12 Far Side Comics From 1993 That Make Readers Go “What the?”

1993 was the penultimate year of The Far Side, and during the course of the year, Gary Larson produced as many memorable hilarious cartoons as ever – and just as many obtuse and hard to figure out punchlines, which left readers asking “What the?“ These cartoons represent some of the strangest Larson illustrated in the final stretch of his career as a cartoonist.

It’s not that Larson’s humor got weirder as The Far Side progressed, but rather, that he got better at crafting weird punchlines that still managed to get a reaction out of his readers. Still, it is fair to say that the author took greater creative risks in the latter stage of the comic’s run.

That is, Gary Larson became more willing to play with the formula for The Far Side that he had created over the years, and often, his more experimental cartoons turned out to be some of his most perplexing.

12 The “Blink-And-Miss-It” Catagory Of Far Side Jokes (Where’s The Punchline?)

First Published: January 11, 1993

Far Side jokes can be grouped into a few different categories, including “subtle” and “obvious” – with this panel being an example of the former, perhaps to a fault. In this Far Side Viking cartoon, the raiders are in the middle of a pitched battle, as they attempt to scale the walls of a castle using suspiciously modern-looking ladders, including one with the warning “this is not a step” printed on the first rung.

With so much action going on – relatively speaking, for a Far Side comic – readers’ attention won’t necessarily be immediately drawn to this small detail, which amounts to the comic’s punchline. While certainly amusing, it can be argued that the joke here is too subtle, and too far from jumping out at the reader, making them far more likely to ask “What the?” than laugh here.

11 These Far Side Factory Workers Make Slaughtering Chickens Fun (Who Hits The Most Threes?)

First Published: February 4, 1993

In another captionless Far Side cartoon, workers at “Red Hen Poultry Co.” are shown going about their days, the majority of them crowded around a conveyor belt, chopping various pieces of chicken as they role by. Again, the joke is not immediately obvious here, until readers realize that in the background of the panel, against the factory’s far wall, is a basketball hoop, splattered with spots of blood, hanging over the barrel labeled “gizzards.“

This is precisely the sort of thing people do to liven up their workplace, but given the nature of their job, it is particularly grizzly – though that adds to the humor, but only once readers have had a moment to acclimate to the comic and identify its sly humor.

10 An Elaborate Psychological Experiment Reaches Its Conclusion (Is This The Far Side’s Most High Concept Joke?)

First Published: March 26, 1993

This Far Side comic is the opposite of too subtle, as its humor is rooted in the excessive exposition coming from an experimental psychologist, who explains to a man in a military uniform, sitting behind a desk, in front of a large portrait of himself, that he is not “the dictator of Ithuania, a small European republic,” but rather “Edward Belcher,” a man “from Long Island.”

The Far Side’s humor was usually smart – when it was dumb, it was deliberately so – and often layered, but this ranks among its most “high concept” punchlines, as Gary Larson manages to cram an entire convoluted plotline into a soliloquy from a single character. Still, the end result is the same; though funny, this cartoon’s deviation from The Far Side’s usual style of punchline will have many readers narrowing their eyes at it, unsure whether to laugh or not.

9 Not Even Gary Larson Can Explain This Cartoon (Is That The Point?)

First Published: April 30, 1993​​​​​​​

By far, this is one of Gary Larson’s most unusual, experimental Far Side comics. Far Side jokes tended to succeed or fail depending on how well their image and caption worked together. Here, however, Larson delivers a deliberately nonsensical sequence of panels, which are paired with a meta-caption, which reads:

“And so,” the interviewer asked, “Do you ever have trouble coming up with ideas?” “Well, sometimes,” the cartoonist replied.

Larson notoriously disliked doing interviews, and hated being asked where his ideas came from. This cartoon is a direct confrontation of that, offering up what may be the least disguised appearance of the artist’s own perspective on the page. While the disconnect between caption and image could be a bug in some Far Side cartoons, here Larson turns it into a feature, and the result is unusual, with readers as likely to be mystified by the comic as made to chuckle.

8 Sometimes The Far Side Was More About Vibes Than Making Sense (How Was That Worm Playing The Drums?)

First Published: May 10, 1993

In another Far Side cartoon that eschews a caption, a bird is depicted with a worm dangling from its beak, freshly plucked from beneath the surface of the earth – where, just moments before, the worm had been minding its own business, playing drums. The drumming worm is a strong absurdist element, of course, but where readers might find themselves asking “What the?” with this cartoon is the connection it asks readers to make.

That is, it requires the knowledge that birds hunt by using vibrations – meaning a drumming worm would make itself a target in short order. Still, the worm playing drums is likely the concept that will stick with readers, as of course the creatures’ lack of appendages make any instrument difficult, but the drums especially tough.

7 The Far Side Takes A Close Look At Hummingbird Accessories (Is This Gary Larson’s Most Inscrutable Cartoon?)

First Published: June 24, 1993​​​​​​​

In this Far Side panel, Gary Larson mixes ornithological fact with a strange flight of fancy, resulting in one of his most quixotic and hard to parse cartoons. According to the caption, the collection of items here depict the “structures, organs, and accessories (shown actual size) pertaining to Mellisuga helenae, the world’s smallest hummingbird.”

