I adored this episode ! It felt just extremely compelling on it's treating of Stolas character and how it explained a lot of questions and hint they gave us in season one. He' s even more tri dimensional than before and I'm loving it. While he do have a lot of flaws, he still reflect on, and try to fix them. Seeing Stolas finally reacting to Stella's costant abuses was worth the wait. I'm truly amazed by how the subject of domestic abuse with the man as the victim was treated with such empathy, without the man in question being ridiculed or the abuse itself minimized just because perpetrated by a woman. I feel like it's never depicted enough in mainstream media. Seeing it portrayed like that in a popular serie was a breath of fresh air... While Helluva Boss starts out as a comedy, these extremely realistic and dramatic moments remind us why (maybe) so many people fell in love with this serie: the team is not afraid to handle heavy topics, and they doesn't treat them as cheap Family Guy like gags either. The characters are so well built in their flaws and goods that they feels real. Stolas writing feels extremely mature and realistic, especially how he feels crashed by social expectations, and how his handle of the situation keep worsening, just like a problem so big will do in real life. His relationship with imps as a whole feel more deep than just a simple liking. Imps seems to have taken an important role for him his whole life : starting with the imp doll he carried with him since he was just an egg (as we can see in the paintings) to the imp butler being closer to him than his actual dad. While he do involountary treat imps in a paternal way due to the environment he grew on, he seems to be more comfortable around them than around his own people, as we can see in Loo Loo Land and at The Harvest Moon Festival vs In The Circus during Stella's party. He probably feels safe around imps, making his love for Blitz even stronger and deeper than just a childhood crush. I've seen people complaining about the childhood friends trope, but they don't seems to realize that this is actually playing with and twisting the trope : not only it serve as a mirroring to their adult relationship (Blitz entering Stolas life with the sole purpose of stealing from him, realizing afterwards that he isn't that bad of a company after all) while showing us they do have chemistry, it also break the trope by making them met for just one day, and then completely rebuild their relationship after 25 years. Stolas doesn't even remember his name ! this isn't a normal childhood friends trope. Stella's villainous personality was even more enforced : they gave hints about her in Loo Loo Land during Octavia/Stolas talk, and this episode just confirmed it out loud and I'm loving how her characterization is going. I can't wait to find more about her past and what kind of relationship she and Stolas have with Andrealphus. Stolas' song was extremely saddening and heart felt. Bryce singing it with a broken voice, like he was actually crying, was extremely fitting for the performance. Helluva Boss is doing great so far, I can't find an episode I really disliked. Can't wait for the next ones !
Review by ZweiReiBlockedParent2022-09-11T21:09:29Z
I adored this episode ! It felt just extremely compelling on it's treating of Stolas character and how it explained a lot of questions and hint they gave us in season one. He' s even more tri dimensional than before and I'm loving it. While he do have a lot of flaws, he still reflect on, and try to fix them. Seeing Stolas finally reacting to Stella's costant abuses was worth the wait. I'm truly amazed by how the subject of domestic abuse with the man as the victim was treated with such empathy, without the man in question being ridiculed or the abuse itself minimized just because perpetrated by a woman. I feel like it's never depicted enough in mainstream media. Seeing it portrayed like that in a popular serie was a breath of fresh air...
While Helluva Boss starts out as a comedy, these extremely realistic and dramatic moments remind us why (maybe) so many people fell in love with this serie: the team is not afraid to handle heavy topics, and they doesn't treat them as cheap Family Guy like gags either.
The characters are so well built in their flaws and goods that they feels real. Stolas writing feels extremely mature and realistic, especially how he feels crashed by social expectations, and how his handle of the situation keep worsening, just like a problem so big will do in real life. His relationship with imps as a whole feel more deep than just a simple liking. Imps seems to have taken an important role for him his whole life : starting with the imp doll he carried with him since he was just an egg (as we can see in the paintings) to the imp butler being closer to him than his actual dad. While he do involountary treat imps in a paternal way due to the environment he grew on, he seems to be more comfortable around them than around his own people, as we can see in Loo Loo Land and at The Harvest Moon Festival vs In The Circus during Stella's party. He probably feels safe around imps, making his love for Blitz even stronger and deeper than just a childhood crush. I've seen people complaining about the childhood friends trope, but they don't seems to realize that this is actually playing with and twisting the trope : not only it serve as a mirroring to their adult relationship (Blitz entering Stolas life with the sole purpose of stealing from him, realizing afterwards that he isn't that bad of a company after all) while showing us they do have chemistry, it also break the trope by making them met for just one day, and then completely rebuild their relationship after 25 years. Stolas doesn't even remember his name ! this isn't a normal childhood friends trope.
Stella's villainous personality was even more enforced : they gave hints about her in Loo Loo Land during Octavia/Stolas talk, and this episode just confirmed it out loud and I'm loving how her characterization is going. I can't wait to find more about her past and what kind of relationship she and Stolas have with Andrealphus.
Stolas' song was extremely saddening and heart felt. Bryce singing it with a broken voice, like he was actually crying, was extremely fitting for the performance. Helluva Boss is doing great so far, I can't find an episode I really disliked. Can't wait for the next ones !