Horror Humanum Est (stylized as H2E) is a French Web Video Edutainment Show animated series created by Cédric Villain.
Consisting of 45 episodes, each video focuses on a horrific momentnote in World History, such as massacres, cruel punishments, wars or accidents.
The channel is available here
This show provides examples of:
- All There in the Manual: Each video is coupled with several additional informations on the channel's official website. From Season 2 onwards, they have been included at the end of each episode as a facecam segment.
- Anyone Can Die: Or, at the very least, be seriously injured and/or permanently disabled.
- Assassination Attempt: In "A Case Of Parricide". King Louis XV was stabbed by Robert-François Damien in 1757. Thanks to the various layers of clothes he wore, the King survived.
- Atomic Hate: "Nuke" is about the US nuclear attack on Hiroshima at the end of World War II.
- Boom, Headshot!: A particularly grim variation in the very first episodenote . After crushing the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the Sepoys who rebelled were tied to the mouths of cannons and blown to pieces when the cannons were fired.
- Caps Lock: The title of Episode 4 is stylized as "The Great LEAP Forward".
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: "Pesticide Cloud In The Night" shows that the closure of the Union Carbide Bhopal Factory was avoided because of corruption to local authorities.
- Death of a Child: Happens a lot throughout the series.
- Dirty Communists: Several episodes deal with Communist regimes.
- "Glavnoe Upravlenie Lagerei" is about the Soviet Union's Gulags.
- "Khmer Rouge" shows the rise of the eponymous movement in Cambodia, as well as the subsequent horrors the ensued.
- "The Great Leap Forward" showcases this eponymous period of Chinese history.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: The first episodes featured a long and gory title sequence.
- Failed a Spot Check: The Bhopal Disaster began because of a cleaning operation that allowed a large amount of water to enter in a tank full of methyl isocyanate, a chemical which produces a deadly gas if exposed to water.
- Gratuitous Latin: The series title is a reference to the Latin saying "Errare humanum est, perseverare autem diabolicum."note
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: With an episode titled "Impaling", what did you expect?
- It's Probably Nothing: In "Pesticide Cloud In The Night", the employees decide not to alert their boss, despite alarming instrument readings, because it's not the first time something like this happens at the factory.
- Karma Houdini: The Union Carbide Corporation. Accused of massive corruption and negligence, that ultimately led to thousands dying and thousands more suffering in a preventable disaster, no one was ever found guilty.
- The Kingslayer: Robert-François Damien in "A Case Of Parricide". However, his attempt to kill the King of France ultimately failed.
- Make an Example of Them: In "Cannons VS. Sepoys", the spectacular executions of Sepoys took place in front of entire Sepoys regiments in order to discourage them from rebelling.
- Middle Eastern Terrorists: Gamaa al-Islamiya in "Terror in Luxor", responsible for the 1997 Luxor Terror Attack.
- Product Placement: A dark parody of it in the Unit 731 episode, with an advert for biscuits infected with plague and cholera.
- Rape, Pillage, and Burn: The subject of "The Nanking Massacre" episode on the Rape of Nanking by Japanese troops in 1937.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: Each video opens and ends with classical music.
- Stuff Blowing Up: Anything can explode, indeed. Nukes, landmines, Sepoys, you name it. Even dogs aren't spared.
- The Theocracy:
- The Taiping Kingdom in "The Heavenly Kingdom".
- In the additionnal notes for "Terror in Luxor", the ultimate goal of Gamaa al-Islamiya was to create an Islamic Republic in Egypt.
- Very Special Episode:
- "Une Bonne Année" showcases every major horrific moments of 2016.
"On doit pouvoir faire encore mieux en 2017."note- H2E participated in CréaTube, an initiative to showcase several YouTube channels worth discovering.
- A special episode on homophobia, made in cooperation with the YouTube channel "La statistique expliquée à mon chat"note , was re-released on the H2E channel following the dissolution of the former.
- On January 1st 2018, for the Centennary of the end of World War I, Cédric Villain published an one-hour-long video showing every French losses of World War One.
- Would Be Rude to Say "Genocide":
- The Rape of Nanking remains a highly controversial subject in Japan, where revisionnist movements are minimizing its importance, causing numerous tensions with China and South Korea.
- The Armenian Genocide is still passionately denied by Turkey, mainly to maintain their reputation and avoid paying reparations to the Armenian community.
- Would Hurt a Child: Happens a lot throughout the series.
- See you soon with more edifying examples of creative cruelty!
