Hell in popular culture

Hell is a common theme for entertainment and popular culture, particularly in the Horror and Fantasy genres where it is often used as a location.^[1]

Art

• Perhaps the most famous depictions of hell can be viewed in several paintings by medieval Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch. The Garden of Earthly Delights is probably the most famous.
• Gustave Doré made illustrations for Dante's The Divine Comedy, including Dante's visit to hell.
• Auguste Rodin made a sculpture, The Gates of Hell, based on Hell depicted in Dante's The Divine Comedy.

Cartoons, anime, comics, manga, and televised cartoon series

• Hell is featured in the American Dad! episode, "The Most Adequate Christmas Ever". It is shown as a fiery canyon near Limbo that is filled with demons.
• In Bleach, Hell is the destination of those who committed unforgivably evil acts during their lives in the human world. When a Hollow whose mortal soul is too wicked to enter Soul Society is slain by a Zanpakutō, the gates of hell (giant doors held by skeletons) appear and begin to open. A giant, laughing spiritual being with a blade spears the wicked spirit and drags it down into hell. In the film Bleach: The Hell Verse, Ichigo goes to Hell to save his sister, Yuzu.
• In the DC Universe, the character Lobo was banned from Hell, as he caused too many problems there, thus achieving immortality, as he was also banned from Heaven for much the same reason. Incidentally, God apparently got some mirth from watching Lobo's antics. Hell in the Sandman Series is run by a triumvirate of Lucifer Morningstar, Azazel, and Beelzebub. However demons like Belial and the Rhymer Etrigan scheme to get into the Trimuverate. The capital of Hell is Pandaimoneum. When the Fire of Hell of extinguished, an act of evil is required to reunite it. This is done by Eclipso slitting Enchantresse's throat. Hell is divided into Nine provinces. The Nine Provinces included Pandemonia, The Odium, The Gull, Praetori, Internecia, Ament, Labyrinth, Err, and Purgatory. Everything there is made from the damned. The rulers of Purgatory, Blaza and Satanus, lead a rebellion by offering hope to the hopeless, and finally Blaze betrays her brother and becomes Hell's ruler.
• In the manga series Death Note, the Shinigami Death god Ryuk tells the protagonist Light that any human who uses a Death Note cannot go to Heaven or Hell. In the last volume Ryuk claims they go to Mu (Nothingness).
• In the comic strip Dilbert (created by Scott Adams) "heck" is a lesser version of hell reserved for people who have done misdeeds that are not evil enough to warrant hell. Heck is ruled by Phil, the Prince of Insufficient Light who carries a giant spoon instead of a pitchfork.
• In the Dragon Ball manga and anime series, Hell is never actually shown in the manga; however it is shown several times throughout the Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball GT and goes by its original name in the anime series. In the North American broadcast version, Hell was known as HFIL. This acronym was stated to stand for Home For Infinite Losers.
• In the Family Guy episode Holy Crap, Peter visits Hell in a cutaway joke where he finds Adolf Hitler, Al Capone, John Wilkes Booth and Superman. This baffles Peter, but Superman explains he was sent to hell "after murdering a hooker who made a joke about him being faster than a speeding bullet." In "Dial Meg for Murder," Goofy is sent to hell for being involved with the events on 9/11. When Goofy tells Satan "that's what they get for supporting Israel," Satan pushes him into the eternal fire.
