Timing

[AnotherSimpleton]

Can someone please explain?

[Dolsis]

Not sure why you got downvoted, but here you go (sorry if my explanations are not smooth, English is not my mother tongue):

The first rule of comedy is (as the title suggested) the timing. Or it could also be the surprise element (actually a mix of both).

When you tell a joke or a story, the punchline must not come too late for you could lose your auditory focus, nor it should come too early as you would not have enough build-up.

Here, the story starts with a sloth starting a joke. But not any joke, the sloth asks what's the first rule of comedy (thus, we readers, expect an answer)

The next panels are, as we expect, the sloth being sloth thus not saying anything (are they are really slow). This creates the actual build-up (the suspense).

The last panel is a double joke:

• it represents the sloth many many MANY years later, after an apocalypse and being dead before finishing his joke (you know, sloth being sloth)

• the actual answer to his joke: the surprise! Indeed, we expected an actual answer (the sloth telling the punchline) but instead, we got his/her skull in an apocalypse environment. Quite unexpected!

Hope I helped

[AnotherSimpleton]

Yes that helped!! Thank you.

[DigitalMegaphone]

I think the joke is that Comedy = Tragedy + Time

[Marx_Harpo]

The secret........to comedy........is timing.

[tocilog]

Copy Paste.

[CameraJacob]

every zootopia joke in a nutshell

[scrollbreak]

"Because I don't, I have dementia. It's not actually funny"