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alt title(s): Far Side
Classic, long-running single-panel comic by Gary Larson. Running from 1980 to 1995, it featured numerous talking animals, most notably cows, and frequent depictions of
heaven and
hell.
Also known for its use of scientific jokes and puns. A story Mr. Larson quotes in one of his anthologies tells of a science teacher who had Far Side cartoons mounted on a bulletin board. As his students learned more and more, they laughed at more and more of the jokes. This is pretty much the essence of
The Far Side- witty, educated, nerdy humor that dealt with the world of animals and plants far more so than the mundane reality of cities and towns.
As a result of The Far Side's popularity, two species of animals have been named after Mr. Larson- an owl louse (
Strigiphilus garylarsoni
), and an Ecuadorian butterfly (Serratoterga larsoni), which Larson humorously admitted was the best someone like him was ever going to get. In addition, the distinctive tail spikes of Stegosaurs are called
thagomizers in reference to one of his cartoons.
This trope-heavy comic provides examples of:
- Abnormal Ammo: The "Dobie-o-Matic" gun.
- Accidental Innuendo: The "When dogs dream" strip. Because of some awkward art, it looked more like the dog was screwing the car than standing over it victoriously.
- Animated Adaptation: Really! Unsurprisingly, it was shown on Cartoon Network late night on Halloween.
- Anticipatory Breath Spray
- Art Evolution: The art started out a bit more grotesque. Larson also had a habit of not filling in all of the backgrounds in earlier strips (like a bulls-eye patterned rug that mysteriously vanished halfway across the panel) - he admitted that he preferred to "touch up" older strips to fill in half-completed background elements when they were published in collections.
- Beach Bury: One strip has a kid burying his father with the following (paraphrased) caption: "Billy, the tide's coming in... Billy, unbury Daddy now... You don't want Daddy to get angry..."
- Black Comedy: Used extremely frequently.
- Bugs Meany Is Gonna Walk: Sort of, in the sense that readers would often write to Larson about factual mistakes he made in his cartoons.
- Complaining About People Not Liking The Show: There was one strip where he basically lashed out at people who didn't like "Dances with Wolves". Apparently even artists themeselves aren't immune to occasional (yet forgivable) bouts of Fan Dumb.
- Cool And Unusual Punishment: "Mr. Thingy"
- Cow Tools: The Trope Namer.
- Creator Breakdown: Played for laughs with at least two strips that basically went "It was late and I was tired."
- Darkest Africa: Essentially presented a la Tarzan movies.
- Did Not Do The Research: Larson was occasionally called on this in some of his animal strips. He admits that while some complaints could get pretty anal (like the comic where a male mosquito talks about biting people...while he and his wife live in a human style house and wear clothes) it really does bother him when he finds out about a mistake he made.
- Distracted By The Shiny: Viking running across a drawbridge: "Oooh! Goldfish, everyone, goldfish!" Larson has noted that Viking is basically him.
- Dont Explain The Joke: The infamous "Cow Tools" cartoon.
- Door Stopper: The Complete Far Side
- Down On The Farm: Pretty much all the strips with cows and/or chickens.
- Dude Not Funny: Larson has a friend with a very strange sense of humor, so when he calls and says "I loved today's strip!" it means "I've offended half of America".
- Executive Meddling:
- Arguably a positive example. Part of his commemorative book, "The Prehistory of the Far Side", consists of him saying how grateful he is that his editors kept him in line and prevented certain risky cartoons from making it to the newspapers. He even credits one case of this as saving his career.
- However, in the same book, he expresses his displeasure whenever strips were altered without telling him first.
- Everythings Better With Penguins: Used occasionally, but no more so than any other animal.
- Everythings Better With Monkeys: "Conducting a little more 'research' with that Jane Goodall tramp?"
- Everythings Better With Cows: Judging from the strip, this, not "penguins" or "monkeys," is probably the best animal to end this sentence with. Larson even joked about renaming the strip The Cow Side.
- Far Side Island: Trope Namer.
- Freudian Couch- used often, sometimes with cows on them.
