Cyanide and Happiness
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''Cyanide & Happiness'' (''C&H'') is a
webcomic Webcomics (also known as online comics or Internet comics) are comics published on a website or mobile app. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers, or comic books. Webcomics can be co ...
created by Rob DenBleyker, Kris Wilson, Dave McElfatrick and
Matt Melvin Matthew Melvin Schultzman (born November 26, 1984), better known as Matt Melvin, is an American cartoonist and writer. He is known for his work on '' Cyanide & Happiness'' and his fantasy novel ''The Leeches Loom''. Early life Talking about his c ...
. The comic has been running since 2005 and is published on the website explosm.net along with animated shorts in the same style. Matt Melvin left ''C&H'' in 2014, and several other people have contributed to the comic and to the animated shorts. The comic and animations use
stick figure A stick figure, also known as a stickman, is a very simple drawing of a person or an animal, composed of a few lines, curves, and dots. On a stick figure, the head is most often represented by a circle, which can be either a solid color or som ...
art to present graphic, dark, and often surreal humor which has been described as "seem ngto have no taste boundaries whatsoever", covering topics such as
abortion Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus. An abortion that occurs without intervention is known as a miscarriage or "spontaneous abortion"; these occur in approximately 30% to 40% of pregn ...
,
suicide Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
,
violence Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or Power (social and p ...
, and
necrophilia Necrophilia, also known as necrophilism, necrolagnia, necrocoitus, necrochlesis, and thanatophilia, is sexual attraction towards or a sexual act involving Cadaver, corpses. It is classified as a paraphilia by the World Health Organization (WHO) ...
. The comic was called one of the ten best webcomics by a columnist for ''
The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...
'' in 2009, and by 2012 the website was receiving over a million views each day. ''C&H'' has won a
Streamy Award The YouTube Streamy Awards, also known as the Streamy Awards or Streamys, are presented annually by Dick Clark Productions and Tubefilter to recognize excellence in online video, including directing, acting, producing, and writing. The forma ...
and has been nominated for an
Eisner Award The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books, sometimes referred to as the comics industry's equivalent of the Academy Awards. They are named in ...
. ''C&H'' has had multiple spinoffs: there have been four seasons of an animated television show called '' The Cyanide & Happiness Show''; three tabletop games have been produced; and two video games are in production.


Conception

''Cyanide & Happiness'' first appeared on explosm.net on January 26, 2005, but initial development of the comic started in 2004. According to
Matt Melvin Matthew Melvin Schultzman (born November 26, 1984), better known as Matt Melvin, is an American cartoonist and writer. He is known for his work on '' Cyanide & Happiness'' and his fantasy novel ''The Leeches Loom''. Early life Talking about his c ...
, he and Rob DenBleyker had been making stick figure death movies together around 1999 and 2000, and they knew Dave McElfatrick from the stick figure community. In around 2001, DenBleyker created the website StickSuicide, which hosted animations and games depicting the violent deaths of stick figures. According to Melvin, McElfatrick later joined StickSuicide, and Wilson was an active member of its forums. Wilson has described himself as the creator of ''Cyanide & Happiness;'' Melvin said that Wilson started the style of ''C&H.'' Wilson started drawing
stick figure A stick figure, also known as a stickman, is a very simple drawing of a person or an animal, composed of a few lines, curves, and dots. On a stick figure, the head is most often represented by a circle, which can be either a solid color or som ...
s while he was home sick from high school with
strep throat Streptococcal pharyngitis, also known as streptococcal sore throat (strep throat), is pharyngitis (an infection of the pharynx, the back of the throat) caused by ''Streptococcus pyogenes'' a gram-positive, group A streptococcus. Common symptom ...
, and was posting comics on the StickSuicide forums. According to Melvin, "when we decided to branch off from just stick figure death movies and do something more with the site, we elvin, DenBleyker and McElfatrickstarted Explosm and brought Kris
ilson Ilson Wilians Rodrigues (born March 12, 1979) is a Brazilian footballer who currently plays for América Futebol Clube (SP). His previous clubs include FC Shinnik Yaroslavl and C.S. Marítimo Club Sport Marítimo MH M, commonly known as Mar ...
on board." The website name "Explosm" came from a domain name DenBleyker was
squatting Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use. The United Nations estimated in 2003 that there ...
on. Another potential name for the project was "BestWhileHigh.com", an idea Wilson disliked, as he thought it sounded too much like teen zine or 9gag. Wilson said that when he heard the name "Explosm", he thought, "I don't know what you just said, but I love it!" The first animation appeared on explosm.net in 2006.


