Funny Background Event / Webcomics

• Gunnerkrigg Court: In this strip, Kat and Andrew's facial expressions reference a Running Gag involving Kat's love of birds, while Annie talks to herself in the foreground.
• 8-Bit Theatre does this occasionally with Black Mage asking White Mage out and getting beaten up.
  • Conversely, this strip had Black Mage asking her out with her trying to think of a proper response to get him to really stop asking her, while Fighter, Red Mage, and Thief float off into the sky seemingly because Fighter "slayed gravity".

  Advertisement:
  • Also this strip.
  • And down the bottom of this one, capping off the Running Gag about drilling for mana. Warning: spoilers.
• In one of Monster of the Week strips, when Senator orders Mulder to investigate the aliens, there's a picture of Senator shaking alien's hand hanged on his office's wall. It's not as if Mulder notices it.
• Happens in this Irregular Webcomic! strip.
  • Steve in this one.
• A rather common occurrence in Girl Genius, especially when Agatha's little clanks are around.
  • Text in the background. Signs, book covers and tools. There were some good ones in the Castle Wulfenbach, but Castle Heterodyne is filled with them. Such as the "Illiteracy Reducing Bubblegum", the staircase with reminders on it, and triggers. The Great Hospital isn't lacking, either.
    • One book cover in particular stands out: "Using Found Objects as Weapons".
  • Mimmoths. Little pests pop up everywhere as long as something nastier isn't.
  • In fact this is part of Phil Foglio's style, and can be seen in his other works too, like Buck Godot: Zap Gun for Hire, What's New? with Phil and Dixie or XXXenophile.

  Advertisement:
  • In a side story, check out Krosp on the bottom left of this page.
  • A number of seemingly unimportant details had to be elaborated on in the novels. Some of those might be revisited:
    • Furniture being upside-down during Zeetha's trip from Skifander. She wrote it off as hallucinations.
    • Krosp chasing mimmoths. This left their trainer with nothing to do.
    • Bats clinging to Aedith. The novel explains the box to be a "Bat Summoning Engine" Agatha had just absent-mindedly fixed.
  • Various odd birds and flying critters.
  • Oggie and his great-great grandson argue about great-great-great grandchildren while everybody else is getting on with the job.
  • Agatha's weasel and Jenka's bear getting acquainted behind the main conversation.
• MegaTokyo has tons of little side jokes and things in its backgrounds. Spotting them all has become a kind of official sport on the forums.

