Hazbin Hotel Episodes Seven and Eight Review: The Radio Demon’s Master Plan.

My biggest issue with the first season of Hazbin Hotel was the pacing.
It often felt like important events and character moments were skipped or rushed because of the limited eight-episode runtime.
So, after learning the second season was also eight episodes, I was concerned the issue would repeat itself.
Well, after seeing the final two episodes of Hazbin Hotel Season Two, I can happily say that I was wrong because the pacing this season has been great.
The penultimate episode, “Weapons of Mass Distraction”, follows up from where “Scream Rain” left off, with Lucifer being lured into a trap set by Vox.
Lucifer is immediately captured with the use of Angelic weaponry, but he is more antagonized by Alastor than Vox.
It is quite humorous to watch Vox’s captives have more beef with each other than their literal captor.
Not only that, but it leads to one of my favorite songs of Hazbin Hotel, “Brighter”, which fully reveals Vox’s backstory.
In life, Vox was named Vincent Whittman, a weatherman so envious of those around him that he killed again and again to reach the top.
Eventually earned a cult-like following, this all culminated with him giving a speech in a pool, ranting about being “baptized into a new era of entertainment.”
Overlooking the pool are dozens of suspended TVs, which turns out to be a rather poor decision design wise because one of these TVs falls and crashes onto Vox’s head, killing him and sending him to hell for his murders.
Vox’s death is both gruesome and ironic, considering his hell-form has a TV for a head.

It is also a deserving end considering all the murders he committed in life.

It also may explain how Vox became so powerful in Hell because, when the TV kills him, it also electrocutes all of his followers standing in the pool as well.
So, when Vox arrived in Hell, he already had a group of loyal followers to use.
Through this, we can see that Alastor is actually right in his understanding of Vox.
He always has a desire to be “brighter,” never satisfied with what he has, but relies on others to gain his power, whether that be his followers or the Vees.
We see this with him hypnotizing Angel Dust into publicly bad mouthing the hotel and supporting the Vees.
He uses this event to unveil his weapon, powered by Lucifer, which he fires at Heaven, destroying Sera’s barrier.
Although terrifying for Heaven, it was funny for me, what with the shot of Peter being spun around when Vox’s weapon punches through the pearly gates.

This moment got a good chuckle out of me.

Vox gives Heaven 24 hours to surrender, and the turmoil this causes leads into the episode’s second song, “Live to Live”, where Pentious advises Sera on her next move, with a great callback to last season’s “It Starts with Sorry.”
While this is happening, Vox continues to fall into Alastor’s trap, further distancing himself from the Vees, and is also manipulated into inviting Charlie to his party.
Following Vox’s invitation, Emily arrives to help Charlie, and the group formulate a plan to rescue Angel Dust and stop Vox.
Baxter is key to this plan, and more than willing to help, showing his role in the season.

I think Baxter’s characterization is a little wonky, since his initial goal of proving the hotel wrong has been completely brushed aside, but it is not a big deal.

The newfound confidence of the hotel results in the final song of the episode, “When I Think About the Future”, which calls back to multiple songs sung previously in the season, before setting up the big finale.
That finale, “Curtain Call”, kicks off with the hotel crew going through their plan to stop Vox, free Angel from mind control, and show everyone that Pentious was redeemed.
Two things, though.
First, it feels like a scene was skipped over where the characters realize Angel was brainwashed, since in the final scene of Episode Nine they were confused about him siding with the Vees.
Second, I still find it pretty convenient that Pentious is not allowed to leave Heaven.
They just say he is not allowed to leave and provide no reason why.

I just wish they would explain *why* Sir Pentious cannot leave Heaven.

