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.
Las Vegas Saying
Matt Melvin announced his departure from Cyanide & Happiness webtoon on August 31, 2014. He expressed his dissatisfaction with the situation in a personal post “I am pretty depressed over the turn of events. Making webtoons on the internet for a living was an absolute dream come true. To find myself no longer in that position is awful.”
Melvin later claimed in an AMA that the other creators forced him out because of “a clause in our contract that, according to all the lawyers I spoke to, was grossly misused,” and that he was no longer allowed to draw C&H characters.
Pizza Delivery
According to what they wrote in explosm.net, Melvin chose to concentrate his skills in web design and project management, and only work on animations on rare occasions. His webtoon productivity slowed, with just three to four issues each month, because he moved his concentration to more personal pursuits.
Eventually Matt stepped down from project management, and in February 2014, left the C&H team entirely. Despite losing a member of the team, the transfer went smoothly, and the Cyanide & Happiness team was able to retain momentum. They managed to successfully rearrange the dynamics of the team and moved forward.
Autumn Leaves
Comics are updated every day. Wilson attributed the comic’s success to its consistency, stating, “There are plenty of funny people creating content, but they’re not consistent or reliable. The Internet has ADD, and if you’re not constantly giving them something new, you’re going to lose them.”
Each cartoonist creates his own strips, however they collaborate on occasion via Skype. “We all help each other with writing sometimes,” McElfatrick remarked in 2010, “but normally each of us takes turns both writing and creating the webtoon on a particular day.” By that time, DenBleyker was utilizing Macromedia Flash to draw the comics.
Personalities
The first animated version of Cyanide & Happiness debuted on the website in 2006. According to Explosm, a new short is released every week. Many more people are involved in the creation of animated shorts than in the creation of comic books; for example, one short produced in 2017 was credited to twenty-one people.
In regards to the format, each Cyanide & Happiness comic strip varies in length, but are typically between three and six panels.The comics are usually static, however some of them have animated panels. Although simple and without many graphic details, it communicates the joke’s narrative very well.
Money
Controversial topics are the regular content of Cyanide & Happiness. Its acid humor is based on the shock value of certain controversial themes in a way that sparks outrage and also laughter.
Characters are frequently identified by the colors of their clothes rather than by their names. The male characters almost invariably have no hair, which became a running gag. Female characters are identified by their long hair and large chests, which are sometimes employed for comedic effect. There are, however, some recurring characters who have names, such as “Obese Maurice”, the epileptic superhero “Seizure Man”, and even Jesus Christ himself.
Blind
When describing the stick figure approach, DenBleyker says: “it makes the characters seem very transient, as if they only exist for a given comic or webtoon,” and added, “Cyanide and Happiness’ prides itself on having no characters or themes. If we ever bring up a character, we usually retire it after its share of original jokes has run out”
The fourth wall is broken by several comics. In #375, for example, one of the characters looks at the reader while the other wonders what he’s looking at. He then turns to face the audience and screams “Oh my god! It’s a human!”
Friendship
Wilson and DenBleyker cite Gary Larson’s newspaper comic The Far Side and Nicholas Gurewitch’s webcomic The Perry Bible Fellowship as influences for their webtoon. Don Hertzfeldt, Bill Hicks, White Ninja Comics, Monty Python, and David Wong were also listed as influences. DenBleyker revealed at a 2012 panel that he writes up to ten hours each day.
McElfatrick claimed that British children’s webtoons like The Beano and The Dandy inspired him. Melvin did not read comic books as a kid, since he favored live-action sketch comedy shows like The Kids in the Hall, Monty Python, Upright Citizens Brigade, and Mr. Show.
Before And After
Cyanide & Happiness has occasionally offered Depressing Comic Weeks, in which all of the comics are depressing or unpleasant for the whole week. The December 30 episode of the Cyanide & Happiness Show featured the “depressing episode”, coinciding with the 8th depressing comic week at explosm.net. These different sides to their comics have helped expand their brand. It gives more variety.
Guest Weeks have also been published on Cyanide & Happiness, where viewers submitted pieces, and some were included as daily comics during the week. Interaction with fans has also been key to keep engagement high. Collaborative efforts are always growth experiences.
Plan
The website was receiving over a million hits each week by April 2006. By 2012, it was attracting over a million visitors each day. The comic’s popularity rose as a result of its sharing policy, which, according to DenBleyker, “encourages viewers to repost and reblog comics, effectively allowing anyone to disseminate Cyanide & Happiness’ content.”
The webtoon was receiving roughly 20,000 unique visits per day in January 2006, but “we put a little box under each comic that allows people to post an Explosm-linked version of the comic, which brings a lot of traffic back to us,” says the author.
Weird Urges
Only after a few days of adding the little box, each webtoon was receiving around 300,000 daily unique views, largely through Myspace and LiveJournal blog links. In a 2010 interview, the creators stated that based on several surveys and conventions their audience was split equally between men and women.
Fans have proven to be very loyal. They show up at the comic conventions to see the creators and buy books and merch until they are out of it. Cyanide & Happiness’ following is consistent and ever growing as a result of the authors’ hard work and because they always deliver.
Lightbulb Reaction
The press has given a lot of positive feedback to the webtoon. Columnist for The Telegraph Tom Chivers wrote in 2009 that Cyanide & Happiness was one of the ten best webcomics, saying, “The darkest, bitterest, rudest comic of the lot, Cyanide and Happiness is also one of the funniest… [the comic] seems to have no taste boundaries whatsoever… [this is] not one for the faint-hearted… approach with caution.”
