This seems to be a problem with a lot of female MCs in the current era of animated/YA entertainment. People are starting to really hate the adorkable, quirky girl archetype when the character isn't explicitly sheltered/naive. After a quick search, Charlie's supposed to represent a woman in her 20s, but she acts like a young teen. I'm supposed to believe this character is a princess. Really harkens back to my RP days where every female character was a princess of this or that. It's a lazy way to make your character seem important, but if the actual weight of that role isn't considered, it becomes just a title with no bearing. Charlie would be better off as a literally who character trying to climb her way up Hell's hierarchy as a businesswoman than as she is now because she is wholly incompetent.
It's so sad that Vivz would have all this time and all this help available and take the dumbest way out, but at least we get to laugh about it.
Vivzbrain: PRINCESS! Make her stupid and cute and get the most Becky voice actress on fucking earth. Tee hee she's dumb. Alastor is SUCH A BIISSHHHIIEEE UWU!!!! *holds up spork*
Me: Oh, a princess of hell? A hell that not only has a continuous culture but delves into the politics of the elites and the powerful? There's such a thing as a "hell school"? There are rivals from other noble families? Lucifer's the fucking dad, but she has a kind heart? The mother is clearly a cosmic being in her own right? Wait, are we going to actually explore the literal light of Lucifer and his rebellion through the eyes of his own offspring, someone raised to be savvy and aware of what place she's in and how to navigate it, tutored by otherworldly beings, powerful, intelligent, and charismatic? Someone who went through all that but still wants to help others? Oh, that could be interesting.
Me after the show came out: Wait, she's just a fucking retard tier trust fund bi-for-attention trust fund kid but in a red pantsuit? Fucksake, Vivz. She's literally Preppy Becky. How could you ruin that kind of a concept? I really hope this is a long game and I lost it, but I doubt it.
I remember wondering how someone with a heart as big as pilot!Charlie's, never mind as powerful as she should be, would handle finding out how awful Valentino was. Maybe she knew all along but had to put up an act until the right time? After all, her dad is Lucifer, her mom is Lilith, no progeny of that pair could ever not know what sex is, at least if it was written well.
Nah, have her a complete fucking doormat, have the torture porn with the candy cane whore bug. I'm more certain than
ever Vivz did 99% of the writing and nobody fucking edited any of it.
Edit because the rage post ain't over: Fuck, what if Charlie was a prince instead, a boy? Then Vivz would make him actually do something. Fucking christ. Fujo shit is just gender swapped troon writing.
The problem is the complete incompetency in writing characters like, say, Angel Dust. She wants to make them these snarky smartasses with a dark past yet have a good heart. Its trying to have your cake and eat it too.
That's doable, as is showing fucked up shit, either nakedly, or juxtaposed to their exploitation, if you take the effort to do it right, by finding editors and beta readers. She did not. I've known a lot of people who are snarky, with pitch black pasts, but goodhearted! On the other hand, I've hung out with combat veterans and trafficking victims, and so can base things off of them.
In the 4th episode, the scenes where the twink porn star gets fucked in the studio create a proper feeling of disgust and terror. This is how Horror should make you feel. The tone of the show is all over the place.
Now, in this amazing video, it is revealed that every single episode of Helluva Boss has 2 different storylines, it's always either about a character having daddy issues or relationship issues. Every character is defined by their daddy or their relationship. And, I'm getting the feeling that Hazbin Hotel will hit the exact same story beats. The setup of the 4th episode of HH is a carbon copy of the last HB episode, just more sexual.
> A character is in distress, because their daddy wants them to perform
> A love interest of the character express concern over this, but is brushed off
> The character is forced to perform their act by their daddy, and it's a traumatic experience
> In the end, they both sing an uplifting song about being positive or whatever the fuck
> A lot of gay shit.
Kek.
Although, it does seem that HH is setting up an actual storyline of war between demons and angels. Is it the effect of hiring actual professional writers?
The problem is the complete incompetency in writing characters like, say, Angel Dust. She wants to make them these snarky smartasses with a dark past yet have a good heart. Its trying to have your cake and eat it too.
Your example piece would have been a way better intro than the expospeak dump that we got, in the extraordinarily narcissistic and tone-deaf form of the main character reading a book about herself.