At Vox’s party, Baxter attempts to provide a connection with Heaven to show Sir Pentious’ redemption, while Cherry and Husk go to save Angel Dust, and Charlie distracts Vox.
The plan quickly goes awry because, although Baxter is hilariously able to silence Vox, Velvette and Nifty fight around him, while Cherry and Angel Dust are ambushed by Valentino.
The fight quickly grows, and Charlie is unable to get a signal to prove her point, leading to the best scene of the finale.
Vox mocks her and, in his moment of triumph, orders her to admit his power.
Unexpectedly for Charlie, Alastor chimes in, using their deal to force her to admit that Vox is the strongest sinner in Hell.
This breaks Alastor’s contract with Rosie and, to top it all off, Vox celebrates his victory by landing his hands on Charlie, breaking his contract with Al.
Alastor’s laughter as Vox falls right into his trap was great to see.
You can see how he perfectly planned all this right from Episode Four and it went off without a hitch.

Vox and Alastor’s rivalry has been a highlight this season.

And if you thought the fight between Alastor and Vox in that episode was hype, you have not seen anything yet.
Watching the two old friends turned rivals fight at full strength is greatly improved by some top-notch animation.
The budget for Season Two clearly went up after Season One’s success.
Vox predictably needs help from his giant robot shark, but this allows him to get back to his weapon and shoot wildly at Alastor.
This has the unfortunate side effect of decimating Pentagram City with an angelic blast, killing many sinners for good.
So, Hell’s entire population just saw their supposed savior annihilating a bunch of them.
Yeah, there is no coming back for Vox’s reputation after this.

As Alastor predicted, Vox really did lose his marbles in Act Three.

Even the Vees are sick of Vox’s antics because, after their respective fights, they stop him from blowing them all up just to kill Alastor.
Valentino rips off Vox’s head before attempting and failing to leave with him and Velvette.
Say what you want about the Vees, but they do care about each other.
Well, Valentino and Velvette do at least; not sure about Vox at this point.
However, while Vox is finished, his weapon remains.
For a moment, it looks like Emily is going to sacrifice herself to save Hell, but this is thankfully instead used to build into the final song of the season, “Hear my Hope,” where all of Hell’s overlords band together to stop the explosion.

Admit it, we all thought Emily was going to self-sacrifice at first.

“Hear My Hope” is a hopeful, and emotional song with two interludes.
The first sees Lute and Abel arrive, and the former attempt to get her revenge, only to be stopped by Abel in a moment of character growth.
While this moment is well sung, I kind of feel like it needed a little more build up, and it kinds of just feels thrown in there.
The second interlude of the song is far better, and sees Rosie confront Alastor, who threatens to let everyone die unless she fixes his staff.
What is interesting to me about this part is how Alastor says, “You’ll watch them die, unless you do,” making it seem like Rosie cares for Charlie and the others.
This adds more layers of mystery to Rosie, of which I have seen a few theories about.
One such theory is that Rosie is Lillith in disguise, which would retroactively make her talk with Charlie about Vaggie in Season One a lot more emotional.
Although, if Rosie is Lillith, then that raises the question of who the Lillith in Heaven is?
But that is just a theory.

Rosie fixes Alastor’s staff, and the two join the circle, along with Velvette and Valentino, much to Vox’s dismay.
The power of friendship puts an end to the explosion, saving Hell.
From here, Lucifer pulls himself from the remains of the weapon, Sir Pentious proves his redemption to Hell, and Angel Dust decides to go back with the Vees because he believes he is a danger to the hotel and his friends.
I originally did not like how Angel was playing very little role in his own rescue, but it seems like they are setting up an arc for Season Three here, so I will reserve judgement on that.
As for the Vees, Valentino has had to become the face of the organization.
Speaking of face, Vox is still just a head, and I think it would be pretty funny for him to remain that way for the foreseeable future.
He has had his time in the spotlight, but man did he ever shine brighter.
The writing team quickly proved me wrong with how much of a convincing threat Vox would prove to be.
For next season’s antagonist, I am pretty confident it is going to be Alastor, based on things Viziepop has said.
It makes sense too, what with Alastor having no more strings, and being free to do whatever he wants.

Alastor’s official villain arc may be about to begin.

