10 Funniest Far Side Comics About Cows

From 1980 until 1995, cartoonist Gary Larson wrote and drew the comic strip The Far Side. It was a single panel comic strip filled with non-sequitur, often surreal jokes mostly aimed at adults instead of children, which was unusual for newspaper comics. Also unusual was the fact that, unlike most daily comic strips, there were no recurring characters. Whereas Peanuts had its recurring gang of kids and Garfield has its cast of humans and animals, every panel of The Far Side introduced new characters and scenarios all aimed at delivering that day’s joke.

That said, Larson did have some themes and types of characters he’d often return to. Dinosaurs, for example, were a big one as Larson would depict them doing normal human things like eating breakfast cereal (with a free kid inside) or smoking cigarettes (the real reason they became extinct, according to Larson). He also liked to explore the domesticity of prehistoric life through cavemen and to lampoon historical figures and moments.

But if one recurring theme of Larson’s The Far Side is a standout, it’s his cows. Over the 15 years he was doing The Far Side, Larson created 4,337 different comics and he returned to cows again and again as a source of humor. He’d depict them doing normal human things or villainous things behind the backs of humans (especially farmers). In an interview with The New York Times, Larson once explained his cow fixations, saying, ”I’ve always thought the word cow was funny,” he said. ”And cows are sort of tragic figures. Cows blur the line between tragedy and humor.”

Here, I took a shot at finding the 10 funniest-ever The Far Side comics about cows, though with so many to choose from, there’s definitely some room for debate.

10

A big realization

From October 16, 1981. The beauty of Larson’s The Far Side is that jokes could be very thoughtful and subtle, whereas others could be more basic, silly, and understandable by children. This one, with a cow realizing she’s been eating grass, is a fairly straightforward gag anyone can enjoy.

9

No one wants to hear that

Image: Gary Larson

This next cow gag, from July 8, 1982, is a bit more subtle and probably a bit dated too. Back in the day, travelers would need places to sleep and if the farmer didn’t want them or trust them in the house, the person would be sent to the barn instead (or, at least, that’s what happened in movies). This Far Side comic is a simple, yet pretty hilarious role reversal.

8

A very famous comic

Image: Gary Larson

This comic is one of the most famous strips in the history of The Far Side, but not because the joke is profoundly funny. If anything, it may be seen as an abject failure, given how the public responded to it.

Running on October 28, 1982, a comic with the caption “Cow tools” simply depicted a cow behind a table, along with some crude-looking instruments on the table. The newspapers running The Far Side ended up getting lots of letters from confused readers complaining that they didn’t understand what the joke was. Many assumed the joke was something subtle or scientific, as many of Larson’s jokes were. The response was so loud and so swift that Larson issued a press release the very next day explaining that the joke wasn’t complicated at all.

“The cartoon was intended to be an exercise in silliness,” wrote Larson. “While I have never met a cow who could make tools, I felt sure that if I did, they (the tools) would lack something in sophistication and resemble the sorry specimens shown in this cartoon. I regret that my fondness for cows, combined with an overactive imagination, may have carried me beyond what is comprehensible to the average Far Side reader”

In other words, the joke was simply “cows are bad at making tools,” proving that people were really overthinking it.

7

Cow gossip

Image: Gary Larson

From July 29, 1987 is yet another cow vs. human role reversal. There was an old expression where someone might say that a bad-smelling house smelled like a barn. So a cow insult must be a barn that smells like a house.

6

For indoor cows

Image: Gary Larson

This panel, from September 25, 1986, is simply a wonderful sight gag, impossible to overthink. I love the delight on the face of the woman bragging about her plastic cow ball and that the reaction of the other woman doesn’t even need to be seen to sell the joke. That’s the beauty of Larson’s humor, much of it is just punchline, without need for a setup or a reaction.

5

Two of Larson’s favorites

Image: Gary Larson

Aside from cows, dinosaurs were a frequent muse of Larson’s. He combined both of these passions on this panel from February 16, 1983, which depicted dinosaurs as cows, or cows as dinosaurs, depending upon how you look at it.

Interestingly, one of Larson’s dinosaur strips ended up making official dinosaur history. In his comic from May 27, 1982, he featured a class full of cavemen being taught by a caveman professor. The professor caveman was pointing at the pointy structure on the end of a Stegosaurus’ tail and the captain said “Now, this end is called the thagomizer… after the late Thag Simmons.”

The Far Side was so popular and this joke so beloved that, over time, “thagomizer” became the official name for the spiky tail structure on Stegosaurus and other related dinosaurs. Prior to that, the structure had no name.

4

Sneaky cows

Image: Gary Larson

Occasionally, Larson would break his single-panel format for a more traditional joke with a setup and punchline, like this strip from January 6, 1984, featuring cows standing upright when cars aren’t looking. This was not the norm for The Far Side, but the beauty of the strip was its versatile format, whereas most comic strips stuck to a strict structure with a regular cast of characters.

3

A valuable lesson

Image: Gary Larson

From January 22, 1983, the cow lesson is a wonderful example of a simple, yet hilarious Far Side comic which is more about just how stupid people are.

2

Proper line etiquette

Image: Gary Larson

While The Far Side could be smart and silly, sometimes it was also really dark in its humor, like this one from May 13, 1983. You never saw these kinds of jokes in The Family Circus.

1

Really sneaky cows

Image: Gary Larson

From February 12, 1986. This is another great example of how dark Larson could be, while also being very silly. This might just be Larson’s funniest-ever cow strip.