What they love is that there is more to Cyanide & Happiness than blood and gore. The gags really are funny, in a laugh-out-loud sort of way, and the pacing is always spot-on.
Sounds Hot
Cyanide & Happiness’s “Stab Factory” didn’t just compete; it stood out as a beacon of comic artistry in the prestigious Eisner Award’s Best Humor Publication category. This acknowledgment highlights the webcomic’s distinctive blend of wit and art, underlining its role as a significant player in the evolution of digital humor.
The nomination itself is a testament to the creators’ ability to marry provocative themes with a minimalist style that resonates widely with audiences.
Collaborative Creation Process
Cyanide & Happiness comics are renowned for their distinctive humor and simplistic stick figure art style. This comic series is the brainchild of four creators: Kris Wilson, Rob DenBleyker, Dave McElfatrick, and Matt Melvin, who later parted ways with the group.
These artists met online and decided to combine their talents to create the comics, which first appeared on the internet in 2005. Unlike traditional comic strips that often have a single author, the creation of Cyanide & Happiness is a collaborative effort.
Diverse Content and Expansion
Over the years, Cyanide & Happiness has expanded beyond its initial format of web comics to include animated shorts, a show, and various other multimedia projects. This expansion showcases the versatility and creativity of its creators, allowing them to explore different narratives, characters, and comedic styles.
The animated series, in particular, has gained significant popularity on platforms like YouTube, where it extends the comic’s reach and engagement with its audience.
Tagged
Other reviewers such as Brigid Alverson from CBR wrote in 2010, “The Cyanide & Happiness formula is pretty simple: Stick men (and women) do shocking things to one another. There are four different artists, but the style and humor maintains itself uniform; a situation is set up in the first panel and resolved, by stabbing, groping, or shouting “You have cancer! LOL!”
Fortunately, the creators pace themselves, mixing different types of humor (including some clever wordplay and visual puns that are not at all bloody) so that when someone gets stabbed in the forehead, it actually does come as a surprise.”
Final Message
According to John Hargrave of the website Zug, “Despite all this solo effort, the end product is coherent and strangely logical, as if the four creators were each viewing the peculiar world of C&H from a slightly different angle – a world where disembodied heads turn into seagulls.”
Back in a 2007 review for Comixtalk, reviewer Xavier Xerexes stated that the art was “very simple, but my sense is that it’s gotten better over the course of the strip’s history and has been pretty decent for a time now. It’s still stickmen, but this time they’re in a slicker style ”
Baby
A writer for student newspaper Yale Daily News said in 2012 that the webtoon was “known for its unusual, graphic and insensitive jokes”.In response to a concern about difficult issues, DenBleyker stated that the authors have not gotten a significant amount of negative criticism and have no plans to tone down their comics’ edginess.
In June 2013, the newspaper comic Pearls Before Swine mocked Cyanide & Happiness in a strip. The strip purported to be a rerun of a C&H strip, and featured one panel in its art style, with almost all of the dialogue censored by black bars.
Finger Circle
In 2015, Cyanide & Happiness was nominated for a Streamy Award in the Animated Category, and in 2016, it was nominated again. The YouTube Streamy Awards annually presented by Dick Clark Productions and Tubefilter recognize and honor excellence in online video, including directing, acting, producing, and writing.
In 2016, the book collection Cyanide & Happiness: Stab Factory received an Eisner Award nomination for Best Humor Publication. The Eisner Awards, also known as the Will Eisner Comic Business Awards, are awards given for creative accomplishment in American comic books. They are also referred to as the Academy Awards of the comics industry.
Last Meal
Explosm published the first two novels through HarperCollins’ It Books subsidiary. Boom! Box, a Boom! Studios imprint, published the third and fourth books. Each collection contains 120 of the creators’ best Cyanide & Happiness comics as well as 30 previously unpublished webtoons. The third edition included 40 previously unpublished Cyanide & Happiness comics from their Depressing Comic Weeks, while the fourth is another collection of the artists’ favorites.
Their site, explosm.com, has over a million daily visitors (as of November 20, 2006) and is ranked 2,777th among the most visited websites worldwide and 1,338th in the United States alone.
Today And Tomorrow
In addition to the animated shorts, the artists created The Cyanide and Happiness Show on the website. This show was born out of a Kickstarter campaign in 2013 and debuted in 2014. The first season was made available for free online, and the second season was brought up by TV network Seeso before being transferred to VRV.
The Cyanide & Happiness Show ran for four seasons, each consisting of ten to eleven episodes. The episodes for the TV versions of the show were 22 minutes long. The animations were done in Adobe Flash format and are typically voiced by the cartoonists.
Four Person Seat Joke
In February 2016, Explosm launched a Kickstarter campaign for Joking Hazard, a Cyanide & Happiness card game in which players must try to create a comical combination using each card as a possible panel of a comic. The project received more than $3.2 million in financing, making it the second most funded card game in Kickstarter history after Exploding Kittens.
Joking Hazard was finally launched in 2016. The reviews compared it to Cards Against Humanity, and as of 2021, the game has a 6.4 out of 10 average user rating on BoardGameGeek, the online forum with 125,600 reviews.
Horse Ride
In June 2019, a new Kickstarter campaign for Trial by Trolley, a card game developed in conjunction with Skybound Entertainment, was launched. The game is based on the trolley problem, in which the player must select a track to send an out-of-control trolley down.