Back at the hotel, it sees even more success, but for the right reasons this time.
Surprise, surprise, Vaggie has also kept her name but dropped the E.
Blitzo would approve.
Still, I am glad that this storyline did not take up as much time as I thought it would back in Episode One.
The final scene of the season sees Lillith finally call Charlie back, ending on yet another Lillith cliffhanger.
Hopefully, Season Three will arrive sooner than Season Two did, and keep up the quality.
Overall, Season Two was a vast improvement over the first.
The pacing, animation and songs were so much better.
Speaking of the songs, I am currently planning to do a top ten list of my favorite Hazbin Hotel songs.
So, you can expect to see that in the next few weeks or so.

Hazbin Hotel Season Two, Episodes Five and Six Review: Holy Animation, Batman!

A few weeks back, Hazbin Hotel gave us one of its best episodes with “It’s a Deal.”
Well, I am pleased to say that Season Two continues to exceed expectations with Episodes Five and Six, “Silenced” and “Scream Rain,” both of which have standout factors that place them above other episodes.
“Silenced” has the best animation of the series so far, and “Scream Rain” is easily the funniest episode of Hazbin Hotel yet.
Episode Five begins with the musical number, “Bad with Us”, which is used to depict Vox going around to recruit other Overlords for his plan to attack Heaven.
The song has a few humorous moments, like Vox’s attempts to recruit Carmilla, embarrassing both Valentino and Velvette.
It also shows off the extreme talent of Christian Borle, as he sings through multiple different musical subgenres to appeal to different Overlords.

It makes so much sense that Vox was a cult leader, given how convincing he can be.

Meanwhile, at the Hazbin Hotel, Charlie is desperately trying to get Emily and other angels’ attention, leading to Vaggie asking Lucifer for help.
It is here that we get the perfect explanation for why Lucifer lets the sinners do as they please.
It is revealed that, since Lucifer being in Hell is a punishment, he is unable to harm sinners, meaning he has had to watch them abuse each other for thousands of years.
This explains why he was so nihilistic back in Season One.
It also answers my question of how Vox would be able to take over Heaven, since I figured Lucifer would try to stop him.
However, just because Lucifer cannot harm sinners, does not mean he is unable to bluff them into thinking he can.
At the same time, it is revealed that Emily and Sera are actually watching Charlie, but Sera has doubts about helping, unsure how she can make up for what she has done
Pentious provides both good advice and a pretty great callback when he tells her, “A wise woman once told me, ‘It starts with sorry.’”
About Pentious though, I do find it strange that Sera and Emily did not bring him with them when they decided to appeal to the Sinners.
You would think seeing one of their own redeemed might sway some of them?
Unfortunately, Pentious is still unable to leave Heaven for undisclosed reasons, which does feel a little too convenient.

Just replace Lute with Pentious and I think this whole scene might have gone a little better for Charlie.

The angels travel to Hell and Charlie convinces them to go with her to apologize at one of Vox’s rallies, a decision which I am sure we can all agree was an excellent one with absolutely no chance of backfiring, just like every other decision Charlie has made this season… right?
At Vox’s rally, we potentially see the beginning of Alastor’s plan, with him goading Vox into pushing Valentino and Velvette to the side in favor of himself.
Vox’s show is quickly interrupted by Lucifer, however, kicking off the second song of the episode, “Vox Populi.”
The first half of the song is a Lucifer solo, which is great, before Vox takes over the song, exposing Lucifer’s weakness to the crowd, going so far as to even bring up Lillith to his face.
It is here where we get our first showcase of excellent animation, with the camera panning around Lucifer circling an unimpressed Vox.

The animation during this song is the best of the series.

Following this, Charlie and the angels arrive, but Vox is able to quickly turn the situation against them, which Charlie really should have expected at this point.
Vox certainly does not have to try hard, what with Lute calling him demon filth (seriously, why did they bring her?), the angels apologizing for genocide with gift baskets, and Sera revealing her true form and stating demons like Vox were the reason she approved the Exterminations.
Vox uses this to build into the final song, “Vox Dei,” a short number but probably my favorite of the episode for the sheer aura it provides Vox.
I will admit that at the beginning of the season I had my doubts about whether Vox could be a threatening antagonist, but this episode more than convinced me.
The animation for this scene is once again amazing, with another panning shot perfectly showing Vox’s threatening presence.