• In the one-panel comic The Far Side (created by Gary Larson in the eighties) Hell is featured among other recurring themes, depicting Satan and his minions as grim-looking figures in robes with horns and pitchforks, running the place in business-like manner: in one instance, the bespectacled secretary behind the typewriter asks her boss seen as a silhouette behind the office door: There is an insurance salesman here. Should I admit him in or tell to go to Heaven?
• In the television series Futurama, the characters go to Robot Hell on occasion, where the Robot Devil and other evil robots reside. The entrance is located in New Jersey. In "Hell is Other Robots" Bender was put in there to be tormented in a series of "ironic punishments" such as being rolled into a giant cigar for smoking. A hell clause means that the Robot Devil will release a soul if he is beaten in a golden fiddle playing contest. In "The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings", Fry and Bender go to hell to make a deal for Fry to get robot hands so he can play the holophonor. The robot whose hands Fry will get is determined by a large wheel with every robot on it. Fry winds up with the Robot Devil's hands (I just put my name on there as a show of good faith to the other robots). The Robot Devil proceeds to use a "circuitous plan" involving Bender and Leela to convince Fry to trade hands back. At the end of the episode the Robot Devil returns to Hell, taking Richard Nixon with him. In 'The Beast with a billion backs' Bender gets the armies of Robot Hell in exchange for his first born son.
• In the comic book series Ghost Rider, Johnny Blaze sold his soul to the demon Mephisto to cure his adoptive father from dying of cancer. In the recent revival of the series we see the Ghost Rider residing in Hell to pay up his end of the bargain. Hell is depicted as a red desert with cannons and pools of lava. We see the devil as a powerful political leader residing in a grand palace with many servants and advisors. The palace is surrounded by burning towers. The demons Mephisto and Sattanish are sometimes shown with characters like Hitler, Himmler, and Stalin. In one story several villains are resurrected by Sattanish to form a Lethal Legion.
• Cartoonist Jimmy Hatlo created a series of Sunday newspaper cartoons about life in Hell called The Hatlo Inferno, which ran from 1953 to 1958.^[2]
• In the comic book series Hellboy by award-winning artist Mike Mignola, Hell is shown in the two page story "Pancakes" (1999 Dark Horse Presents Annual) to be a dark, alternate dimension filled with flames and demons and where the infernal capital city of Pandemonium resides. In issue one "Seed of Destruction" the Nazis with aid of the mad monk Rasputin successfully breach the transdimensional boundary of Hell via magic and call forth the infant Hellboy so that he may bring about the end of the world. They are stopped, however, by the Allied Forces who also rescue Hellboy and raise him.
• The comic book Spawn sees Hell its demons as an important plot element. Mercenary Al Simmons gets betrayed by his own employers, dies, and goes to Hell. He then makes a deal with the Devil Malebolgia (Guardian of Hell) that if he agrees to fight with Malebolgia's army, he would get to return to Earth and see his wife again. Throughout the comics, he meets and fights many nefarious characters.
• In the anime Jigoku Shojo, Hell is not seen but the soul is ferried there.
• In the Renkin 3-kyū Magical? Pokān episode, "The Spell of Rebirth is a Trip Through Hell", Uma is condemned to Hell by Enma (played by Dr. K-Ko) following the ending of "Love's Spell is a Trip to the Beach." In this series, Hell is depicted in different levels like the Children's Hell where children continuously stack rocks until it is knocked down by a demon version of Liru, a Boiling in Oil Hell that is overseen by a demon version of Pachira, and a flaming chariot ride around Hell operated by a demon version of Aiko. When Uma ends up driving them crazy, the demon Aiko ends up allowing Uma to ascend into Heaven with a letter to God (portrayed by Keimie) stating that Uma is banished from Hell for all eternity.
