Alright, so I remember Vivziepop from a long, long time ago when she made what was decidedly a furry music video of Kesha’s “Die Young” song for what I believe was a school project. She garnered some attention for her wonderful animation skills, and, apparently, went on to have a fairly successful art-based Youtube channel and also a comic series.

Then kaboom. Though apparently Hazbin Hotel (YOU’VE WATCHED THE VIDEO I EMBEDDED FOR YOU, RIGHT?) has been some time in the making, its eventual release made quite a splash. And boy, did that splash reach far.

And, really, that’s no surprise. The show twists expectations, is unashamed in what it represents, and has a fantastic art style that oozes visual cues for the characters’ personalities. It also has a unique take on hell while staying mostly faithful to the type of characters we might find there and sets up an entertaining premise.

This is most definitely not a children’s cartoon, but the adult themes coupled with the “Saturday Morning Cartoon” style really creates a powerful contrast. This is the kind of imaginative content I love seeing, and I hope all the best to Viziepop. This is only a pilot, and their funding and future plans are uncertain, but as a proof of concept they’ve nailed it out of the ballpark. They even have high tier voice talent in their animations that include major actors from series like Invader Zim.

As if the success of Hazbin Hotel wasn’t enough (22 million views as of this moment) though, a mere short time later they launched a second pilot set in the same hell universe titled Helluva Boss (ha). It’s just as good, if not better:

Anyways, I found both were quite enjoyable and imaginative and just wanted to gush about the videos. There’s also some good stuff buried in there too that I’ve seen somewhat explored in a few novels, such as the concept of redeeming those sent to the hell-variant of the afterlife, or even, in general, what the structure of life beyond death might look like. The shows aren’t serious about any of this of course, but they still do play with the ideas.

The point is really that they’re just fun little entertaining videos though. So make sure to go watch them and enjoy!