Disclaimer: I could be wrong about all of the assumptions I am about to make, I am making this with the hope of being corrected if I am wrong about any of this.

Okay, so Hazbin Hotel is everyone's favorite punching bag online. One of many reasons for that is that it "abandoned" its premise of redeeming sinners and went for "fighting heaven," and people wish it had stuck with its pilot premise.

"Okay, I ask, "What would that look like?" I am actually trying to imagine what that would be like because, at the moment, it feels like a vague "just fix it" or "make it better" criticism.

When I try to imagine this—and I might be wrong, and I want to be corrected if I am—all I can see is everyone just sitting around the Hotel and talking.

IDK about anyone else, but that feels like it would be unnatural, forced, and boring.

The way I have looked at "redemption" arcs, I will admit, is through a very action series-focused lens. Most arcs I know of have the character be an active villain with a goal, but also some virtues so we have something to root for, and as they go through their journey/the plot they realize the error of their ways or this is not what they wanted, and then you got their redemption moment where they flip sides and join the good guys, usually with some kind of grand speech or moment of heroism to cap off their development.

But then I look at Hazbin Hotel, and I'm like, "Okay, how does this work here?"

I already complained in a previous rant about how I think Blitz's development in Helluva Boss, even with its writing flaws, is a much better take a redemption because you see him naturally go through events.

Meanwhile, with Hazbin Hotel, I just imagine Charlie locking her and Angel Dust in a room and basically demanding Angel spill his whole backstory and emotional state. Then, she would say the big emotional quote/lesson of the episode, and that repeats.

I just feel like in storytelling there is a reason characters go through some external plot and grow from that rather than just sit around talking

One story that I have fully seen recently talking about redemption/character development is the Norse God of War duology. Imagine if there was no external plot, no journey to the tallest peak in the realms, no fighting the Aesir, it was just Kratos and Atreus at their house playing life simulator. Kratos would not have begun to open up and develop had he not gone on those journeys with Atreus. It's the reason why Faye had the tree for her funeral pyre break the ward protecting their home, so Kratos would take Atreus with him on their journey so they could bond. Or at least that is how I see it. The external conflict gives characters things to do to help work through their inner/more personal conflict.

But with Hazbin Hotel's premise, there is no external threat. Even the Exterminations don't count because they don't happen all the time; they only happen once- now twice—a year and are usually meant to be big finale set pieces. Heaven isn't exactly down the street so we can have confrontations with them absolutely whenever.

When I imagine Hazbin Hotel as the critics seem to want, all I imagine is like a fanfic of someone's OC with future vision, kidnapping Book 1 Zuko, tying him to a chair, and trying to force his character development with every Iroh conversation he has throughout the series at once, instead of Zuko going through his whole journey.

Having a premise be "criminals get therapy" is a bit hard to imagine when most shows don't use therapy that often. The most recent stuff that I know of that has therapists are:

1. Rick and Morty, but I heard that therapist from the Pickle Rick episode is not a good one

2. Maruki from Persona 5 Royal, but I also heard he did some therapy no-nos

3. Dr. Linda Martin from the Lucifer Netflix series. Possibly the closest we'll get to this premise, but from what I remember of watching that series when I binged it a couple of years ago, she was more there for the usual episode premise of Lucifer has some issue, he goes to her to vent, she TRIES to give him advice, he takes it the wrong way because he has an ego, Lucifer goes about the episode and learns the lesson in a roundabout way via naturally going through the plot. Exactly the issue I have here.

4. Black Canary in Young Justice. I haven't seen the full series, but I have seen a clip of her giving a session with Garth/Beast Boy that has popped up on my YouTube feed.

It feels like therapy in fiction is meant to give the "Here is the big moral lesson" lines, and I don't think you can have a show that has one of those every time/episode. I know a complaint about Helluva Boss is that it has a lot of the big emotional moments but little to no build-up; that is what I feel like people are asking of Hazbin Hotel. You want the big character emotional moment of character growth without them doing anything.

Or I remember there are some moments in Batman shows and comics where some of the villains get reformed, usually for just an episode or one issue. Usually, we just see the tail end of their reformation, not the full process, and the rest is how they do after that. I believe I remember an episode of BTAS with the Ventriloquist getting rid of Scarface. We don't see the full process, just the tail end so we can get into the episode.

I remember some suggestions for fixing the plot that I seen here and there were:

A. Make it more like Smiling Friends. But from what I remember about S1 of SF, 1. some of the things they did to make people smile were kind of messed up, and 2. I feel like changing someone's morality and making them a better person should take a lot more effort and more than one episode than just making them smile. Otherwise, you won't be getting actually deep characters with complex reasons for what they do; you're gonna get more "bad men who very got enough hugs" and cartoon characters like Sir Pentious.

B. Have the Hotel guests do exposure therapy and then go out and live their lives. My issue with that is that it feels like the Hotel guests are more the main/focal/central characters now instead of our actual main character, Charlie. I have already complained about this before, about how this whole premise makes Charlie seem more like a side character in a main character role. The role of the morality chain meant to make the more gruff character(s) stay on the path of good for their development.

I'm sorry if this all feels disjointed. I just want to know what people want, not just a vague idea, because I get it. The show seemed to promise one thing and deliver another. But sometimes, when I hear certain criticism, I'm like, "Ok, yeah, that is a good idea/point, but now, how do you actually implement it?"

Again, as I said at the beginning, I could be wrong about ALL of these assumptions; it's just what comes to mind whenever I hear about this complaint. If I am wrong, I want to be corrected. This is just how this common complaint comes off to me and I just want to know what people see in their heads when they imagine Hazbin Hotel as it was "promised."