• In The Simpsons, Hell is depicted numerous times. In "Bart Gets Hit by a Car", Bart enters Hell due to a car accident where the Hieronymus Bosch painting The Garden of Earthly Delights is parodied. Satan is shown to have a Macintosh computer which he uses to view details about everyone who enters Hell. Bart's arrival is, however, too early, so the Devil sends him back to Earth, advising him to continue to "lie, cheat, steal and listen to heavy metal." Homer ended up in Hell in The Simpsons Halloween Episodes. In "Treehouse of Horror IV" Benedict Arnold, Lizzie Borden, Richard Nixon, John Dillinger, Blackbeard, and the 1976 Philadelphia Flyers are brought up from hell to form a "jury of the Damned". In the same episode it is suggested that James Coco also went to hell. Homer is subjected to the torture of eating every donut (in the "Hell Labs Ironic Punishment Division") in the world after selling his soul for a donut. After happily eating all of the donuts, a demon claims 'most people go mad after 15 minutes.' In the episode "Treehouse of Horror XI" Homer is tortured in hell by the devil after St. Peter opens a trapdoor near Heaven's gate. His screams wake up John Wayne who also resides there. In "Simpsons Bible Stories", the entire family fall asleep in church and wake up to find the Apocalypse occurring, whereby a staircase opens in the ground and they are sent down to Hell. Homer is at first excited by the smells of barbecue but soon starts screaming in agony. In "Treehouse of Horror XVIII" The Devil sends every person in Springfield to a Hieronymus Bosch-like hell.
• In many episodes of the television series South Park, "(Do the Handicapped Go to Hell?/Probably"), Satan appears. On many occasions, he is accompanied by his homosexual lover Saddam Hussein, who ironically seems to be even more malicious than Satan himself. Hell in the series is an overpopulated place where several famous people as Frank Sinatra, John F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy, Jr., Walter Matthau, Dean Martin, Diana, Princess of Wales, Tiny Tim, Michael Landon, Gene Siskel, George Burns, Andy Dick, and Mahatma Gandhi live next to more obvious people as Adolf Hitler, Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, Djenghis Khan and Mao Zedong. Only Mormons seem to go to Heaven. South Park's version of Hell can also be seen in the episodes: "Best Friends Forever" and "Hell on Earth 2006". In this episode, Steve Irwin (who had only recently died at that time) was depicted as an inhabitant of Hell, causing much controversy with viewers and Irwin's family. At the end of the "Dead Celebrities" episode, several celebrities who had passed away in 2009 arrive in Hell.
• In the Tom and Jerry cartoon, "Heavenly Puss', Tom is nearly sent to Hell.
• Warner Bros. cartoons occasionally depict Hell.
  • In Devil's Feud Cake, Yosemite Sam repeatedly tries to kill Bugs Bunny, but always ends up back in Hell, having to face Satan.
  • In Draftee Daffy, after Daffy Duck accidentally kills himself while trying to escape a man from the draft board, he wakes up in Hell, only to be reunited with the man.
  • At the end of The Hole Idea, the professor slips a hole under his domineering wife, sending her to Hell, but Satan rejects her.
  • In Satan's Waitin', Sylvester goes to Hell after plummeting to his death, but Satan (in the form of a dog) lets him use up the rest of his nine lives on Earth.
  • In Three Little Bops, the Big Bad Wolf's botched attempt to blow up a jazz club sends him to Hell, where he learns how to play jazz properly, at which point the Three Little Pigs admit him to the band.

