War isn’t exactly known for being a barrel of laughs, but in the surreal hands of Gary Larson, The Far Side managed to find its unique brand of humor in some of civilization’s most famous conflicts. Running from 1980 to 1995, Larson’s comic took inspiration from many different areas of life, with a particular focus on nature, science and a love of words. However, Larson was also no stranger to depicting battlefields, mining humor from tactics and weapons of war from throughout history.

In this article, Screen Rant has collected Larson’s 15 funniest comics on the subject of war, from the nuclear age way back to medieval siege warfare. Don’t forget to vote in our end-of-article poll and choose which of Larson’s comics about war is the best of the bunch.

15

Snakes of War

Gary Larson Imagines the Strengths and Weaknesses of a Snake Army

If there’s one thing that defines Far Side more than anything else, it’s Gary Larson’s love of language. Here, he takes the phrase ‘Dogs of War’ – a term originating from William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar – and changes the animal to something a little less familiar. However, Larson isn’t just playing with words; he also notes that a serpentine army might be surprisingly capable of some aspects of war, as the snakes are asked to crawl up towards an enemy encampment – a tactic for which they’re more than qualified.

In another strip combining snakes and war (above), Larson notes that not all military duties would suit snakes, as a python sergeant despairs at a sidewinder soldier who’s unwilling or unable to march in formation.

14

Washington Crosses the Delaware

Far Side Reimagines the American Revolutionary War

In this strip, Gary Larson parodies Emanuel Leutze’s 1851 painting Washington Crossing the Delaware, which shows future president George Washington leading his troops into position for the Battle of Trenton. The battle is considered one of the most ambitious of the American Revolutionary War, with Leutze’s painting celebrating Washington for leading the daring attack. Larson comedically undercuts the moment by adding the detail of Sid – an onlooker roped into the offensive thanks to Washington renting his motorboat for the trip.

Larson’s original comic was published in 1980, and he revisited the gag again in 1986, this time suggesting that Washington’s heroic bearing in Leutze’s painting had nothing to do with his mission, but was simply how the general moved from place to place.

13

Trojan Horse

Far Side Visits the Trojan War

The Trojan Horse is perfect subject matter for Gary Larson – an iconic image with a clear narrative attached, which The Far Side can then subvert with his own unique sense of humor. Larson keeps it simple with this strip, pulling his favorite trick of adding mundane details to a larger-than-life situation, as one of the Greeks realizes their bladder isn’t compatible with this particularly military strategy. Indeed, Larson used this exact idea twice, and it’s funny to imagine that his other Trojan Horse strip (below) is set a few moments later, with the ‘call of nature’ having infected the entire fighting force.

Indeed, to modern eyes – and in a society where the story of the Trojan Horse is well known – the gift of a gigantic wooden horse is already bizarre, and accepting such an obvious trick even moreso. Larson mines this humor in another strip where, instead of a giant wooden horse, the soldiers line up one by one to create “a big weiner dog.”

12

Army Ants

Gary Larson Takes Insects’ Military Credentials Too Seriously

This strip combines the Far Side‘s two greatest loves – wordplay and insects. As two young lovers sit down for a picnic, they’re besieged by ants – but these being army ants, they intend to claim the chicken legs and potato salad with heavy ordnance. Larson loves to depict insects in The Far Side, often taking the side of the tiny creatures that somehow have to figure out how to live around humans – including the especially dangerous young humans, who are prone to capturing them in jars.

Larson’s love of insects led to multiple insect species being named in his honor by fans, including the louse strigiphilus garylarsoni and the butterfly serratoterga larsoni. Thankfully, none of the insects bearing the Far Side creator’s name have carried out serious attacks on picnic-ers… at time of writing.

11

Bomb Shelter

The Far Side Considers the Mundane Problems of a Nuclear Apocalypse

Larson loves a bomb shelter gag, and this strip explores the practical realities of trying to survive nuclear war hidden underground. A lot of Far Side strips play with – or outright depict – the idea of nuclear annihilation, and this is no coincidence. In a 1987 interview with 20/20, Larson admitted that growing up during the Cold War – and especially the Cuban Missile Crisis – helped to shape his sense of humor, saying:

I remember sitting in my seventh-grade English class thinking that the world was going to end during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It made you look at the world a little bit askew.