I apologize, Vox. I was not familiar with your game.

On top of that, it is abundantly clear that Vox is meant to represent extreme right-wing rhetoric in media, given his statements of “manifest destiny”, “make Hell great again”, and “I’m the furor (führer)”.
It is not subtle, but it is definitely effective, both on the viewer and the angels, who flee, leaving Charlie alone.
She returns to the Hazbin Hotel, infuriated with her father and Vaggie.
It is here we get the long awaited calling out of Charlie, with Vaggie pointing out how she is making things worse by not listening to her and engaging with Vox.
Seeing Charlie finally be called out was both a great moment from Vaggie and a worthy conclusion to another really good episode with stellar animation.
Following “Silenced”, we move on to the funniest episode of the series so far, “Scream Rain.”
The episode opens similarly to the last one, with Vox attempting to convince Carmilla to join his cause.
He enlists the help of Velvette to do so, who delivers the most totally not fake apology of all time.

Wait… you mean this smile ISN’T genuine?

In the end, Vox does convince Carmilla by leveraging her daughters’ safety.
As for Velvette, if last episode saw Valentino souring towards Vox, now it is her turn.
Vox belittles her and he did not even need to feel inferior to Alastor to do so.
Back at the hotel, Charlie and Vaggie are still at odds but have to work together after word of Carmilla supporting Vox spreads.
They go to confront her together, leaving Nifty in charge, since Husk quit because Alastor is no longer there to force him to work at the hotel.
Afterwards, we get our first song of the episode, “Love in a Bottle”, which sees Husk return to his old ways at a casino, winning again and again, until he eventually loses and falls into a drunken stupor.
The song is both catchy and sad, what with Husk’s spiral.

Plus, hearing Keith David sing is always a win.

Meanwhile, upon Charlie and Vaggie’s meeting with Carmilla, we get the first of a few great laughs in the episode, with Carmilla complaining about “lesbian drama” while Charlie shouts at her for helping “the TV man!”
We also get a surprising look into Vaggie’s past when Carmilla reminds her of her time with the exorcists.
Through brief flashes, we see Vaggie and another exorcist recruit being mistreated by Adam and Lute.
It looked like whoever this other exorcist was, they were close to Vaggie.
Even stranger is the appearance of the exorcist woman.
They all look alike, with the same hair coloring and facial features.
It makes me wonder if this was a deliberate choice by Adam or something else?
Before we can get answers, the scene transitions to Husk again, where he is shocked to see Angel Dust singing in drag at the casino.
Husk’s shocked “Angel!?” got a good laugh out of the me, and the following song from Angel, “Losing Streak” is so good it makes a few of the sinners in the audience question their sexuality.
Unfortunately for Angel, Vox has plans for him, which we see when he requests his time from Valentino.
Both he and Velvette diss him for using them, to which Vox attempts to lay on the charm until, of course, Alastor starts goading him again.
Seeing Alastor spin in the chair to reveal himself got another big laugh from me, and the idea that he and Velvette were just gossiping about Vox is very humorous and already inspired multiple fanarts.
As for Vox, Alastor triggers his inferiority complex again, and he tries to force Valentino to comply.
This ends with the funniest moment in all of Hazbin Hotel for me, when Valentino storms off while speaking in Spanish, Vox makes a racist remark, and Valentino responds, “I’m from fucking Flordia!” and then decks Vox in the face with a glass.

Sadly, this humor would not last long. Just ask Angel.

While hilarious, this scene also pushes Alastor’s plan further.
He has spent the past two episodes manipulating Vox into pushing the other Vees away, and it definitely seems to be working.
I would not be surprised if Velvette and Valentino betrayed Vox in the last two episodes.
How this will tie into the rest of Alastor’s plan remains to be seen.
While Alastor’s plotline is still ongoing, Charlie and Vaggie’s fight is thankfully resolved this episode, when Charlie realizes the error of her ways, and goes all out on an apology by making a romantic setting for her and Vaggie.
This culminates in the last song of the episode, “Easy”, which shows how good Vaggie is for Charlie because, when she gets overwhelmed, Vaggie soothes her back to calmness.
Well, “calm” is probably not the right word considering the whole song is pretty much a substitute for Charlie and Vaggie doing the do, proven by it ending with the two of them in bed.

