I’ve never considered myself much of an investigative journalist, necessarily. But when you stumble onto a story like this one, you have to dig deep. 

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the latest installment of the TBTL Friday Newsletter. I hope this email finds you well.

This story, like all good exposés, begins in the bathroom. That’s where I keep the Far Side page-a-day calendar that my father gifted me for Christmas. I love this calendar. It contains 365 of Gary Larsen’s weirdest, one-panel cartoons, spanning across his 15-year publishing career. 

A few weeks ago, just after brushing my teeth and before jumping in the shower, I did what I always do: I peeled away the previous day’s Far Side comic to reveal the new joke of the day. It was a classic that I remembered well. It depicted a man and woman who had just met a space alien visiting earth. The woman is getting ready to take a photo of her husband posing with the alien in front of its spaceship. The cartoon implies that the husband is nagging her to make sure the camera is loaded. The woman is saying to her husband, “Yes, yes already, Warren…There is film in the camera!”

But there is, of course, a problem. The woman, while being a bit snippy towards her partner, is making the terrible mistake of opening the back of the camera to confirm that there is film inside. And as anyone my age or older knows, if you expose the film to sunlight like that, you ruin the whole roll. There will be no photos when you get the film developed. This couple’s unthinkable experience will not be captured, and it’s likely nobody will believe them when they tell their story of befriending a three-eyed, single-snouted creature from outer space.

I thought about this cartoon more than usual as I went about my morning, because -- while some of Gary Larson’s cartoons are timeless -- this one would likely be indecipherable to today’s younger reader. Most people born in the past 25 to 30 years have only experienced digital cameras. They might know that there used to be something called “film” in their parents' Kodaks. But would they know that you had to handle the film very carefully, and that any exposure to outside light could destroy your entire roll of vacation memories? Probably not. 

Now, imagine my shock one week later when I found myself in the midst of my morning routine again -- teeth brushed, shower taken, hair…well, I don’t really have much hair to comb these days, but it would have been combed -- when I peeled away another calendar page. As always, I was excited to see what the Gary Larson archives had cued up for me. But I was not prepared for what I found. 

It was another film-based joke, this one taking place in a darkroom that a boy has set up in his home. He’s developing a roll of film he’d shot himself, and he’s excitedly holding one dripping image in front of his face. He’s saying, according to the caption, “I’ve done it! The first real evidence of a UFO! … And with my own camera, in my own darkroom, and in my own…”

But before he can finish his sentence, we see trouble brewing once again. His mother, undoubtedly well-intentioned, is opening the door behind him and holding a plate of cookies and a glass of milk. She’s bringing her boy a snack! But she’s also letting light into his darkroom and -- you guessed it -- ruining the film and destroying the only known evidence of extraterrestrial life.

This, my friends, can only be described as essentially the same joke. The context is different. The characters have changed. But the premise and the punchline? Show me the difference. 

Now, the page-a-day calendar itself does not present these cartoons in chronological order. So I turned to the enormous, encyclopedic Far Side anthology that listener Dan sent us a few years ago to find out which of these panels was published first. Turns out, the darkroom comic came out in August of 1980. The one with the married couple and the alien came out three years later, in the summer of 1983. 

So the main question for me is whether Gary Larson realized that he was going back to the same well when he made the second comic, or if he ever even realized it in hindsight. Unfortunately, I cannot find any evidence that the cartoonist ever addressed this issue, and he has not responded to our interview request. We will keep you posted on that front. 

Now, you’re probably thinking that the story ends here and that you can move ahead with the rest of your weekend. Would that you could, dear reader! But unfortunately, I’m not quite finished yet. Because it would appear that this is a bit of an epidemic amongst my most beloved artists. 

As careful listeners of TBTL might remember, I’m also a relatively new fan of the relatively old strip called Nancy, which follows the exploits of a precocious, troublemaking little girl and her friend, Sluggo. I do not own a Nancy page-a-day calendar (yet), but I do enjoy following the Bluesky fan account that posts multiple strips a day from the vast Nancy archives.

Last Friday, around the time I was starting to write this report, the fan account posted this comic from May 8, 1939:

Like you, I immediately recognized this same joke from another Nancy comic I’d read last month. The version I remembered focused on television instead of a book.  Here it is, from April 23, 1949 (almost exactly 10 years later): 

Notice that the same exact language is used in panels 2 and 3. This is like a cartoonist doing a cover version of his own work!

The questions this raises are almost limitless. Do all long-running comic strips have a version of this? Has Garfield ever repeated the same observation about lasagna and Mondays? Has Beetle Bailey filled the same thought-bubbles while cleaning out a latrine and while peeling potatoes? HAS DAGWOOD BEEN EATING THE SAME SANDWICH FOR 96 YEARS?

And the biggest question of all: Is this why Gary Larson retired early and became reclusive? Because he didn’t want to answer for this if it were to ever come to light? 

I will  continue to seek answers, my friends, and of course I’ll keep you in the loop with any updates. Because as far as I can tell, these are the most important matters of our time. 

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. And honestly, if you’ve read this far into the newsletter, you deserve a reward. Luke and I will try to do an especially good show for you on Monday. 

-- Andrew

We’re still working on bed skills.