The trolley problem is a thought experiment in ethics about a fictional scenario in which an onlooker has the choice to save 5 people in danger of being hit by a trolley, by diverting the trolley to kill just 1 person. Over $3.5 million was raised during the campaign. Trolley’s Trial was published in 2020.
Big fan
Rapture Rejects is a battle royale game set in the Cyanide & Happiness webtoon Universe. The game was released on Early Access on Steam in 2018. 50 players drop into a world where only one can survive. The player needs to scavenge for resources and fight off enemies until there’s only one person left.
The game was scheduled to come out of early access in early 2020, however that never came to happen in the end. On April 26, 2021, Explosm announced on twitter that it had requested that the game be removed from Steam, which was eventually done in August 2021.
Internet References
In September 2017, Explosm launched yet another Kickstarter campaign for a video game called Cyanide & Happiness, with a goal of $300,000 and a total of $575,000. The game is said to be influenced by games like South Park: The Stick of Truth. It was supposed to be released around the end of 2018, however it was moved back to 2019, then to 2020, and finally to “early 2021.”
Cyanide & Happiness: Freakpocalypse Part 1 – Hall Pass to Hell was announced as the game’s title in March 2020. On March 11, 2021, the first part of the game was released.
Report Card
In 2013, Explosm released the Cyanide & Happiness mobile app. The free “Lite” edition gave users access to the archive’s last 30 days. Cyanide & Happiness characters were used in the television advertisements for Orange Mobile’s Orange Wednesdays, though in an interview Matt Melvin said the characters in the ads “were not really C&H characters, but definitely based on them.”
For the website FMyLife, C&H artists created comic adaptations of user stories in the same graphic style as C&H. Cyanide and Happiness also sells their own merch, such as T-shirts, figurines, housewares, school supplies, signed prints, and even beer.
Office Work Week
As for other work, Rob DenBleyker created the Joe Zombie television series, which lasted six episodes and left fans hoping for a seventh, which he promised “will come out sometime.” Die Romantic – A Look At Aiden, written by Dave McElfatrick, is a caustic assessment of the goth punk band Aiden. Kris Melvin developed a new webtoon called The Last Nerds on Earth after leaving the Cyanide and Happiness team.
Both Wilson and McElfatrick have branched into music, Wilson pairing up with Explosm music producer, Ben Governale, to form Varroa, and McElfatrick going solo on his own band, We’ve Got Hostiles.
Kids
McElfatrick also makes his own YouTube videos, in which he reviews games and converses with guests. DenBleyker and McElfatrick also created and acted in the Purgatony television series. It’s a short animated series with only 1 season currently consisting of 8 total episodes. Each of the 8 episodes lasts for about 15 minutes.
It follows Tony Purgatelli, one of the many people that work for Death in Purgatory. Tony’s job is deciding where dead people go in the afterlife; heaven or hell. Death is a giant skeleton wearing a black robe and a sombrero and his face is never shown.
University Joke
One of the most popular characters in the Cyanide & Happiness universe is Sad Larry. Larry Larrison is the Gall Mart Supermarket cashier. He is depicted as a pale, middle-aged man, clad with worn-out clothes and a name tag. His other features include light facial hair and baggy eyes.
It is revealed that Sad Larry has been sad since his birth, and the doctor declared that he was sad for no apparent reason. As his parents also appear to be as he is, it may be genetic.
Awake
Greenshirt is one of the most popular characters to appear in this series. He has died many times in these comics and has made readers laugh out loud.
Greenshirt is not one single individual and cannot exactly be considered as a recurring character, since he doesn’t have a proper name and lacks a true backstory due to the fact that most of C&H comics are independent and have their own stories and characters, without impacting on the others. Greenshirt is, in fact, one of the most common and reusable physical appearances used for the anonymous figures of C&H.
Looks Like
Tall Justin is a character that never shows his head. He’s a very tall Greenshirt from whom we only see his long torso and string legs. He’s in the 50ᵗʰ episode of the Cyanide & Happiness webtoon Comic Classics.
Susan is from the Cyanide & Happiness Shorts. She’s the cashier of Coffee Coffin, and her name is not revealed until This Is Goodbye. Susan also shares the same face and hairstyle with Linda.
Knock Knock
Blueshirt appeared in the first “Cyanide and Happiness” webtoon comic. Blueshirt has had other names through the comics such as: Dan in #1689 and Kyle in #1721. He’s one of two major characters (Greenshirt being the other) to appear from the very beginning.
Lil’ Jil is a character in the Cyanide & Happiness Shorts. She’s a superhero who gets shrunken down and goes into bodies to either save people or destroy them.
Fine
Purple-Shirted Eye Stabber is a character created by Rob DenBleyker. His previous appearances were limited to comic books, although he has subsequently appeared in three animated shorts and Season 3.
He stabs people’s eyes usually with a knife, but he also uses other tools like pens and Nerf blowguns. The shade of dark purple is rarely utilized for any other character because his shirt color is his single identifying feature.
Art Poject
Throughout Cyanide and Happiness, Jesus Christ is portrayed as an arrogant superpowered entity who, despite being the designated driver, changes his glass of water into wine behind people’s backs.
Several factors resulted from Jesus’ death on the cross. One is that it left holes in his hands, which made it difficult for him to hold objects correctly. Around Easter, Jesus transforms into a zombie version of himself and hunts people.
