Far Side:
Cartoon Caption says “Inside The Sun”. It shows a guy sitting in a chair surrounded by about eight fans. In front of him is a window showing huge flames erupting. On the wall there is a huge switch with 2 positions “RISE” and “SET”.
Mad Magazine:
During the energy crisis of 1973 they made a great suggestion for conserving energy.
The government recommends keeping your house furnace set at 68 degrees in the winter and your air conditioner to 75 degrees in the summer. SO, they concluded use your air conditioner in the winter to keep your house a toasty warm 75 degrees. AND use your furnace in the summer to make your house a cool crisp 68 degrees for those hot summer months.
That makes some weird kind of sense doesn’t it ? LOL
and RenMan, I never saw that Far Side cow cartoon, but your description of it gave me a good laugh !
A Viking ship, loaded with fierce Vikings rowing toward the horizon as the biggest Viking beats the drum. Meanwhile, 1 Viking is trailing his feet in the water off the back of the boat.
My favorite FS is the one showing a sideview of an airplane with two pilots in a cockpit, one of which is screaming “DEAR GOD! THAT"S THE EMERGENCY FUEL LIGHT (or something similar)! WE"RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!..oh wait, that’s just the intercom light…” and you see, in the plane’s portholes, the terrified look of the passengers.
A bear with a tag in his ear, a radio transmitter around his neck and a big number 23 on his side walking up to his cave where his wife angrily greets him, “And where were YOU all day?!”
2 crocodiles laid back on a river bank, one picking his teeth with a toothpick. “That wasnt bad. soft pink skin, no fur, hardly any bones…” Pith helmet near the waters edge.
2 Gazelles on a hilltop with the letter Z on their sides, standing defiantly looking at 2 lions talking. “Forget about those two. Theyre turbocharged.”
I cant describe this one to do it any real justice but I am sure any Far Side enthusiast knows this one.
Two warriors from ancient China standing on recently constructed Great Wall of China and looking out. One says to the other, “Now let’s see that dog get in here!”
Custer’s Last View, which showed from the perspective of someone lying flat on his back a couple of Indians looking down and brandishing weapons.
Washington Crossing the Street, which took the famous picture Gen. Washington and crew crossing the Delaware River and superimposed it on an ordinary modern street crossing.
I checked in for Midvale – i say that to myself everytime I do it.
Second : two Police are arresting a dog, leading him away in handcuffs, A lady (in those Larson Glasses) & her cat are watching from the house he was taken from and the lady is saying to the cat “… And I suppose you think this is a dream come true.”
Third: two fisherman in a lake see the mushroom clouds over the mountains in the distance. one is saying “I’ll tell you what this means Jim, no size regulations and screw the limit.” (paraphrased)
My other favorite along the same theme shows people standing around in a field. A car full of cows is passing and one of them is leaning out the window, yelling, “Yakkity yakkity yak!”
My all-time favorite shows an auditorium full of doctors, each sitting hilding a duck, and listening to a speaker who also holds a duck. The room is dim, so you can see that one audience member’s eyes are open very wide. The caption says: “Suddenly, Professor Liebowitz realizes he has come to the seminar without his duck.”
That one totally cracks me up, every time I see it.
Here’s my absolute favorite (previously posted): A female chimp is grooming a male, and she says, “Well, well, another blonde hair. … Conducting a little more ‘research’ with that Jane Goodall tramp?” (I think if you imagine that last word shouted angrily, that makes it even funnier!)
Goodall first saw it when the then-executive director of the Goodall Institute showed it to her, icily saying, “Just look at that, will you!” Goodall’s reaction was to laugh and say “Wow! Real fame at last!” But the director told her that she had found it very offensive because it suggested she had sex with the chimps! She had even had a lawyer write a letter of complaint which appeared in the paper! Goodall was very angry about this and meant to write a letter of apology to Larson, but she was very busy and forgot about it.
About one year (and one new executive director) later she got a call from National Geographic who wanted to reprint the cartoon, but Larson’s company refused because of the lawyer’s letter. Things were finally straightened out and the cartoon was reprinted.
My favorite Far Side shows two spiders sitting on a leaf. One of them has just jumped out wearing a mask and scared the other one. The other spider has a huge pile of spiderweb piled up on the ground underneath him and is saying, “Don’t ever do that again! You scared the STRING out of me!”
I haven’t seen any recent issues myself, but there was an article in the newspapers a few years ago about the magazine making an effort to conform to a more hard-edged, “modern” style of humor. Apparently Jack Davis, the only artist left from the very earliest days of the magazine, quit after all those years because he found the new direction too offensive.
Mad could hardly be what it once was, anyway. Bill Gaines is dead, Don Martin is dead, Wally Wood is dead, Dave Berg is dead, Al Feldstein retired in the '80s, and the magazine is now part of the AOL-Time-Warner conglomerate. I hear it even carries advertising now.
Picture: Caveman sitting atop a huge microscope, looking at a mammoth through a hollowed-out log, saying “It’s a mammoth.”
Caption: “Early microscope”
Picture: Caveman squashed in mammoth tracks with a broken whistle in his mouth.
Caption: 1,000,000 BC: Gak Eisenberg invents the first and only silent mammoth whistle.
Picture: Caveman in front of a movie screen, pointing to an image of a spiked dinosaur tail.
Caption: "Now this part is called the Thagomizer, after the late Thag Simmons.
A guy is standing on his lawn, holding a bucket of paint and a dripping brush. All around him are objects with sloppily-painted labels: “HOUSE”, “DOOR”, “THE DOG”, “SHIRT”, “PANTS”. He’s saying, “There! THAT should clear up a few things around here!”
Sign on the lawn says, “Keep Off The Dog”. Two kids are standing on the dog. An old man is coming out of the house shaking his fist, hollering, “Hey! You kids!”
Doe is standing there in alarm, her husband the buck has been blown backwards off his easy chair. Two humans in the doorway, one a hunter with gun, one a game warden. Says the warden, “I’m sorry, ma’am, but his license is in order and your husband was in season. Just because he knocks doesn’t mean you have to answer the door.”
Guy being carried on a stretcher, face down, from a guard tower with a bunch of arrows sticking out of his ass… another guy explaining (presumably to the boss), “So I say to Norm, Hey, as long as we’re up here, one of us oughtta moon those Saxon dogs.”
My favorite MAD Don Martin strip…Two cowboys huddled behind a rock , being ambushed by about ninety-twelve Indians.Though clearly outnumbered , the cowboys keep shooting till ,miraculously, all Indians are dead.First cowboy says ’ We got 'em." Second cowboy , looking dejected says “Rats… I missed”.
My dino professor told me that they didn’t have a real name for that dohicky on the stego’s tail, until this comic. They decided it was a good name and it stuck!
Anyway, my favorite Far Side is two cavemen standing outside their cave looking at a giant glacier about a meter and a half away. The caption was "Say, Thag…wall of ice closer today?’
