I reviewed the pilot of Hazbin Hotel back in 2020. While that got picked up by Amazon and now has its second season a spin off series also produced was Helluva Boss, which also had a pilot and now also has 2 seasons out on YouTube. Earlier this year they announced that Helluva Boss was also going to be funded by Amazon allowing for the crossovers we have been hoping for, but also a redone version of the pilot and that’s what we’re reviewing today.
Helluva Boss stars the Immediate Murder Professionals aka I.M.P consisting of the IMPS Blitzo (the O is silent) Moxxie, Millie and Hellhound Loona who is Blitzo’s adopted daughter. They are paid assassins. Mission Zero is much like the original pilot set before the first episode and has the team organizing their first job going over their different ideas on how to handle the first job. These show a bit about what each character is like, such as Millie just out right slaughtering everyone with melee weapons and her bare hands, while Moxie was a professional sniper.
The briefing is interrupted by Stolas a Goetia that Blitzo got the Grimour he plans to use to travel to the human world from Hell to do his assassinations. Before returning to the planning and then just winging it as they leap through the portal to the new company jingle (might be an opening theme, don’t know) It’s not long. The episode clocks in just below 12 minutes so it’s a short watch… it’s not for kids there’s a lot of foul language and … lets just say more.
One interesting thing to view is comparing it to the original pilot. First easily noticeable is the considerable improvement on animation quality, that Amazon money gives it a noticeable boost, and not just over the original pilot. Another bit is seeing how they tweaked or adapted parts from the original pilot into this new take on it. The characters shown in that pilot are different in how they would be later shown in the show proper, most notably Stolas, who now has a considerably larger role in Mission Zero than he did back then. Some parts like the phone call which led into such dialog even the other demons were shocked to the point of destroying the phone was kept in, while new is Stolas coming to the office directly after that phone call, also he’s considerably less antagonistic. Loona is fairly nicer than she was portrayed in the original pilot. As with all them though most of the character development happens in the show proper and this is just by design the earliest outside of flashbacks we would see them.
With the new deal with Amazon any new episodes of the show will come out on Amazon Prime first before showing up on YouTube with the promise that now Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss characters can interact, something we are all looking forward to seeing. Since the core characters are key to this show and if you enjoy them that leaves Mission Zero a good way to see if you’re interested in finding out if the show is for you.
Rating: 🎅🎅🎅🎅