I am glad see Charlie changing while continuing to get closer with Vaggie.

The episode goes from one couple to a potential one, cutting to Husk and Angel talking in the aftermath of Angel’s performance, where the two further connect, before Angel has to leave for a job.
It is here that the episode goes from funny and feel-good to depressing, when we finally get the scene of Vox hurting Angel from the trailer.
A big twist also happens here because Vox reveals that he has been hypnotizing Angel into spying on the Hazbin Hotel, which is how he knew numerous things, such as the fact that Lucifer could not hurt him.
Vox now plans to use him to make Charlie kill herself somehow, but we will have to learn the details on how this will work in the final two episodes.
Another interesting detail are the eyes watching Angel when he enters the apartment.
These eyes have been seen throughout Hell, but this is the first time the show has deliberately focused on them.
They do not seem connected to Vox, so I am interested in seeing what the explanation is, although I think this might be foreshadowing for future seasons.

Angel Dust is not the only factor is Vox’s plan though because we see him imitate Charlie’s voice to draw Lucifer in, planning to use him as a power source for something.
Vox’s plans are going to come to their climax soon but, with him pushing aside Valentino and Velvette, Cherry and Husk’s suspicions about Angel’s location, and Alastor’s currently unknown plan, I think it is pretty safe to say this will all blow up in Vox’s face in a spectacular and satisfying fashion.
We will know in an hour, when the final episodes of Season Two drop.
As for Episodes Five and Six, they are both great, with excellent animation and hilarious moments.
Season Two has exceeded my expectations so far, and I hope the last episodes will not disappoint.

Hazbin Hotel Season Two, Episodes One and Two Review: Magnificent Music Returns.

I found the first season of Hazbin Hotel to be an enjoyable but flawed season.
It had fun characters and fantastic musical numbers, but the pacing felt especially off.
With the show being a success, I hoped it would convince the bigwigs to greenlight more episodes for Season Two.
Unfortunately, we are stuck with eight again this season.
To be fair though, that does not necessarily mean the pacing is doomed, since Viziepop could still find a way to craft a completely concise story with eight episodes.

We will have to wait for the rest of the season to release before we find out if the pacing will work.

As for Episodes One and Two of Hazbin Hotel Season Two, they provide a decent start to the season, which has me excited for the extra six.
For starters, I actually like how these episodes were structured together, with Episode One showing Hell’s side of the story, while Episode Two shows Heaven’s.
That being said, Episode One “New Pentious” is definitely the weaker of the two.
In the aftermath of the Hazbin Hotel fighting off Adam’s Extermination, the hotel has received lots of interest but for the wrong reason.
Instead of demons seeking redemption, like Charlie hoped, they are all there to kill angels.
Well, almost all of them.
A demon named Baxter joins the hotel, hoping to prove his hypothesis that redemption is impossible.
He is quite similar to Pentious, leading to Charlie constantly calling him that, since she is still grieving her friend.
As for Baxter, we do not get enough of him for me to really judge if I like his character or not.
And then there are the hotel’s regular residents.
It was great to see Charlie, Vaggie, Alastor, Angel Dust, Nifty and Husk again.
My favorite of the bunch this episode was absolutely Nifty, with her newfound fame for killing Adam being pretty humorous.

Never change, Nifty, you murderous gremlin.

