Customer Reviews

The Huge Book of Hell

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Before there was "The Simpsons," there was "Life in Hell," a dark comic strip drawn by Matt Groening. As Groening has become famous for the great television series he created, he has continued drawing this weird but hilarious strip. There are several "Life in Hell" books with names like "School is Hell" and "Childhood is Hell." I recommend reading "Work is Hell" when you are frustrated with your job and checking out "Love Is Hell" when love just ain't coming your way and you want to feel better about that. The books are much darker and more philosophical than "The Simpsons." The drawings are raw and crude. The humor can be quite self- deprecating. For example, Groening draws most of his characters as bunnies only to have some characters ask if they are drawn that way because of the cartoonist's artistic limitations. But the writing more than makes up for the weak drawing. His new book, "The Huge Book of Hell," for example, has suggested magazine covers: "'Annoying Performance Artist magazine', not to be confused with Annoying Street Lunatic magazine." The imaginary publication features such articles as "The gentle art of scab-pulling and "Is it OK to yell 'I'm on fire' in a crowded theater?" Gross? Sure. Silly? Well, sometimes. High-brow? Maybe. And there is even a special book within the book. Yes, just like Oprah's book discussion group, Groening provides "A reading group guide to 'The Huge Book of Hell.'" The guide includes such discussion questions as: "How would you characterize the cartoonist's own attitude towards society? Does it change as the book progresses? Will it ever? Why does the cartoonist refuse to change? Have you read any of his other books? Is it any better there? What the hell is wrong with this guy?" My favorite cartoon panel in the book -- perhaps because it hits close to home -- shows a young character lying awake at night asking questions. "Do animal crackers feel pain when you bite their heads off? Why do flies land on dog manure? Don't they know it's dog manure?" and "How can anyone eat something called rump roast? and "Is it possible to have so many questions flying around inside your brain that you can never go to sleep and eventually go insane?" The final, inevitable panel shows him finally sleeping. Groening is great, no matter what the medium.

Matt Groening, the creator of one my favorite shows the simpsons, draws a little cartoon called Life In Hell. A strip that goes through lifes little moments like, Sex, Love, School, Hate, Death, Religion and Rabbits, whose conclusion is that we are all ... If you enjoy the simpsons at all, you will love this comic strip. Just open it up and start laughing I gaurentee that this will be funnier than Garfield or Charlie Brown could ever be.

Matt Groening, both in his Life In Hell series and the Simpsons TV show, has shown a keen eye for social satire. I constantly find elements of my own personality in his work. This book will keep you laughing cover-to-cover. Will and Abe's sibling rivalry is just hilarious. Akbar and Jef's relationship (romance?) reminds you that yours is not too bad. Binky and Bongo are constantly submitted to humiliation in a way that many of us can relate to. For some of us, Life In Hell is the story of our lives.

If you like The Simpsons, then you've gotta buy this book and learn about Hell. It's Groening unconstrained. Just like his TV show, Life in Hell is a bunch of poorly drawn characters on the surface and incredibly deep humor on the inside....10 stars!

After watching The Simpsons Anniversary Special in 3D on Ice, I wanted to revisit some of Groening's earlier works. The Big Book was sold out, so I went with this one, and I am not disappointed. There's a lot of funny, high quality strips in here. If anything, it makes me wish the Simpsons still had the edge Groening's series here. But if you're looking for a book full of self-referential, self-deprecating comic strips filled with bunnies, this is your book.

The first three or so chapters delighted me. At first, I was thinking, "Wow this guy thinks EXACTLY like I do!". Then I hit the rest of the book. The majority of this book is dedicated to who Matt Groaning hates, and it's always an extremely generalized group (and anyone who's read the book will no what I mean). He'll take a strip that starts out with a lot of creative potential, and then slap a very generalized criticism onto it. It wouldn't be so bad if these criticisms were sharp, witty, and made you think (which they sometimes are and do), but they usualy come off dissapointingly arrogant, shallow, and empty. What makes this especialy dissapointing is the fact that there are so many gems spread through out the book. Strips that seemed to speak to my very soul. But the I would envatibly turn the page and read strip that was so "instert word here"-ist that it threatened me to think less of Matt as a human being. This would be forgivable if all of the dissapointing strips were earlier ones, but many of them date all the way up to 1995, which gives plenty of slack for Matt to have grown up. I can't realy say Im glad to have read this book over all, but Im definitely glad that I was able to read a number of particular strips that were in it.

this is a very very very funny book. i have to say i like jeff and akbar more than the stuff with binky, bongo, and sheba. will and abe is funny too. i'm a cartoonist kinda' personan i think matt does really good cartoons, so whoever thinks he draws bad:!@#$ you! and if he's so bad why don't you try drawing binky, or bongo, or sheba, jeff,(akbar's the same looking)will, or abe!!! all you simpson fans; read it!