This fact helps to put a lot The Far Side‘s worldview into context, as its characters inhabit a dangerous world where things can go very wrong very quickly. However, this sense of possible doom also dovetails with Larson’s love of nature and choice not to ignore the harsh, danger-filled life that most animals live. Larson treats humans as just another kind of animal, not lending danger any extra weight just because the potential victims are Homo sapiens rather than Felis catus.

10

What If We Gave a War…

Far Side Flips a Vietnam War Protest Slogan

This Far Side strip is a rare example of Larson’s humor being confusing for modern readers. The strip refers to a popular anti-war slogan used during the ’60s to protest the Vietnam War, during which civilians being conscripted into military service via draft lottery was a particularly hot-button issue. Vietnam is often described as “the first televised war,“ with direct coverage from warzones leading to particularly widespread opposition. Indeed, the Smithsonian National Museum of American History acknowledges the historical importance of ‘Suppose they gave a war and nobody came,’ keeping a sign emblazoned with the slogan in its collection relating to ‘Protest and Civil Disobedience.’

Larson offers up a surprisingly grim take on the slogan, with generals discussing its suggestion as a possibility while planning out an unspecified conflict. The joke hinges on the dark humor of one general fantasizing about a world where everyone does come to the war; presumably one of mass suffering and bloodshed. However, the strip also engages with the Vietnam era phrase on a darker level, drawing humor from the idea of military leaders ever actually being phased by the idea.

9

Love Boat

The Far Side’s Ultimate ’80s Comic

As with the Vietnam War gag above, this strip may not make immediate sense to younger Far Side fans. Larson’s comic combines two topics that are less-than-fresh for the modern reader – the 1970s romantic drama Love Boat and the 1984 Tanker War (as well as the larger military history of this strategically important waterway.) While Larson had a great eye for which classic TV shows would stand the test of time, The Love Boat didn’t hold up as well as his strips on Star Trek, Jeopardy and The Flintstones.

Larson imagines the characters of Love Boat stumbling across the heavily contested waters, contrasting the happy-go-lucky tone of the show with real-life military tensions. In another strip contrasting the light-hearted show with dark subject matter, Larson seemingly shows how this standoff ends.

8

“Throw the Grenade”

Like Beetle Bailey, Far Side Finds Humor in Unprofessional Soldiers

One of Gary Larson’s favorite jokes when it comes to depicting war is showing military personnel acting more like excitable kids than hardened soldiers – something he has in common with Mort Walker’s contemporary comic strip Beetle Bailey. In this case, Private Johnson has to be sternly instructed not to give the enemy a warning when hurling a live grenade. In this early comic, Larson showcases one of the techniques that make his jokes so satisfying – alluding to a previous, unseen moment that’s funnier for the reader to imagine than to actually see.

7

Clown vs the World

Gary Larson Justifies Your Fear of Clowns

While some of The Far Side‘s war comics rely on knowledge of real-world events, this strip is built on simple wordplay, as the insult ‘clown’ becomes incredibly literal. The harlequin in question has apparently wandered into a military base and is about to kick off a global thermonuclear conflict. Making things even worse, the clown doesn’t appear to have any particular emotional response – he’s mostly pushing the button to see what it does.

Larson has an odd habit of combining clowns with violence – in the comics above, clowns are shot, beaten and face the electric chair, while also dealing out their own brand of violence. It’s the classic trick of contrasting two very different tones – something that’s inherent to The Far Side and Larson’s sense of humor. In an interview with The New York Times, Larson was asked why cows appear so often in his comics, replying that he feels they “blur the line between tragedy and humor.” While The Far Side certainly accomplishes this with its cow comics, Larson has a definite tendency to treat clowns in the same way.

6

The Battle of Bunker Hill

The Far Side Returns to the Revolutionary War

“Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes” is an iconic instruction attributed to the real-life Battle of Bunker Hill, meaning that soldiers shouldn’t fire their weapons until the enemy are incredibly close, prioritizing a single, accurate burst of gunfire over hurried efforts to shoot twice. Again, Larson twists the logic of this historical story by taking a turn of phrase incredibly literally, turning one unfortunate, big-eyed soldier into a target for the entire enemy army, since his eyes register well before his fellow redcoats’.