Creators

''Cyanide & Happiness'' was started by four cartoonists who were at the time in different locations: in 2006, Rob DenBleyker was a college student at
University of Texas at Dallas The University of Texas at Dallas (UTD or UT Dallas) is a public research university in Richardson, Texas. It is one of the largest public universities in the Dallas area and the northernmost institution of the University of Texas system. It wa ...
; Kris Wilson lived in
Fort Bridger, Wyoming Fort Bridger is a census-designated place (CDP) in eastern Uinta County, Wyoming, United States. The population was 345 at the 2010 census. The community takes its name from the eponymous Fort Bridger, established in 1842, which is located wit ...
; Matt Melvin lived in
San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United States ...
; and Dave McElfatrick lived in
Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...
,
Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
. The creators did not meet each other face-to-face until the 2007
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego Comic-Con International is a comic book convention and nonprofit multi-genre entertainment event held annually in San Diego, California since 1970. The name, as given on its website, is Comic-Con International: San Diego; but it is co ...
. In 2010, McElfatrick started a petition for a visa into the United States, in order to be with the other writers to produce more animated shorts. The petition garnered over 146,000 signatures and in September 2010 it was announced that Dave qualified for the visa that would allow him to work in the United States. On August 31, 2014, Matt Melvin announced that he was no longer part of Cyanide and Happiness. Melvin said in a personal post that he was "pretty depressed over the turn of events. Making comics on the internet for a living was an absolute dream come true. To find myself no longer in that position is awful on multiple levels." Melvin later said in an AMA that the other creators forced him to leave through "a clause in our contract that, in the opinion of myself and all the lawyers I spoke to, was grossly misused" and that he was now forbidden to draw ''C&H'' characters. According to explosm.net, Melvin preferred "to focus his talents in web design and project management ndvery rarely worked on the animations. His comic production also scaled down, releasing only three to four per month, and his attention shifted to focus on more personal projects. Eventually Matt stepped down from project management, and in February 2014, left the C&H team entirely. The transition went smoothly, and the Cyanide & Happiness team was able to maintain momentum despite losing a member of the team." Other creators have contributed to the comic and to the animated shorts, such as Chase Suddarth, Joel Watson, Connor Murphy, Zach Prescott, Bill Jones, Mike Salcedo and Shawn Coss. According to their Twitter profiles as of 2021, DenBleyker still lives in Dallas, Texas, and McElfatrick now lives there too, while Wilson lives in
Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
.


Production


Publication

The webcomic is published daily. Wilson credited the comic's success to consistent output, saying, "There are plenty of funny people creating content, but they're not consistent or reliable. The Internet has
ADD Addition (usually signified by the plus symbol ) is one of the four basic operations of arithmetic, the other three being subtraction, multiplication and division. The addition of two whole numbers results in the total amount or '' sum'' of ...
, and if you're not constantly giving them something new, you're going to lose them." Each cartoonist creates their own strips; they have used
Skype Skype () is a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for VoIP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also has instant messaging, file transfer, deb ...
for occasional collaboration. McElfatrick said in 2010, "We all help each other with writing sometimes, but generally each of us take turns in both writing and creating the comic on a given day." In 2010, DenBleyker was using
Macromedia Flash Macromedia Flash may refer to: *Adobe Animate, a multimedia authoring and computer animation program formerly known as ''Macromedia Flash'' *Adobe Flash Adobe Flash (formerly Macromedia Flash and FutureSplash) is a multimedia software platform ...
to draw the comic.


Animated shorts

In 2006, the first animated version of ''C&H'' appeared on the website. According to Explosm, it currently releases a short each week. Many more people are involved in producing the animated shorts than in the comic; as an example one short released in 2017 had twenty-one people credited to its production.


Format and themes


Format

Each ''Cyanide & Happiness'' comic strip varies in length, but are typically three to six panels. The comics are usually static, but some of the comics have animated panels.


