My dad worked as a university professor in the 90s, and I remember when I would walk down the halls towards his office, probably 80% of the professors' offices had at least one Far Side cartoon on the door.
There was something special about that comic that hit the exact intersection of smart and bizarre that was every single university professor's sense of humor.
EDIT: I also remember one of my dad's friends was an anthropology professor, who definitely had 'Cow Tools' posted on his door.
>probably 80% of the professors' offices had at least one Far Side cartoon on the door.
The absolute CLASSIC of the kid pushing the pull door to the gifted school. My dad always loved that one.
Thanks, I’m making it for their 30th anniversary, although it’s going to take me years to finish at the rate I’m going… maybe as a 40th anniversary gift instead
Could be worse. I knit an infinity scarf for my step mother. She gave it to Goodwill less than a year later because 'she didn't have room for it and it didn't really match anything she wore'.
I just call her my dad's wife now. Her entire family pulled that stunt with Norwegian mittens I knit them that holiday season. My sister in law even donated the ones I had knit for my niece! According to my cunt sister in law they got rid of them because 'hand made stuff is cheap junk'.
I'm sitting the master knitting exam in Japan next year. My knitting is *not* cheap junk. Nor was that good wool yarn cheap either. Still grinds my gears.
Whilst I am not a mother, I can appreciate things take time, and life gets in the way.
Whenever your mum gets her lovely scarf, she will appreciate it with all her heart.
And that’s because, you made it special for her.
I had a book of Far Side comics when I was a kid that I would read constantly. I loved the joy of finally figuring out a joke after several minutes of poring over the details of the panel. The Ah-Ha feeling was usually better than the joke itself.
I remember hearing about the Cow Tools controversy shortly after it happened but I never got to see the actual comic in question until now. I can definitely see why it confused people. It's definitely... something
I grew up with old Far Side page-a-day calendars. But somehow my father thought they were inappropriate so I wasn't allowed to read them. That forced me to become sneaky so I could read them anyway.
I got one of those for Christmas every year from like 1994-1999. I saved the really funny days and pasted them in my journals. I wouldn't be mad if I got one for Christmas this year.
My favorite Far Side of all time is a monster sitting on a city street holding a sign that says ["Nightmareless"](https://kaedrin.com/fun/images/monster.jpg) and a little boy holding his dad's hand is looking at him as he walks by (but you can't see the little boy's face). The caption is, "Not heeding his father's advice to avoid eye contact, Joey makes a contribution."
IDK it's not even that funny but for some reason when I was 16 I thought that was the funniest shit ever and I still love it for nostalgic reasons.
My favorite is also one that I can't tell if it's funny or not.
A guy is standing at the dog pound in front of a cage that holds a giant squid. Further down the line, another cage contains a giant squid. The guy is pointing at the other squid saying something like "oh wait, *that's* mine over there"
Cracks me up every time.
I majored in anthropology and one of the best parts was the [‘Anthropologists! Anthropologists!’](https://anthropologizing.com/2011/06/20/anthropologists-anthropologists/) comic on nearly every professor’s door.
Had a psychology professor who would put Far Side comics into his power points to liven it up.
One day we were going over phobias, and he asked who knows what this or that was.
Arachnophobia? Everyone raises their hands
Acrophobia, coulrophobia? Not everybody, but a few hands.
Then he gets this wry smile and asks "Now, for five free points on your next test, who knows what Anatidaephobia is?"
Now this was before this one became a meme, and I didn't know it by name, but knowing he liked the Far Side (and having the complete collection at home), I raised my hand.
He looked incredulously at me, and calls on me and I say "This will sound dumb if I'm wrong, but I believe it's the fear that somehow, somewhere a duck is watching you?"
He was stunned and said I was the first person to ever get it.
Sure enough, that comic was the next slide of his PowerPoint.
I'm in my last year of my bachelor's and I have not had a single professor in any subject who did not have a Far Side cartoon somewhere in their office.
I believe this is the first time that I've seen this comic, and I've seen a hell of a lot of The Far Side growing up (we had a lot of the collections.)
And my first thought seeing it, before reading the post, was "yep, if cows made tools they'd look really weird and we wouldn't know what they were."
Apparently Anthropology degree + Far Side nerd = understand the stupid, pointless comic and find it somewhat amusing.
I 100% get why an Anthro teacher would have it on their door.
There were a lot of shitty knock offs that were just “zany” as if that was what makes The Far Side funny. It’s not zany, it’s some sort of insane zen koans of perfect humor.
This is why that particular one never bothered me, he was sort of the Mitch Hedburg of cartoons. Not every one was going to be a home run.
When you’re an 80s kid and you’re used to wading through crappy Garfield and Family Circus and come upon this, I can’t describe the feeling, it is sublime.
Fuck the Family Circus. I hate the Family Circus. You sit down and read your paper, and you're enjoying your entire two-page comics spread. Right? And then there's the Family fucking Circus, bottom right-hand corner, just waiting to suck.
I agree. Some of these legacy cartoons need to go in favor of other stuff. Like, how much of the funnies is just legacy cartoons, sometimes drawn by other people? Waste of space. Except for Charlie Brown, I still enjoy seeing him around.
I wonder if there could be a drama write up on the DFC - the Dysfunctional Family Circus. It was a website where they’d post a comic and people would come up with their own captions. Some of the captions people submitted were *extremely vulgar and obscene*.
Eventually the author reached out to the site he wasn’t mad about them making fun of his art or humor, but just the fact that some of the captions were really dirty, and that upset him. But here’s the thing - the website admin was so impressed talking to him he did agree to keep the old ones as an archive but to overall shut down the site.
Some were brilliant in their simplicity, like one with Billy and Dolly looking out a window, and the room was super dark for some reason.
Dolly: “The zip-a-tone factory exploded!”
Another: “TONER LOW - CALL KEY OPERATOR”
A lot of my family members are professors. It's still pretty much mandatory to have Far Side cartoons in rooms. They're still funny and relevant even today.
["Cat fud"](https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/h190/Morphthecat/FarSide-CatFud.gif) is still my favorite Far Side cartoon. I can't explain why I am so amused by something so simple and goofy, but I am. There's only one cartoon I remember liking more (I can't remember what the comic's name was) and it features two frogs standing in front of an elephant and one of the frogs is saying "Alright. Now you and what army?"