Boss Battle
Harry Butcher, which is pronounced Heh-Ree-De-Han-Some-Bud-CHA and is also often known as Harry the Handsome Butcher, is a Cyanide & Happiness Shorts character.
Harry the Handsome Butcher is a straightforward man who sells meat.
He worked at a deli called “Harry Butcher’s,” which was part of the Handsome Butchers chain. He is a hard worker who is well-liked by female customers due to his attractive appearance. He is blond and muscular.
God IS Watching
The character of Señor Cleanfist is a superhero in the webtoon. He’s dressed in a light blue jumpsuit with a cape and yellow cleaning gloves. By using the word “grime,” he can be summoned for assistance (a pun on “crime”).
He might just show up when someone needs help cleaning. Señor Cleanfist has appeared in two C&H shorts: “Señor Cleanfist” and “Too Many Superheroes” from Season 2 of the C&H Show.
Condescending
Mr Johnson appears in the Cyanide & Happiness comics as well. It can be found in the strips of Rob DenBleyker and Dave McElfatrick.
Johnson is dressed in a green tie and a cyan business shirt. He’s a coworker who harasses people in an inappropriate manner. Other characters typically respond to him with a terrified “Mr. Johnson, no!” Interestingly, he’s had more than one of the artists make comics of him.
Confession
Ted Bear appears in the short films Cyanide & Happiness and I Think I’ve Got This With Chip Chapley. He is a wilderness survivalist who teaches viewers how to survive in the wild and how a lost human can learn how to fight back, feed, and most importantly, survive from animal attacks.
Ted Bear is voiced by Arin “Egoraptor” Hanson, the co-host and founder of the Let’s play Game Grumps series.
Next Level
Cliff Miller is a Cyanide & Happiness Shorts character. He has a green shirt and died of colon cancer.
During his lifetime, he visited Sweet Seats, a chair store, where he sat on three chairs and concluded that they were quite pleasant. But it wasn’t the chair’s comfort that was bothering him; it was his rear. He was then finally diagnosed with colon cancer in 2010 and died the next day.
Doctor Images
Sad Mary is a character who appears in the Cyanide and Happiness shorts: Sad Larry in Love and Sad Larry’s Sad New Year (supposedly). It’s unclear if she’ll ever show up again.
Sad Mary is the female counterpart to Sad Larry, but she is less empathetic and may become furious and insulted when she’s unhappy. She also works as a waitress at a neighborhood restaurant. She’s Sad Larry’s love interest.
Believe in the idea
Your distinctive point of view makes you stand out among all the online information. Start with a topic that greatly interests you. Because making a comic book takes quite a lot of time and effort, you should be committed to your characters and story.
Keep a notebook handy so you may jot down any narrative suggestions, character ideas, or dialogue as it occurs to you. As your plot develops, it is crucial that you work on character development as well.
Develop your script before illustrating it
Don’t immediately begin drawing your comic book. Take your time instead. If you’ve ever read a book, you already understand how important it is to have a compelling plot.
If you want to create a comic that flows naturally and is flawlessly put together from beginning to end, you should compose your script before you begin illustrating. If not, you run the danger of removing or modifying dozens of panels if the story does not work. That would entail starting over from scratch and wasting a lot of time.
Learn about the practices of your favorite comic book creators
Once you’ve seen enough of them, you could start to think that you can create your own comics. But there’s always something new from more experienced illustrators that you may pick up.
explosm.net
You can find out more about the techniques employed by your favorite comic book authors by reading blogs, books, and interviews. For illustrators who are new to the comic book industry, there are guidelines and tips accessible. When you’re feeling uninspired or stuck, use these tools and sources of motivation.
How to build the tension right
Make sure the content fits each panel while keeping the story progressing to keep readers engaged. Do you think the conversation was successful? Are there too many actions on each page? Consider how you might build suspense at the conclusion of each page to grab the reader’s attention.
Drawing more will help you become a better judge of when and how to cut your panels. A single deed or image can frequently speak a thousand words, which is the power of synthesis.
Establish a consistent illustration style
Choosing an illustration style that is right for your project is the best piece of advice from professional comic book creators. There might be effects on the texture, shading, or color of some characters or backgrounds. Additionally, a page’s permitted frame count may be limited.
Maintaining visual coherence and avoiding producing drawings that can’t be duplicated afterwards are the goals. Your readers will feel more secure if your brand’s design remains consistent. It increases your level of trustworthiness and recognizability, all of which are necessary for building and sustaining a following.
Sketching approach
When it comes to drawing, we have access to a wide range of technologies. A sketching process will always be distinct, whether it is done on a tablet, with a pencil and paper, or using a drawing software. There are a ton of articles, courses, and forums to support you, no matter whatever sketching technique you select.
Your comic book illustrations will typically be sketched (outlined), inked (to provide texture and depth), colored (a color scheme is chosen), and lettered (selecting a font). Whatever technology you choose to use for your sketches, make sure you are at ease with it.
Your readers experience
The reading experience you have when reading print comics is influenced by the format you choose. Blurb magazines are a popular medium for comics. Each page provides plenty of room, and printing several copies is inexpensive.
After deciding on your format, pick the publishing tool that best suits your abilities. You will be able to see the finished product at this point. However, there are other options for you. You can start a blog or an Instagram account and enter the world of webcomics.
Unraveling the Humor Style of Cyanide & Happiness
Cyanide & Happiness is globally recognized for its distinctive blend of humor. It primarily hinges on dark humor, absurdity, and surreal comedy, making it a unique player in the webcomic world. These comics regularly present grim situations lightheartedly, focusing on the unpredictability of life and human nature’s often strange responses to these scenarios.