- Fire And Brimstone Hell: "Would you like inferno or non-inferno?… Just kidding, it's all inferno."
- Flock Of Wolves: "Is anyone here a real sheep?"
- Fluffy Cloud Heaven: "Wish I'd brought a magazine."
- Follow The Leader: Since the early 1990s, plenty of one-panel imitators have cropped up, including The Dinette Set, Bizarro, Close to Home, Real Life Adventures, etc. Most of them are So Okay Its Average to So Bad Its Horrible.
- Funetik Aksent: Parrot mimicking, "Shut up boid! Shut up boid!" to a gangster loading a gun.
Scientist: I know they're trying communicate, we must be missing something!
blackboard: Kay pasa, say hab-lah ess-pan-yoll
- Funny Aneurysm Moment: "Suddenly, on a national talk show in front of millions of viewers, Dick Clark ages 200 years in 30 seconds." That's pretty much what happened after his stroke.
- God: Portrayed as a big guy with long white hair, robes and a beard. Has a good sense of humor. According to Mr. Larson, this is "the way most of us are pretty sure he looks."
- In one strip he has the Earth in a pot and is holding a jar on it that says "Jerks" and is thinking, "…and to make it interesting..."
God, Thinking: "Something tells me this thing is only half-baked..."
- Hall Of Mirrors: "But which of us is the real duck, Mr. Frischberg, and not just an illusion?"
- Horny Vikings
- Intellectual Animal
- Interspecies Romance: Dog to sheep: "Confession time Mona: I've led you astray."
- Inventional Wisdom
- Kangaroo Pouch Ride: Vikings ride kangaroos around a steep cliff. Predictably, one jumps into the abyss.
- Lets Meet The Meat: A chicken being served chicken soup by his wife when he has the flu. "It's nobody we know!"
- A chicken baking a cake takes a long hard look at her eggs…
- A cow grilling burgers: "You're sick, Jessie! Sick, sick, sick!"
- Non-food variant: a calf wearing leather. According to his parents, he's only doing it for the shock value.
- Lighter And Fluffier: The "Wimpodites" and their ferocious pillow-fighting tactics. A common prey to vikings.
- Mad Scientist: Lots.
- Memetic Mutation: This strip◊ is the inspiration for the "Blue Screen Of Death" nickname for Window's ultimate failure state. (And, by extension, Heroic BSOD.)
- Morally Ambiguous Ducktorate: See Anatidaephobia.
- Nobody Here But Us Chickens: Including a cartoon where a farmer returning home from collecting eggs in the chicken coop passes a chicken returning to the coop after collecting the farmer's infant child…
- Noble Savage
- Noodle Incident: Lampshaded by Larson about a particular strip:
Duck: So, Professor Jenkins, my old nemesis! We meet again...but this time, the advantage is mine!
- No Such Thing As Bad Publicity: Cow Tools again
- Opaque Lenses: Any person in glasses.
- Public Domain Character: Pretty much anyone listed on that page has shown up at least once.
- Serious Business: The aforementioned Jane Goodall strip drew an angry letter from the Goodall Society, upset at someone making a joke at the expense of their founder. Larson did some asking and learned that Goodall herself was amused by the strip, and things were sorted out.
- Somewhere A Paleontologist Is Crying: Larson has the page quote, specifically citing the numerous times he drew dinosaurs and cave men in the same era. In a weird subversion, one these comics is the reason for the whole Thagomizer thing, which is "Named after the late Thag Simmons'. The term has actually fallen into use among paleontologists.
- Starfish Aliens
- Talking Animal: Every now and then.
- Tethercat Principle: The Trope Namer.
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Several, but one notable example of two ancient Chinese warriors standing upon the newly completed Great Wall; one of them boastfully states "NOW we'll see if that dog can get in here!".
- Uberwald: An occasional setting.
- Viewers Are Geniuses: Some of the jokes are pretty scientific and/or obscure.
- Your Mileage May Vary: Many people today love this cartoon, but back in the day, it was either liked or strongly disliked. Some of the letters showcasing the disdain of certain readers are showcased in The Pre-History of the Far Side and "The Complete Far Side."
