "What's most embarrassing about this is how immensely improved both cartoons turned out to be."
7 "FIRE!"
The Far Side Comic Published 25 June
At their best, The Far Side's comics are like goofy jokes told by a friend, and that's definitely the case with this strip, which sees the leader of a firing squad regret offering his victim one last cigarette. While this is early Larson and his art style is still developing, his focus on using foreground and background to tell a complete story is still impressive. Any other comic would have the benefit of additional s, cutting away to show different characters and bring their actions together into a 'story.'
10 Funniest Far Side Comics That Somehow Found the Funny Side of Fossils
The Far Side has plenty of funny dinosaur comics, but Gary Larson is so talented he can even make their ancient bones hilarious.
Larson has to include the firing squad, the leader and victim, and the woman in the burning house all together for the gag to work. It's done a little clumsily here, but this is the precursor to dozens of comics where you never even notice Larson had compounded two or even three s' worth of info into one image.
6 The Loch Ness Dog
The Far Side Comic Published 12 June
As much as The Far Side loves goofy jokes and wordplay, sometimes Larson leans fully into the surreal. That's arguably the case here, as a group of tourists to Scotland's Loch Ness are wowed by the sighting of a semi-mythical dog who lives in the area. Larson's art style is always bare and minimalist, but his framing is more sophisticated than it seems. There are endless ways to tell this gag, but zooming out to make the dog feel as small and inconsequential as possible is the best version of the joke.
Larson loved to include dogs in The Far Side, often taking advantage of their proximity to humans and their 'social' position as pets. Larson's dogs want all the same things as real household pets, but they have access to human-level intellects and tools to get them. See, for instance, the dog holding up his owner with a revolver in order to finally get a meal without begging.
10 Funniest Far Side Comics Where Gary Larson Made Pirates Hilarious
Gary Larson's The Far Side has a lot of recurring themes, from cowboys to clowns, but pirates are some of its most underrated stars.
5 "Let Me Have the Chair"
The Far Side Comic Published 5 June
In The Complete Far Side, Larson argues that while some people are witty, he's always simply aimed to have "a sense of humor" - to tell jokes which are funny on the surface, inviting a deep belly laugh. The image of a long-necked giraffe climbing on a chair to get a better view is exactly that, but Larson adds to it by including another giraffe who doesn't trust their findings.
4 "Relax, Worthington"
The Far Side Comic Published 2 June
The Far Side doesn't treat its human characters very well, but its explorers often get the worst fates. In this strip, two explorers are about to wander into the home of a grisly predator, with a trashcan full of pith helmets and bones making it clear that the situation readers are seeing play out has happened many, many times before. Larson offers a crumb of mercy with the fact that one of the explorers has clearly spotted the trashca, though whether he'll act on this information we'll never know.
3 Crash Landing
The Far Side Comic Published 4 June
Larson used this format - a shipwreck survivor on a tiny island with a single coconut tree - so often that it came to be known as "The Far Side island" among professional cartoonists. It's an incredibly rich seam for Larson to mine, since trapping people in such a small area serves to explain any number of bizarre behaviors and obsessions.
However, despite all the desert island comics he created, it's hard to find one funnier than June 4's captionless strip, as a shipwreck survivor watches a crew of aliens swimming towards him, having just suffered a similar mishap. Sadly, if Larson's other island comics are any indication, there's little hope for human/alien relations once they've been on the island for any length of time.
We Asked You to Vote for Far Side's Funniest Superman Comic & the Winner Is a Perfect Movie Parody
We asked Screen Rant readers to vote on Gary Larson's best Far Side comics starring Superman, and the winner includes an iconic movie reference.
2 Center for the Study of Viral Pathology
The Far Side Comic Published 1 June
One of the most iconic and popular Far Side comics ever, this strip exemplifies Larson's skill at telling a complete story in a single image. Two scientists accidentally drop a viral pathogen out of the window, vastly underreacting in the moments before chaos ensues. Easily the best detail is the vague concern of the pedestrians down below, however it's also worth noting the subtle humor of having two scientists at the window when one would have done - it's definitely funnier that this is a group mistake rather than just one person mes.
The strip shows why Far Side is so beloved today, and so accessible no matter your level of familiarity. Larson's humor doesn't depend on episodic gags, familiar characters, or even a world with consistent rules. In the best Far Side strips, readers can come to Larson's gags with no preconceptions and instantly get what's happening and why it's funny.
1 "Have You Made a Wish?"
The Far Side Comic Published 26 June
While many Far Side fans will disagree with anything winning out over the Viral Pathology comic, we've crowned this strip the true king of June 1984. This is partly because it asks the reader to do more work, making the pay-off even funnier - Larson never even uses the term 'wishbone' or shows anything of the body except the feet, and yet readers instantly know what's happening. The use of "I'm comfortable with my grip" in the caption also makes this gag surprisingly visceral - it's not often a newspaper comic strip has the potential to make you wince.
15 Funniest Far Side Comics That Somehow Found the Funny Side of War
War isn't exactly a barrel of laughs, but Gary Larson managed to find Far Side's unique brand of humor in some of civilization's biggest conflicts.
Along with scientists, Larson loved to include doctors in The Far Side - the template of serious people doing important work is exactly the kind of premise Larson loves to subvert. However, several of Larson's medical comics never saw publication. For example, one strip showing a surgeon feeding 'offcuts' to his pet dog (below) was only published in The Far Side's various collections, since newspaper editors were unwilling to offer gross-out humor to their readers. In that context, the wishbone strip is even smarter, staying just on the right side of the line to see publication.
Those are the funniest Far Side comics that just turned 40, having first seen publication in June 1984 - don't forget to vote below for your favorite, and let us know if we made the right call placing the surgeons over the viral mishap.