Setting and characters

The comic regularly makes jokes on controversial topics including
abortion Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus. An abortion that occurs without intervention is known as a miscarriage or "spontaneous abortion"; these occur in approximately 30% to 40% of pregn ...
,
madness Madness or The Madness may refer to: Emotion and mental health * Anger, an intense emotional response to a perceived provocation, hurt or threat * Insanity, a spectrum of behaviors characterized by certain abnormal mental or behavioral patterns * ...
,
suicide Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
,
AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual m ...
,
disabilities Disability is the experience of any condition that makes it more difficult for a person to do certain activities or have equitable access within a given society. Disabilities may be cognitive, developmental, intellectual, mental, physical, se ...
, and
necrophilia Necrophilia, also known as necrophilism, necrolagnia, necrocoitus, necrochlesis, and thanatophilia, is sexual attraction towards or a sexual act involving Cadaver, corpses. It is classified as a paraphilia by the World Health Organization (WHO) ...
. One review noted the characters in the comic regularly explode "along with being beaten, shot, and occasionally torn asunder by projectile food", another noted, "its subjects include correcting the spelling in a suicide note, a doctor feeling up a dead patient, and a character giving the Lincoln Memorial a lapdance", and another highlighted a strip in which a boy cries for four panels over the corpse of his father who was hit by a car. Characters rarely have names and are usually only distinguishable by the colors of their shirts. The male characters almost always have no hair, which became a joke in itself in #642. Female characters are distinguishable by their long hair and chest size, often used to comedic effect. Some recurring characters have names, such as "
Obese Obesity is a medical condition, sometimes considered a disease, in which excess body fat has accumulated to such an extent that it may negatively affect health. People are classified as obese when their body mass index (BMI)—a person's we ...
Maurice", the
epileptic Epilepsy is a group of non-communicable neurological disorders characterized by recurrent epileptic seizures. Epileptic seizures can vary from brief and nearly undetectable periods to long periods of vigorous shaking due to abnormal electrical ...
superhero "Seizure Man", and
Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
. DenBleyker said that the stick figure style "makes the characters seem very transient, as if they only exist for a given comic", and said that, "'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." Some comics
break the fourth wall The fourth wall is a performance convention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this ''wall'', the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. From the 16th cen ...
. For instance, in #375, one of the characters looks at the reader, and the other asks what he is looking at. He then looks out and says "Holy shit! It's a person!" In #445, the panel catches on fire and the characters inside panic. In #680, a character has fallen through a broken bottom border of the panel.


Influences

Wilson and DenBleyker have mentioned the newspaper comic ''
The Far Side ''The Far Side'' is a single-panel comic created by Gary Larson and syndicated by Chronicle Features and then Universal Press Syndicate, which ran from December 31, 1979, to January 1, 1995 (when Larson retired as a cartoonist). Its surrealist ...
'' by
Gary Larson Gary Larson (born August 14, 1950) is an American cartoonist, environmentalist, and former musician. He is the creator of ''The Far Side'', a single-panel cartoon series that was syndicated internationally to more than 1,900 newspapers for fif ...
and the webcomic ''
The Perry Bible Fellowship ''The Perry Bible Fellowship'' (abbreviated to ''PBF'') is a webcomic and newspaper comic strip by Nicholas Gurewitch. It first appeared in the Syracuse University newspaper ''The Daily Orange'' in 2001. The comics are usually three or four pa ...
'' by Nicholas Gurewitch as influences for the comic. Wilson mentioned
Don Hertzfeldt Don Hertzfeldt (born August 1, 1976) is an American animator, writer, and independent filmmaker. He is a two-time Academy Award nominee who is best known for the animated films ''It's Such a Beautiful Day'', the '' World of Tomorrow'' series, an ...
,
Bill Hicks William Melvin Hicks (December 16, 1961 – February 26, 1994) was an American stand-up comedian, social critic, satirist, and musician. His material—encompassing a wide range of social issues including religion, politics, and philosophy—wa ...
, ''
White Ninja Comics ''White Ninja'' is an animated webseries created by Scott Bevan and Kent Earle from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. It was previously a webcomic that ran from 2002 to 2012 as part of the National Lampoon Humor Network. The comic was also part o ...
'',
Monty Python Monty Python (also collectively known as the Pythons) were a British comedy troupe who created the sketch comedy television show '' Monty Python's Flying Circus'', which first aired on the BBC in 1969. Forty-five episodes were made over four ...
, and David Wong as influences. At a 2012 panel, DenBleyker stated that he writes for up to ten hours a day and collaborates with friends. McElfatrick said he was inspired by old British children's comics such as ''
The Beano ''The Beano'' (formerly ''The Beano Comic'', also known as ''Beano'') is a British anthology comic magazine created by Scottish publishing company DC Thomson. Its first issue was published on 30 July 1938, and it became the world's longest-runn ...
and The Dandy''. Melvin did not read comics as a kid, but enjoyed Larson's ''The Far Side'' and
Matt Groening Matthew Abram Groening ( ; born February 15, 1954) is an American cartoonist, writer, producer, and animator. He is the creator of the comic strip ''Life in Hell'' (1977–2012) and the television series ''The Simpsons'' (1989–present), ''Fut ...
's ''
Life in Hell ''Life in Hell'' is a comic strip by Matt Groening, creator of ''The Simpsons'', ''Futurama'', and ''Disenchantment'', which was published weekly from 1977 to 2012. The strip features anthropomorphic rabbits and a gay couple. The comic covers a w ...
''; he preferred live-action sketch comedy shows such as ''
The Kids in the Hall The Kids in the Hall is a Canadian sketch comedy troupe formed in 1984, consisting of comedians Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney and Scott Thompson. Their eponymous television show ran from 1989 to 1995, on CBC, in C ...
'', ''Monty Python'', ''
Upright Citizens Brigade The Upright Citizens Brigade is an improvisational and sketch comedy group that emerged from Chicago's ImprovOlympic in 1990. The original incarnation of the group consisted of Matt Besser, Amy Poehler, Ian Roberts, Matt Walsh, Adam McKay, Ri ...
'', and ''
Mr. Show ''Mr. Show with Bob and David'', also known as ''Mr. Show'', is an American sketch comedy series starring and hosted by Bob Odenkirk and David Cross. It aired on HBO from November 3, 1995, to December 28, 1998. Cross and Odenkirk introduced m ...
''.


