Basic Instructions is a web comic that was produced from 2003-2015, and was revitalized in 2021. Scott is currently posting one new comic per week, on Mondays. Check it out on the Basic Instructions web site, or follow Scott on his Patreon page to get the comics early with exclusive Patreon commentary.
There are four printed collections of Basic Instructions comics:
Basic Instructions Books:
Help Is on the Way: A Collection of Basic Instructions (Dark Horse Comics, 2008)
Amazon.com (USA) – paper book
Amazon.co.uk (UK) – paper book
Amazon.ca (Canada) – paper book
Ever want to know the best way to combat “the silent treatment”? How to destroy society? Apply video game skills to real life? Well, read Help Is on the Way, a collection of strips from the hilarious online web comic Basic Instructions! Cartoonist Scott Meyer will guide you through some of life’s more uncomfortable moments with plenty of absurdly bad advice, usually packed economically into four side-splitting panels. This is the kind of stuff that jumps from the weekly paper onto your cubicle wall in seconds flat! Learn how to apply the laws of physics to your personal relationships! Help Is on the Way, by Basic Instructions creator Scott Meyer, is your “all-inclusive guide to a life well-lived.”
Made with 90% Recycled Art: A Collection of Basic Instructions Volume 2 (Dark Horse Comics, 2010)
Amazon.com (USA) – paper book
Amazon.co.uk (UK) – paper book
Amazon.ca (Canada) – paper book
Comic and cartoonist Scott Meyer is back with yet another book of bad advice wrapped in good intentions. Learn such important skills as How to Talk to a New Parent, How to Engage in Prefight Smack Talk, How to Complain about Work, How to Properly Perform a High Five, and more! A former stand-up comedian, Meyer channels his extensive and varied wit into four panels of side-splitting culture commentary every other day or so and posts them to his website, basicinstructions.net. Dark Horse’s second collection of those Basic Instructions, Made with 90% Recycled Art, will likely spend some time on the copy machine before certain pages find themselves on cubicle walls worldwide.
The Curse of the Masking Tape Mummy: Basic Instructions Volume 3 (DEAB Productions, 2012)
Amazon.com (USA) – paper book
Amazon.co.uk (UK) – paper book
Amazon.ca (Canada) – paper book
Basic Instructions, the webcomic of sarcasm and schadenfreude, is back and as consistently surprising as ever! Helpful advice includes “How to Gloat Over Your Captured Enemy,” “How to Prepare for the Apocalypse,” and much more! Basic Instructions are your all inclusive guide to a life well lived. If you attempt to follow this advice, and your life goes hilariously askew, we apologize in advance, although not very sincerely.
Dignified Hedonism: A Collection of Basic Instructions Volume 4 (Rocket Hat Industries, 2013)
Gumroad.com (worldwide) – e-book
Amazon.com (USA)- paper book
Amazon.co.uk (UK)- paper book
The image above might look like a mere book (Actually, it looks like a tiny thumbnail image of a book), but in fact it is much, much more (or at least a tiny, thumbnail image of much, much more)!
Dignified Hedonism is a collection of Scott Meyer’s comic strip Basic Instructions. Those in the know will tell you that Basic Instructions is one of the most efficient ways science has found to deliver sarcasm into your brain. Also, each and every Basic Instructions comic in this book contains at least four solid attempts at humor. That’s three more than most comics, and four more than many. Lastly, because Basic Instructions is one of the wordiest comics of all time, this book’s value is undeniable if, of course, it is calculated on a cost-per-word basis.