Hazbin Hotel (Season 2)

After saving Hell from another Angelic extermination, the Hazbin Hotel’s popularity has skyrocketed…for all the wrong reasons.  As new guests arrive hoping to learn how to kill Angels, the Entertainment Demon Vox plots to use the Hotel’s newfound fame to his advantage, pressing for a complete overhaul of both Heaven and Hell.  And with Charlie Morningstar too overwhelmed by her own ambitious and demands of the hotel, Vox has little standing in his way.  The Hazbin Hotel may have saved Hell once but if they cant band together once again they might just be the downfall of Heaven and Hell.

Hazbin Hotel was a massive hit when it dropped in 2024 and many of my friends wanted me to cover it on the blog.  Sure enough, I loved Season One so much it ended up on my Top 5 Best Reviewed Titles of that year.  Heck it was so good I’m relaxing my usual “wait til the shows run is done to review it” rule to continue looking at Season Two.  Given how much Season One succeeded, Season Two’s hype and expectations is through the roof.  And for the most part, it manages to accomplish what the First Season did and improve in various ways when it comes to the characters, music and scale of the rising conflict.  In fact, it kind of says a lot about how well Hazbin Hotel Season 2 is that it’s weakest component is it’s main character, Charlie.
 
Yeah, Charlie’s kind of parked in neutral for most of Season Two.  She’s understandably sad over the loss of Pencious and is initially unaware that the Hotel did in fact work as intended.  When Charlie does realize this, she becomes increasingly neurotic and borderline oblivious to just how much her “good intentions” are messing things up for everyone around her.  She even goes to very dangerous lengths to push her friends towards redemption that feel less well meaning and more insanely desperate.  It doesn’t paint Charlie in the best light as a character much less as a leader.  She does improve towards the end of the season but it takes forever for Charlie to get herself in gear.
 
Charlie’s failings do end up giving the rest of the fantastic supporting cast more to do to both pick up her slack and advance their own character arcs.  Vaggie becomes more a leading figure for the Hotel while Cherri deals with Pentious’ romantic confession and sacrifice and even Angel and Husk get their moments to share their troubled pasts while leaning on each other more.  There are two characters who stand out the best in this ever growing cast and top of the list for me is Pentious.  He gets arguably the best storyline of the season, exploring a question I doubt the viewer much less Charlie ever considered: What happens when you get to Heaven and you’re all alone?  Sure everything is sunshine and happiness but Pentious’ missing the family that got him there was an emotional gut punch but man does he persevere and shake up Heaven in his own way.  Also I love his new angelic character design, it’s cute.
 
Then there’s Vox.  Whoa this guy’s been built up by the fanbase and after his few and far between appearances in Season One, Vox explodes onto the scene in Season Two.  You can easily see why he is the kind of Demon he is cause Vox is dramatic and extravagant in just about everything he does.  He’s a showman who can play to the core of the crowd of Hell’s desires and expertly turns the Hazbin Hotel’s victories to his own advantage.  And while Adam had the bad boy attitude and potty mouth to make him a fitting antagonist for Season One, Vox steps up the villain game with some truly demented and terrible things to just about everyone, including some very unsettling moments I wont spoil in this review.  You want to see him get the ultimate comeuppance but he’s also well written, well acted and you can even at one point sympathize with the guy when you realize what’s pushed him to become this nigh unredeemable being.
 
When it comes to the music of Hazbin Hotel, it’s still incredible and Season Two has some absolute bangers and tearjerkers alike.  Songs like “Gravity”, “Love in a Bottle” and “Sera’s Confession” nail the heavier emotional beats that their performers are dealing with and make for an argument that all of the dialogue in this show could just be sung and it could be just as good.  Vox and his cohorts “The Vees” get some great villainous tracks that are dark, catchy and fun, embodying all of their deceit, in fighting and their need to always go big and then go bigger.  My personal favorites include the aforementioned “Gravity”, the Season Finale’s “Hear my Hope” and Charlie and Vaggi’s sexy duet “Easy”.  But nothing and I mean NOTHING ever comes close to matching “Clean it Up” sung to perfection by Nifty.  NGL it might be my favorite song of the whole series so far cause of how crazy and “kawaii” it goes.
 
If there is one thing that hampers Season Two from being as good as Season One it’s how crowded it feels with all the storylines.  While I do think many of the cast advance their plots forward wonderfully, others get lost in the shuffle.  Lute’s desire to destroy Hell and avenge Adam gets overshadowed by Emily and Sera’s plotlines sort of intersecting with that.  Baxter is a fun addition to the cast but even he doesn’t get much in the way of a storyline for himself.  And then there’s Alastor.  Given where we left him at the end of Season One, we were bound to explore his origins and the cryptic deal he spoke of (btw the Pre Hell backstories we do see are amazing and heartbreaking).  Not saying I dislike the character, far from it.  Alastor’s one of the favs for a reason and his 3v1 showdown with the Vees is a major highlight.  Maybe it’s just me but Alastor’s storyline moves too fast and resolves in such a way that it never seemed like a big deal to begin with.  Or at the very least, when he pulls off what he pulls off, why didn’t he ever do it sooner? 
 
Hazbin Hotel (Season Two) isnt the slam dunk 10/10 that its debut season was for me.  While the season was at times overstuffed and Charlie’s continual denial of the situation around her got truly irritating, everything else was on fire from the stellar character writing to the improved animation to the songs that make the heart flutter, cringe and smile in equal measure.  The shows already been renewed for at least two more seasons after this one (at least I think it’s going to at least Season Four).  So you can bet I’ll be back for another stay when Season Three debuts hopefully sometime in 2026.  Hopefully by then the growing pains of Season Two can be ironed out and the series can soar higher than it already has.
 
9/10