Summary
Characters stranded on desert islands in Larson’s Far Side comics often faced absurd situations for comedic effect.
Larson’s use of the desert island trope evolved over time, reflecting his style and humor as his comics progressed.
From playful wordplay to dark irony, the desert island setting in Far Side comics served as a versatile tool for Larson’s humor.
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Gary Larson’s The Far Side featured its share of recurring elements over the years – with one iconic example being his frequent use of the “stranded on a desert island” trope to achieve hilarious results. The desert island became one of the strip’s most recognizable visuals, while delivering some of its best jokes.
The Far Side utilized the desert island in a variety of ways – though one vital element they all shared was the idea of casting human characters away from the context of civilization. From there, Larson would often introduce some extra, absurd element, and let the dissonance produce comedic gold.
Gary Larson’s humor was frequently intended to test the limits of what it meant to be human. The desert island was among Larson’s most valuable tools for achieving this goal. As his style evolved over the years, so did his use of the island trope, making a comparative analysis particularly insightful.
The Far Side ran from the end of 1979 until the beginning of 1995. This list contains strips selected from between the years 1980 and 1986, depicting the steady evolution of the desert island in Gary Larson’s imagination.
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15 The Far Side’s First DESERT Island Joke Was A Classic
First Published: April 15, 1980
The desert island trope appeared early in The Far Side’s run, though not in precisely the familiar form that would become recognizable to readers over the years. Gary Larson positions this panel’s shipwreck survivor in the bottom-left corner, with the reader’s focus drawn to the note he’s writing, which reads: “Help, I’m stranded on a –”
What follows are crossed out alternations of the words “desert” and “dessert,” as the man can’t decide which is correct. It’s an old joke, pre-dating the comic strip, but one that perfectly fits its sensibilities, and found perfect form in Larson’s rendition of it.
14 An Unusual Far Side Panel With A Familiar Gary Larson Punchline
First Published: November 20, 1981
This Far Side desert island panel is one of the first to take on the compositional formula that Gary Larson would take to increasingly funny heights as the strip went on. Here, a small island is placed center-frame, with the stranded individual taking up most of the beach.
What makes this Far Side strip unusual is that contains successive images. Though all contained in one panel, the survivor’s dejected isolation, hope at seeing a boat in the distance, and crushing sadness at realizing it is only a toy, are all depicted – as Larson’s style became codified, he would mainly stick to one single moment in time.
13 Gary Larson Takes Another Step In The Right Direction
First Published: April 13, 1982
In this Far Side installment, Gary Larson nearly arrives at the version of the desert island that became visually synonymous with the strip – all the elements are there, save for the perspective. That said, the absurdity of this panel ranks it high among the funniest desert island cartoons.
As the survivor below excitedly waves for help, the pilot circling his island cancels his rescue call-in, because the man below only wrote “HELF” in the sand. The incomplete “P” is made much funnier when considering the man stopped just short of completing his message when he saw his desired rescue seemingly arriving.
12 The Far Side’s Desert Island Is Truly Born
First Published: April 30, 1982
This panel finally, fully delivers the iconic Far Side desert island that became standard in virtually all of Gary Larson’s later uses of the setting. The joke is also Larson’s humor at its most pure – that is to say at once mischievously ironic, unrepentantly dark.
Larson depicts a man on a desert island who has managed to acquire paper and a bottle, and has seemingly fashioned a writing utensil out of a feather. As he scribbling “send help,” however, catastrophe strikes: a coconut falls from the island’s single tree and smashes the bottle, thwarting his attempt to solicit a rescue.
11 Islands Aren’t Supposed To Be That Squishy
First Published: October 13, 1982
Here, Gary Larson once more experimented with the form of The Far Side’s desert island jokes, delivering one of the comic’s most novel variations on this stock them. “Hang on Betty,” a stranded man reassures his family companion, “Someone’s bound to see us eventually.”
Of course, from the reader’s perspective, the joke is evident: they are, in fact, sitting on the eyeball of some enormous, unidentified sea creature. Meaning they are very much being seen – but also that rescue may not be the end result of their adventure on the high seas.
10 Who Is More Likely To Get Rescued First
First Published: June 17, 1983
An example of The Far Side’s penchant for silliness, this panel offers a light compliment to the strip’s regularly scheduled darkness.
In this drawing, Gary Larson takes the standard Far Side desert island and adds something – another nearby island. On the island in the foreground, a human survivor sits staring up at the sky, having spelled out “Help” – in full – in the sand.
The humor of the panel comes from the mirrored visual of the second island in the background, with a duck in the same pose as the human, having also written a desperate message in the sand: “Quack.” An example of The Far Side’s penchant for silliness, this panel offers a light compliment to the strip’s regularly scheduled darkness.
9 Professor Jenkins Day Goes From Bad To Worse
Published: July 12, 1983
This Far Side panel is more than just a hilarious example of the desert island trope – it also encapsulates Gary Larson’s fixation on ducks, as well as his regular use of talking animals of all kinds. One of the joys of reading Far Side across time is the way Larson’s jokes became more layered, more precisely using stock elements, as the comic progressed.
This is a particularly great example, as a duck gloats to his “old nemesis” – the unfortunate Professor Jenkins, who has just survived a shipwreck – and relishes that the setting has given him the edge over the still-dripping wet human.
8 Sidney Needs To Get His Priorities Straight
First Published: September 23, 1983
Gary Larson’s Far Side characters often met their doom, but rarely were they the subject of a double-calamity, like the unfortunate “Roger” in this strip, who after being stranded on a desert island is then struck and killed by a meteor.
