The Far Sidebuilt its reputation on creator Gary Larson’s willingness to “go there,” to deliver edgy, and even uncomfortable, punchlines, and to cover ground that no other syndicated newspaper cartoons would dare tread;yet as Larson revealed, the early drafts of some of his comics could be too “grotesque,” even for his tastes, which led him to tone these panels down for public consumption.
In the 1990 bookThe Prehistory of The Far Side, the author offered an unparalleled behind-the-scenesinsight into his creative process; the window into howFar Sidecartoons came together, from rough draft to final product, is a must-read for any admirers of Larson’s work.
As part of that tour throughFar Sidehistory, Gary Larson also offered some interesting notes on the evolution of particular panels, noting several instances in which he decided he went slightly too far, both with captions and imagery, and scaled it back for the finished version.
This Far Side Comic All Came Down To Which Kind Of Larva To Use
First Published: June 06, 2025
There is unquestionably a gross-out factor to the humor of thisFar Sidecartoon, but surprisingly,Gary Larson actually made the final comic less gross, a deliberate decision that resulted from, as he put it inThe Prehistory of The Far Side, “one of those rare instances when even I found something sort of repugnant in the drawing.” Larson’s original sketch featuredanthropomorphic flies, aFar Sidestaple, which the artist subsequently substituted beetles for in the published version; the most significant change, however, involved the bug couple’s “children,” shown crawling around their feet on the floor.
When [Gary Larson] re-drew the panel, in addition to changing the “maggots” to “grubs,” he utilized one of his most tried-and-true techniques: giving these inhuman characters human eyes.
In contrast to their anthropomorphized parents,the “maggots” in the rough first draft lacked any discernible features, instead having just a single suction-like mouth, which is seemingly what Larson thought was off-putting. When he re-drew the panel, in addition to changing the “maggots” to “grubs,” he utilized one of his most tried-and-true techniques: giving these inhuman characters human eyes.As Gary Larson’s editor once put it, the eyes were often where the true humor of aFar Sidejoke lies, and that is the case with this cartoon, for sure.
Gary Larson’s Perspective On This Far Side Snake Panel Changed Across Drafts
First Published: June 21, 2025
This panel represents a particularly noteworthy example of the ways Gary Larson might change aFar Sidebetween drafts, given how most of the details remain the same, with one major exception, while the perspective is flipped. In the published comic, captioned “down at the Eat and Slither,” a trio of snakes sit at a lunch counter, with one of them depicted looking at the menu, despite having clearly just eaten, which is evident from the massive bulge of undigested prey in its midsection. The first draft, meanwhile, actually showed readers a few moments earlier.
The sketch shows the scene from the opposite side of the counter;most notably, the snake in the baseball cap is illustrated with a whole pig stuffed in its mouth, which Larson opted to omit in the end, writing inThe Prehistory of The Far Side:
The first version of this…seemed just a tad grotesque, and I ended up eliminating the pig being swallowed. (On another note, I’m not exactly sure how these snakes are holding up their newspapers.)
So, while details like the snake waitress, and the sneak wearing a fedora, and all the specials on the menu posted on the wall are consistent between drafts, the framing of the image is a significant change.
As far as the tone of the joke goes, it is certainly less “grotesque” this way, though fans ofThe Far Sidewill recognize that this is hardly the most abrasive imagery Gary Larson ever conjured and put out into the world. The fact that Larson shied away from his initial vision for the comic, though, is made even more curious by the fact that a 1992Far Sidecomic would actually revisit the “pig stuffed in snake’s mouth” cartoon, faithfully fulfilling the earlier sketch, except in one ofThe Far Side’subiquitous living room settings, rather than a restaurant.
This Far Side Cartoon Was Tragic Enough Already, So Gary Larson Made It Less “Graphic”
First Published: July 22, 2025
The published version of thisFar Sidecartoon is a heavy enough critique of deer hunting, but it was even more blunt in its initial conception. In the final iteration, a police officer informs a horrified deer that her husband’s killer, a hunter who burst into their home and shot the husband dead in the living room, will get off on a technicality, as “his license does check out, and after all, your husband was in season.” It is a laugh-out-loud punchline that carries with it legitimate criticism of hunting, as well as the tangled bureaucracy of the legal system.
Larson’s initial idea for the caption, included inThe Prehistory of The Far Side, uses less finesse, as the policeman far more callously tells the freshly widowed deer, “this license all checks out…but maybe I can get him to take your husband somewhere else and clean him.“This is a more harsh variation on the premise than the joke ultimately became, with its critical stance much less obfuscated by its humor. Gary Larson acknowledged this during the drafting process and, as a result, decided to revise the piece. He explained:
I decided the caption on the first draft was just too graphic and unsettling (although it’s what deer hunters do, isn’t it?) and I modified it in the final version.
In the end, this was seemingly the right decision; while Larson admits that he occasionally revised some of his jokes past the point of being funny, this is one where he found the precise right calibration of humor through trial-and-error. The published panel is dark, absurd, and also poignant, leading it to be among theFar Sidecartoons that have left the longest-lasting impressionon readers. As much asThe Far Sideis known for its dark humor, these examples show that there were limits to what Gary Larson would write or draw to get a laugh.
For Gary Larson The Far Side Was A Constant Process Of Revising And Revisiting Ideas
Larson’s Stable Of “Running Gags”
One thingobservantFar Sidereaders will recognizeabout each of the panels discussed here is that they are all variants on themes and reoccurring ideas that Gary Larson returned to again and again, from the inherent humor of snakes snacking, to the parenting methods of houseflies, to the deer/hunter conflict being transposed from the deer’s habitat to the humans'. While eachFar Sidecartoon underwent a vigorous revision process before it was released into the wild, so to speak, to a larger degree,Larson’s entire body of work is the product of revisiting concepts that he found amusing.
More than just producing idiosyncratic work, [Gary] Larson is truly a singular creator in terms of his chaotically creative mind.
When it came toThe Far Side, ideas were never fully abandoned. Indeed,Far Sidejokes that Gary Larson only ever made once are much more the exception than the rule. That is one of the many reasons it is so stimulating to take a deep dive into the artist’s creative process, because more than just producing idiosyncratic work, Larson is truly a singular creator in terms ofhis chaotically creative mind, which deserves to be studied as much asThe Far Sideitself to preserve whatever arcane secrets he is willing to reveal about the production of his work.