The problem, however, is that you're still not looking at HH/HB's writing through the correct lens. All of the confusing aspects of this setting make perfect sense when you come to understand that Viv writes straight-up fujoshi bait. In fact, it is only through this lens that the plots of Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss even begin to make sense, because they are actually the same plot, which is one of a thin pretense for overwrought homosexual males to show sexy vulnerability in a way that titillates the female members of the audience.We're a hotel that rehabilitates sinners, but it's actually just group therapy! We're a company of assassins, but it's actually just group therapy!
Why are the leading ladies chopped liver, you ask? When are Charlie and Millie gonna get character development?
The answer to that question is, of course, never. Those characters are near-blank-slate audience surrogates that allow us to imagine that we're getting close to and comforting these poor, damaged faggots as they wheeze tobacco dust, whine about their sad pasts, and tearfully clutch their aching sodomite bellies full of alcohol and cum.
I think the sad part of this is that so far Hazbin hasn't been bad enough to really make fun of, but it hasn't been good enough to win anybody over. It's a 4-6/10 show, the many shows that run for maybe 2 or 3 seasons, the type that you might put on TV while in bed and fall asleep to, and are forgotten as soon as they are taken off the air because they're neither bad enough to live on in infamy nor good enough to be looked upon with fondness, just mediocre.
Jesus being in Hazbin would raise the point of "wouldn't Charlie desperately try to work with him?". On the other hand, Vivzie missing such an obvious plot point isn't past her. Lol.
What the fuck was all that? Why is he lecturing us on how "we're all human beings" and "there are all different types of people" and "muh childhood bullying?" Literally all this nigger had to say was "Yeah, I spent $50k on softcore self-insert porn. It was dumb but it's my money." The exact same message without the patronizing word salad.
Jesus being in Hazbin would raise the point of "wouldn't Charlie desperately try to work with him?". On the other hand, Vivzie missing such an obvious plot point isn't past her. Lol.
Hell I remember someone earlier mentioning St. Peter as another Heavenly figure that would help.
Really Viv cares more about seeing fujo fics of her characters than reading about any theology or myth for her shows that heavily deal with Hell and Heaven
Edit because the rage post ain't over: Fuck, what if Charlie was a prince instead, a boy? Then Vivz would make him actually do something. Fucking christ. Fujo shit is just gender swapped troon writing.
@The handsome tard you had an amazing post and I’d like to add more to it:
Throughout the series this “Sanny” character repeatedly claims that he doesn’t know why he went to Hell (“heh, must’ve jacked off one too many times and not prayed for forgiveness after”), however it’s revealed (perhaps by an antagonist) that that is a lie. The real story is that Sanny was an office worker who went postal and shot up his workplace, committing suicide before the cops got to him. This has a profound impact on Charlie, who initially considered him a perfect candidate for redemption, but is disgusted both by his crime and the fact that he lied to her. Sanny’s true nature could be hinted at throughout the series (he’s normally chill and collected, but occasionally has outbursts of anger and violence when things don’t go his way).
Just an idea.
you had an amazing post and I’d like to add more to it:
Throughout the series this “Sanny” character repeatedly claims that he doesn’t know why he went to Hell (“heh, must’ve jacked off one too many times and not prayed for forgiveness after”), however it’s revealed (perhaps by an antagonist) that that is a lie. The real story is that Sanny was an office worker who went postal and shot up his workplace, committing suicide before the cops got to him. This has a profound impact on Charlie, who initially considered him a perfect candidate for redemption, but is disgusted both by his crime and the fact that he lied to her. Sanny’s true nature could be hinted at throughout the series (he’s normally chill and collected, but occasionally has outbursts of anger and violence when things don’t go his way).
Sanny hides away (heh) in shame, but eventually opens up to Charlie about his story. He grew up with perfectionist parents who pushed him into ensuring a successful career throughout his life. He never disobeyed them (something he regrets) and spent his years studying, which isolated him from society. It made him intelligent, but he never made significant friendships, never got into relationships with women, and generally missed out on things that his peers were doing, something that eats away at him.
Eventually he graduated college and got an office job, but hates it. His boss is an asshole, his coworkers mock him for not understanding social cues and his naïveté, and the pay isn’t as good as he thought. And all of it was never something that he chose to do. There could be a moment of tragi-comedy where he decides to look up his high-school bully (an obnoxious prick that his parents told him would never amount to anything, unlike their son, who will be a successful millionaire when he grows up) and finds that he is a Logan Paul-esque social media celebrity who shows off his expensive cars and hot supermodel girlfriends (to add insult to injury, he is also a Mr Beast type who does elaborate stunts for charity, which makes him loved by all despite it clearly being an attempt to boost his ego and wallet). This culminates in Sanny snapping and shooting up his workplace. Keep in mind that Sanny is the one telling this story and he may not be the most reliable narrator.
