Recap / Infinity Train: Voyage of Wisteria: The Hazbin Car

Everyone arrives at the hotel, and there are a few upsetting truths to learn...

Tropes in this arc include:

• 1000 Origami Cranes: Lexi's new outfit has this motif with cranes on the kimono and a little pendant of a red origami crane in a bottle.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: The Monroe parents were shown to be abusive, neglective parents who were responsible for Grace entering the Infinity Train. In Part 2, they're shown to be lonely, miserable, their marriage is broken and they've had all the time in the world to realize that their daughter's disappearance is their fault and that she's been found dead so there's no way for them to ever be a family again.
• Alternate Self:
  • The Shirley Fenette that entered the car is a different one than the canonical version, thus she gets a happy ever after.
  • An alternate version of Boscha Urodela is mentioned as one of Ogami's victims.
• Armor-Piercing Question: In a flashback, Grace states that for all the power Lapis has, she ran away. Lapis questions if Grace did the same.
• Asshole Victim: One of Ogami's victims is pre-Academia Leo Akaba. Considering the shit-ton of atrocities he does in his home verse without getting any type of punishment for it, not a lot of people (perhaps barring his son Reiji and Yusho Sakaki) would shed a tear at his passing.
  • This is deconstructed...Amelia and Hotchner warn against regarding the Unsub as any kind of a hero for eliminating Asshole Victims...he's only killing for his own validation, and as Goh can attest, he won't stop at people the train might be better off without.
• Bait-and-Switch: After Goh hears the recording of Grace's death, he races out because he knows that voice. Hazel is horrified at thinking that he knows Grace before he states that he knows his: the killer was Ogami.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Lexi wanted to hear Grace apologize. He gets it...as she's dying from a stab wound, frantically apologizing to everyone before she passes away.
• Believing Their Own Lies: Kisaragi is every bit as delusional as he was in Knight of the Orange Lily, believing himself to be the hero of the story and that he has done nothing wrong despite the heaps of evidence saying otherwise.
• Blame Game: The Monroe parents put blame on the mall cop for alerting them on Grace's shoplifting that caused her to disappear. Then Cecilia blames her husband for refusing to let Grace take her punishment before she starts sobbing at how their daughter is dead and now they'll never be able to apologize or make it up to her.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: Once again, One-One doesn't quite understand how Grace dying is a bad thing, aside from how she'll have more time to think things through and she'll join Simon on this redemption quest. Amelia bitterly notes that this might be why Ogami was able to operate under the radar for so long.
• Blunt "Yes": Everyone's reaction to Kisaragi questioning if they all think he's so petty to rub it in that his Project Solitaire was the best choice of action against the Apex.
• Bookends: The last the Monroe parents saw Grace and Simon was at the bench at the mall cop's office. After eight years, the find out that she's returned to that office, dead with knife wounds to her stomach.
• Broken Pedestal: London muses that this will happen to White Gestalt once the truth about what really happened sinks in.
• Bystander Syndrome: What hurts Grace the most is that she did nothing but stand in place when Destruction went ablazing and Chloe actually tried to fight back to protect Tuba and Hazel. That in the end, it's her fault that Simon became a monster and she couldn't reason with him.
• Call-Back:
  • When Grace entered the Curry Car, the car has murals of Chloe and Romin Kirishima, and denizens tell the tale of the Curry Prince's passing.
  • Grace hears the announcement of the Mall Car cleaned up and the car made in tribute to Chloe.
  • The video that plays during the announcement of the Blossoming Shrine Car is from The Elephant Teapot Car.
• Continuity Cavalcade: Most of the voices that remind Grace of her faults were quotes from Blossoming Trail, particularly through the Fog Car.
• Cruel Mercy: Grace isn't attacked at all by the denizens despite everything she did, but letting her walk alone while remembering her sins is just as cruel if not more so. Most exemplified in the Curry Car where she must eat the curry with her right hand (in Indian culture the left hand is unclean although you technically can eat with it if you're left-handed) while showcasing the numbers that she worked hard for is worth nothing now.
• Deadly Euphemism: Amelia questions London if Easter returned home after that "fireworks display". London lampshades that the way she says it makes it seem lighter than what happened.
• Disability as an Excuse for Jerkassery: Discussed; Mrs. Borage had some talks with her son Franklin about whether or not he was using his condition as an excuse for both ignoring Chloe's bullying or being overly smug about it to the classmates.
• Dissonant Serenity: London happily ends the explanation on why he hates Kisaragi and why he'll bash his brains in with a big smile on his face, while his audience is terrified.
  Hazel: (sobbing) I thought rabbits were supposed to be cute and fluffy!
• The Dreaded: The White Rabbit is dangerous to most of the denizens in the Hazbin Car and London states that Project Solitaire was so bad, not even Chloe could have stopped them if they were still around.
• Dramatic Irony: London talks smack about how much he hates Grace and everything she's done...completely unaware that Grace is listening in as Warbler.
• Due to the Dead: Hazel, Lucy, and Toby do one for Grace, which initially gets on Lexi's nerves before he decides to finally move on.