Film

• In the 1991 film Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, the title characters end up in Hell.
• Hell is also depicted in Tex Avery's The Blitz Wolf (1942).
• Constantine (a 2005 Warner Bros. film) depicts as graphic a version of the traditional Christian version of Hell as can be found in cinema: it shows a parallel plane with many of the same buildings and structures as the normal world, but twisted, ruined and perpetually seared as if eternally hit by the blast wave of a nuclear bomb. This film is based on the DC/Vertigo comic series Hellblazer.
• In televised stage musical Jerry Springer the Opera, Act 2 sees Jerry descend into Hell within his imagination, where it is depicted as his TV studio but smouldering and burned, and his audience members are sealed within the walls.
• A depiction of Hell based on Dante's Inferno appears in the 1935 Spencer Tracy film Dante's Inferno.
• In the film Deconstructing Harry by Woody Allen, the protagonist descends into Hell where he has a chance to learn from the Devil himself (played by Billy Crystal), among other things about the significance of having air conditioning in Hell, and then proceeds to discover his own father. After learning those reasons, Harry grants absolution to his ancestor and suggests that latter is to be taken to Paradise - only to be reminded: I am Jewish and do not believe in Paradise!.
• The film Drag Me to Hell tells the story of a woman cursed by an evil gypsy. The curse will send her to Hell unless she can get rid of it.
• The film Event Horizon also deals with themes of Hell As a ship with an experimental, singularity-inducing reactor core, that was supposed to travel faster than light by folding space, instead entered another dimension, which is likened to Hell, and inadvertently bring a demon with it.
• In the Disney film Fantasia (1940), the "Night on Bald Mountain" sequence shows Chernobog ruling Hell.
• At the end of 1996's The Frighteners, the main villains are grabbed by dark tentacles inside giant lava worms and dragged into a fiery vortex that is clearly meant to be Hell.
• At the end of Ghost (1990), Sam's killer is swarmed by a legion of shadowy figures and dragged through the streets, presumably to Hell. The same thing happens to the killer's boss Carl.
• Hell is depicted in the Danish film classic Häxan (1922).
• Hell is subjective in the Hellraiser film series, as well as Clive Barker's novella. Upon solving the Lament Configuration, the sinner, or victim experiences a hell which they themselves defined by their own actions. From the fifth film onward, it is revealed that the primary demon, the cenobite known as Pinhead (sometimes the Engineer), enjoys playing games with his victims, leading the guilty along a story of their own deeds until in agony they finally confront their sins, at which point Pinhead tears apart their physical self to take their soul into the Labyrinth.
• 2000's Little Nicky depicts hell as a kingdom where monsters, giant fire birds, flying jellyfish and a large castle, named the Castle of The Underworld belong and the entrance to Hell is a fiery gate, called the Gateway to Hell. Satan (Harvey Keitel) performs tasks such as shoving a pineapple up Hitler's posterior.
• During the Christmas Future segment of Mickey's Christmas Carol, Scrooge McDuck is thrown into a grave with a coffin that opens directly into Hell.
• The 2010 film Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, Percy and his colleagues save his mother from Hades, who sometimes appears as a giant horned demon with fire. The Underworld is shown as a miserable fiery wasteland with Hades castle over it. The entrance is under Hollywood.
• In the Pluto cartoon Pluto's Judgement Day Pluto is sent to Hell where he is punished for harming cats.
• The 2006 film Silent Hill depicts Hell numerous times throughout the film. It implies a private hell, where we punish ourselves by denying our guilt and fate, only prolonging our suffering and agony. The overall concept of the film is the lengths a mother will go to for her child, traveling to 'Hell and back'. Hell is also depicted as a modern world, but decayed and rusted, populated by strange and horrific creatures. In a number of respects, this concept is rather far removed from the game setting.
• South Park's version of Hell can also be seen in the film, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (2000).
• In the Stephen King film, Storm of the Century, the character Andre Linoge states that "Hell is repetition".
• At the end of the 1995 horror film Tales from the Hood it is revealed that the three of the four main characters (Stack, Ball, and Bulldog) are not in a funeral home, but in Hell, which they had been in all along while listening to the horrific tales told by the funeral director, Mr. Simms. The walls around them shatter to reveal the fiery Hell as Simms morphs into Satan himself.
• What Dreams May Come, a 1998 film that won an Academy Award for its depiction of heaven and hell as the subjective creations of the individual, was an essentially mystical interpretation of heaven, hell and reincarnation. It was based on the eponymous novel by Richard Matheson.

Gaming

Roleplaying games

• In the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game, there are seven hellish planes, that are usually called the Lower Planes. The Plane most often referred to as 'Hell' is the Outer Plane Baator and comprises nine levels, sometimes called the Nine Hells or the Nine Hells of Baator. The other planes are Pandemonium, an endless underground network filled with howling winds that cause madness; the Abyss, a collection of countless places of evil and chaos, each one worse than the one before; Carceri, the prison of the multiverse; Hades, place of grey and bleak plains (that also has a place called Niflheim); the four peaks of the vulcans of Gehenna; and Archeron, a place of broken weapons and engines of war from all battlefields.
• In Nomine, the forces of Heaven and Hell fight each other in a modern setting. Hell, the home location of all demons, is separated into several subdivisions called principalities, each ruled by one or more Demon Princes. All of Hell's principalities is named after a cultural version of hell (i.e., Hades, Sheol, Tartaurus, etc.) An additional area, known as lower hell, is where Lucifer resides. Most demons stay away from there and only go to lower hell when they have no other choice.