The joke here is that Roger is not the focus of the cartoon – rather, Sidney is. Evidently, Roger’s sudden demise has altered the dynamic of what was evidently a love triangle among the survivors. At least, as the caption notes, Sidney sees this not as a tragedy, but as his chance to win the unnamed woman’s affections.
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First Published: January 26, 1984
The Far Side thrived on humor like this, where the visual gag might have prompted the reader to ask “What-the?” while the caption perfectly encapsulated the bizarre frustration of the situation.
One of the comedic short-cuts Gary Larson employed particularly effectively in his desert island strips involves including some out-of-place element of civilization on the island with his stranded characters. In this panel, the tiny island inexplicably has a phone booth, along with its single, solitary coconut tree.
However, unfortunately, the survivors don’t have any quarters – to the great consternation of one of them, whose companion will not stop asking him for change. The Far Side thrived on humor like this, where the visual gag might have prompted the reader to ask “What-the?” while the caption perfectly encapsulated the bizarre frustration of the situation.
6 Hopefully These Far Side Aliens Come In Peace
First Published: June 4, 1984
[Gary] Larson’s humor was at its best when it captured a single, fraught moment in the lives of its characters – terrestrial or otherwise.
As often as The Far Side visited desert islands, aliens visited The Far Side. This comic is the perfect fusion of those two recurring elements, as Gary Larson depicts a spaceship having crashed into the ocean, with its crew swimming to the nearest land – which happens to be occupied by the ragged survivor of a human shipwreck.
Larson’s humor was at its best when it captured a single, fraught moment in the lives of its characters – terrestrial or otherwise. That is absolutely the case here, as the reader is left to question what first contact will be like under these uniquely dire circumstances.
5 An Amusing Twist On The Desert Island Gag
First Published: July 31, 1984
Like many top-tier Far Side cartoons, this one is intended to raise more questions than it answers, with the uncertainties prompting incredulous laughter in the reader.
Often, the humor of Gary Larson’s desert island Far Side strips relied on its characters’ isolation. This strip operates in precisely the opposite way, proving that Larson was able to identify his own comedic tendencies and subvert them to find a new angle on a familiar joke.
As depicted here, rather than an island in the middle of a vast ocean, two men are stranded in the center of a small pond – with a walking path surrounding it in sight. Like many top-tier Far Side cartoons, this one is intended to raise more questions than it answers, with the uncertainties prompting incredulous laughter in the reader.
4 One Of The Cruelest Pranks In Far Side History
First Published: October 4, 1984
Far Side characters were known to play practical jokes on one another from time to time – but in this panel, that tendency is taken to the extreme. In this panel, a pair of glasses with a ship painted on the lenses lies on the beach in the foreground. In the background, a man holding a paintbrush behind his back prods his companion:
“Wake up Bob!…I think I see a ship!…Where are your glasses?”
The strength of this panel is the way Gary Larson makes the reader complicit in the prank; readers know the meaning of the smile on the pranksters’ face, even as they share in the horror of Bob’s eventual realization that help is not arriving.
3 Surviving On A Desert Island Isn’t All Fun And Games
First Published: March 16, 1985
It was often self-evident why the inhabitants of The Far Side’s desert islands were among its most forlorn characters, considering they usually sat with nothing to do, and seemingly no hope of rescue.
This panel gave them an extra reason, as this group of survivors somehow had access to a beach ball and a basketball hoop, which they fixed to the island’s lone tree. This kept them occupied, until a small but significant disaster struck: their ball deflated. The humor of this strip comes from the hunched figures of the characters, as they watch the air quickly go out of their only form of exercise and entertainment.
2 A Surprisingly Verbose Display Of Gary Larson’s Secret Dialogue Skills
First Published: June 3, 1986
This Far Side panel is at once surreal and ominous, making it a precise blend of the strip’s two dominant tones.
The Far Side was best known for its brevity, often given readers minimalist captions, and often using no words at all to communicate its jokes. This panel is one notable exception, delivering a dialogue-heavy comedic bit, which is as close to a full “scene” in the traditional narrative sense as Gary Larson ever got.
The cartoon depicts a man arriving at a desert island, where he finds a vetriloquist, whose puppet tries to warn the new arrival that his human is a cannibal. This Far Side panel is at once surreal and ominous, making it a precise blend of the strip’s two dominant tones.
1 Nobody Says You Have To Like Your Fellow Survivors
First Published: November 9, 1986
As with many of The Far Side’s desert island panels, the humor here derives from the triviality of the characters’ feud, in direct contrast to the gravity of their plight, a joke Gary Larson told successfully in many different ways.
This Far Side installment features two men sitting on opposite sides of a tree, staring out in opposite directions over the crystal-blue waves. From their ragged appearances, it is obvious they’ve been stranded for quite awhile – and from the messages carved into the tree, it is clear they hate each other.
“Bob’s a jerk, Al is a moron” the tree reads, over and over. As with many of The Far Side’s desert island panels, the humor here derives from the triviality of the characters’ feud, in direct contrast to the gravity of their plight, a joke Gary Larson told successfully in many different ways.
Interestingly, this strip can be taken as a reprise of the cruel prank from the earlier entry, as one of the survivors in that panel was identified as “Bob.” Certainly, his dislike of Al would seem warranted, were that to be the case.
The Far Side
The Far Side is a humorous comic series developed by Gary Larson. The series has been in production since 1979 and features a wide array of comic collections, calendars, art, and other miscellaneous items.