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Comic strip

Life in Hell is a comic strip by Matt Groening that was published weekly from 1977 to 2012. The strip features anthropomorphic rabbits and a gay couple. The comic covers a wide range of subjects, such as love, sex, work, and death, and explores themes of angst, social alienation, self loathing, and fear of inevitable doom.

Life in Hell started in 1977 as a self published comic book Groening used to describe life in Los Angeles to his friends. In the comic book, Groening attacked what many young adults found repellent: school, work, and love. He described it as "every ex campus protester's, every Boomer idealist's, conception of what adult existence in the '80s had turned out to be." These magazines contained comic strips, comedy sketches, letters, and photo collages. The magazine covers were humorous as well: the first issue saw Binky, a rabbit humanoid character, standing in a cloud of smog and declaring, "What you see is what you breathe." Groening also worked other imagery into the covers, such as drawings from Jules Verne's books and a photo of his family's living room. An editor from Wet magazine bought one of the magazines and liked it, and offered Groening a spot in the magazine; soon after, in 1978, Life in Hell debuted as a comic strip in the avant garde Wet, to which Groening made his first professional cartoon sale. The first strip, entitled "Forbidden Words", appeared in the September/October issue. Then publisher of the Reader Jane Levine said Groening arrived at editor in chief James Vowell's office one day, showing him his "silly cartoons with the rabbit with one ear." After Groening left, Vowell came out of his office saying, "This guy is gonna be famous someday." The book was an underground success, selling 22,000 copies in its first two printings. Caplan had already left her career in advertising sales at the Reader to manage the Life in Hell Co./Acme Features Syndicate full time, which managed syndication and merchandising for Groening's Life in Hell cartoons. The gift line included t shirts, mugs, calendars, and greeting cards. With Caplan's management and promotional talents his cartoon went from being published in 11 free weeklies to over 250 papers nationwide. In 1986, after Groening and Caplan had married, they published Work is Hell plus two calendars, one with cartoonist Lynda Barry. Matt's books soon drew the attention of Pantheon/Randomhouse, which obtained the rights to distribute the books. In 1989, Life in Hell Cartoon Co/Acme closed its doors. Life in Hell reached the attention of Hollywood producer James L. Brooks, who received one strip—"The Los Angeles Way of Death" from 1982—as a gift from fellow producer Polly Platt. In 1985, Brooks contacted Groening with the proposition of developing a series of short animated skits, called "bumpers", for The Tracey Ullman Show. Originally, Brooks had wanted Groening to adapt his Life in Hell characters for the show. Fearing the loss of ownership rights to his characters, Groening instead created an entirely new batch of characters: the Simpsons. As television began to place more demands on his time, however, Groening came to almost exclusively feature single panel strips or 16 panel grids in which Akbar and Jeff exchange terse jabs. This later period also saw the increase of autobiographical strips, perhaps because Groening was influenced by this burgeoning trend in alternative comics. Television has also made the strip "safe enough for a number of newspapers to print", according to Groening, who says he has not "toned the strip down at all, other than no longer using profanity" as a concession to daily papers that carry the strip. On December 7, 1998, Groening registered the domain mattgroening. com to publish Life in Hell online; however, the website has remained in its "under construction" state since then, although Groening insists he will "get around to it [when he is] ready to wade in on a regular basis." As of May 20, 2021, the domain leads to sponsored ad listings with a "This page is under construction Coming soon!" message in the top right corner below the Network Solutions banner. Groening decided in 2007, in the wake of the 2006 United States elections, to write "Life Is Swell" above the comic instead of "Life in Hell". Though Groening had previously stated that he would never give up the comic strip, in 2009 he indicated that due to troubling times for print newspapers and constant involvement with The Simpsons and Futurama, he would likely one day drop the strip. Three years later, Groening announced the strip's conclusion and the final new strip ran on June 16, 2012. The final strip shows Akbar or Jeff dancing naked, while the other tells him to stop. At the end of the strip he gives up and dances along with him, saying "Well, I tried."

The strip was published in a perfect square, unlike most Sunday strips which are published in rectangles. Various formats were used for different strip topics. When Akbar and Jeff were discussing love Groening would use four rows of boxes, each row with four in it. Other strips had one large panel, This is based on the way Lynda Barry made comics when they were in college, and the way it was published originally in the Reader. Atop each strip is the handwritten title "Life in Hell" and "Copyright Matt Groening" and the year it was made. Sometimes the title would be stylized in different fonts, with "This is your" above "Life in Hell," or with alternate spelling's of Groening's name. In the strip "Why men growl" he wrote his name as Matt "Grrrrroening." In "Are you Easily Provoked?" he misspelled his name three times until getting it right and writing "godamnit" underneath. If the strip is cowritten, Groening writes the contributor's name(s) underneath his. Groening sometimes put where he was when he was making the strip, such as Chicago or Portland, underneath his name.

Binky is a stressed and thus "normal" rabbit and star of the cartoon. He usually embodies dread and alienation. Binky is usually stuck in a dead end job, has a bad apartment and regularly sees a therapist. Binky is usually full of wise old sayings. Sheba is Binky's estranged girlfriend. Her character design is "basically Binky in drag". Binky and Sheba met at a coffee shop in a 1981 storyline, and are often used as a generic couple whenever Groening needs one. Bongo is Binky's illegitimate son, the product of a drunken night of "jungle passion." He was introduced in a 1983 storyline in which his mother, Hulga, left him with Binky so she could seek her fortune in New York. Bongo's defining physical attribute is his one ear, which Groening admits is solely so that the casual viewer can tell him apart from Binky. Bongo made an appearance in the Futurama episode "Xmas Story", where he is seen being sold in a pet shop. He also appeared in The Simpsons episode "Treehouse of Horror XII" as one of the rabbits that Homer catches in the trap. He appears in The Simpsons again in another episode as a plush toy in Lisa's room, though he is called Madam Bunny. He is shown as a plush toy in "The Fool Monty" where Mr. Burns is eating it in Bart's closet. He has a cameo in "Simpsorama" as one of the rabbit like creatures rampaging New New York, where he writes on a wall "Crossovers are hell". Akbar & Jeff are described in various strips and interviews as "either brothers or lovers — or both. Whatever offends you most, that’s what they are". In one interview, Groening says they are gay. Matt Groening appears in the strip as a bearded, bespectacled rabbit. He is also sometimes represented as Binky. Will and Abe are Matt Groening's two sons, represented in rabbit form. They usually talk about vampires, zombies, and other child fantasy topics. Snarla, a cat, is Bongo's classmate and love interest. She bears a resemblance to Lisa Simpson. Bart Simpson, has never spoken—except when he uttered his former catch phrase "Don't have a cow, man!" in a "forbidden words" strip—but is seen in the background of a number of strips. Mr. Simpson is Binky's anthropomorphic dog boss at his job. His name predates The Simpsons. Gooey, Screwy, and Ratatouille are Akbar and/or Jeff's triplet nephews. The names are an obvious spoof of the Disney characters Huey, Dewey and Louie (Donald Duck's nephews).