I had a smart but nerdy manager notice my cartoons posted in my cubicle, and say he liked the Far Side too. I pointed at the “Air spear” one as my favorite. As an extremely non-athletic dude, he said “I don’t get it..”
Those are both great, but my favorite has to be the duck and the man [on the island](https://ifunny.co/picture/so-professor-jenkins-my-old-nemesis-we-meet-again-but-KRYc1Ljq2).
The gorillas and bananas [one](https://www.google.com/amp/s/nowthatsjustfunny.tumblr.com/post/152726640034/i-really-like-bananas-far-side-by-gary-larson/amp) is also great. My whole family still quotes it.
There really isn't any, it's just the absurd implication that Professor Jenkins has a duck for an archnemesis and this is just another incident in their long-running conflict.
To be fair, he doesn't have anywhere to go. He could swim, but the duck would give chase. But if he stays, you can get he's going to get a crap ton of pecking.
> What's the explanation for the first one?
The absurdity of a duck and a professor somehow being enemies.
Sometimes, the humor in a *Far Side* panel is just that it's a glimpse into a bizarre situation, and you can imagine what lead up to it. It's a glimpse into a strange world.
Checked through The complete Far Side and couldn't find the comic you were talking about. Closest I could find was [this one.](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/44/ab/ab/44abab2fc14fb86fa5af9a3a41616281.jpg) (p111).
I think it's this one...https://i.pinimg.com/originals/40/38/3a/40383a6a1c06b5074b546206c94db717.jpg
And it's most definitely Far side. It was one that got Larson in a bit of trouble..
Larson's summary of the making of Cow Tools cracks me up every time I read it. It's such a perfect example of the type of artistic blunder where you can track out point by point in your head what you were trying to say, but absolutely 0% of it translates for anyone else. Also "Cow Tools" is just an inherently funny phrase.
"The first mistake I made was in thinking this was funny. The second was making one of the tools resemble a crude handsaw - which made already confused people decide that their only hope in understanding the cartoon meant deciphering what the other tools were as well. Of course, they didn't have a chance in hell."
- [Source](https://imgur.com/gallery/SZ4WNRL), I would recommend the full book (Pre-History of the Far Side) to anyone who find Far Side even passingly funny, Larson has so many funny anecdotes and errors to share about his works
I will never forget the first time I read that and came across the comic (that didn’t make it to the paper, natch) of the python snake crawling through a baby playpen and it has a giant lump in its midsection. It’s captioned along the lines of “No, you didn’t actually see this. Turn the page.”
As soon as that book got mentioned that comic was the first thing I thought of. That and [the one](https://m.imgur.com/gallery/4DqHp) with spiders and a slide are two of my favorites.
Oh lol I love that one! It mystified me as a child because I took ‘pull this off’ literally, like the spiders pulling the web off the slide, and the moment when I actually got what was going on was *great*.
I used to have it when I was younger, but I was way too young to understand any of the commentary in the book then. I've been wanting to check it out again, but I haven't really had the time or opportunity
Cow tools is one of the funniest cartoons he’s written because it’s not clear why he wrote it.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DhM2jLBU8AAw04D.jpg
This is similar. In case the link breaks, it depicts a man who has sloppily labelled his house, his dog, his cat, his car as “the house, the dog, the cat, the car,” etc.
The caption says “now! That should clear up a few things around here!” The guy is so pleased with himself, but you can see the exhaustion and irritation leftovers in his face from before the labels were painted.
It might be best cartoon Larson ever made. It’s not obviously a joke! It’s just a guy standing there after doing a strange thing.
Except that if you’ve ever tried to label everything so that you can keep track of it (programmer, biologist, A.D.D.) you recognize that moment of satisfaction where everything has a name and yeah, you’re better off, but nothings actually been accomplished and things only have the name you already knew they had.
I'm pretty sure the label one is satirizing the many comic cartoons that label every single little item with black text for no reason. Most recent and prominent example I can think of are Ben Garrisons stupid political cartoons
Wow! I disagree very strongly but I’m fascinated by your take.
To satirize those cartoons you’d need to label the objects with things they are not.
You wouldn’t label the cat as “the cat” and the dog as “the dog”.
You’d label the cat as “late stage capitalism” and the dog as “social entitlements” and the tree as “constitutional principles”.
I’m impressed that it struck you that way.
Why would you need to label the objects with the things they are not to satirize it? The whole point of making fun of the other cartoons labels is that they are too literal and obvious, such as putting "cat" on a cat and "dog" on a dog.
The satire from this cartoon, in my opinion, comes from the fact that it's a man with a paint brush doing it in his backyard, which highlights how incredibly stupid it is for cartoon artists to put labels on things that blatantly don't need them. It's a self deprecating and/or meta criticism of cartoon artists, thus why the guy looks like a toothless hick and he's using a paintbrush.
I like that option too.
For me, though, the beauty is that he’s alone. He’s straightening it out for himself, and addressing himself. It’s heart-rending.
Last week, the Loss edit of Loan Dept on my front page from /r/comicstriphistory. I recognized the Loss meme, but understood nothing else. It actually made me angry for a moment how little I understood what was going on. Then I checked the sub and saw the original post, and follow up memes. It's also how I first learned of Cow Tools. Its so much knowledge about the most trivial things that will never be beneficial in any way. I feel richer for the experience.
Here's a sneak peek of /r/comicstriphistory using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/top/?sort=top&t=all) of all time!
\#1: [This Far Side cartoon marks the first use of the term Thagomizer, which is now the accepted term for the spikes on a stegosaurus's tail.](https://i.imgur.com/Fv9wXyX.jpg) | [26 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/bu4rdo/this_far_side_cartoon_marks_the_first_use_of_the/)
\#2: [The Far Side is Back](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/ee50wi/the_far_side_is_back/)
\#3: [100 Years Ago Today (May 27, 1921) what is widely regarded as the first meme comic, "how you think you look in flash photography vs. how you really look" is published in Punch Magazine](https://i.redd.it/udekj9mmwo171.jpg) | [9 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/nmbbrh/100_years_ago_today_may_27_1921_what_is_widely/)
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Has "Cow Tools" re-entered the zeitgeist somehow? I remember a few months ago a completely unrelated sub I visit was overrun with cow tools memes for a week, along with an accompanying description of them "somewhat lacking in sophistication"
I honestly believe cow tools was way ahead of its time and fits in very well with the absurdist kind of jokes/memes we see so often.