Compared to traditional joke structures, Cyanide & Happiness often leans into non-sequiturs and the unexpected. The punchlines are not designed to be immediately accessible or straightforward. Instead, they often require a moment of reflection, leading to a delayed but gratifying punch of laughter. This style is marked by a particular inventiveness that consistently pushes the boundaries of conventional humor.
The Art of Crafting Iconic Characters
In Cyanide & Happiness, each comic strip usually introduces new characters rather than relying on a set cast of recurring personalities. This approach helps keep the material fresh and allows for many comedic situations. Despite this, the creators have developed several recurring characters, such as the Depressing Comic Week characters, which the audience has come to know and love.
Even though these characters aren’t always recurring, they’re immediately recognizable thanks to their minimalistic design and the creators’ ability to convey distinct personality traits within a few panels. The lack of recurring characters helps ensure that the comedy isn’t character-driven but scenario-based. This allows for greater variety in the humor and the exploration of a wider range of comedic scenarios.
Decoding the Popularity of Absurdity
Absurdity forms the backbone of the humor in Cyanide & Happiness. It explores situations far from reality, creating a world where anything can happen. The comic strips often contain twists and turn that defy common sense and normal expectations, providing an element of surprise and shock.
This use of absurdity serves two purposes. Firstly, it allows the creators to critique various aspects of society in a way that’s accessible and entertaining. Secondly, it offers an escape for readers by portraying a reality that’s completely detached from their own. The blend of absurd scenarios with relatable human reactions makes for unique and universally appealing humor.
The Genius Behind the Shock Value
Cyanide & Happiness is infamous for its shock humor. It thrives on crossing boundaries and challenging societal norms, often resulting in hilarious, if somewhat controversial, outcomes. Shock humor is essentially designed to surprise or offend the audience, thus invoking laughter through the sheer audacity of the joke.
Despite being a high-risk comedic style, it’s proved hugely successful for Cyanide & Happiness. The key to its success lies in its well-calculated implementation. The comics never resort to shock value for its own sake; instead, it’s always integrated with the overall humor strategy, contributing to the strip’s surprise elements and underlining the comic’s distinctive brand of satire.
Insights into Recurring Themes
Cyanide & Happiness uses recurring themes to present its unique blend of humor. Death, existential dread, societal norms, and personal failures are among the frequently explored subjects. These themes are often presented with an unexpected twist, playing on the readers’ anticipation and presenting a hilarious and surprising punchline.
What sets Cyanide & Happiness apart is its ability to tackle these heavy themes without becoming morose. The creators use humor as a tool to deconstruct these issues, offering a fresh perspective and making them more accessible to a broad audience. By doing so, they highlight the inherent absurdity of life in a way that’s both funny and thought-provoking.
Analyzing the Artistic Style of Cyanide & Happiness
At first glance, Cyanide & Happiness exhibits a simplistic artistic style characterized by minimalistic stick figures, bright colors, and light backgrounds. The characters’ faces, despite their simplicity, are expressive, conveying a wide range of emotions. This straightforward style is part of the comic’s charm and accessibility, ensuring the focus remains on the humor.
However, the simplicity is deceptive. It requires a keen understanding of visual storytelling to convey complex jokes with such minimalistic drawings. The creators’ ability to imply movement, indicate the passage of time, and create tension using their distinct artistic style shows a deep understanding of comic strip mechanics. The aesthetic simplicity also serves to amplify the impact of the comic’s often complex and dark humor.
Transitioning from Webcomic to Animation
Cyanide & Happiness significantly shifted from being a webcomic to producing animated shorts and series. This transition allowed the creators to explore their humor in a new, dynamic medium, expanding their reach and influence. With animation, they could add timing, voice acting, and sound effects to their repertoire, enhancing the humor and making it more immediate and impactful.
Despite the different mediums, the animated series remained true to the spirit of the webcomic. Like the comic strips, the animation has a simple and minimalistic style that stays faithful to the original aesthetic. This successful transition demonstrates the adaptability of Cyanide & Happiness’s content, making it a standout example in digital entertainment.
The Impact of Cyanide & Happiness on the Modern Webcomic Industry
Cyanide & Happiness, with its unique humor style and daring subject matter, has undeniably impacted the modern webcomic industry. It has shown that webcomics can challenge societal norms, tackle sensitive topics, and still be massively popular. Its success has paved the way for other creators to explore unconventional forms of humor and push the boundaries of the genre.
Not only has Cyanide & Happiness influenced the kind of content being produced, but it has also influenced how webcomics are monetized. By expanding into merchandise, animations, and games, Cyanide & Happiness has demonstrated how webcomic creators can diversify their income streams, ensuring their sustainability and success in the long term.
Interactions with Social Media
The creators of Cyanide & Happiness have effectively used social media platforms to connect with their audience. Their approach to social media interaction involves sharing their comic strips and animations, posting behind-the-scenes content, and engaging with their fans directly. This direct connection with the audience has been instrumental in building a strong and loyal fanbase.
Moreover, the easily shareable format of Cyanide & Happiness strips allows for widespread distribution across various social platforms. Many of their comics and animations have gone viral, increasing their visibility and popularity. This successful use of social media demonstrates the importance of these platforms for webcomic creators in reaching and engaging with their audience.