After this he shows a much more nihilistic side to Charlie. He believes that the world is a cruel, uncaring, and unfair place. He was a life long Atheist but is actually even more disheartened after discovering Hell/Heaven exists because that means that there was an intelligence that made such an unfair existence. He blames his parents for making him this way, blames society for treating him badly, but most of all blames Heaven/God for birthing him into such a scenario. He wishes he was never born and gives up all hope of redemption, saying (perhaps falsely) that he never really believed that he or anyone else could be redeemed and just went along with the Hotel plan to see what would happen.
Charlie understands but still gets angry at him. He may have had a tough life but that doesn’t justify the cowardly killing of innocent people. Or lying about the real reason he is in Hell.
Sanny retorts that Charlie is just like his parents/society:
“You just wanted a perfect goodie-two shoes that you could dote over to make your retarded hotel look good”
“You wanted someone that you could point to and say ‘we’re not all bad’! We’re in fucking hell you stupid clownfaced slut, do you think there is hope for any of us!”
“This was all just the pet project of a naive spoiled bitch who has never had to suffer a day of her life ‘cuz her Dad rules this place”
“I look forward to the next extermination where I can punch one of those asshole exterminators in the face and get my head sliced off to put me out of my goddamned misery!”
Charlie is upset by his unkind words, but despite that she still believes there is hope for him:
“If you ever want to crawl out of your hole-to-die-in you know where to find me”.
Eventually Sanny decides to rejoin the Hotel.
I think an interesting idea for an episode would be where, as part of his path to redemption. Charlie has Sanny go to Earth and try and make amends to his victims in some way. He meets some of their family members (under a disguise) and learns how their lives were crushed by the deaths of their loved ones to such a cruel act of violence. Characters we previously only saw in flashbacks are given some more fleshing out, and as Sanny learns more about them he realizes just how evil his actions were. Perhaps they weren’t as mean as he thought they were, and they all struggled with problems and insecurities just like he does. He learns more about his boss, that despite being an asshole he loved his family, and his assholeishness was because he was often under just as much stress as Sanny was. He learns that his boss even intended to give him a raise after seeing how hard he was working.
Eventually he even meets his parents again. They both divorced after the shooting and his father decided to live out in the middle of the woods under a different name (causing difficulty in finding him), and his mom is an alcoholic wreck (her life as a socialite and gossip backfired after what happened with her son and she is now a pariah). His parents are the only mortals he reveals his true identity to, and they are shocked, angry, but also glad to see him. As they talk it becomes clear to the audience that they aren’t quite as bad as Sanny made them out to be. They both blame themselves for what happened and wonder where they went wrong. Sanny gets angry and explains how they pushed him into a life he was unhappy with.
They say:
“We just wanted what was best for you! Why did you never talk about your problems with us! We would have listened! You could’ve become a coked out bum and we still would have loved you!”
Sanny breaks down: “All I ever wanted was to make you guys happy! I wanted to be a strong independent man like you wanted, so I thought I should deal with things myself!”
“I’m so sorry, I’ve let you down”
They have a group hug, but it is time for Sanny to go.
As he leaves he feels disheartened, the weight of how his selfish action has caused so much suffering leaves him feeling he is unable to move forward. A voice consoles him, saying that he has made an important step towards redemption, and to not give up hope. Due to the content of the message, Sanny thinks it is from Charlie, but he realizes the voice is masculine, and he turns around to see nothing but a ray of light coming from the Moon. He sits there for a moment, before deciding to return to the Hotel…
That was… emotional for me to write (that’s how you write melodrama, take notes Viv!) There are some other concepts that I think could be interesting but I’ll leave it here for now. I will add one last thing:
Back when the character sheets for Hazbin leaked, some of the character profiles had songs listed for them I guess fit/inspired the character (Iirc Vaggie’s was “Crybaby” by Melanie Martinez, and Charlie’s was “Over the Rainbow” by Judy Garland). I think I have a couple songs for this “Sanny” character (ignore the retarded visuals on the first one):
I just realized your concept about a man damned to the place of Hell trying to get out really does remind me of the premise of The Amazing Digital Circus.
Pomni, a girl who somehow ended up in a digital game with other abstract creatures that fell into the same dimension as her, gets a whole new body and freaks out about it. In fact upon entering this new dimension she completely forgot what her previous name as a human was, but she knows she's not supposed to be there and is trying to find a way out. As such, this is sort of the end goal/main objective of the entire show, for her or the entire cast to find a way to escape.
