Gary Larson - The Far Side Gallery

"The Far Side Gallery", a collection of the hilarious cartoons from the warped mind of Gary Larson, will have you rolling on the floor laughing most of the time. That's no exaggeration, either. It's unfortunate that Larson laid down his pen and paper for good a few years back, but at least we're fortunate enough to have these collections of his daily cartoons for us to hold onto and enjoy. And enjoy them we do.

Larson's humor, while it may be described as warped, twisted, or just plain silly, genuinely is very funny and doesn't take too much tought to appreciate. The humor isn't crude, it isn't inappropriate, nor is it controversial....it's just plain "out there". When you do think about his cartoons after seeing them, it sometimes hits you how obvious it is. Sometimes, it may not hit you right away why the cartoon is funny, and then unexpectedly it'll hit you and you'll laugh even more. When you couple the idea behind the jokes with the illustrations, most of the time you'll laugh yourself silly.

For the most part, Larson had several of the same type of characters in most of his cartoons: aliens, farmers, cavemen, hunters, cows, birds, and just plain morons. In actuality, nobody was safe from the humorous thoughts inside Larson's head. Not EVERY joke in here will be gotten or laughed at, but by far, the majority will keep your side aching from laughter.

For those who may be unfamiliar with Gary Larson's particular brand of humor, here's a few examples (but you'll have to bear with me because in most cases you need to see the picture to go along with it:

*** In one cartoon, you see a broken window in someone's home and the owner is holding a piece of paper that obviously came tied to the brick that went through that window. On the paper is written "Bricks thrown thru your window? CALL Al's Glass 555-1232"

*** In another, there's a ship in its last stages of sinking. Around the ship are a few liferafts filled with men, rowing away from it, while the a man in a chef's hat is standing on the sinking bow, thinking to himself "I wonder if that's really true...The cook always goes down with the ship?"

*** And then, in yet another, there's a brick wall with broken eyeglasses on the ground beside it. There's a man wearing a pair running full-speed into the wall and a sign nearby that says "WARNING - Eyeglass Testing Area"

So, now do you see the twisted humor that Larson's provided his fans for years? If not, do yourself a favor and buy "The Far Side Gallery". There's the above-mentioned cartoons and countless others spread out over 192 pages. Any book store should have this in stock, or it can be purchased from Ebay, Amazon.com, or any other such site for $5 or so. It really is a hilarious collection of cartoons, and I guarantee that you'll laugh more than once. I definitely recommend picking it up.