comics like Peanuts or Garfield as an example of what they’re all like - that being ‘kid friendly’. While The Far Side is, indeed, appropriate for readers of all ages, some of the jokes the comic tells certainly are not, especially when considering the underlying horror of some of the gags.
The Far Side isn’t afraid to joke about dead babies, catastrophic plane crashes, nuclear holocaust, and overall just deaths of all shapes and sizes (even those that are impossibly bizarre). To be fair, each comic is way too absurd to be taken seriously, but if one reads into what is actually happening in certain Far Side comics, they’ll stop laughing long enough to realize that what they just read is insanely dark. Here are 8 of those dark Far Side comics that are utterly iconic (and unexpectedly horrific).
8 Murderous Clown
This Clown has had Enough of People Laughing at Him in The Far Side
A clown walks into a gun shop with a look of sinister determination and pure rage on his face. The clown thinks to himself, "Laugh at me, will they?", implying that he plans to use the gun he's about to buy on the people that laughed at him. Normally, when a clown makes an appearance in a comic strip - including and especially The Far Side - they are doing something funny. However, in this case, things got real dark, real quick. Not only is this clown not doing anything funny, but he's about to do something utterly unspeakable.
10 Far Side Comics That Prove Clowns Are the Things of Nightmares
These Far Side comics depict clowns in the most frightening ways possible as Gary Larson reminds readers that they aren't as silly as they may appear.
Of course, the hilarity of this Far Side comic is that people are supposed to laugh at clowns - that's their whole thing. He's a literal clown. His job is to make people laugh at him. Unfortunately, it seems his line of work finally made him snap.
7 Hungry Mailbox
A Mailman’s Worst Nightmare Comes True in The Far Side
A postal carrier is delivering the mail on his route as he assuredly does every workday. Nothing out of the ordinary here, just a regular mailman putting some mail in a mailbox. But then, when he puts his hand in the mailbox, the mailbox latches onto him. He struggles to release his hand from inside the mailbox, but things only get worse from there. The mailbox sucks in the mailman's entire arm before slowly pulling his whole body in. The mailbox consumes the mailman, effectively making real a postal carrier's worst nightmare. And, the scariest part is, the mailbox isn't done.
After eating the mailman, the sentient, man-eating mailbox raises its own flag, indicating to the next postal carrier that there's a letter inside that needs to be delivered. That means another postal carrier is fated to stick their hand in the man-eating mailbox in the near future, perpetuating this nightmare in The Far Side.
6 Goat of Death
Two Pilots Don’t Know They’ve Doomed Their Entire Plane in The Far Side
Two pilots are flying their plane, just as they do every workday. But then, they see something a bit unusual. The pilots see a mountain goat standing on a cloud bank. One of the pilots even points out to the other one how strange that is, and to his credit, he's not wrong. A mountain goat floating in the sky would be strange. Unfortunately, that's not what's happening here. These pilots don't know that they have doomed not only themselves, but the entire plane filled with engers, as they are flying straight into the side of a mountain.
The sight of a mountain goat is nothing short of an omen of death, as it's the last thing these two pilots will ever see. Obviously, this is insanely dark. These pilots were just doing their jobs, when, all of a sudden, they found themselves flying into the side of a mountain to their deaths. Indeed, this Far Side comic took an unexpectedly dark turn real fast.
5 Killer Moths
Moths Eat a Skydiver’s Parachute in The Far Side
A couple of skydivers had jumped from a plane and were free-falling down to earth when it came time for them to pull their chutes and glide down the rest of the way. One of the skydivers' chutes deploys no problem, but unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the other's parachute. An eclipse of moths explodes from the skydiver's pack, as they had eaten his parachute, leaving him to fend for himself while he's in free fall. Tragically, that means this skydiver is going to die, which technically makes these Far Side moths 'killer moths'.
What makes this comic even darker is that the other skydiver - the one whose parachute wasn't eaten by moths - can do nothing to help his friend. He has already pulled his chute, which means he'll have to watch as his fellow skydiver plummets to the ground, while he gently glides down. If he hadn't, the other skydiver might have been able to get to his friend, attach himself to him, and share their only chute. But, that's impossible now, making this dark Far Side comic even darker.
