Chris Sims in Comics Alliance:
When you look back at pop culture, you can occasionally follow the threads back to these points that change everything. They’re the projects that paved the way for so much that came after, the ones that introduced their audiences to a strange new way of thinking that eventually becomes the new standard, these massive influences that vast sections of the things we love almost certainly wouldn’t exist without. And for my generation, Gary Larson’s The Far Side is one of those points.
Through a daily strip that ran for fifteen years in over 1,900 newspapers — and got dropped from a handful for being too weird in the process — Larson introduced an entire generation to the surreal, random, and occasionally very dark humor that would become part of the language that we all speak. And today, August 14, as Larson celebrates his birthday, it’s a pretty great time to look back on his work.
More here.