Video games

• Hell: A Cyberpunk Thriller, a point and click graphic adventure game, features a dystopian future where religious fundamentalist rule with an iron first and can literally send people to hell.
• The 1996 city-building god game Afterlife has the player "build" Heaven and Hell as cities.
• The RTS game, Age of Mythology, has several missions that take place in Hades.
• In Bayonetta, Hell takes the form of a demonic realm called Inferno, a world inhabited by demons. The Umbra witches make deals with numerous demons for power, but are sent to Hell after they die. Major angels on the verge of death are also taken to Hell as trophies. Also, during the game over sequence, Bayonetta is shown being dragged into Hell by numerous demonic hands. Finally, the name of Rodin's bar/weapon shop is called "The Gates of Hell."
• The "hack and slash" fantasy horror video game, Dante's Inferno, based on the medieval poem of the same name, is exclusively set in Hell, fully realised in its medieval Roman Catholic conception as a physical and supernatural environment full of grotesque suffering and torture in correspondence with various sins, with the nine circles of hell making the different parts of the game through which the player, Dante, must fight.
• The video game series Devil May Cry features Hell as a location to battle through. The name of the main character Dante is a reference to The Divine Comedy, as is his twin brother Vergil.
• In the first of the Diablo series of games, a "leaked-out" portion of hell is featured as a pit deep under the ground largely characterized as a place of suffering, as the bodies of hundreds of apparently tortured people reside there. The game manual refers to this place as actually part of the mortal realm whose barriers with the metaphysical Hell have weakened, causing it to take on hellish attributes combined with more worldly ones. None of the apparently tortured bodies show any signs of life or torment, and as such may simply be the Decor that Diablo, the lord of Terror, has chosen for his home in the mortal world. This fits with the view of the actual Hell as portrayed in Diablo II, which features Hell as a bleak landscape populated by grotesque monsters and souls in active torment.
• The famous PC game series Doom also involves the concept of Hell, but with a science-fiction twist, as a future teleportation experiment accidentally opens a gate to Hell, releasing demons. Hell is treated in the Christian conception, replete with Satanic symbols and corporeal demons, as a parallel universe of crimson skies, black mountains and oceans of fire. At the end of the second game in the series, after the main character has killed the 'largest demon he's ever seen' Hell is wrecked, and the main character wonders where evil people will go when they die. In Doom 3 the player must travel to Hell to obtain a powerful Martian artifact.
• In the fourth edition of the game series The Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, the main quest in the game involves preventing and stopping monsters from coming through gates linking to a place called Oblivion. It is widely believed that this is synonymous with Hell. However, the realm seen mostly in this game is only one of the 16 realms of Oblivion, the one belonging to the daedra lord Mehrunes Dagon (a 4 armed almost human creature). The other 15 realms of Oblivion (one for every other daedra prince) are not the same as Dagon's, and the realms of the more benevolent daedra (such as Azura and Meridia) are probably not hell-like at all. Also, Oblivion is not an afterlife for the sinful.