4 Doomed Baseball Fish
Two Goldfish Play Baseball in Their Bowl & Doom Themselves in The Far Side
A couple of goldfish are hanging out in their shared bowl one day when they have a fun idea: they should play baseball! It's not like there's anything else to do in that bowl all day, and they already have baseball equipment for some reason, so they decide to play. Unfortunately, that decision leads to their deaths. The two fish look at the hole in their bowl made by the baseball in utter horror and total disbelief, as the water slowly drains from their home, and they are left completely helpless with nothing to do but wait until the bitter end.
15 Funniest Far Side Comics About Goldfish
Among the most iconic visuals from Gary Larson's Far Side are its goldfish, whose tiny fishbowls often contained some of the comic's biggest laughs.
Who would have thought that a comic featuring a couple of cartoon fish playing baseball could be so horrifically dark? Sure, the dark humor is hilarious, but these fish are about to die, and readers are just watching it happen. At least they got to have some fun playing baseball before their time was up, even if that is the reason they're going to die in the first place.
3 Dead Baby, Fed Snake
A Snake Eats a Baby in The Far Side (& Will Pay the Price)
A snake is stuck in the bars of a baby's crib, as its stomach is too big to fit through the slits. Why is its stomach too big? Well, that's because of the last thing this snake ate, which this crib was designed to contain: a baby. This snake slithered into the baby's room, ate them, and then got too fat to escape. While the visual humor is clear, it's also one of the most horrific sights imaginable. As the snake is stuck in the crib, annoyed that it can't leave, a baby is getting digested in its stomach after assuredly being strangled to death before being eaten whole. Yeesh.
11 Far Side Comics That Prove Creator Gary Larson Was Obsessed With Snakes
Far Side creator Gary Larson clearly loved drawing snakes; they were one of of the animal kingdom that appeared most frequently in the strip.
The only silver lining here is that the snake will assuredly be killed for doing this, especially if it doesn't escape before the baby's parents enter the room and see for themselves this horrific sight. However, that doesn't detract from what already happened in this absurdly dark Far Side comic.
2 Mary Had a Little Lamb… for Dinner
The Far Side Turns a Children’s Rhyme Surprisingly Dark
A woman is sitting at her dining room table, enjoying a meal that she prepared for herself. The illustration leaves what she's eating a bit ambiguous, though it's clear that it's meat of some sort. It isn't until one reads the caption that the true horror of what readers are really looking at sets in. This isn't just some random woman, this is Mary from the popular children's rhyme "Mary Had A Little Lamb", which is about a little girl and her pet lamb. However, it seems Mary has grown up, and her love of lambs has shifted quite a bit.
Indeed, this is still a story detailing how Mary had a little lamb, but it's been utterly corrupted, and a more fitting title would be "Mary Had A Little Lamb... For Dinner". While people eating lamb isn't uncommon, it's a bit shocking - and insanely dark - to see Mary indulging in this particular dish.
1 The Far Side Kills Snoopy (Yes, Really)
Not Even the Peanuts Gang is Safe in The Far Side
A warplane pilot walks away from his aircraft after painting on it, marking the planes he's shot down during battles. There are five aircraft painted on his plane as a way to both honor the soldiers he killed and show how deadly he is to other enemy pilots, who will want to think twice before engaging in a dogfight with him. And, funnily enough, one of the paintings is of Peanuts' Snoopy - more specifically, Snoopy's WWI Flying Ace alter ego.
5 Best The Far Side Comics Featuring the Military
The Far Side has a long history of making fun of the military, and these are the best of the best.
Over in Peanuts canon, Snoopy regularly tangles with the Red Baron as the WWI Flying Ace, and he always manages to make it out of their dogfights alive. However, The Far Side shows things from a different perspective, as this pilot - who is presumably the Red Baron, despite the fact that his plane isn't red - finally shot down and killed Snoopy. Obviously, the idea that The Far Side actually murdered a beloved Peanuts character - arguably the most beloved, Snoopy - is incredibly dark, and utterly unexpected.