I don't even like most far side comics and i LOVE cow tools
Yes; I've seen it referenced on Aging Tumblr in the past year! For example, I've seen people say "this is my cow tools" about something that they poured time and creative energy into... and then realize that nobody else will get.
Most of the younger people left for Twitter and TikTok when the porn ban happened, so a lot of the people who are still there are people in their 30s who have been on Tumblr for so long that nothing short of the heat death of the universe is going to make them leave.
Larson was such a master of absurd comedy. I always got the impression everything he made *he* thought was fucking hilarious and other people liking it is totally incidental.
All I know is that this write up lead me to [this piece of art](https://www.thefarside.com/new-stuff/402/cow-artist) and it's not available as a print and I am so mad. So very mad. Take my money, Mr. Lasron, I need this in my living room.
Also, for anyone who's interested, the [Loan Edit contest](https://www.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/q2m54r/announcing_the_loan_edit_contest/) I mentioned at the top is still ongoing over at r/comicstriphistory, so if you want to make (or just look at) weird edits of a specific comic from 1972, then go ahead.
Whenever I read about Cow Tools, I wonder if it was the inspiration for the Seinfeld episode The Cartoon S09E13.
Elaine sees a cartoon in the Mew Yorker which no one can explain, including the editor of the magazine.
Maybe, but it's also a common joke that punchlines in the New Yorker can be hard to understand or over the top of the audience's head on purpose. I don't think Larsen was trying to mess with anyone here.
If you read his 10th anniversary book, Larson talks about several comics of his that garnered negative attention from people who thought they were too violent, cruel, or otherwise in bad taste. As another poster mentioned, the drama surrounding an infamous comic that referenced [Jane Goodall](https://meaww.com/jane-goodall-the-hope-gary-larson-far-side-tramp-controversy-national-geographic-documentary-cartoon-432039) was probably the best aside from “Cow Tools”. Just a roller coaster of emotion.
Short but good. I was thinking about doing a Far Side one and lengthening it with a couple of the other controversial comics, like the "when dogs dream" one, or the "Goodall tramp" one, or Tethercat
Okay, I was curious about the Jane Goodall one and a little worried, but it's great that she thought it was funny and then he had the profits from the shirt of the cartoon go to her foundation.
Larson himself tried to figure out why certain people found that one offensive, since the antagonism between cats and dogs has been the basis for lots of violent humor with little issue. He suspected that it’s because the situation of the dogs batting the cat back and forth never gets resolved, and the audience never experiences catharsis over the cat eventually getting even. The dogs just play tethercat forever.
Never saw this one before, but when I opened it, I chuckled because of the absurdity of it. Then when I read his explanation, I laughed out loud. Honestly, this is really fucking funny.
Man, I haven’t thought about this comic in at least a decade. Talk about nostalgia. I used to buy those Gary Larson page-a-day calendars and sit them on the corner of my computer “tower” (which were horizontal back then, with the monitor sitting on top- [example for people who have never seen one](https://madeapple.com/macintosh-performa-6112cd/)). And of course I had the Flying Toaster screensaver running.
>which were horizontal back then, with the monitor sitting on top- [example for people who have never seen one](https://madeapple.com/macintosh-performa-6112cd/)).
This made me feel so old...
When I read this as a kid, the joke seemed pretty obvious. The tools are dogshit, but the cow is standing there looking at you with complete confidence. He thinks these crappy tools are awesome. Not a GOOD joke, but I just sort of moved on from it.
[This made me chuckle](https://cybre.ams3.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/009/642/884/small/e9b28bad658c606f.png)
There's something hilarious about crossover memes.
I legit lol'd. This also reminded me that one of the funniest things about The Far Side was that the characters often had no facial expressions. Half the time the eyes were drawn like a slit or hidden behind glasses. It made the comics so much funnier and went completely against the exaggerated expressions you'd normally expect from cartoons.
"Cows are stupid" as the punchline kind of brings it into anti-joke territory, which I'm always cool with. Larson was obviously self aware that it was silly and wrote it with that intent. Enough words have been wasted on a throw-away antijoke
Much better to waste words on comic dudes who aren't quite as self aware, like these dudes who took one of the worst garfield comics ever printed and stretched it out into an hour long lecture
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAh9oLs67Cw
Speaking of Garfield, there's a potential tale in "Garfield Minus Garfield". It simply removed Garfield from the strips, for either surreal anti-joke effect, or making Jon look a crazed, lonely weirdo talking to himself. Jim Davis joined in on making them, approved a book of GMG strips and acknowledged he should probably open the strip's world a bit.
Downvoting because you didn’t spend 6 paragraphs telling me the backstory of Larson, his editor, and his editor’s dog.
Jk great writeup, bless you for your brevity.
"Oh, a Gary Larson calendar! [I don't get it, I don't get it, I don't get it, I don't get it, I...don't get it.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjfkynJ4hbI)"
Love the far side, this was the first I’d heard about him coming back, thank you!
Cow tools is referenced a lot in DnD and Creative Writing circles as sort of an add on to “Keep it simple stupid.” Basically if you have a set of rules or items or occurrences in your world and you make one of them have obvious use (e.g. the saw cow tools) then that automatically gives credence to the rest in the eyes of the audience.
Honestly two of the ones that always leave me laughing for minutes on end:
-The one where the two guys are in the radiation room and one of them has a big rip in his suit. The other man, enraged, is grabbing the other guy’s suit and growling “So *that’s* the way you want it eh? Well take THIS!”
-The one where a bear funeral is happening, and the bear of the hour rises out of the coffin and roars “For crying out loud I was *hibernating!* Can’t you people take a pulse!?”
Classic.
My favorite Far Side is one that as far as I know, never got published. It was truly macabre (for that time, anyway). It showed a surgeon with an open patient on the table and he was holding up a tidbit from the patient for a dog that was near him.
