ByVal Hull
Science fiction and fantasy tend to attract serious people. Be it the tweed suit-wearing academicals discussing various hypothetical scenarios humanity may face once space travel gets introduced into our daily routine, or the bearded scholars painstakingly building up new worlds from the ground up while making sure everything inside them makes perfect internal sense.
If, however, you care about none of that and just want to be entertained, while still firmly remaining in the realms of sci-fi and fantasy, this article will point you toward six of the best book series that eschew the inherent stuffiness of their respective genres and instead focus on having some good lighthearted fun. And puns. Oh, so many puns.
Here’s our list of some of the greatest fantasy/sci-fi comedy series:
While this list isn’t arranged in any particular order of relevance or importance, the top spot still goes to the master himself – Terry Pratchett. Pratchett’s command of the English language, especially when it comes to extracting laughs out of seemingly simple sentences, is rivaled only by the likes of P.G. Wodehouse. And the sheer number and variety of Discworld books means that just about anyone can find a Discworld book that’s to their liking (be sure to check out this reading order guide of ours to find the right Discworld book for you).
The stories themselves all take place on and around the improbable Discworld carried through space by a giant beelephanted turtle. This setup that doesn’t even attempt to be realistic allows Discworld to be the perfect mirror for fantasy tropes, society, and the human condition in general. Cowardly inept wizards, city guards who have to deal with dragons, ancient prophecies, and unfair cost of living, Death, his apprentice, and later on his granddaughter are all ridiculous and hilarious characters that nevertheless remain endearing and very much human throughout the Discworld run of over 40 books. If you want a fantasy series that makes you laugh, you need to look no further than Terry Pratchett’s Discworld.
Douglas Adams to sci-fi is what Terry Pratchett is to fantasy. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy started off as a BBC radio series, but then quickly blossomed in popularity and was adapted into a series of novels, plays, TV series, a movie, and even a couple video games. The series as a whole, and each individual part of it, tends to be intentionally contradictory and lean towards the absurd. Early on in the story, Earth gets destroyed as an obstacle to building a high-speed space road, and our protagonist, who at the time is considered to be the last surviving human, then goes on a quest. Not to restore his lost home world, but to have a nice dinner.
Adams’ main strength throughout it all is his ability to craft sentences that make no sense on the surface. But if you stop to think about them, they oftentimes keep defying logic and reason, but you’re now able to see them as uproariously funny. A couple quick examples include, “The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don’t,” and “In the beginning the Universe was created. This had made many people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.” If these aren’t enough to sell you on the man’s genius, you should probably move on. Just don’t forget your towel.
In order for something to become a classic series, it needs to be, well, classic. Having started back in 1978, and technically still ongoing unperturbed by Robert Asprin’s death back in 2008, MythAdventures is a definite classic. It was one of the first fantasy series bold enough to craft a fantasy story inspired by the misadventures of the Laurel and Hardy comedy duo that runs primarily on puns and anachronisms. But on top of all that, the series also features one of the most detailed and believable magik systems put to paper.
The series follows a clueless, but not stupid, apprentice named Skeeve and his fast-talking and crafty mentor Aahz (no relation) who loses his magik powers early on and has to rely on Skeeve’s meager spells from that point onwards. Aahz also happens to be a dimension traveler, or demon as they’re otherwise known. Some other demons include the Deveels selling and buying just about everything on their Bazaar (that one could easily describe as bizarre), and Trolls, whose female counterparts are widely known as – you guessed it – Trollops.
For a series that had its start back in the ’70s, it’s amazing how modern and fresh it feels. Its basic multiverse premise is as popular today as ever. The sense of continuity going through the books, where secondary and minor characters of earlier stories are not forgotten and instead often join the crew on future adventures, is exactly what readers want today. And the quick punchy dialogue that’s the series bread and butter doesn’t feel dated at all and makes it a very fun read.
In his introduction to Something M.Y.T.H. Inc, the 12th novel in the MythAdventures series, Robert Asprin has this to say about publishing humorous fantasy in the ’70s:
To elaborate, the first six Myth novels were written separately with contracts for one, one, two, and two books as the popularity of the series grew. Back then, fantasy/science fiction humor was not considered salable. (The Myth books, along with a LOT of help from Piers Anthony’s Xanth novels, turned that around.) Anyway, originally the publishers were going to take a flier on ONE humor book. When it sold, they stretched to contract one more. Then two more. Then another two.
And there you have it. Piers Anthony’s Xanth novels were among the first to explore and, more importantly, popularize the idea that humor and fantasy go well together. And while the author later got mired in all sorts of controversy, even from the onset his stories are a fair bit more explicit than you’d necessarily expect from a breezy fantasy romp (in this case, the breeze is mostly coming from the characters running around naked half the time). Still, the basic premise of fantasy Florida populated by wizards and fantasy creatures works really well, especially in the original Xanth trilogy. Which allowed it to eventually become a massive juggernaut totaling 47 novels as of this writing. So if you want fantasy, humor, and a lot of it, Xanth is your series.
Michael Carroll, a fellow sci-fi writer, described Harry Harrison’s style in his obituary as such:
“Imagine ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ or ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark,’ and picture them as science-fiction novels,” he said. “They’re rip-roaring adventures, but they’re stories with a lot of heart.”
And while Harrison is perhaps best known for the literary inspiration behind the movie classic Soylent Green, his Stainless Steel Rat series definitely deserves a spot on this list. The series depicts a milquetoast world of the future where crime and other abnormal behaviors have all been but eradicated. Our hero is the rare specimen who not only preserved his law-breaking genes, he managed to hide them for long enough to become a criminal mastermind. Which didn’t stop him from getting caught and enlisted to help catch other criminals like himself, only unburdened by his strong moral compass. Plenty of amusing and exciting adventures follow. So, if you prefer spaceships to dragons, this here is the humorous series for you.
So far on this list, we’ve explored the realms of mystical fantasy and spacefaring science fiction. But if you’re in the mood for something more grounded and easily relatable, then Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files series is what you’re looking for. Set in modern-day Chicago, the series follows one Harry Dresden – part wizard-for-hire and part private investigator. It combines these two parts well and holds them together with an overarching dark family mystery. As the series goes on, Harry has to become stronger and face bigger threats, with the current latest novel – Battle Ground – entirely dedicated to an all-out battle for Chicago between various factions of fantasy beings that include the Faerie, vampires, and ancient gods.
The humor of the series is perhaps more understated compared to some other entries on this list, but there’s still plenty of it there. To give you some examples, in one book Harry rides into battle on a zombie T-Rex named Sue, and in another, he learns parkour. Only with him being a wizard and as such used to vocalizing his spells, any time he jumps over something, he yells out, “parkour” to the great amusement of us, the readers, and everyone around him.
As we’re always on the lookout for more things that can make us laugh, feel free to share what you think are great fantasy and sci-fi series that are packed with humor.
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Beyond Hogwarts is a site primarily about the Wizarding World, including the Harry Potter franchise and Fantastic Beasts but also covers a wide variety of other series including The Lord of the Rings.
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