*Spoilers for Hazbin Hotel Season 1 Episode 1*
The official Synopsis for Hazbin Hotel follows Charlie, the princess of Hell, as she pursues her seemingly impossible goal of rehabilitating demons to peacefully reduce overpopulation in her kingdom. After a yearly extermination imposed by angels, she opens a hotel in the hopes that patrons will be “checking out” into Heaven.
The episode focuses on Charlie Morningstar (Erika Henningsen) as she tries to promote her Hazbin Hotel through a commercial that the radio demon Alastor (Amir Talai) made for her. The commercial mostly makes fun of the hotel instead of trying to promote it for the other demons in Hell. Once the commercial ends, Charlie and Vaggie (Stephanie Beatriz) agree that the commercial does not represent what Charlie wants the hotel to be. Angel Dust (Blake Roman) who is an ex porn-star, suggests that he and Alastor do a scene to promote the hotel, but that idea is quickly shut down by Vaggie.
Charlie then proceeds to get a call from her father, Lucifer (Jeremy Jordan), asking her to meet with the leader of the angel army, Adam, since he will not be able to make it. Charlie is ecstatic about the opportunity and breaks into a song, where she describes her dream to allow for souls to be redeemed and sent into heaven. While Charlie goes to meet Adam, Vaggie gathers the crew of the hotel to make a new commercial to surprise Charlie with when she returns from the meeting, a commercial that truly represents Charlie’s idea of the Hazbin Hotel.
During the meeting Adam disregards Charlie most of the time, barely caring about anything that she may have to say. When she finally gets his attention, she again breaks into a song explaining her plans, which Adam then replies to with his own song, explaining how hell is forever and the souls that live in hell will stay there until the angels come and exterminate them. Charlie then returns back to the Hazbin Hotel, and right as her and the crew of the hotel are about to watch the commercial, a news broadcast starts that reveals a terrible truth…
This episode is the perfect introduction to this world and the characters that live within that world. The animation is crisp and colorful, with very creative and unique character designs that allows for each character to feel special and different in their own way. The writing is good throughout the episode, with the adult rating being taken advantage of, allowing for the characters to say curse words that would not be allowed to say in a kids cartoon. The songs were not necessarily bad, but they felt pretty generic when compared to other musical numbers in cartoon shows or movies. The voice acting is great from the whole cast, although the main standouts truly are Erika Henningsen as Charlie and Amir Talai as Alastor. Both actors really get into their element with these characters and that is portrayed perfectly in their vocal performances throughout the episode.
Overall this episode is a breath of fresh air as a new and unique adult animated show. The show will have audiences hooked from the start with its colorful and stunning animation, and the story is what will have the audiences wanting for more.
Rating: 7.5/10