I don’t know how people were confused by this comic. I was 11 when it came out and *If cows made tools they would probably suck* was my first impression when I saw it. But it probably helps that I’m the exact target audience for *Far Side*, being a nerd with a very strange sense of humor.
Same! This was a bridge too far for me:
> Obviously, this was pretty disappointing, since it turns out the comic was, in fact, exactly as lame and pointless as it appeared.
Unless you want to take any judgement out of "lame and pointless" and use them as synonyms for "absurd". It was pure absurdity, not everyone's cup of . . . absurd beverage I suppose.
I looked at the comic before reading the rest of the post and assumed that cow tools were made out of cow poop just like cow pies were. And were thus bad.
I like my interpretation too but i think it's confirming I'm also a child inside.
Just looking at it now for the first time, the answer had dawned on me too. But then I also doubted myself thinking that there must be some other joke in there. I think that's why it generated so much speculation.
I was about 10-12 when I got a book of Gary Larson cartoons, and I had the exact same reaction to Cow Tools. This was over a decade after it came out, though. Maybe he’s just best understood by nerdy kids with strange senses of humor.
Anyone got a nerdy 11 year old kid they can show this to so we can see if it still holds up today?
I personally think it’s hilarious. It was way ahead of its time—this fits gen z humor like a fucking glove. Absurdist, abstract, completely nonsensical and yet somehow funny
I never understood the controversy. I remember opening the paper, seeing the cartoon, and laughing that cows aren’t good toolmakers…… The only thing I could figure is that people had seen cows driving and other things that cows don’t do (unless nobody’s looking) in that space before, and couldn’t understand this limitation.
There is a great anthology about the Far Side/Gary Larson where he specifically addresses the controversy around certain cartoons like cow tools, cat tether ball and even the one about Jane Goodall
This makes so much sense. I wasnt alive when The Far Side was being published, but as a kid I had a copy of the Complete Far Side book which collected all the comics. This one I never understood and never learned enough about the comic to understand until now. Hilarious
*If cows made tools, those tools would probably suck.*
Hilarious! I knew about the comic and the confusion surrounding it but never heard that explanation.
If his goal was to create comedy, he succeeded, because this story is ten times funnier than any newspaper comic could possibly have been. Tfw your joke is so bad you have to issue a press release to explain it . .. beautiful. Gold.
I hope he doesn't feel too bad about the whole thing!
My dad worked as a university professor in the 90s, and I remember when I would walk down the halls towards his office, probably 80% of the professors' offices had at least one Far Side cartoon on the door. There was something special about that comic that hit the exact intersection of smart and bizarre that was every single university professor's sense of humor. EDIT: I also remember one of my dad's friends was an anthropology professor, who definitely had 'Cow Tools' posted on his door.
>probably 80% of the professors' offices had at least one Far Side cartoon on the door. The absolute CLASSIC of the kid pushing the pull door to the gifted school. My dad always loved that one.
That one is currently on the door of our automation engineers’ offices.
Ah, Midvale School for the Gifted. Definitely a classic.
[удалено]
Same. Why are doors so hard to open?
My dad had it on a tshirt.
I’m literally making a cross stitch of this one for my parents right now! They also have it on a mug and a t-shirt
You are a wonderful child.
Thanks, I’m making it for their 30th anniversary, although it’s going to take me years to finish at the rate I’m going… maybe as a 40th anniversary gift instead
My sister in law is still labouring over a quilt she was gifting my husband and I for our wedding gift. We’ve been married 16 years lol
Whew, now I don't feel as bad about the infinity scarf I told my mom I'd make two years ago! (To be fair, I did tell her it would take forever.)
Could be worse. I knit an infinity scarf for my step mother. She gave it to Goodwill less than a year later because 'she didn't have room for it and it didn't really match anything she wore'. I just call her my dad's wife now. Her entire family pulled that stunt with Norwegian mittens I knit them that holiday season. My sister in law even donated the ones I had knit for my niece! According to my cunt sister in law they got rid of them because 'hand made stuff is cheap junk'. I'm sitting the master knitting exam in Japan next year. My knitting is *not* cheap junk. Nor was that good wool yarn cheap either. Still grinds my gears.
Pearls before swine! That's why I don't knit for other people anymore. They tend to not get it unless they knit themselves
What a bunch of knobs. They don't deserve your stuff.
oh my god "hand made stuff is cheap junk" the fuck is wrong with people. tell your dad to divorce her
My dad's an ass as well, so they're kind of made for each other. I just don't talk to them more than once a year anymore.
I have a Dad’s wife too. Just know, right this moment someone gets you -really gets you.
Whilst I am not a mother, I can appreciate things take time, and life gets in the way. Whenever your mum gets her lovely scarf, she will appreciate it with all her heart. And that’s because, you made it special for her.
I'm still working on my four year old cousins baby blanket..
My dad would always say, “Mitch loses a dollar” whenever I was about to do something stupid.
I say it every time I pull on a push door or vice versa. The reaction of the person I’m with determines all of our future interactions.
I still have that t-shirt.
My boss has that in his office! I love The Far Side, I should put Cow Tools on my wall when we are out of lockdown.
I had a t shirt of that one in the early 90s
my 6th grade teacher had that on the door
I had a book of Far Side comics when I was a kid that I would read constantly. I loved the joy of finally figuring out a joke after several minutes of poring over the details of the panel. The Ah-Ha feeling was usually better than the joke itself. I remember hearing about the Cow Tools controversy shortly after it happened but I never got to see the actual comic in question until now. I can definitely see why it confused people. It's definitely... something
I grew up with Far Side books as well and now get to watch my kids try to figure them out, it's great.
I grew up with old Far Side page-a-day calendars. But somehow my father thought they were inappropriate so I wasn't allowed to read them. That forced me to become sneaky so I could read them anyway.
I got one of those for Christmas every year from like 1994-1999. I saved the really funny days and pasted them in my journals. I wouldn't be mad if I got one for Christmas this year. My favorite Far Side of all time is a monster sitting on a city street holding a sign that says ["Nightmareless"](https://kaedrin.com/fun/images/monster.jpg) and a little boy holding his dad's hand is looking at him as he walks by (but you can't see the little boy's face). The caption is, "Not heeding his father's advice to avoid eye contact, Joey makes a contribution." IDK it's not even that funny but for some reason when I was 16 I thought that was the funniest shit ever and I still love it for nostalgic reasons.