Navigating Censorship and Creative Freedom
With its controversial and boundary-pushing humor, Cyanide & Happiness inevitably confronts censorship and creative freedom issues. Balancing their unique humor style with societal norms and platform policies has always been a significant challenge for the creators. They have grappled with self-censorship, community guidelines, and varying international acceptability standards.
However, Cyanide & Happiness’s creators have managed to navigate these challenges without losing their distinctive humor. They are open about these struggles and have even used their comics to comment on the issue of censorship. By doing so, they have maintained their creative integrity and sparked discussions about censorship’s role in creative fields.
These Dark and Hilarious Webcomics By ‘Loading Artist’ Are Stirring The Web
The way to success
Gregor is a comic artist who was born on June 24th, 1989, in Auckland, New Zealand. He worked as a UI Artist for Gameloft New Zealand and left the studio before it was shut down.
He started Loading Artist in early 2011, and due to its success, and the miracle of Patreon, he quit his job to work on it full time. Today he has over 500k followers on his Instagram profile and is also very successful on the Twitch platform.
Early inspirations
When asked when he began drawing and what inspired him to start creating comics, he replied that it was as far back as he can recall. Ever since he could grab a pen, he would draw doodles and it evolved into more sophisticated drawings.
As for his early contact with comics and cartoons, he read The Far Side, Calvin & Hobbes and had a complete infatuation with Garfield. All of this got him into comics. From then on, it was history.
Gregor is self-taught
We asked Gregor if he was entirely self-taught or if he had any formal art training. He was very honest and replied that he lacked the necessary training for drawing. However, he specialized in 3D as he was pursuing a career in 3D game artistry.
He said, “While attending an art school is undoubtedly preferable to self-teaching, it is not the only option. No way, not with the Internet and all the available free tutorials.” He found other sources to learn drawing.
An artist in progress
Gregor wanted to be a better artist so he came up with a plan. He thought he would stick with it better if he had the pressure of people watching his progress. He said, “So I decided to create an art blog where I would post my updates. I called it ‘Loading Artist’ because I’m an artist in progress.”
However, not too long after creating the website, he had the idea to create a comic book and practice his drawing inside of it.
Coming up with ideas
The hardest thing for Gregor is to think of comedic concepts. He appears to work well under pressure and comes up with ideas near their due date. “I’ll make an effort to sit down and brainstorm for at least a few days beforehand, but it rarely happens until the penultimate night when something finally puts me out of my agony,” he shares.
He typically pounds it out during brainstorming sessions when sitting down at a cafe with a coffee and sketchbook. He always keeps his phone close at hand in case something sparks an idea for a fast digital note.
Changing workflows
There have been some big changes in his workflow comparing the very first Loading Artist comic to the most recent work. The biggest change would be moving from Adobe Photoshop to Clip Studio Paint. “I am in love with my current workflow and drawing the line art is a breeze in comparison with all my new hotkeys and techniques.”
The biggest game-changer for him has been using vector layers for the lines because it gives him the freedom to easily edit a line and even fast erase the parts he doesn’t want.
Loyal fan base
Early in March 2014, Gregor joined Patreon, and it has been a good experience so far for him. He considers himself extremely fortunate to have such a loyal fan base. Patreon lets people financially support and reward content creators — such as podcasters, writers, and YouTubers — through a monthly subscription.
Regarding ideas for how to make better use of Patreon, he thinks you should keep the prizes fair in terms of how long they will take you to do them, as they might add up quickly and compromise your primary work.
Twitch
When asked if he practiced other artwork outside comics, Gregor said: “The only other artwork I produce, aside from my comics, is for my Twitch stream, whether it’s an animated overlay, emotes, or gaming wallpapers for the games we play. I don’t do much drawing besides comics.”
Twitch is a video-streaming platform that offers a fun, social way to watch people play games. Through the Twitch app, gamers who broadcast their matches (known as streamers) play their favorite titles while providing running commentary on the action.
His favorite comics
Gregor’s favorite comics are also webcomics. Extraordinary Comics, which is drawn nicely and has a surreal/wholesome element, is one of his favorite webcomics, written by his real-life best friend. In addition to Safely Endangered, which is funny and has a very pleasing style.
“For me, a good comic is one that is concise and uses few words. I also enjoy comics that feature more than just two people gazing at each other while keeping their lips open.”
Advice for new comic artists
When asked to share any final advice for aspiring comic artists, Gregor simply said “Just start.” He frequently receives inquiries about how to develop a “style” or how to get ready when considering creating a comic, etc.
The best advice is to just get started. Your initial work will undoubtedly be terrible, but that is to be expected. Just continue to create. Don’t hold on to your earlier work. Recognize your growth and learning. Practice makes perfect, just keep doing what you do.
Gameloft
Gregor worked as an UI artist at Gameloft in New Zealand He has worked as the lead user interface artist on a few games, including the recent “Ice Age Adventures” and “My Little Pony.” It entails setting the interface’s style, creating the menus in Photoshop and Flash, sharing ideas with the designers, and attempting to maintain good relations with the programmers.
A user interface (UI) artist works primarily in the video game industry. As a UI artist, your responsibilities entail the implementation and optimization of user-friendly graphics, icons, and buttons to help players understand complex games or game features.
Dual artistic existence
Gregor is between 2 career paths. He has two careers: one as a UI artist in the video game industry, and the other as a comic book creator. He has been alternating between the two.