5

Fighter Pilot

Far Side Declares WWI on Charles Schulz’s Peanuts

While Gary Larson took a lot of shots at pop culture, he was a little kinder to rival newspaper comics. However, when he did target a comic strip contemporary, he didn’t pull his punches, with this strip showing a World War I fighter pilot who is keeping track of his kills, which appear to include Charlie Brown’s dog Snoopy. This is a reference to a running gag in Peanuts where Snoopy imagines he’s a WWI pilot, battling in the air with his nemesis the Red Baron – a gag that has surprising roots in real-life military history.

Throughout The Far Side, there are only a handful of jokes that poke affectionate fun at ‘competitor’ comics, with gags about Peanuts, Mary Worth and one particularly cynical shot at Garfield, where a boa constrictor is implied to have eaten the iconic tabby. Perhaps the best known of these is the comic captioned ‘At The Far Side’s spy center,’ where various Far Side staple characters spy on rival strips including Opus the Penguin, Nancy and Cathy. Eagle-eyed fans can spot Peanuts‘ Charlie Brown threatening to have Snoopy put down on the screen in the bottom right.

4

“Someone’s Gonna Get Hurt!”

Larson’s Best ‘War Comics’ Are Those That Get Medieval

Similar to Dr. Strangelove‘s iconic quote “you can’t fight in here, this is the War Room!”, Larson imagines a medieval warrior who hasn’t quite understood the point of the pitched battle around him. As swords are swung and arrows fly, this warrior suddenly comes to the unwelcome realization that there could be consequences to the scuffle taking place around him.

3

“I Told You Guys to Slow Down”

With Arrows and Catapults, Far Side Can Indulge in More Cartoon Violence

One of the big advantages of using cartoons for comedy is the ability to use situations that would be unfeasible in any other medium. Here, Larson depicts yet more childish, over-excited soldiers, but this time set during the Crusades. However, just because these characters aren’t dealing with high-explosives doesn’t mean they’re immune to deadly mistakes, as one of their number is sent flying while messing around with a catapult. Larson gets the most out of this situation by having the senior warrior only slightly irritated by the mistake, despite the fact the unfortunate soldier hasn’t even landed yet.

Larson’s best comics depicting war tend to take place in the medieval period, where characters can get injured in more comical ways – including one soldier who finds his buttocks riddled with arrows after mooning “these Saxon dogs.” Indeed, depicting these kinds of injuries was one of the reasons Larson never wanted to use recurring characters in his work. In The Complete Far Side, Larson explains that he wanted to tell one-time stories so that he could injure characters and readers would find it funny since they wouldn’t feel any connection to them. Larson writes:

Once you’ve got your character established in the hearts and minds of readers, it’s not a good idea to run him over with a truck a few weeks later. … I was hit and run. My ever-changing characters got crunched, speared, shot, beheaded, eaten, stuffed, poisoned, and run over about twice a week. (Tastefully, of course.)

2

Your Stupid Dog

In Larson’s World, Even Knights Are Just Big Kids

In another medieval comic, Larson once again depicts serious soldiers as big kids, as one armor-clad warrior is embarrassed to realize that his dog is following him to battle, just as a kid’s canine companion might slip out of the house and follow them to school. The Far Side often uses dogs in its gags, so it’s not surprising that Larson would focus on a household pet even in such a distant era. The best part of the gag is that it’s implied this has happened before, suggesting that the castle in the background really needs to improve its security – or at least that Richard needs to start closing the door to his quarters when he heads out to battle.

1

Goldfish!

There’s a Reason This Is One of Far Side’s Most Famous Comics

This strip perfectly captures Larson’s skill at contrasting military violence with mundane, goofy humor, as an invading Viking is distracted from pillaging and arson after spotting a goldfish in the castle’s moat. Larson doesn’t skimp on the detail as arrows fly and torches are held aloft, selling the idea of a gigantic battle being interrupted by a moment of silly humanity. This gag would be funny enough, but Larson also has the Viking pointing out his find to the rest of his army, suggesting he thinks that it’s worth everyone else stopping to appreciate his find.

Those are The Far Side‘s best comics that find something funny on the battlefield, drawing on everything from Larson’s silly sense of humor to his very real experiences growing up at the height of nuclear paranoia – be sure to vote below for your favorite of Gary Larson’s comics depicting large-scale human conflict.

Source: The New York Times