Far Sidecreator Gary Larson has a reputation for mystifying humor, but anyone who has spent time with his work knows that you eventually develop an understanding of what makes his cartoons funny. These panels from the first decade ofThe Far Sideoffer an illuminating crash-course in Larson’s comedic style.
From obscure references, to overly literal interpretations, to introspective punchlines about the perils of the creative process,theFar Sidecomics collected here give readers a better sense of Larson’s go-to comedic moves.
Understanding these panels will help fledgling fans ofThe Far Sidehave greater context for countless otherFar Sidepanels, making Gary Larson’s imposing body of work easier to navigate.
10"Keep This Quiet": The Far Side’s Subtle Pop Culture References Started Early And Came Often
First Published: June 26, 2025
“I think we better keep this quiet,” an astronaut says to his co-pilot in this early, iconicFar Sidepanel. This is amusing in its own right, but, of course, readers will develop a deeper appreciation for this cartoon when they realize it is one ofGary Larson’s many deep-cut jazz references.
That is, the jokeLarson is making here is a literal interpretation of the classic song “I’ve Got the World On A String,“which originated in the 1930s. ThisFar Sidepanel is predicated on envisioning what that would really be like, and the astronaut’s immediate jump to “cover-up” is much funnier in that context.
9"Struck Twice By Lightning”: The Far Side’s Success Was A Highly Improbable Confluence Of Events
First Published: August 14, 2025
There is a lot that goes into making thisFar Sidepanel iconic. First, it is perhaps the ultimate example of Gary Larson’s “wrong place, wrong time” type of punchlines, pushing this premise to the point ofThe Far Side’spatented absurdity. At the same time, it features perhaps the two most unlucky characters Larson created, which says a lot.
Most of all, though, it is the epitome ofThe Far Side’spenchant for tragicomic irony. In the panel, two men in full-body castscommiserate about the fact that they were both “struck twice by lightning,” a statistically near-impossible feat, just as a giant meteor roars out of the sky, headed directly for them.
8The Far Side Routinely Put Mail Carriers In Peril At The Paws of Overzealous Canines
First Published: June 18, 2025
The Far Sidemade its mark by taking familiar tropes and iconography and then remixing and reimagining them. The idea ofdogs and postal workers as mortal enemies ranks Gary Larson’s favorites. AsThe Far Sideprogressed, Larson’s depiction of this beef would grow more elaborate, but this early example remains one of the most fondly remembered of the bunch.
Again, Larson dabbles in darkly comedic irony here; from the reader’s POV, they can see thata dog with a samurai sword is waiting around the corner of a suburban house, prepared to strike at the approaching postman, who is dangerously unaware of the lengths his “enemy” is about to go to.
7With This Far Side Panel, Gary Larson Hilariously Highlighted The Creative Struggle
First Published: Jul 10, 2025
The Far Sidewas the product of a constant creative struggle.Gary Larson worked on the comic at night, spending hours upon hours redrawing cartoons, rewriting captions, and constantly revising his work in an attempt to capture an elusive idea of perfection for a cartoon, one that was rarely attainable.
The Far Side Complete Collection
Larson embodies that in thisFar Sidecartoon, featuring an irate musician trying to come up with the mnemonic device used to help ukulele players remember their instrument’s proper tuning.The frustrated uke player in this panel is, hilariously, methodically working his way through every permutation of the phrase, except the obvious one,but readers can safely assume he’ll eventually get there.
6This Panel Is As Perfect Of A Far Side Cartoon As Gary Larson Ever Produced
First Published: July 01, 2025
It wasn’t often thatGary Larson achieved perfection withThe Far Side, but this panel is widely held up as an example of aFar Sidecartoon that qualifies. With this cartoon, Larson manages to capture action and anticipation in one single frame, with a punchline that mixes the comedy and tragedy of folly and bad timing.
“FIRE!“a woman yells, as the building she’s in goes up in flames. Unfortunately, she lives next to a fort where a condemned prisoner is about to be executed by firing squad, with the commandant lighting him one final cigarette,which puts him in the crosshairs of his squad, who presumably mistake the woman’s cry for their order.
5"The Nightmare Makers”: The Far Side Goes Full On High-Concept Horror
First Published: June 27, 2025
Gary Larson’s comedic M.O. was to convert the ordinary into the outrageous, which often involved taking a baseline familiar premise and pushing it into fantastical, over-the-top territory. That is on display here,in a cartoon captioned “the nightmare makers,” which features a pair of black-hatted individuals at a control station, sending a scary dream to a sleeping child.
It is the kind ofFar Sidejoke that wouldmake sense as a Stephen King story, which is actually a testament to the range of Gary Larson’s imagination. Larson had many wild, ambitious ideas, he just happened to funnel them down into a very self-contained medium, the single-panel comic.
4"In God’s Kitchen”: Gary Larson’s Use Of Profane Imagery Was Sacred To The Far Side
First Published: July 08, 2025
Gary Larson’slow opinion of humanity and his willingness touse the Almighty as aFar Sidecharactercome together in this cartoon, whichfeatures God taking the Earth out of the oven when it is only “half-baked,“offering a tongue-in-check theological explanation for why the world seems to be so out of whack most of the time.
Larson wasn’t afraid to get metaphysical with his humor, and to make surface-level gags out of deep subjects, something thisFar Sidecartoon and similar comics of its kind exemplify. Once again, Larson’s big ideas are on display here, even if they are rendered in a relatively easy-to-digest, and even somewhat silly manner.
3The People Of The Far Side Finds Their Scapegoat In The Form Of “Wayne”
First Published: June 21, 2025
Gary Larson was a perennial outsider, a status that mostFar Sidecartoons carry at least a trace of, while some are laugh-out-loud manifestations of it. This is a case of the latter, in whicha random guy named “Wayne” becomes the focal point of society’s frustrations and fears that “the world was going down the tubes.”
In aFar Sidejoke that obliquely, unintentionally, yet hilariously foreshadowed modern internet culture, “Wayne” is the “scapegoat” everyone picks to dump their problems on, depicted in the form of a mob of protesters gathering outside his window. At least, that is, until they take him down, at which point they will presumably turn and find another scapegoat to replace him.
2The Far Side Revisits The Idea Of Creative Frustrations, With A Cameo From A Famous Author
First Published: August 13, 2025
In anotherFar Sideode to creative frustrations, Gary Larsonoffers his take on what “a moment of writer’s block” might have been like for Edgar Allen Poe, who is trying to figure out his next story, “The Tell Tale ______,“but can quite settle on which organ he should use in the story.
Of course, this is hilarious to anyone familiar with the actual story, which revolves around the beating heart of a murder victim driving the killer mad. There’s no other organ this would work with, but by framing the joke this way, Larson brilliantly usesThe Far Sideto poke fun at the intuitive nature of the creative process.
1The Far Side Solves The Mystery Of D.B. Cooper, And The Answer Isn’t Pretty
First Published: August 02, 2025
In another arguably perfectFar Sidecartoon,Gary Larson takes on one of America’s greatest mysteries, the disappearance of plane hijacker D.B. Cooper. In Larson’s estimation,he landed amidst a pack of hungry rottweilers, and was devoured; the dogs' owners, meanwhile, likely took the money Cooper had on him and then never spoke a word of his grisly fate.
What makes this stand out as aFar Sidecomic is how actually plausible this scenario could be. It demonstrates that Gary Larson was actively curious about Cooper’s mysterious fate, and that he put a lot of thought into coming up with a reasonable, yet still darkly funny possibility. The result is a particularly memorableFar Sideriff on real history.