He originally intended to work in the games industry as a 3D artist (or a 2D concept artist), but while pursuing his Game Development Graduate Diploma at Media Design School, he discovered he had a passion for creating a game’s user interface. This is how he ended up in Gameloft.
Post frequency
Gregor started the webcomic Loading Artist at the beginning of 2011. He had no idea where he wanted to go with it; all his instinct told him was that he needed to act quickly. He was actually experiencing a minor quarter-life crisis.
Loading Artist is about an artist who wants to become rich and famous. He is very grateful considering he posts anywhere from “once a week” to “once in a blue moon.” Nevertheless, his fans never miss a post.
Gregor admires Cyanide & Happiness
Going into deep conversation, when asked what inspired him the most, Gregor said “The occasional realization of how extremely limited our time on Earth is.” This gives him the push to keep creating no matter what to leave a mark behind.
When asked what webcomic or artwork he would have liked to create himself, he replied ‘Cyanide & Happiness’, which is a popular webcomic. In 2009, a journalist for The Telegraph named the comic as one of the top ten webcomics, and by 2012, the website was getting over a million visitors each day.
He takes pride in the work he did at Gameloft
Gregor takes pride in the work he accomplished at his job at Gameloft. Aside from his work in Loading Artist, he is pleased with everything he did at Gameloft.
Even though the iOS apps for “My Little Pony” and “Ice Age Adventures” are not exactly the kinds of games he would have wanted to create, he was proud of what his team and himself were able to accomplish, given the challenges they faced. Creating apps is not easy, and it requires a lot of knowledge and teamwork.
Good and bad advice
When asked what the best advice he received was, Gregor said that he never received it; however, he occasionally thinks back on an Akimbo comic (#202) because it helps him put things into perspective and reevaluate his priorities in life.
The worst piece of advice he received was to visit Reddit. “I’ve spent a lot of time online wasting time. It’s a habit I’m working on getting rid of.” Like addictive behaviors, excessive internet use has been shown to release dopamine in the brain.
Recurring characters
The comics that don’t feature the recurring characters, are actually comics created by the main recurring protagonist. The primary and recurring character is an artist who creates the comics and aspires to become a better artist (thus Loading Artist as he is still in the process of loading).
Recurring characters (no official names yet): The Guy with the Hat aka Hat Guy aka Loading Artist aka Gregor, The Girl aka The Girlfriend aka Jes, The Friend, The Cat aka Cat, The Bird, The Grim Reaper aka Grim aka Death, The Boss aka Game work Boss, and The Colleague aka Game work Employee.
Gameloft lay off
As many as 160 employees have lost their employment as a result of Gameloft, the biggest game company in New Zealand, closing another studio. Seven studios were shut down by the French mobile company in 2015 alone as part of what CEO Michel Guillemot called “an ambitious cost reduction initiative.”
The New Zealand closure, which would result in the loss of 160 jobs, maybe the most “ambitious” of all. This is when Gregor was laid off but fortunately he decided to dedicate his full time to webcomics.
The project that got shut down
Gameloft opened an office in Auckland in 2009, and the company has grown beyond all expectations. “When Gameloft first opened in Auckland six years ago, we anticipated that they would expand to a workforce of maybe 50 or 60 people. Their expansion to over 150 individuals demonstrates how well the team worked together,” said Stephen Knightley, chair of the New Zealand Game Developers Association.
However, Gameloft later opened a new office in Nigeria, a response to a sharp increase in revenue in Africa over the last four years.
Termination
Since then, the government has declared its intention to “claw back” the company’s $3 million in development funding. The closure’s method and justification, however, are yet unknown. Ex-employees from the company explained that after the holiday break when they came back to the office, they were met with bad news.
“When we came in on Monday, they essentially told us the studio wasn’t profitable. Their proposal was to terminate the operations at the studio, making us all redundant.” Then, they handed them a letter in which they highlighted some financial data demonstrating that we had practically been operating at a loss since 2014.
Callaghan Innovation
After opening an office in Auckland ten years ago, Gameloft quickly expanded to three times the size anticipated by the industry before deciding to leave. The largest single employer in the nation in the video game industry is the company that created My Little Pony and a Despicable Me video game.
Grants have been suspended by Crown agency Callaghan Innovation as of this afternoon. It announced that it had provided Gameloft funding totaling a little over $3.5 million and that it would now attempt to recover every penny of it, with the exception of $5,000 in student awards.
Taxpayers’ money
One-fourth of the workforce in the game-maker sector was employed by Gameloft. Daniel Stephens, the company’s local manager, was reported as saying, “We can only see it expand from here,” in an official case study dated October 2015, praising Gameloft’s achievements. According to Steven Joyce, minister of science and innovation, supporting such industries cannot guarantee success. He now anticipated that Callaghan Innovation would ensure the return of taxpayer funds.
Several hundred businesses that work in the game industry, ICT, and high-tech manufacturing receive growth subsidies equal to about 20% of their R&D costs (research and development).
Intellectual property
Minister Joyce said, “It’s the same deal for everybody, and there’s also a claw-back provision so, let’s say they didn’t continue their R&D in New Zealand, Callaghan Innovation has the right to claw back that money.” Any intellectual property created In New Zealand was transferred to Gameloft.
According to Mr. Joyce, there was no way to prevent such and the awards program did not require tightening. Iain Butler, a spokesman for Callaghan Innovation, said that while it looked that all research and development had now come to an end, it was unclear why Gameloft was leaving.