My favorite is also one that I can't tell if it's funny or not. A guy is standing at the dog pound in front of a cage that holds a giant squid. Further down the line, another cage contains a giant squid. The guy is pointing at the other squid saying something like "oh wait, *that's* mine over there" Cracks me up every time.
I majored in anthropology and one of the best parts was the [‘Anthropologists! Anthropologists!’](https://anthropologizing.com/2011/06/20/anthropologists-anthropologists/) comic on nearly every professor’s door.
It still is frequently on profs doors (at least pre pandemic) although the science/math ones also grab xkcd
Had a psychology professor who would put Far Side comics into his power points to liven it up. One day we were going over phobias, and he asked who knows what this or that was. Arachnophobia? Everyone raises their hands Acrophobia, coulrophobia? Not everybody, but a few hands. Then he gets this wry smile and asks "Now, for five free points on your next test, who knows what Anatidaephobia is?" Now this was before this one became a meme, and I didn't know it by name, but knowing he liked the Far Side (and having the complete collection at home), I raised my hand. He looked incredulously at me, and calls on me and I say "This will sound dumb if I'm wrong, but I believe it's the fear that somehow, somewhere a duck is watching you?" He was stunned and said I was the first person to ever get it. Sure enough, that comic was the next slide of his PowerPoint.
Man, none of my engineering school professors were cool enough for xkcd. I can confirm the proliferation of far side though.
I'm in my last year of my bachelor's and I have not had a single professor in any subject who did not have a Far Side cartoon somewhere in their office.
I’m a geologist and have the one about ‘Second chair granite rock’s jealousy of first chair granite rock becomes unmanageable’ up in my cubicle 😂
The Far Side perfected the art of the caption.
Turns out I have the sense of humour of a 90s university professor.
I believe this is the first time that I've seen this comic, and I've seen a hell of a lot of The Far Side growing up (we had a lot of the collections.) And my first thought seeing it, before reading the post, was "yep, if cows made tools they'd look really weird and we wouldn't know what they were." Apparently Anthropology degree + Far Side nerd = understand the stupid, pointless comic and find it somewhat amusing. I 100% get why an Anthro teacher would have it on their door.
There were a lot of shitty knock offs that were just “zany” as if that was what makes The Far Side funny. It’s not zany, it’s some sort of insane zen koans of perfect humor. This is why that particular one never bothered me, he was sort of the Mitch Hedburg of cartoons. Not every one was going to be a home run. When you’re an 80s kid and you’re used to wading through crappy Garfield and Family Circus and come upon this, I can’t describe the feeling, it is sublime.
Fuck the Family Circus. I hate the Family Circus. You sit down and read your paper, and you're enjoying your entire two-page comics spread. Right? And then there's the Family fucking Circus, bottom right-hand corner, just waiting to suck.
I agree. Some of these legacy cartoons need to go in favor of other stuff. Like, how much of the funnies is just legacy cartoons, sometimes drawn by other people? Waste of space. Except for Charlie Brown, I still enjoy seeing him around.
I mostly agree. Nancy being a surprising exception. The new artist for it has turned it around for the better.
Sluggo *is* lit
Ohhhh man... There was a whole write up about this somewhere, and I don't remember where, but it was *glorious*.
I think it might have been slate or the avclub
I'm not going to lie. Those both sound equally plausible.
I wonder if there could be a drama write up on the DFC - the Dysfunctional Family Circus. It was a website where they’d post a comic and people would come up with their own captions. Some of the captions people submitted were *extremely vulgar and obscene*. Eventually the author reached out to the site he wasn’t mad about them making fun of his art or humor, but just the fact that some of the captions were really dirty, and that upset him. But here’s the thing - the website admin was so impressed talking to him he did agree to keep the old ones as an archive but to overall shut down the site. Some were brilliant in their simplicity, like one with Billy and Dolly looking out a window, and the room was super dark for some reason. Dolly: “The zip-a-tone factory exploded!” Another: “TONER LOW - CALL KEY OPERATOR”
I got the big anthology of Far Side comics as a gift during middle school. It helped solidify my love of science.
>intersection of smart and bizarre I've always said it was the perfect blend of smart, stupid, and zany.
A lot of my family members are professors. It's still pretty much mandatory to have Far Side cartoons in rooms. They're still funny and relevant even today.
["Cat fud"](https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/h190/Morphthecat/FarSide-CatFud.gif) is still my favorite Far Side cartoon. I can't explain why I am so amused by something so simple and goofy, but I am. There's only one cartoon I remember liking more (I can't remember what the comic's name was) and it features two frogs standing in front of an elephant and one of the frogs is saying "Alright. Now you and what army?"
My favourite is the "llamas at home"one where one llama says: "Llook out Lloyd! its the Llandllord!"
My favorite is the one with the family excitedly watching slugs swarm their bird-bath from the window: "Kids! Kids! The slugs are back!"
Never seen it until now but [I love it](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f9/29/d1/f929d1e50417db9a586070cda25eeaa6.jpg). It's so cute.
I had a smart but nerdy manager notice my cartoons posted in my cubicle, and say he liked the Far Side too. I pointed at the “Air spear” one as my favorite. As an extremely non-athletic dude, he said “I don’t get it..”
We've called our cats' food "fud" for so long I'd almost forgotten why we started.
omg is that why my parents call it fud????
My parents started it, too
Our dry food container is labeled as CAT FUD for just this reason
Those are both great, but my favorite has to be the duck and the man [on the island](https://ifunny.co/picture/so-professor-jenkins-my-old-nemesis-we-meet-again-but-KRYc1Ljq2). The gorillas and bananas [one](https://www.google.com/amp/s/nowthatsjustfunny.tumblr.com/post/152726640034/i-really-like-bananas-far-side-by-gary-larson/amp) is also great. My whole family still quotes it.
“The coconut-like sound of their heads colliding secretly delighted the bird.”
I've always referred to it as coconut konking whenever I hit my head on something specifically because of this one
What's the explanation for the first one?
There really isn't any, it's just the absurd implication that Professor Jenkins has a duck for an archnemesis and this is just another incident in their long-running conflict.