Events

On occasion, ''Cyanide & Happiness'' has featured Depressing Comic Weeks, where for the week all the comics are depressing or upsetting. The December 30 episode of the Cyanide and Happiness Show featured the "depressing episode", coinciding with the 8th depressing comic week at explosm.net. ''Cyanide & Happiness'' has featured Guest Weeks, where readers submitted entries, and some were featured as daily comics over the course of the week.


Reception


Readership figures

By April 2006, the website was receiving more than a million visits per week. By 2012, it received more than a million visitors each day. DenBleyker has said that the comic's popularity grew from their sharing policy, "which encourages readers to repost and re-blog comics, effectively allowing anyone to spread ''Cyanide and Happiness'' content." In January 2006, the comic was getting about 20,000 unique visitors a day, but "we added a little box under each comic which allows people to post an Explosm-linked version of the comic, which brings a lot of traffic back to us. After we put that box up, the traffic started exploding." After a few days, the comic received about 300,000 unique visitors a day, which consisted of mostly traffic from Myspace and
LiveJournal LiveJournal (russian: Живой Журнал), stylised as LiVEJOURNAL, is a Russian-owned social networking service where users can keep a blog, journal, or diary. American programmer Brad Fitzpatrick started LiveJournal on April 15, 1999, as ...
blog links. In a 2010 interview, the creators reported that based on surveys and conventions their audience was split equally between men and women.


Critical reviews and responses

Tom Chivers, a columnist for ''
The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...
'', 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...
he comic He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
seems to have no taste boundaries whatsoever...
his is His or HIS may refer to: Computing * Hightech Information System, a Hong Kong graphics card company * Honeywell Information Systems * Hybrid intelligent system * Microsoft Host Integration Server Education * Hangzhou International School, in ...
not one for the faint-hearted... approach with caution." Writing for '' CBR'' in 2010, reviewer Brigid Alverson said, "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 are fairly uniform; a situation is set up in the first panel and resolved, by stabbing, boob-grabbing, or shouting "You have cancer! LOL!" in the last....Fortunately, the creators pace themselves, mixing different types of humor (including some clever wordplay and visual puns that aren't at all bloody) so that when someone gets stabbed in the forehead, it actually does come as a surprise. Also, there's 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 usually spot-on. Occasionally someone is left hanging for an extra panel, but usually it works." John Hargrave of the website ''
Zug , neighboring_municipalities = Cham, Baar, Walchwil, Steinhausen, Unterägeri , twintowns = Fürstenfeld (Austria), Kalesija (Bosnia-Herzegowina) Zug (Standard German: , Alemannic German: ; french: Zoug it, Zugo r ...
'' said that "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 in which disembodied heads turn into seagulls, and Jesus is a designated driver." A writer for student newspaper
Yale Daily News The ''Yale Daily News'' is an independent student newspaper published by Yale University students in New Haven, Connecticut since January 28, 1878. It is the oldest college daily newspaper in the United States. The ''Yale Daily News'' has consis ...
said in 2012 that the comic was "known for its unusual, graphic and insensitive jokes". Writing for ''Comixtalk'' in 2007, reviewer Xavier Xerexes said that the art was "pretty minimal, but my impression is it's gotten better over the archives of the strip and really for awhile now has been pretty good. It's still stickmen, but it's a slicker stickman style". In response to the question regarding controversial topics, DenBleyker said that the authors have not received a huge amount of serious negative feedback and do not intend to tone down the edginess of their comics. The newspaper strip ''Pearls Before Swine'' parodied ''Cyanide & Happiness'' in a strip in June 2013. The strip claimed to be a rerun of a C&H strip, showing one panel in its art style with almost all of the dialogue censored by black bars.


