Here we go:
Larson took the unusual step of issuing a press release, explaining the joke:
The cartoon was intended to be an exercise in silliness. While I have never met a cow who could make tools, I felt sure that if I did, they (the tools) would lack something in sophistication and resemble the sorry specimens shown in this cartoon. I regret that my fondness for cows, combined with an overactive imagination, may have carried me beyond what is comprehensible to the average Far Side reader.[1]
Years later, in The Prehistory of the Far Side, Larson further explained that he was inspired by the idea that tool use was the characteristic that separated mankind from the rest of the animal kingdom
I mean, ok.
He also said his fatal mistake was making one of the tools too closely resemble a saw
If the caption was “If cows made tools” it wouldn’t be so bad. Still not super funny.
“may have carried me beyond what is comprehensible to the average Far Side reader” goddamn I hate this pretentious little fuck, he’s got some ok comics but cow tools pisses me off almost as much as the last season of game of thrones
I always thought that he meant “it’s not that deep guys, they’re just silly”
Idk, I def get unreasonably mad about cow tools and it’s at least partially bc of memes cx he just feels really condescending and full of himself for coming out to explain why you probably don’t have the iq to understand why a cow with some tools it made is funny (it really isn’t even that funny imo, and explaining it just makes it even less funny)
I understand it more in a way of : “it’s so absurd, that it barely makes sense in my head, let alone basically to anybody else”
Imagine getting this pressed over IRL shitposting
I don’t get it.
It has been described as “arguably the most loathed Far Side strip ever”
Fucking right it is.
Hah. Dude made one that was so unfunny that it became funny again. Amazing.
Ah yes, the Cow Tool Effect:
When a piece of comedy is so unfunny that it becomes an Internet phenomenon or meme as a result.
An Internet phenomenon would be a meme by definition.
The Cow Tool strip predates the Internet, but was possibly a meme regardless. The Internet just helps memes propagate at warp speed.
I apologize for being too lazy to put "(or meme)” in parentheses.
The joke is that they’re cow tools.
Good news: it’s not just you.
It’s the one that confused everyone!
Oh wow, this is the Far Side comic, the one that made Larson famous!
Dead Ringers, anyone?