• The first Fear Effect game deals extensively with the Chinese concept of hell, replete with its aforementioned political ramifications. Several of the later levels actually take place in the Chinese hell.
• In both God of War games, the main character, Kratos, gets sent to the Hell of Greek mythology thrice. The first time, he is killed by a broken pillar thrown by Ares. The underworld is depicted as having floating platforms made of bloody flesh and huge bones. There are red clouds above and below; above is the underside of the world, below is the massive river Styx. The souls of the dead are seen falling into it. The second time, Kratos is killed by Zeus; it is a giant cave with black, skeletal arms everywhere. The third time, Kratos falls into the Great Chasm with an elderly, insane Icarus. He steals his wings and glides down to rest on the rocky Titan Atlas.
• In another popular fighting game series, Guilty Gear, the characters Testament and Eddie both have a stage based on Hell. Hell was Testament's stage in Guilty Gear X, while in Guilty Gear XX, it was Eddie's stage. Up until Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, it was depicted as the freezing kind of Hell in GGXX, but in GGXXAC, it is depicted as a more fiery hell with buildings halfway sunken in what appears to be a whole ocean of blood. The GGXXAC Hell was also Venom's stage in that game. Guilty Gear Isuka also has two stages that reference to Hell; in any mode other than GG Boost mode, a stage owned by both Testament and Eddie is called Hell's Forest, which is also called Deep Forest in the American Release of GGI. The GG Boost mode stage that references to Hell is called Hell's Prison, and is the fourth and second-to-last stage of GG Boost mode.
• In Hellgate: London, demonic armies has merged from hell and reduced London to ruin and is slowly converting the world to hell through a process called "Hellforming". The protagonist must fight back the demonic invaders and destroy hell.
• In the video game Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, Mephisto's Realm is a name given for hell. It appears as a fiery wasteland inhabited by aggressive demons.
• In the Metroid series, Norfair has a close resemblance to Hell.
• In the expansion pack "Hordes of the Underdark" for the game, Neverwinter Nights, the player gets banished to the eighth level of hell, a frozen wasteland called Cania.
• Hell is portrayed as a battlefield frozen in time in the video game Painkiller. Everything from bullets to trenches to mushroom clouds are present in stark stasis, allowing the player to move about the vista to get a good look at it. The most notable omission from the stage is that of people; the player is the only living thing in the scene, occasionally accosted by wraiths—presumably ghosts of the dead soldiers. Being the final level in the game it is relatively short and culminates with a showdown with Satan himself.
• The first game in the Quake computer game series involves an invasion by forces from Hell, more exactly the Great Old Ones. Note however, that the rest of the series has nothing to do with this concept.
• In the popular fighting game series, Street Fighter, the character Akuma uses a move called "Shun Goku Satsu" which sends the opponent's soul to Hell.
• In the game Tony Hawk's Underground 2, there is an unlockable level (within 2 others) that depicts Hell. Little Demons, rural citizens, and a jazz dancing Satan are in the level.
• In the Guitar Hero series, many characters, songs, guitars, and stages represent and come from Hell.
• In Minecraft, players are able to create a portal to "The Nether", the game's equivalent to Hell.
• In Mortal Kombat, one of the arenas is called Hell, and the character Scorpion is a hell specter.