Awards

The book collection ''Cyanide & Happiness: Stab Factory'' was nominated for an
Eisner Award The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books, sometimes referred to as the comics industry's equivalent of the Academy Awards. They are named in ...
in the Best Humor Publication category in 2016. ''Cyanide & Happiness'' won a
Streamy Award The YouTube Streamy Awards, also known as the Streamy Awards or Streamys, are presented annually by Dick Clark Productions and Tubefilter to recognize excellence in online video, including directing, acting, producing, and writing. The forma ...
in 2015 in the Animated Category, and was nominated again in 2016.


Print collections

The first two books were released by Explosm through
It Books HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Corp ...
, a division of
HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Cor ...
. The third and fourth books were published by Boom! Box, an imprint of
Boom! Studios Boom! Studios (styled BOOM! Studios) is an American comic book and graphic novel publisher, headquartered in Los Angeles, California, United States. History Origins In the early 2000s, Ross Richie and Andrew Cosby had been working in Holly ...
. The first two volumes each feature 120 of the artists' favorite ''Cyanide & Happiness'' comics, and 30 previously unpublished comics. The third volume featured many ''Cyanide & Happiness'' comics from their Depressing Comic Weeks with 40 previously unpublished comics, while the fourth is another compilation of the artists' favorites.


Television adaptation

In addition to the animated shorts created for the website since 2006, the artists created '' The Cyanide and Happiness Show''. This show was created following a Kickstarter in 2013 and premiered in 2014. The first season was released for free online, while for the second season it was picked up by TV network
Seeso Seeso was an over-the-top subscription streaming service owned by Comcast through NBCUniversal, launched on January 7, 2016, and closed on November 8, 2017. It provided comedy content such as original and broadcast television shows. History O ...
; later it moved to VRV. ''The Cyanide & Happiness Show'' has had four seasons, each of 10–11 episodes. The episodes for the TV versions of the show were 22 minutes long. The animations have been in
Adobe Flash Adobe Flash (formerly Macromedia Flash and FutureSplash) is a multimedia Computing platform, software platform used for production of Flash animation, animations, rich web applications, application software, desktop applications, mobile apps, mo ...
format and are typically voiced by the cartoonists. The team hired contributors from the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
,
India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
and
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
for various processes.


Game adaptations


''Joking Hazard''

In February 2016, Explosm started a
Kickstarter Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...
project for a ''Cyanide & Happiness'' card game titled ''Joking Hazard'', in which each card is a possible panel of a comic and the players must attempt to produce a humorous combination. The project's funding finished with over $3.2 million
USD The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...
in backings, and at the time was the second most funded card game in Kickstarter history after ''
Exploding Kittens ''Exploding Kittens'' is a casual dedicated deck card game designed by Matthew Inman of ''The Oatmeal'' webcomic, Elan Lee and Shane Small, and first published by ''The Oatmeal'' in 2015. Beginning as a Kickstarter project seeking US$10,000 in ...
''. ''Joking Hazard'' was released in 2016; reviews have compared the game to ''
Cards Against Humanity ''Cards Against Humanity'' is an adult party game in which players complete fill-in-the-blank statements, using words or phrases typically deemed offensive, risqué, or politically incorrect, printed on playing cards. It has been compared to th ...
'', and the game has an average user rating of 6.4 out of 10 on
BoardGameGeek BoardGameGeek (BGG) is an online forum for board gaming hobbyists and a game database that holds reviews, images and videos for over 125,600 different tabletop games, including European-style board games, wargames, and card games. In addition to ...
.


