hellscape

noun

hell·​scape ˈhel-ˌskāp 

plural hellscapes

: a hellish landscape : a harshly unpleasant place or environment

I blame growing up in Southern California—this did not prepare me for real winter, much less the frigid hellscape that is New York in January.

—Aliza Arbabanel

Meanwhile, it's heartbreaking to see Route 33, once called out by Jalopnik as "America's greatest driving road," reduced to this horrifying hellscape. And, of course, to think about all the nearby people and animals and communities being inundated with fire and smoke.

—Andrew P. Collins

Examples of hellscape in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Hawkins, Indiana, has not turned into a hellscape of Demogorgons and slimy vines. —Alison Herman, Variety, 27 Nov. 2025

For a story about a supernatural phenomenon that threatens to pull the entire world into a hellscape of bisexual lighting, omnipresent thunder, and endless tangles of oozing vines, Stranger Things returns for its final season feeling curiously small. —Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 27 Nov. 2025

Los Angeles is not a hellscape. —Karen Bass, Time, 17 Nov. 2025

Photo by Dominique Charriau/WireImage The world is both a literal and metaphorical hellscape right now, and no one knows that better than Natalie Portman. —Katherine Singh, Refinery29, 14 Nov. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1894, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for hellscape

• agape
• escape
• landscape
• lenape
• reshape
• seascape
• soundscape
• ape
• cape
• crape
• crepe
• drape