Literature

• Dante Alighieri's famous epic poem Divine Comedy tells how he visits Heaven and Hell. His visit to Hell is probably the most famous literary depiction of the concept. Hell has its entrance in the Northern hemisphere, the other side of the world to Purgatory, and the bottom of Hell is at the Centre of the Earth. Hell is systematically divided in thematical tortures for crimes of the same nature in its Nine Circles, for example people violent against others are trapped in the Seventh Circle of Hell in a boiling river of blood with centaurs firing arrows to keep them in their place. The people are judged by the Serpentine Minos. Hell was created by Lucifer's fall, he is now trapped in the final level for Traitors. Hell is surrounded by the river Acheron, the neutral sit on the banks chased by swarms of insects and running after a banner. Dante claims to have seen several famous people being tortured in hell: biblical characters (Judas, Cain, ...), mythological characters (Medusa, Minotaur,...), historical characters (Nero, Brutus, Attila the Hun,...) and people of his own lifetime. His journey is described with many imaginative details.
• In Piers Anthony's series Incarnations of Immortality, Hell, along with Heaven and Purgatory, are actual locations populated by the main characters and souls of the dead.
• Wayne Barlowe's book, Gods Demon, is set in Hell and follows the endeavors of a powerful Demon, Sargatanas, to achieve redemption. The hell depicted is in many ways the classical Christian perception of burning cities and desolate wastelands with souls being routinely tortured.
• In The Black Jewels trilogy by Anne Bishop, Hell is one of the three realms.
• Science fiction author Fredric Brown wrote a number of imaginative fantasy short stories about Satan’s activities in Hell.
• In the novel The Black Tattoo by Sam Enthoven, Hell is depicted as a Roman type empire, complete with gladiator pits.
• The novel Job: A Comedy of Justice, by Robert A. Heinlein, offers a Hell that is a thriving community centered on a Lake of Fire that, while it is indeed a burning lake, is something of a practical joke. Incoming souls, who are in apparent corporeal form, fall to the lake but are (usually) caught by attendants who stand by with nets. The newly-arrived citizens are assigned temporary quarters, have jobs, and often meet old friends (and enemies). Sex, eating and drinking, and other forms of entertainment are part of Hell; this Satan is a reasonably courteous host and has a sense of justice.
• Stephen King suggests that Hell is repetition in his short story, "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French". The story focuses on a woman who is forced to repeat the first hours of her and her husband's doomed second honeymoon over and over.
• The novel The Taking, by Dean Koontz, features a global alien invasion, but it is suggested that the invaders may be demons instead of aliens.
• In the novel City Infernal by Edward Lee, Hell is depicted as a modern metropolis (the Mephistopolis), albeit where bones are currency and electricity is provided by tapping the bio-electricity of tortured souls.
• In Milton's Paradise Lost, Lucifer and the other Fallen angels (such as Beelzebub, Belial, and Molech) are imprisoned in Hell for rebelling against God after the birth of Christ. Hell is Nine days' fall from Heaven and three times further than Earth. Between it and the Universe are Chaos and Night. In Hell, the fallen Angels build Pandaimoneum. Hell's gate is guarded by Sin, Satan's daughter. In Book 10 a bridge is built from Hell to Earth by Sin and Death after the Fall of Man, which has been caused by Lucifer, while the Fallen Angels are turned into snakes.
• In Jean-Paul Sartre's play No Exit the famous quote: "Hell is other people" is made.
• Emanuel Swedenborg wrote Heaven and Hell in which he claimed to have visited Hell.
• In J. R. R. Tolkien's novel The Silmarillion, The Dark Lord Morgoth's first empire Utumno, bears many similarities to Hell, as Morgoth himself is similar to the Devil and both are deep underground, infested by demons and other evil creatures.
• In David Weber's book Echoes of Honor, Hell is the nickname given to the Havenite prison planet of Hades.
• In the horror manga Reiko The Zombie Shop by Rei Mikamoto, the main antagonist Riruka Himezono (who was killed in the early part of Volume 7 by a zombie mutant), is given a glimpse of Hell after her death. Hell is depicted as an empty landscape where the souls of those who died become zombie servants summoned by the necromancers in the manga. The inhabitants of Hell are shown to be bearing all of their mortal wounds (such as the necromancer Tracey bearing a bullet wound in her forehead) that were inflicted upon them as humans in life and is guarded by a limbless, mentally disturbed psychopomp who is tasked with sending the souls to Hell. Also, Reiko sends Saki Yurikawa to Hell in order to stop her murderous rampage after she was reduced to a severed head by Saki.

Music

Albums

• GWAR uses the word "hell" and related concepts in the albums titled:
  • Beyond Hell (2006)
  • Hell-O! (1988)
• Slayer's second studio album Hell Awaits. Many of the band's other songs also have Hellish lyrical themes.
• The 2004 Insane Clown Posse album, Hell's Pit is a concept album about Hell.
• Bring Me the Horizon's third studio album, There Is a Hell, Believe Me I've Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let's Keep It a Secret revolves around the themes of Heaven and Hell.
• The Venom album titled Welcome to Hell released in 1981.^[3]
• Bad Meets Evil's debut EP Hell: The Sequel features the song Welcome 2 Hell. The EP's name is a reference to the song Bad Meets Evil from Eminem's major-label debut album The Slim Shady LP quoting the line: "Bad Meets Evil, see you in hell for the sequel."