I doubt Vivzie actively knew about TADC's development for her to not explore this aspect for her show because of it, but it's interesting how TADC could be a look into a different world for how HH could've gone if a concept like Sanny were to exist for the show to play around with.
I'm kind of all over the place so please bear with me.
I think a viewer who was just checking out the series for the first time would be confused watching the first episode. You really need some of the context from the pilot to at least allow the viewer to get to know the characters and have everyone, especially Alastor, introduced properly. My immediate question upon seeing Alastor would be "Who is this guy and why are the others so scared of him?" "How did Angel Dust get convinced to be a resident of the hotel if he's such a degenerate?" "Are Nifty and Husk just staff or do they want to be redeemed too?"
Most of the time pilot episodes end up getting remade when the series is approved for production and is either redone completely with the finalized concepts or exactly the same but in-line with final designs and voices. I really believe HH would have benefitted from having the pilot remade.
With that out of the way, I enjoyed every episode so far and honestly find it fun - but I see and hear the flaws clear as day. My favorite bits are mostly Angel Dust when he's not talking about dick, Alastor being creepy, Nifty being herself, and everything about Sir Pentious + his egg minions. He's such a loveable snake. I wish Charlie and Vaggie were actually interesting but they're just not. Poor Charlie got hit with the dumb naive crybaby blonde stick inbetween the pilot and the first episode.
I also actually really enjoyed ep. 4 and seeing how Val treats Angel. I don't like Poison as a song, Addict would have been much better - but seeing Angel crumble and suffer fucked me up a little. Every flash of a frown or scared expression was impactful emotionally, but I really think it should have been done far more carefully. I understand fully why so many people are upset by it. Made me feel gross to know the person behind boarding Poison finds it hot. We don't need to see Angel being thrusted into and slapped around looking sad multiple times to get what his life is like. The scene in the dressing room with Val was enough.
So first of all, the awful camera work in Ep. 1 made me almost get motion sickness, it's that bad. I didn't really notice it in the other 3 episodes thankfully. I like interesting camera work especially in animated stuff, but you also need to know what you're doing.
Second, voices.
Vaggie's voice is just not good. Her actress is either not into it or is being directed to sound like that. You really got the voice of a recent Disney hit protagonist who's all bubbly and energetic and then you try to have her sound like she hates her life and has a cold at the same time. Why. She sounds a bit better when she sings, but Viv should have put down her damn ego and found an actress with a naturally subdued and deeper voice if that's what would fit.
Angel Dust's actor has voice cracks quite a lot. You can hear how he struggles to do the accent and it's so distracting. Out of all the voice actors from the pilot, Kovak needed to stay on as Angel Dust. Fuck you Viv, you robbed yourself.
Alastor's new voice just doesn't feel menacing enough. The radio fuzz does a lot of work, but the emotion is off.
Husk being voiced by Keith David doesn't bother me at all though I know many disagree. I just really like how he sounds. No, it doesn't fit the character but he's so soothing.
I don't have much to say about anyone else voice-wise. Same guy as Ozzie is the new bug demon Zestial, and I love listening to him too.
I want to be autstic about musicals for a minute here: for the love of God, if you have never actually written a musical before get someone who has to help you and let them take the reins. I am not an aficiando of Broadway or anything, but I have seen my fair share of stage musicals over the course of my life. I have also seen nearly every Disney musical movie and always take note when a movie has a pleasing score. There is a plethora of media out there to learn from about how to do a crowd-pleasing musical. It's not easy, there's really a lot that goes into it. However - when you have these big Broadway celebrity voices on your production and the songs end up not landing - holy shit that is such a waste of resources, time, and budget.
I am going to now sing the praises of one piece of media: Centaurworld, a recent animated musical series done right.
Centaurworld is a 2 season animated musical show on Netlfix. Nobody talks about it, but I adore it with every fiber of my being. Anyway, nearly every song except for a couple of outliers is done brilliantly. They get the tone, the camera work, the vocal expression, the flashiness when needed, and most of all the lyrics combined with the score. This show has a Broadway cast just like Hazbin Hotel, but they really let that aspect shine all throughout the series. You can tell it's done by professionals.
One thing I notice between HH and CW is that CW songs all have a proper lead-up to them. HH suffers from the stereotype of musicals having characters just randomly belt out into song. You should always be able to hear the music coming and anticipate "oh, this character is going to start singing in a few seconds" instead of it just coming out of nowhere. I mean, you can have it come out of nowhere, but usually it's supposed to be for comedic purposes. You can't do it all the time.
