30 Inappropriate Dark Humor Cyanide & Happiness Webtoons

Dark, surreal, and unexpected, Cyanide & Happiness’ contentious nature is one of the main reasons for its popularity. The material has grown into many areas of social media since its start in 2005. The comic strips are rather dark in humor and unpredictable. The animations use stick-figure art to present graphic, dark, and often surreal humor that has no boundaries. As you may have guessed from its name, this webcomic has a dark sense of humor and language – but is still very enjoyable.

Here are the best webcomics from Cyanide & Happiness, all the funnies you need to get through the week.

This article was originally published on avocadoposts.com and has been republished here with permission.

Dying Stick Figures’ Terrible End

On January 26, 2005, Cyanide & Happiness was first published on explosm.net. However the webtoon’s first development began in 2004, but the background story goes even further back.

Around 1999 and 2000, Matt Melvin and Rob DenBleyker were making stick figure death flicks together, and they were friendly with Dave McElfatrick, who was part of the stick figure community. Around 2001, DenBleyker launched the website StickSuicide, which featured animations and games depicting stick figures dying terrible ends. McElfatrick later joined StickSuicide, where Kris Wilson was an active member of its forums. That is how they got to know each other.

StickSuicide Boards

Wilson has referred to himself as the “founder” of Cyanide & Happiness, while Melvin has stated that Wilson is the “father” of the C&H aesthetic. It all started in high school one day when Wilson was home sick with strep throat. He began drawing stick figures and posted webtoons on the StickSuicide boards.

“When we decided to branch off from just stick figure death movies and do something more with the site, we [Melvin, DenBleyker and McElfatrick] started Explosm and brought Kris [Wilson] on board.” Melvin says. The amateur project, that would ultimately become Cyanide & Happiness, slowly started taking form.

Squatting On a Domain

DenBleyker was squatting on a domain name that became the name of the website “Explosm.” Cybersquatting is described by the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act as registering, trafficking in, or using an Internet domain name with intent to profit from the goodwill of a trademark belonging to someone else.

Another name for the project was “BestWhileHigh.com,” which Wilson rejected because it sounded too much like a teen zine or 9gag. “I don’t know what you just said, but I love it!” Wilson said when he first heard the moniker “Explosm.” In 2006, the first animation was published on explosm.net.

Logical Math

In 2006, Rob DenBleyker was at the University of Texas at Dallas; Kris Wilson lived at Fort Bridger, Wyoming; Matt Melvin lived in San Diego, California; and Dave McElfatrick lived in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The creators didn’t meet in person until 2007 at the San Diego Comic-Con.

In 2010, McElfatrick began a petition for a visa to enter the United States so that he could work with the others on more animated shorts. The petition received over 146,000 signatures, and Dave was approved for a visa that would allow him to work in the United States in September 2010.