At first, Larson illustrates an egg, a nest, a heart, and so on, but by the end of the panel, he has moved on to “keys” and “lunchbox,” in a ridiculous lateral move from reality to make believe. Still, the grouping of all these items together is likely to cause readers to ask “What the?” even after they understand the premise of the joke, as its humor seems a little too niche, as if this were a case of the artist catering to an audience of one: himself.

6 Gary Larson Delivers A Weird Pun Before Leaving Town (Did The Far Side Artist Phone This One In?)

First Published: July 2, 1993

Gary Larson only produced two new Far Side cartoons in July 1993, before taking the rest of the month off – yet both are arguably “What the?” comics, as is the case here, with a panel depicting a train rounding a curve as “Engineer Matthews” gets on the intercom to tell his passengers they’re about to “hit some pretty bad trackulence,” as they approach a bumpy portion of the rails.

The humor here is rooted in the riff on “turbulence,” which is the kind of joke that frequently led people to wonder how Larson came up with it. Admittedly, this cartoon has the feel of having been rushed out the door as the author prepared for another one of the increasingly common hiatuses he took in the later years of The Far Side, which likely contributed to why it may not have totally connected with readers.

5 The Far Side’s Squirrels Hype Themselves Up (Isn’t It Kind Of Endearing?)

First Published: August 10, 1993

“Nuts! Nuts! Get ’em! Nuts! Nuts! Get ’em!” a group of squirrels huddled together on a tree branch shout, as the caption informs readers that, “before starting their day, squirrels must first pump themselves up.” This reads as one of Gary Larson’s perennial attempts to map human behavior onto animals with The Far Side, and vice versa, though it is perhaps not as successful as he often was.

Nevertheless, there is a certain charm to this cartoon, as the squirrels and their sunrise chant might not be the most relatable Far Side animals, but they and their behavior are certainly amusing. There is something slightly hypnotic about “Nuts! Nuts! Get ’em!” which makes this panel have a chance at being a Far Side joke that sticks in readers’ minds, even if they’re not entirely sure why.

4 Ruining A Nice Work Shirt Is The Worst Feeling (What Exactly Is A Pocket Squid For?)

First Published: September 16, 1993

Anyone who has ever made a habit of carrying a pen in their pocket – protected or otherwise – will know the scourge of ink stains, and in this Far Side cartoon, Gary Larson extrapolates a ridiculous punchline from that familiar experience. “Once again, Vernon has a good shirt ruined,” the caption explains, “by a cheap pocket octopus.”

The “pocket octopus” premise will have many readers not just asking “What the?” but shouting it, yet Gary Larson still manages to make this cartoon’s punchline land by having all the characters in the illustration wearing “pocket octopai,” suggesting that it is a common accessory in this Far Side workplace; yet what it is, and why, will remain forever elusive to even the most astute Far Side fan.

3 Gary Larson Documents Slander Among Snake Researchers (Is This The Most Confusing Far Side Comic Of The Year?)

First Published: October 15, 1993

In this Far Side cartoon, a researcher at a laboratory studying snakes and other reptiles reacts with dismay when two of his colleagues show up. “They’re skinheads, you know,” he tells another coworker standing next to him. Visually, this is one of Gary Larson’s most detailed panels, which helps immerse the reader in the setting at this moment – which is great, because the caption begs for further context that is nowhere to be found.

In other words, Larson’s fictional world in this panel seems very real, and detailed, but the end result is a punchline that will leave many readers mystified, with more questions than answers. The confusion is a result of this being among The Far Side’s most obtuse jokes; that is, while not impossible to understand by any means, it is far from easy to decipher.

2 Gary Larson Was Always The Man With A Fork In A Room Full Of People With Spoons (Make That Make Sense?)

First Published:​​​​​​​ November 9, 1993

This silly Far Side panel is captioned “Douglas is ejected from the spoon band,” as a man with a fork clutched in his hand stomps toward the bottom right of the frame, as behind him, the conductor of the spoon band rests a fist on one hip, and points toward the exit with another.

Characters’ eyes are the window into this Far Side cartoon’s true humor, but it is also notable for being thematically representative of Gary Larson’s approach to – well, seemingly everything, at least when it came to art, humor, and culture. Larson always went against the grain, marched to the beat of his own drum, and brought a fork to a spoon band, so to speak. In other words, this is a classic “odd man out” comic, even if the ridiculous quality of the punchline, on its surface, may befuddle its share of readers.

1 On The Far Side, Happiness Could Be Hard To Find (How Much Did It Cost?)

First Published: December 29, 1993

Subverting the idea that “money can’t buy happiness,” this Far Side comic features a man, Mr. Crawley, emerging from the Happiness store, as he realizes that his friends who told him it didn’t exist “just didn’t know where the store was.” Interestingly, in contrast to many “What the?” Far Side cartoons, the caption to this one actually over-explains its premise – which ties into its “What the?” quality, which comes from how overly literal the joke is.

In a way, this could be called a meta-“What the?” comic, in the sense that what drives this response is the fact that this cartoon feels stylistically off from Gary Larson’s usual sense of humor. It is still unmistakably a Far Side comic, but it is so reader-friendly that it might accidentally trick some fans into thinking they’re making something. That is the great paradox of The Far Side, and part of what makes the comic so special.