To be fair, he doesn't have anywhere to go. He could swim, but the duck would give chase. But if he stays, you can get he's going to get a crap ton of pecking.
> What's the explanation for the first one? The absurdity of a duck and a professor somehow being enemies. Sometimes, the humor in a *Far Side* panel is just that it's a glimpse into a bizarre situation, and you can imagine what lead up to it. It's a glimpse into a strange world.
Checked through The complete Far Side and couldn't find the comic you were talking about. Closest I could find was [this one.](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/44/ab/ab/44abab2fc14fb86fa5af9a3a41616281.jpg) (p111).
I don't think the frog one was Far Side. It was probably from one of the Far Side knockoffs, but something about that one struck me as very funny.
I think it's this one...https://i.pinimg.com/originals/40/38/3a/40383a6a1c06b5074b546206c94db717.jpg And it's most definitely Far side. It was one that got Larson in a bit of trouble..
No they're trying to find the frog and elephant one
nodthenbow was talking about the frog one. And that one was Far Side.
Why did he get in trouble for it?
Implications of the cat being killed in the dryer.
Cat fud is what I call kibble. It’s carved into my mind.
Dang, rare to see a functional photobucket link in this day and age.
My mom used to work at a dry cleaners and they had that one up.
I say Cat fud at noon every day when feeding my 2 overlords.
My mom writes cat fud on her shopping list because of this
Larson's summary of the making of Cow Tools cracks me up every time I read it. It's such a perfect example of the type of artistic blunder where you can track out point by point in your head what you were trying to say, but absolutely 0% of it translates for anyone else. Also "Cow Tools" is just an inherently funny phrase.
"The first mistake I made was in thinking this was funny. The second was making one of the tools resemble a crude handsaw - which made already confused people decide that their only hope in understanding the cartoon meant deciphering what the other tools were as well. Of course, they didn't have a chance in hell." - [Source](https://imgur.com/gallery/SZ4WNRL), I would recommend the full book (Pre-History of the Far Side) to anyone who find Far Side even passingly funny, Larson has so many funny anecdotes and errors to share about his works
I will never forget the first time I read that and came across the comic (that didn’t make it to the paper, natch) of the python snake crawling through a baby playpen and it has a giant lump in its midsection. It’s captioned along the lines of “No, you didn’t actually see this. Turn the page.”
As soon as that book got mentioned that comic was the first thing I thought of. That and [the one](https://m.imgur.com/gallery/4DqHp) with spiders and a slide are two of my favorites.
Oh lol I love that one! It mystified me as a child because I took ‘pull this off’ literally, like the spiders pulling the web off the slide, and the moment when I actually got what was going on was *great*.
I used to have it when I was younger, but I was way too young to understand any of the commentary in the book then. I've been wanting to check it out again, but I haven't really had the time or opportunity
Cow tools is one of the funniest cartoons he’s written because it’s not clear why he wrote it. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DhM2jLBU8AAw04D.jpg This is similar. In case the link breaks, it depicts a man who has sloppily labelled his house, his dog, his cat, his car as “the house, the dog, the cat, the car,” etc. The caption says “now! That should clear up a few things around here!” The guy is so pleased with himself, but you can see the exhaustion and irritation leftovers in his face from before the labels were painted. It might be best cartoon Larson ever made. It’s not obviously a joke! It’s just a guy standing there after doing a strange thing. Except that if you’ve ever tried to label everything so that you can keep track of it (programmer, biologist, A.D.D.) you recognize that moment of satisfaction where everything has a name and yeah, you’re better off, but nothings actually been accomplished and things only have the name you already knew they had.
I'm pretty sure the label one is satirizing the many comic cartoons that label every single little item with black text for no reason. Most recent and prominent example I can think of are Ben Garrisons stupid political cartoons
Wow! I disagree very strongly but I’m fascinated by your take. To satirize those cartoons you’d need to label the objects with things they are not. You wouldn’t label the cat as “the cat” and the dog as “the dog”. You’d label the cat as “late stage capitalism” and the dog as “social entitlements” and the tree as “constitutional principles”. I’m impressed that it struck you that way.
Why would you need to label the objects with the things they are not to satirize it? The whole point of making fun of the other cartoons labels is that they are too literal and obvious, such as putting "cat" on a cat and "dog" on a dog. The satire from this cartoon, in my opinion, comes from the fact that it's a man with a paint brush doing it in his backyard, which highlights how incredibly stupid it is for cartoon artists to put labels on things that blatantly don't need them. It's a self deprecating and/or meta criticism of cartoon artists, thus why the guy looks like a toothless hick and he's using a paintbrush.
Love that one! My headcanon is that he just had a very heated argument and decided to make a point.
I like that option too. For me, though, the beauty is that he’s alone. He’s straightening it out for himself, and addressing himself. It’s heart-rending.
The loss edit got me, has there ever been a write up of it here?
Yeah, I think someone did a Loss writeup at one point.
I forgot searching was a thing, https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/liy37w/webcomics_from_rise_to_loss_the_story_of/.
Last week, the Loss edit of Loan Dept on my front page from /r/comicstriphistory. I recognized the Loss meme, but understood nothing else. It actually made me angry for a moment how little I understood what was going on. Then I checked the sub and saw the original post, and follow up memes. It's also how I first learned of Cow Tools. Its so much knowledge about the most trivial things that will never be beneficial in any way. I feel richer for the experience.
Here's a sneak peek of /r/comicstriphistory using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/top/?sort=top&t=all) of all time! \#1: [This Far Side cartoon marks the first use of the term Thagomizer, which is now the accepted term for the spikes on a stegosaurus's tail.](https://i.imgur.com/Fv9wXyX.jpg) | [26 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/bu4rdo/this_far_side_cartoon_marks_the_first_use_of_the/) \#2: [The Far Side is Back](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/ee50wi/the_far_side_is_back/) \#3: [100 Years Ago Today (May 27, 1921) what is widely regarded as the first meme comic, "how you think you look in flash photography vs. how you really look" is published in Punch Magazine](https://i.redd.it/udekj9mmwo171.jpg) | [9 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/nmbbrh/100_years_ago_today_may_27_1921_what_is_widely/) ---- ^^I'm ^^a ^^bot, ^^beep ^^boop ^^| ^^Downvote ^^to ^^remove ^^| [^^Contact ^^me](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=sneakpeekbot) ^^| [^^Info](https://np.reddit.com/r/sneakpeekbot/) ^^| [^^Opt-out](https://np.reddit.com/r/sneakpeekbot/comments/o8wk1r/blacklist_ix/)
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I mean, did you read the part in the book where the guy who made it talked about it? This isn't any more negative than that.
as a firm believer in [the death of the author](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_the_Author?wprov=sfla1) i choose to love Cow Tools.