Work environment
A staff member who worked at Gameloft for five years said that there was anxiety before the company announced its demise. According to them, the staff was informed two weeks ago that they had to find a solution to avoid revenue loss and excessive spending, and days later, they were informed that it would be their last day at work.
The head office was making a lot of poor choices, he claimed. No real explanations were given to the staff members.
Job opportunities
Stephen Knightly, the chair of the New Zealand Game Developers Association, said Gameloft had benefited from the subsidies because it had served as an incubator for game developers who later established their own studios.
Mr. Knightly anticipated that a large portion of those let go would swiftly land new video-game positions. Grinding Gear Games announced that it had already made six job offers. On the Paris Stock Exchange, Gameloft is valued at $700 million. Hopefully, all the staff members were able to get a job in game-making.
Alleged labor legislation violation
Gameloft Auckland has been absolved of suspicions that it violated labor legislation after former lead programmer Glenn Watson made complaints of hazardous working conditions. The New Zealand Labor Department concluded it could discover “no substantial evidence” that workers had been put at risk because of what was alleged to be unreasonable working.
Watson stated he had worked between 100 and 120 hours a week on occasion. “There were other times when I would be called back into the office at 11:30 pm by the studio producer, only to head home again at 2:30 am,” he said at the time.
Gameloft proved innocent
Watson’s allegations prompted the authorities to investigate whether Gameloft Auckland had transgressed the nation’s Health and Employment Act (1992), endangering workers through exhaustion.
After the investigation’s conclusion, no action would be taken against the French publisher, according to Gameloft’s Sydney-based spokesman Paul Puech, who also stated that the business has no more remark to make. The case was closed, and no more allegations were made after that by Watson or other staff members. Watson’s claims could not be proved a hundred percent.
Contract changes
Watson continues by asserting that he believed such working conditions were approved by Gameloft’s French management and that it was common practice for the company to fabricate deadlines in order to finish games ahead of schedule.
However, Gameloft changed its employee contracts to provide time in place of overtime after receiving complaints. Why aren’t they prepared to fix the fact that staff members are even being asked to work fourteen-hour days in the first place if they went in and rectified this? Watson enquired.
Coworkers believe in Watson
Numerous other workers have backed up Watson’s accusations, and there are emails that have been recorded that “seem to be authentic” and show Watson discussing the long hours with senior management. According to reports, management maintained that the absurd time constraints were allowed by employee contracts.
Watson’s resignation from the company, though, appears to have been the final straw for him: “Gameloft urged me to ‘apologize’ for leaving the studio and allowing others to carry the weight of my labor.”
Gameloft in Nigeria
Gameloft is opening a new office in Nigeria due to a 536 percent rise in sales there over the previous four years. According to Vincent Brezillon, sales director for Africa, “the opening of a new trade office in Africa will allow us to take advantage of the significant potential of a market that already has more than 367 million users.”
“The expansion of a subsidiary in Nigeria, the continent’s largest economy, has been fully justified by the success we’ve had since opening an office in Johannesburg and the soaring sales in Africa over the past two years.”
Digital Strips
Digital strips is a webcomic podcast, where they are reviewed by Jason Sigler, Steve Shinney, Terence McManus and Daku Memmel. Their intention is to bring at least 5% of webcomics worth reading to the rest of the world.
There is also a Digital Strig blog, where coverage of the webcomic community is provided with news and commentary. The podcast features webcomic reviews, roundtable discussions, occasional interviews with webcomic creators and characters, and general advice on how to start and operate a webcomic. They reviewed Loading Artist’s webcomics.
Comparisons
The podcast team first compares Loading Artist’s style with Anyone for Rhubarb?, I am ARG!, Amazing Superpowers and Optipess, since they repeat characters doing bizarre things. They say the art style is simple jokes, but not so simple emotions.
In particular, Jason thinks that the style has got a lot of depth to it, shading, perception and perspective. He remarks the comic is done by someone who knows how to draw. He compares it to The Oatmeal, Cyanide and Happiness and the Perry Bible Fellowship and says that Loading Artist is like a mix of these three.
Story Arc
Jason also remarks that he particularly liked the story arc of the breakup, because it was based on the real life story of the author. The main character’s girlfriend, Jes, breaks up with him and leaves. Gregor did a short series of this story arc and Jason believes you can really see how Gregor is dealing with the breakup through his art.
The character of Jess was a regular one until that point, which makes it more painful when she leaves to never appear again. Jason enjoyed this comic journal aspect of it.
Juxtaposition of styles
The team discusses the juxtaposition of the simplicity of the characters (like Cyanide and happiness) and the painted backgrounds (like Bolt City/Copper). They also mention that these are the most detailed stick figures they have ever seen, since they appear to be people because of how expressive they are.
They agree that with this comic, you will never know what you are going to get, but you are going to feel an emotion, which makes it quite unique.
The length of a comic
One of the things that sets this webcomic apart from others is its strip length. Jason likes the idea that you never know how long the comic is going to be. It can go very long or it can be done in only three panels.
The fact that it can take up to 8 frames allows it more story and character development. In fiction writing, character development is the process of building a unique, three-dimensional character with depth, personality, and clear motivations.
He started out poorly
That is what others in the team think. Gregor’s first webcomics were not as good as the ones he does now. In the beginning it was a bit stiff and flat, but it was when the author started to add his emotions into it that the comic took off.
The podcast team recommends this webcomic, but what they don’t like is the commercial presentation. They state it is “too needy” because it’s constantly reminding you to subscribe, donate and become a patreon.