HH episode 3 has all the overlords in a meeting and for whatever reason they decided to have the argument between Carmilla and Velvette be a very sudden little musical number when it didn't need to be one. I thought it was pretty boring. They could have at least made it flashier and more fun by having all the overlords get into the song and harmonize with their thoughts on this spat. Nobody except for Zestial says anything during that meeting. They just sit there staring emotionless while Velvette walks all over the table. I just don't understand.
I can't think of much else to say and I'm tired so I'll leave it there for now. I honestly feel invested in what's going to happen with this show both as a viewer but also as a lolcow watcher.
TL;DR I like the show so far and am excited an indie project got this far but someone really needed to tard wrangle Viv
Watched it and I'm kind of confused about how badly its written. Helluva boss might be a gay melodrama that wastes its characters but a least it has characters.
I am struggling to tell you what any characters goal or motivation is... all I got out of four episodes is that alister and lilith are somehow involved 7 years ago.... that's it.
I have less understanding of the show then I did first watching the pilot.
That was an interesting and touching take but I think your backstory works best for another Hotel resident thats introduced after Sanny, since his whole point is the ambiguity on if you can be sent to Hell despite being a good person somehow and the implications on if that does turn out to be the case (I did think on the possible reasons tho I wont list them all). I can picture your character looking a bit like a nerd, glasses and all (probably he cant take them off, they are "fused" to his face in whats no doubt a twist to his human appearance) and his role in the grand scheme is to show how not everyone that joins this will have faith and will just take advantage (kind like Angel Dust initially) and even then, they can still be helped. I can see him and Alastor getting along given his chaotic and polite nature. A series about Hell would need to address more hardcore sins like mass shooters and raise the question on if they can be redeemed...or if they even deserve it.
The way the whole show was setup, it really made it seem like we would get a relatively big cast of characters over time with a revolving door policy, meaning they can either lose faith and leave or stick around and eventually get redeemed into a better place so we would have the cast thats fixed and the temporary one. It would allow for a lot of wholesome and tragic moments...but I guess the problem is that there wouldnt be enough "mature" humor I guess.
I just realized your concept about a man damned to the place of Hell trying to get out really does remind me of the premise of The Amazing Digital Circus.
Pomni, a girl who somehow ended up in a digital game with other abstract creatures that fell into the same dimension as her, gets a whole new body and freaks out about it. In fact upon entering this new dimension she completely forgot what her previous name as a human was, but she knows she's not supposed to be there and is trying to find a way out. As such, this is sort of the end goal/main objective of the entire show, for her or the entire cast to find a way to escape.
I doubt Vivzie actively knew about TADC's development for her to not explore this aspect for her show because of it, but it's interesting how TADC could be a look into a different world for how HH could've gone if a concept like Sanny were to exist for the show to play around with.
The concept of an individual being thrusted into an alien world/realm and trying to find a way out is a classic trope that has been around for decades and its usually a good way to do world building in a way that doesnt feel very "as you know". I think if you are going to do a significantly different take of heaven and hell, you might as well have the POV of a newcomer who probably sees the entire understanding of these two places has been shattered and thus can have more human reactions to said differences. Embrace the difference and how it would make someone snap upon seeing all they knew being wrong.
"Thats Beelzebub ?! He is suppose to look like a fat disgusting fly that represents the sins of Gluttony! Not this fox looking thing! This is wrong! ALL WRONG!"
Probably sounding like this
People snapping into madness is funny so you can get some comedy out of that.
"Thats Beelzebub ?! He is suppose to look like a fat disgusting fly that represents the sins of Gluttony! Not this fox looking thing! This is wrong! ALL WRONG!"
Probably sounding like this
Man, now I'm imagining a comedic plot involving trying to expose Wolf Beelzebub as a faker and bring the real Beelzebub back to his rightful throne, furfag jokes and hijinks ensue.
Got done watching episode 4, and I genuinely cannot see what people see in the HuskerDust ship. Angel's a hedonistic fag who goes after every man he sees either for business or to drown himself in sorrow, and Husker is just some furfag who doesn't want to deal with anyone else's shit, but somehow this makes him the prine candidate to being Angel's special someone?
Nothing whatsoever. It's the worst ship. Husk being continually annoyed by Angel's inappropriate advances would have been funny. You know, like the show was a comedy or something.