Singles and songs

• In the song "Fire Water Burn" by The Bloodhound Gang, the protagonist claims if he'll go to hell he hopes he will "burn well". He then lists the people with whom he'll spent his days: John F. Kennedy, Marvin Gaye, Martha Raye, Lawrence Welk, Kurt Cobain, Kojak, Mark Twain, Jimi Hendrix and Emmanuel Lewis, "because he is the antichrist."
• The All American Rejects's radio single "Gives You Hell" from their 2008 album When the World Comes Down.
• "Green Hell", a song by The Misfits, later covered by metal band Metallica for their 1998 album Garage, Inc..
• "Heaven and Hell" by Black Sabbath
• The jazz band Squirrel Nut Zippers' song, "Hell", describes a general depiction of Hell. The song has been featured on various film soundtracks and commercials for films/television shows.
• Disturbed has a b-side track titled "Hell", was originally for their third album Ten Thousand Fists, but was released on one of the Stricken singles. Its theme represents the meaning of hell, revenge, etc.
• AC/DC uses the word hell in "Hell Ain't a Bad Place to Be", "Hells Bells", "Highway to Hell", "Jailbreak"
• "It Snows in Hell", a song by Finnish hard rock band Lordi.
• The Jam released the song "Private Hell" on their album Beat Surrender.

Radio

• Bleak Expectations BBC Radio 4 series spoofs Dante's Inferno in the 2nd episode of the fourth series. The underworld is a place for all souls before they are assigned to their respective heavens or hells.
• The radio show Coast to Coast AM has circulated a sound recording which is said to feature the screaming of people suffering in hell, supposedly recorded by Russian engineers drilling into the ground in Siberia, although it is a hoax known as the Well to Hell hoax. [2][3]
• The BBC Radio 4 comedy series Old Harry's Game is set in Hell. It was written by Andy Hamilton who also stars as Satan.

Television

• In the Buffyverse, there are several places in the world, that are natural gateways between the Underworld and the world of Mortals. One of these Hellmouths is located directly under the library of the Sunnydale High School. However, instead of there being one "hell", there are hundreds of hell dimensions, in which demons are the dominant lifeform and non-demon life, if there's any, is subject to great torture.
• A 2008 television ad-campaign for Capital One credit cards features a Hell that has been 'frozen over' because customers are able to get spending bonuses without restrictions. The ads depict Satan and his minions in a comical manner.
• In Doctor Who, the 10th Doctor comes across a being which identifies itself as 'the Beast', resembles popular interpretations of the Devil, and makes numerous references to Hell. In a later episode, "Hell" is said to be a synonym for The Void, the coordinates of which are all sixes The Void is nothingness, the place between Universes.
• In the science-fiction show Lexx, Heaven and Hell are depicted as two joined planets situated in the darkest part of the Dark Zone. The hell planet is known as Planet Fire to its inhabitants. When a human who has made "bad choices" dies in the Lexx universe, their life essence is taken to the core of Fire. They are eternally reincarnated to suffer on the planet's surface. Hell is depicted as an endless burning desert, with distant towers dedicated to various types of punishment. The inhabitants have no memories of their resurrections or past lives, and exist in an ongoing cycle of suffering and death.
• The Sopranos offers several interpretations of hell, including Christopher Moltisanti's description (in "From Where to Eternity") and Carlo Gervasi's summary (in "Chasing It)" of hell as portrayed in the Twilight Zone episode, "A Nice Place to Visit".
• In the satirical puppet show Spitting Image, hell is depicted as a fiery inferno containing people like Hitler and various Russian leaders. A later sketch set in the future depicts John Prescott going to hell to find it contains Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. The devil treats Prescott nicely, unable to think of any form of torment he hasn't already been through whilst alive.
• The Supernatural television series mentions Hell many times as the place that demons originated. Dean Winchester, one of the main characters, has been sent to Hell once but was later rescued by the angel, Castiel. And Sam Winchester, one of the main characters, has been in Lucifer's Cage, but somehow escaped with no known reason.
• The "Reaper" television series has the main character Sam as a bounty hunter for the devil who must send escaped souls back to hell. Entrances to hell are places that are "hell on Earth" such as the DMV and a storage center were multiple murder victims are hidden.

References

1. ^ Clute, John; John Grant (1999). The Encyclopedia of Fantasy. St. Martin's Griffin. pp. 460. ISBN 978-0312198695. 
2. ^ Sample Hatlo Inferno cartoon:
3. ^ [1]