Sean Parker
It’s been a minute since Shudder unleashed a new scripted series on us (not since The Creep Tapes in November, I think), and Hell Motel seemed to have come out of left field at us this month. Honestly, if it weren’t for the creepy poster of a horned masked figure standing behind a motel counter, I probably would never have known that my next summer obsession was here. If you were a fan of Shudder’s Slasher series, well, it just might be your next summer obsession, too. Slasher creator Aaron Martin reteams with Ian Carpenter, the showrunner of Slasher in its later seasons, for a new twist on an old trope.
Remember that tucked-away little motel in Psycho? Well, it’s gotten a facelift and the walls have been painted red. Yet, for a motel out in the middle of nowhere, when it rains, it sure draws a crowd. While not the traditional Bates Motel, Hell Motel provides a wink and a nod to one of the films that started the Slasher genre, as two newlyweds arrive at the motel in 1995 only to have their wedding night bliss turned to gruesome terror and turned into a shocking cold case that every true crime fanatic in the world knows something about.
Bringing us back into the present day, we’re met with a cast of characters sitting in a limousine, moments away from pulling up to the Cold River Motel. Six people from a variety of fields that are all in some way associated with true crime or the Cold River Motel itself have been invited for a gimmick-filled weekend to what the owners hope will be THE premier true crime-themed B&B of the ages.
Ruby and Portia (Brynn Godenir and Michelle Nolden) are hopeful they will strike promotional gold with their exclusive client list during the motel’s soft launch inaugural weekend, which includes aging scream queen Paige Harper (Paula Brancati) who has starred in all the movies based on the incident, Kawayan (Emmanuel Kabongo), a morbid artist that uses blood and bones in his work, Crow (Shaun Benson) a winded medium, Andy (Jim Watson) an academic who’s studied the Cold River Motel murders at length, Adrianna (Genevieve DeGraves) a woman with a precocious sexual appetite for killers, and Blake (Atticus Mitchell) a top podcaster with an affinity for visiting murder locations.
After arriving, the guests are brought into a dining room area where the famous chef Hemmingway (Eric McCormack) has prepared an on-brand meal, serving a tasty lamb dish in the most tasteless manner possible. Though that should be enough for the guests to turn on the arrogant food purveyor, it’s the blood punch that sends them over the edge.
Hell Motel then introduces us to our final two characters, Floyd and Shirley Dantree (Gary Powell and Yanna McIntosh), who barge in on the opening weekend due to a storm that has abruptly started outside. Like Marion Crane and the lovebirds at the start of the episode, Floyd and Shirley’s RV has been made to seek shelter off the road as a hurricane begins to sweep through the area. Though this exclusive weekend is specifically catered to the guests, Ruby and Portia allow the RV to park in the empty parking lot, but make an absurdly big deal about it in the process. But now that our gang’s all here, Hell Motel truly starts to heat up.
This pilot episode, titled “Blood Bath,” doesn’t give us a whole lot up front but comes through with a lot of B-movie-style fun in the back half. Most of the episode is spent getting to know the people we’ll be spending the next eight weeks (or less!) with, particularly Paula Brancati’s Paige, who seems to be on the way to becoming the main POV character, unless next episode Martin and Carpenter decide to switch to another Lost style.
Paige is the only person being paid to come to the motel. She takes the opportunity in hopes of connecting more with the real-life person her character was based on in all of the diegetic Doomed Service movies, only to discover the memory of the victim is being sullied and her integrity is being diminished. She complies when asked to wear the victims’ actual clothing, is verbally abused by Hemmingway for losing her appetite at dinner, and hits her last nerve when the hosts go too far for promotional footage. When Floyd and Shirley arrive, she hopes they can provide her a way back to town, but that’s before someone adds one more to the Cold River Motel’s body count and ensures no one is getting out.
The theme of true-crime fanfare through the various types of obsessive individuals is a huge part of Hell Motel so far. Half the characters seem pretentious, while the other half seem to have decent heads on their shoulders (or at least for the time being). The table banquet scene alone seems to show the differences between potential exploitative psychopaths and those who are starting to have real reservations in dealing with the debasement of living people, alive and dead. I doubt the Lizzie Borden house has ever offered this kind of drama.
Hell Motel starts off a little shaky, but in the final frames of the episode, Martin and Carpenter manage to bait the hook that will make you want to come back by telling you outright that there’s no need to rack your brain on the motivations of these characters. Unlike Slasher, we won’t be waiting for victims to drop each week to see if the person we suspect in week one makes it to episode eight. By the end of “Blood Bath,” you know who did it, even if it isn’t very difficult to guess if you’re paying attention. Still, for some reason, knowing up front who to keep an eye on carves out a new way to approach a slasher series beyond the whodunit, and it has me genuinely intrigued to discover where it might end up.
Hell Motel episode one, “Blood Bath,” is now streaming exclusively on Shudder. New episodes air every Tuesday.