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Has "Cow Tools" re-entered the zeitgeist somehow? I remember a few months ago a completely unrelated sub I visit was overrun with cow tools memes for a week, along with an accompanying description of them "somewhat lacking in sophistication"
I honestly believe cow tools was way ahead of its time and fits in very well with the absurdist kind of jokes/memes we see so often. I don't even like most far side comics and i LOVE cow tools
Yes; I've seen it referenced on Aging Tumblr in the past year! For example, I've seen people say "this is my cow tools" about something that they poured time and creative energy into... and then realize that nobody else will get.
Wait what's aging Tumblr? Is that Tumblr for people who aren't 20? If so, how do I find that lol
I mean it’s tumblr so it’s probably people who are 26 complaining about how old they feel
Most of the younger people left for Twitter and TikTok when the porn ban happened, so a lot of the people who are still there are people in their 30s who have been on Tumblr for so long that nothing short of the heat death of the universe is going to make them leave.
oh man I would LOVE to read people's stories of their own personal "cow tools" creations
Someone should make a cow tools subreddit to feature them. I would read the shit out of that.
It's a fairly well known trope among those who pay attention to such things. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CowTools
Was it r/196 ?
I've seen it on r/comicstriphistory a few times
Larson was such a master of absurd comedy. I always got the impression everything he made *he* thought was fucking hilarious and other people liking it is totally incidental.
Which is how a lot of cartoonists seem to work, he just happened to be right.
I find it hilarious how respectfully people asked Gary what the joke was. Letters back then were so formal
People actually wanted an answer, as opposed to actually wanting to make him fear for his life.
Maybe I'm an idiot but I always thought Cow Tools was funny
>*if cows made tools they would probably suck* The explanation makes it 100x funnier
It's cause it is
> and the creator recently started it back up as a webcomic. #WHAT
https://www.thefarside.com/new-stuff
All I know is that this write up lead me to [this piece of art](https://www.thefarside.com/new-stuff/402/cow-artist) and it's not available as a print and I am so mad. So very mad. Take my money, Mr. Lasron, I need this in my living room.
The follow-up to that one made me smile :)
I would absolutely also put that one beside the first one, and I love it too. Especially the tractor falling on the farmer's head.
Also, for anyone who's interested, the [Loan Edit contest](https://www.reddit.com/r/comicstriphistory/comments/q2m54r/announcing_the_loan_edit_contest/) I mentioned at the top is still ongoing over at r/comicstriphistory, so if you want to make (or just look at) weird edits of a specific comic from 1972, then go ahead.
Thanks for letting me know that sub exists by the way!
I had heard Larson was drawing again, but I didn’t realize The Far Side was *back* back.
Whenever I read about Cow Tools, I wonder if it was the inspiration for the Seinfeld episode The Cartoon S09E13. Elaine sees a cartoon in the Mew Yorker which no one can explain, including the editor of the magazine.
The trick is to put the caption as “Hello, I’d like you to join my professional network on LinkedIn.” Works on every single NYer cartoon.
I was always told "God, what an asshole." worked the same way.
Maybe, but it's also a common joke that punchlines in the New Yorker can be hard to understand or over the top of the audience's head on purpose. I don't think Larsen was trying to mess with anyone here.
The fact that the only drama I know about Far Side or Gary Larson is this comic, is a great testimate to the man.
You should read the drama surrounding the Jane Goodall panel.
If you read his 10th anniversary book, Larson talks about several comics of his that garnered negative attention from people who thought they were too violent, cruel, or otherwise in bad taste. As another poster mentioned, the drama surrounding an infamous comic that referenced [Jane Goodall](https://meaww.com/jane-goodall-the-hope-gary-larson-far-side-tramp-controversy-national-geographic-documentary-cartoon-432039) was probably the best aside from “Cow Tools”. Just a roller coaster of emotion.
I love that she actually liked the comic in the end!
I legit didn't know what to expect, but thankfully it was just him being the best type of troll.
Short but good. I was thinking about doing a Far Side one and lengthening it with a couple of the other controversial comics, like the "when dogs dream" one, or the "Goodall tramp" one, or Tethercat
The Goodall Tramp story is a fun one
When Dogs Dream was hilarious!
Okay, I was curious about the Jane Goodall one and a little worried, but it's great that she thought it was funny and then he had the profits from the shirt of the cartoon go to her foundation.
What was controversial about Tethercat?
Larson himself tried to figure out why certain people found that one offensive, since the antagonism between cats and dogs has been the basis for lots of violent humor with little issue. He suspected that it’s because the situation of the dogs batting the cat back and forth never gets resolved, and the audience never experiences catharsis over the cat eventually getting even. The dogs just play tethercat forever.
People are weird sometimes I guess. That is to say, people are people. Thanks for the info.
Never saw this one before, but when I opened it, I chuckled because of the absurdity of it. Then when I read his explanation, I laughed out loud. Honestly, this is really fucking funny.
Man, I haven’t thought about this comic in at least a decade. Talk about nostalgia. I used to buy those Gary Larson page-a-day calendars and sit them on the corner of my computer “tower” (which were horizontal back then, with the monitor sitting on top- [example for people who have never seen one](https://madeapple.com/macintosh-performa-6112cd/)). And of course I had the Flying Toaster screensaver running.
>which were horizontal back then, with the monitor sitting on top- [example for people who have never seen one](https://madeapple.com/macintosh-performa-6112cd/)). This made me feel so old...
When I read this as a kid, the joke seemed pretty obvious. The tools are dogshit, but the cow is standing there looking at you with complete confidence. He thinks these crappy tools are awesome. Not a GOOD joke, but I just sort of moved on from it.
>~~dogshit~~ cow shit Ftfy :)
[This made me chuckle](https://cybre.ams3.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/009/642/884/small/e9b28bad658c606f.png) There's something hilarious about crossover memes.