''Trial by Trolley''

In June 2019, another Kickstarter campaign for a card game project was launched, developed in collaboration with
Skybound Entertainment Skybound Entertainment is an American multiplatform entertainment company founded by Robert Kirkman and David Alpert. History Skybound Entertainment is the company behind the long-running comic, '' The Walking Dead'', created by Robert Kirkman ...
, titled ''Trial by Trolley''. The game is an adaptation of the
trolley problem The trolley problem is a series of thought experiments in ethics and psychology, involving stylized ethical dilemmas of whether to sacrifice one person to save a larger number. The series usually begins with a scenario in which a runaway tram or ...
in
philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
where a player must choose a track to send an out of control trolley down. The campaign raised over US$3.5 million. ''Trial by Trolley'' was released in 2020 and it also has a 6.4 out of 10 rating on BoardGameGeek.


''Rapture Rejects''

In November 2018, Explosm Games, along with developer studio Galvanic Games and publisher
tinyBuild tinyBuild Inc. is an American publisher of indie games based in Bellevue, Washington. The company was established by Alex Nichiporchik and Tom Brien in 2011 to expand Brien's game '' No Time to Explain'' into a commercial release. Building fro ...
, released ''Rapture Rejects'' to
Steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization ...
as an
early access Early access, also known as alpha access, alpha founding, paid alpha, or game preview, is a funding model in the video game industry by which consumers can purchase and play a game in the various pre-release development cycles, such as pre-alph ...
game. ''Rapture Rejects'' is a battle royale style game. The developers stated that they planned to release the game in early 2020, but the game remained in early access, and is no longer available for sale.


''Freakpocalypse''

In September 2017, Explosm began another Kickstarter for a ''Cyanide & Happiness'' video game with a goal of $300,000, earning over $575,000. The game is described to borrow elements from games such as '' South Park: The Stick of Truth''. The game was slated to be released near the end of 2018 but was later pushed to 2019, then delayed again to 2020 and then again until "early 2021". The game's title was announced in March 2020 to be ''Cyanide & Happiness: Freakpocalypse Part 1 – Hall Pass to Hell''. The first part of the game was released on March 11, 2021.


''Master Dater''

In March 2022, Explosm began Gamefound for a new ''Cyanide & Happiness'' card game titled ''Master Dater''. It will be released on February 14, 2023.


Other adaptations

Explosm released a ''Cyanide & Happiness''
mobile app A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on d ...
in 2013. The free "Lite" version allowed the user to access the last 30 days of the archive. ''Cyanide & Happiness'' characters were used in the television advertisements for
Orange Mobile Orange S.A. (), formerly France Télécom S.A. (stylized as france telecom) is a French multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications corporation. It has 266 million customers worldwide and employs 89,000 people in France, and 5 ...
's Orange Wednesdays, though in an interview Matt Melvin said the characters in the ads "weren't really ''C&H'' characters, but were definitely based on them." The artists of ''C&H'' produced comic adaptations of user stories for the website
FMyLife FMyLife is an English-language blog that serves as "a recollection of everyday anecdotes likely to happen to anyone". Posts on the site are short, user-submitted stories of unfortunate happenings that begin with "Today" and end with "FML". At its ...
, in the same art style as ''C&H''. Merchandise sold by ''Cyanide and Happiness'' includes T-shirts, figurines, housewares, school supplies, signed prints, and a beer.


Other works by the creators

DenBleyker made a series called ''Joe Zombie'', which lasted six episodes, and left fans to anticipate a seventh, where he stated "will come out eventually". McElfatrick wrote ''Die Romantic – A Look At Aiden'', which scathingly critiques goth punk band
Aiden Aiden was an American horror punk band from Seattle, Washington that formed in the spring of 2003. They achieved underground success during the mid to late 2000s with their classic lineup, featuring vocalist William Francis, guitarists Angel Ib ...
. After leaving the ''Cyanide and Happiness'' team, Melvin started a new webcomic, titled ''The Last Nerds on Earth''. 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. McElfatrick also produces his own YouTube videos, where he reviews games, and chats with friends, such as Gus Johnson. DenBleyker and Dave McElfatrick wrote and starred in a series called ''Purgatony''.


References


Comics references


General references


External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Cyanide and Happiness Black comedy comics American comedy webcomics 2005 webcomic debuts 2000s webcomics 2010s webcomics 2020s webcomics Webcomics in print