Advertisement:
• The KA Mics does this occasionally.
• Bittersweet Candy Bowl does it occasionally.
• A regular staple of Penny Arcade, especially involving the Fruit Fucker.
  • Also, this.
  • And this strip is titled "Catapult".
• Epic use in Sluggy Freelance (this strip), where the edge of the panel changes the meaning of some background text, which in turn finishes Torg and Sasha's sentences.
• Inverted in EarthBound fan comic The Chosen Four, thus making it a "Funny Foreground Event." While the main plot takes the back seat, two Exit Mice can be seen chatting. Meanwhile, Ness, Paula, and Jeff can be seen running around in the background in a comedic chase with the rabidly decreasing Guardian Diggers, which is then joined in by Gigantic Ants attempting to avenge their brother Titanic Ant, and then all of the sudden a horde of Mad Ducks and Noose Men.
• Homestuck combines this with Mood Whiplash. HoNk
  • It also happens numerous times once Doc Scratch takes over the narration. For instance these two pages, wherein SS can be seen in the background (and page header) employing atrocious candy bowl etiquette. Then later, while the audience is distracted by Vriska vs. Bec Noir, SS wanders around in the header, casually spreading gasoline around the room, which he then lights on fire.
    • Inverted as well in that some fans actually forgot to look at the main panels, focused on the Background events, such as Jade accidently killing Dave, and didn't notice Doc Scratch as he beat up Slick with a book.
  • During Dave's adventures in the LOHAC Stock Exchange, various timeshifted Daves are wandering around in disguises, including one wearing a beagle puss on top of his shades.
• Something*Positive has this gem. look at Choo-Choo Bear
• The Girl Next Door, this strip.
• These two College Roomies from Hell!!! strips. The first one becomes even funnier when you realize the relationship between her and April and how she would be feeling about her right now.
• Eerie Cuties shows what happens when the resident tomboy gets a good look at the local succubus.
• Following Heather "Spinnerette" Brown accidentally destroyed a hugely expensive genetic modification device thingy, we get to see a panel that's been installed in the lab: "In Case of Heather, Break Glass".
• Scandinavia and the World: This one has Norway trying to keep Denmark away from the beer while Sister Sweden is talking to her brother.
• Nuzlocke Comics ribs its own Schedule Slip in Ruby's battle with Lorelei, by way of the audience holding a sign that says "UPDATE FASTER".
• Numerous examples in Bite Me!, such as there being hilarious meanings to french written on signs in the background, or tiny snippets of background conversations, once even between rats discussing political philosophy.
• Miscellaneous Error has one across two strips.
• Done subtly in Freefall. During the visit to Ecosystems Unlimited arc, careful observation will show that every time Sam encounters someone with a differently colored security pass, he will steal it and replace theirs with whatever one he has at the time.
  • Done less subtly earlier; when Sam tries out a new piloting move, Helix's eyes flash "TILT".
• In the General Protection Fault crossover with User Friendly, Fooker fights with the person who gave him the software that got him in trouble while Nick talks with his co-worker in the foreground.
• The guy in the background of this Questionable Content has made some mistakes.
  • Speaking of which, although it more qualifies as Funny Background Art, the Coffee of Doom frequently has either weird drawings, or strange menu items, such as "cabbage latte."
  • In issue 3448, you can see the/a flying roomba chasing a bird above Feye and Bubble.
• The Transformers Animated web comic Discovery had a very interesting background event that involved Wheeljack exploding something.
• The various wall posters on Academia. One of them is of Charles Darwin with the label "Chuck D", and another is of the extinct crocodilian Sarcosuchus, labelled "Snarkosuchus".
• In O Human Star, Sulla has absolutely no respect for awkward silences.
• The Wotch has a kid on a skateboard who runs into telephone poles a lot. See here. He gets a slightly more important role here.
• Unwinder's Tall Comics. In this strip, Howard is in the background, apparently spewing flies out of his mouth. In this strip, Moist Rider can be seen working in the background of Howard's coffee shop, which ties in with that strip's Alt Text, "Howard won't hire anyone he didn't create."
• Buck Godot: Zap Gun for Hire features this trope, as can be seen in this comic.
• El Goonish Shive:
  • The non-canon "Oblivious Wand Waving" storyline has this in spades starting with this strip where a guy is turned into a girl complete with clothing changes after drinking a soda.
  • In another strip, a man carrying several boxes trips and falls after being distracted by Elliot's excessively busty female form.
  • In this comic, Tedd and his father are having a conversation while Tedd watches TV. The screen is visible in panel three, revealing that Tedd is watching Mythbusters, and Adam appears to have stood a bit too close to an explosion.
• Precocious: In the "The Protest" story, Tiffany is found in both the "down with Jacob" and the "Team Jacob" groups.
• In How I Became Yours, during a scene where Zuko is Hauled Before A Senate Subcommittee, Aang has a look on this face which just screams that he is praying for the sweet release of death. He keeps that face throughout the whole (supposed to be serious) finale.
• In the visual-novel styled Morph E, all of the backgrounds in Amical's manor include paintings of Amical. Most of them are normal enough but there are some abnormalities which appear briefly in important CG scenes or distantly in the background of some shots. Examples to date include Amical skiing away from the SkiFree Yeti, Amical as a mermaid and Amical streaking.
• Occurs regularly on Slice of Life, such as with this hapless assistant.◊
• This xkcd comic is a simple pun on the phrase "The best defense is a good offense." Appropriately enough, the thesis being defended is apparently "The Evolution of Threat Defense in Mammals".
• In this strip of Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures we have the bubblegum creature Deebs playing with and ultimately eating a cell phone as Chicki and Lorenda talk more serious things.
• Sparklecare: All over the hospital, there are posters with bright colors and smiley faces that display hilariously disturbing messages. Among these are:
  "Smile. It only hurts for a second."
  "Welcome to the Emergency Room! Enjoy your stay!"
  "Smile! Ur DEAD."
  "You aren't pretty on the inside. Appearances are FAKE and meaningless."
• Existential Comics: While Kant is trying to chat up Elizabeth of Bohemia, we see in order 1) Camus and Hume giving him the thumbs-up behind her back when he's pretending to be interested in what she's saying, 2) Mary Wollstonecraft throwing a drink in Hume's face, and finally, 3) Wollstonecraft and Simone de Beauvoir giving Elizabeth the thumbs-up behind Kant's back when she's pretending to be interested in what he's saying.
• The red-headed woman on the far left of this Sexy Losers strip is the "Unbelievably Fertile Woman"; hence the ending where she's telling yet another traumatized child "And that's the story of how you were born!"
• Daughter of the Lilies: The evening after defeating the drath, the group sits and waits while Thistle recovers after fainting briefly. While they talk, Lyra pulls out a compact and starts powdering her nose.
• In Freaking Romance, if Zylith's cat Mr. Purrfect is in the background of any scene, he'll be doing something humorously cat-like.
• Near the end of Blue Moon Blossom, amidst the comic's Darkest Hour, there is a villager in the shaded foreground that got turned to stone while in the midst of stuffing their face with apples.
• In Yokoka's Quest, Yfa and Kalliv playing hide-and-seek in the background while Grace is talking with Mao.

---