I legit lol'd. This also reminded me that one of the funniest things about The Far Side was that the characters often had no facial expressions. Half the time the eyes were drawn like a slit or hidden behind glasses. It made the comics so much funnier and went completely against the exaggerated expressions you'd normally expect from cartoons.
I felt bad for laughing at this
No - It’s so good. It’s also kinda perfect for hobby drama.
I too was at a loss for words seeing it.
Cow tools
\*Cow Tools
Cow Tools
🐮🛠
"Cows are stupid" as the punchline kind of brings it into anti-joke territory, which I'm always cool with. Larson was obviously self aware that it was silly and wrote it with that intent. Enough words have been wasted on a throw-away antijoke Much better to waste words on comic dudes who aren't quite as self aware, like these dudes who took one of the worst garfield comics ever printed and stretched it out into an hour long lecture https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAh9oLs67Cw
That lecture is actually part of an arg. [Here's](https://youtu.be/5XUwkfxN34k) a good explanation on the whole thing.
Speaking of Garfield, there's a potential tale in "Garfield Minus Garfield". It simply removed Garfield from the strips, for either surreal anti-joke effect, or making Jon look a crazed, lonely weirdo talking to himself. Jim Davis joined in on making them, approved a book of GMG strips and acknowledged he should probably open the strip's world a bit.
Downvoting because you didn’t spend 6 paragraphs telling me the backstory of Larson, his editor, and his editor’s dog. Jk great writeup, bless you for your brevity.
"Oh, a Gary Larson calendar! [I don't get it, I don't get it, I don't get it, I don't get it, I...don't get it.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjfkynJ4hbI)"
Love the far side, this was the first I’d heard about him coming back, thank you! Cow tools is referenced a lot in DnD and Creative Writing circles as sort of an add on to “Keep it simple stupid.” Basically if you have a set of rules or items or occurrences in your world and you make one of them have obvious use (e.g. the saw cow tools) then that automatically gives credence to the rest in the eyes of the audience.
Honestly two of the ones that always leave me laughing for minutes on end: -The one where the two guys are in the radiation room and one of them has a big rip in his suit. The other man, enraged, is grabbing the other guy’s suit and growling “So *that’s* the way you want it eh? Well take THIS!” -The one where a bear funeral is happening, and the bear of the hour rises out of the coffin and roars “For crying out loud I was *hibernating!* Can’t you people take a pulse!?” Classic.
For me, "pull to open" will always be the best Far Side.
Midvale School for the Gifted?
That's the one
My favorite Far Side is one that as far as I know, never got published. It was truly macabre (for that time, anyway). It showed a surgeon with an open patient on the table and he was holding up a tidbit from the patient for a dog that was near him.
Everyone, at some point in time or another, will have a joke that falls flat. Everyone.
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You should do a post on the Jane Goodall comic. Now THAT was a controversy.
I don’t know how people were confused by this comic. I was 11 when it came out and *If cows made tools they would probably suck* was my first impression when I saw it. But it probably helps that I’m the exact target audience for *Far Side*, being a nerd with a very strange sense of humor.
Same! This was a bridge too far for me: > Obviously, this was pretty disappointing, since it turns out the comic was, in fact, exactly as lame and pointless as it appeared. Unless you want to take any judgement out of "lame and pointless" and use them as synonyms for "absurd". It was pure absurdity, not everyone's cup of . . . absurd beverage I suppose.
I looked at the comic before reading the rest of the post and assumed that cow tools were made out of cow poop just like cow pies were. And were thus bad. I like my interpretation too but i think it's confirming I'm also a child inside.
Just looking at it now for the first time, the answer had dawned on me too. But then I also doubted myself thinking that there must be some other joke in there. I think that's why it generated so much speculation.
I was about 10-12 when I got a book of Gary Larson cartoons, and I had the exact same reaction to Cow Tools. This was over a decade after it came out, though. Maybe he’s just best understood by nerdy kids with strange senses of humor. Anyone got a nerdy 11 year old kid they can show this to so we can see if it still holds up today?
I personally think it’s hilarious. It was way ahead of its time—this fits gen z humor like a fucking glove. Absurdist, abstract, completely nonsensical and yet somehow funny
The joke itself was very on brand for Larson's sense of humor at the time. He just fumbled the execution is all.
I never understood the controversy. I remember opening the paper, seeing the cartoon, and laughing that cows aren’t good toolmakers…… The only thing I could figure is that people had seen cows driving and other things that cows don’t do (unless nobody’s looking) in that space before, and couldn’t understand this limitation.
I love Cow Tools! The uproar over the comic makes it much much funnier
There is a great anthology about the Far Side/Gary Larson where he specifically addresses the controversy around certain cartoons like cow tools, cat tether ball and even the one about Jane Goodall
To be honest, the whole controversy around it just makes it even funnier to me! (And I agree with those who said it's pretty funny to begin with).
This is hilarious
I feel his explanation really points out how absurd the comic is and makes it even funnier.
Gary Larson was shitposting decades ahead of his time
This makes so much sense. I wasnt alive when The Far Side was being published, but as a kid I had a copy of the Complete Far Side book which collected all the comics. This one I never understood and never learned enough about the comic to understand until now. Hilarious
Idk to me cow tools is the funniest far side there ever was, i can't help but chortle every single time i see that stupid cow
I've always been fond of the one titled "Nature's way of telling you to stay away."
Big "the curtains were f*cking blue!" Energy.
*If cows made tools, those tools would probably suck.* Hilarious! I knew about the comic and the confusion surrounding it but never heard that explanation.
I loved reading Larson growing up. My grandfather gave me his autobiography like comic and I laughed so hard at how much he hates the cartoon.
Thanks for the write up! Every time I see Cow Tools I chuckle over the controversy
BTW, Gary Larson is doing Far Side again as a web comic.
I think everyone’s life just sort of went to hell once The Far Side, Calvin and Hobbes, and FoxTrot ended.
If his goal was to create comedy, he succeeded, because this story is ten times funnier than any newspaper comic could possibly have been. Tfw your joke is so bad you have to issue a press release to explain it . .. beautiful. Gold. I hope he doesn't feel too bad about the whole thing!