On the other hand, Vaggie has a subplot with her trying to figure out a new name for herself.
I am absolutely convinced this storyline will just end with her choosing to keep the name Vaggie, so the subplot already feels predictable.
That being said, if it does ends in a different way I will withdraw this criticism.
What I will not be withdrawing is my complaint regarding a specific joke concerning Angel Dust.
Back in Season One, we saw how terrible Valentino treated him, so to see a slapstick joke of Valentino repeatedly abusing him felt really out of touch.
On the subject of the Vees, they seem to be stepping into their roles of main antagonists this season, especially Vox.
The TV Demon intends to use his control of media to manipulate Hell’s populace into turning against the hotel and rebelling against Heaven.
This storyline has a lot of potential with its topical relevance to the problems of today’s media.
I am also curious to see how Vox intends to take over heaven.

To be honest, I cannot imagine the Vees lasting long against Lucifer, let alone the high-ranking Angels of Heaven.

We see one such Angel at the end of the episode, Emily, who arrives to quickly tell Charlie about Sir Pentious’ redemption before leaving.
Charlie screams in response, ending the episode.
Her learning that redemption works may seem like a good thing, but one key detail is that Charlie was the only one who saw Emil.
It is also later revealed Sir Pentious cannot leave heaven.
Therefore, I can see Vox twisting Charlie’s boasting about Pentious’ redemption to be a lie, turning the populace of Hell further against her.
But we will have to see.
Now that I have the story content of the episode out of the way, I will discuss the musical aspect.
“New Pentious” has two musical numbers, “Hazbin Guarantee (Trust Us)” and “Once We Get Up There.”
“Hazbin Guarantee” is my favorite of the two, with a great contrast between Charlie failing to get clients with her songs of hope, and the Vees succeeding with their manipulative lies.

The Vees are easy to hate because of how they use and then throw people away as if they were things.

As it stands, “New Pentious” is a good episode, but “Storyteller” is even better.
I will start with the songs this time; Episode Two having three of them, “Like You”, “Sera’s Confession”, and “Gravity”.
Going from weakest to best, “Like You” does a good job of showing Pentious’ situation in Heaven, and how he just wants to get back to his friends.
“Sera’s Confession” succeeded in making me invested in Sera, due to the exploration of her moral conflict.
But by the far the best song is “Gravity”.
This number was teased a while back, and you can absolutely see why it was chosen to advertise Season Two.
Lute’s rock ballad with a hallucinated Adam is incredible to watch and listen to; already being the best song in the season thus far.

“Gravity” crushes it, pun very much intended.

Getting back to the story of the episode, it opens up with Pentious on trial after appearing in Heaven.
Things look bad for him until the Speaker of God arrives and gently asks him to tell his story.
We flashback to the 1800s when Pentious was alive and it is revealed he knew who Jack the Ripper was but failed to report him, resulting in the deaths of five more women.
His failure to act damned him to hell, until he redeemed himself by risking his own life to save his friends, exactly the sort of thing he should have done for those women.
I loved the exploration of Pentious’ human life, and I hope we get more for other characters.
Vox was revealed to have been a cult leader in Episode One, but I want to see what made Nifty so crazy, and just what the hell Alastor’s deal is?

Pentious is released after his redemption is revealed, and the episode then follows Emily guiding him around Heaven, Sera trying to decide Heaven’s next move while dealing with her guilt, and Lute planning revenge while being absolutely pissed that Adam’s son Abel got the position of Exorcist leader over her.
The one time nepotism paid off, I guess.
Sera also tells Lute to back off Lillith, and we later see the woman herself ignoring Charlie and Lucifer’s texts, so the mystery around her is still ongoing.
The end of the episode ties in with the conclusion of the previous one, with Emily rushing off to tell Charlie about Pentious’ redemption before Sera closes Heaven off.
Overall, “Storyteller” is the better episode of the two.
It has great character work, especially for Pentious, Sera and Lute, and incredible songs, most notably “Gravity”.
As for where Season Two goes now, the Vees are probably going to stoke tension further between Heaven in Hell, which will lead to some confrontation with Alastor, as seen in the trailer.

The eventual fight between Alastor and Vox should be hype.

Whatever comes next, though, whether it be good or bad, I have no doubt that we will be getting more excellent songs to jam to.
I already look forward to hearing these musical numbers when episodes Three and Four air next week.