• Everyone Has Standards
  • Zig Zagged. Nobody takes the message revealing how Grace died well. While she had those who care for her, whether out of standards or sympathy, some are not sympathetic to her death, for understandable reasons that she committed another number of crimes and traumatized many people while alive. Grace's former victims are still dealing with their scars and trauma she inflicted on them, and are not sympathetic and even say they are glad she is dead. But they are gently called out on being told they should not be glad she died despite what she did to them, to which they agree. In fact, the characters who do think it's good (Mad Ben and Kisaragi) are reprehensible assholes with no moral high ground at all.
  • Lexi has an understandable hatred for Grace for betraying him and leaving him buried alive for years, trapped just a few feet away from his father. Even with Simon dead and Grace gone in the sequel, he can't let it go since neither of them (particularly Grace) didn't apologize. He initially lets go of his hatred of Simon by his father's urging, but when he learns that Grace was murdered, he did not openly say it was a good thing, as some of her former victims or people who are just as horrible as her (Mad Ben and Kisaragi) got joy from the Apex leader's Karmic Death. Later, when Lexi learns that Hazel, Lucy, and Toby build a small memorial for Grace, at first angry, he was surprised when they said they were afraid he would destroy the memorial (since it's shown that he shattered Grace and Simon's photo in Azada). Reflecting on this, Lexi decides to offer a tribute to Grace and moves on from his hatred.
• For Want Of A Nail:
  • Shirley being taken by the train meant she survived her canonical death and got a happy ending with Lelouch as a result. She also never had to deal with Mao.
  • Grace's parents blamed themselves that if they just let Grace take her punishment instead of berating the mall cop, or at least even showed her some love and concern like a good parent did, she wouldn't have vanished.
  • As noted below in Take That!, Leo Akaba was taken by the Train and later killed by Ogami before he went to Academia, completely derailing the plot of his home series.
• Freak Out: Grace has one while in the Birdcage Car as she gets nightmares of everyone chewing her out for her apathy and she destroys the furniture inside to shut everything out.
• Good Victims, Bad Victims: Toby notes that the first 'kill' he saw Grace commit wasn't someone that the train could easily hold against them, but a spider monster with button eyes that would've killed him if it hadn't been for her.
• Heel Realization: Lexi finally registers how bad he's become because of his bitterness, and makes a determined effort to change with a Significant Wardrobe Shift into a brand new form.
• Hero of Another Story: The alternate Shirley Fenette helped bring peace into her world and got to live a happy life.
• Hourglass Plot: The end of Blossoming Trail was about Grace doing all she could to protect Hazel (a turtle denizen who could turn into a human) from Simon. Now Hazel has to protect Warbler (who is really Grace reincarnated) from thousands of pissed-off denizens.
• I Know You Know I Know: Mad Ben turns into Mad Feedback to counter Easter's electrical attacks. Easter states that they knew he knew they knew about their plan and had Vaggie dump a bucket of water on him to counteract it.
• Karmic Death: In Knight of the Orange Lily, Grace cruelly killed Utahoshi with her knife and it's implied she did it to others prior to him. Here, Grace dies via stabbing in the stomach by a denizen.
• Kick the Dog:
  • One-One's announcement of how they're going to auction off everything in the Mall Car is this for Grace, as it goes to show how in the end, everything she did was for nothing and no one, not even the Conductor who wants people to move on and face their traumas, cares about her.
  • Toby does this when he announces that the story as to how the Apex was named came from when Grace and Simon crippled Lexi and is considered a bedtime story to the Apex kids.
  • Kisaragi stating that it's good that Grace is dead come across as this, since he's clearly only saying it for his own satisfaction, rather than because she can no longer hurt anybody.
• Kid Has a Point: Amelia suggests using photo evidence of Grace online to figure out a timeline because she'd like to be noticed. Hazel (carrying a teary Warbler aka reincarnated Grace) states that after everything Grace went through in the Fog Car, she'd rather be invisible.
• Large Ham: London and Easter like to go on tangents about how "Queen Grace" will arrive to unleash hell upon the masses because of their beef against her (and also because London is a wrestler, who are well known for being hammy).
• Literal Metaphor: When Mad Ben's Omnitrix glitches thanks to Alastor's powers, he goes through a roulette of them. One of them has him screaming "THIS IS THE WORST!" since one of the aliens that Ben-Prime turned into is called "The Worst".
• Locked Out of the Loop: Lexi is deeply confused as to why Easter thinks he's copying Specter. Amelia steps in by explaining that Lexi was buried underground when Specter was still on the train and even if he didn't, the big memory wipe meant that he'd have forgotten anyhow.
• Meaningful Name:
  • Vermillion City mayor Rhett Myrtus is broken down to "Rhett" (Advice) and "Myrtus" (Myrtle flower which means "Hope"). He broadcasts a message of hope for Vermillion City so they can get out of the dark times that were Sara and Parker.
  • Grace's parents are named Huxley and Cecilia. Huxley means "inhospitable place" (reflecting how Grace never felt comfortable at home due to her parents' neglect) and Cecilia means "blind" (both parents couldn't see that Grace needed love from them).
• Mythology Gag:
  • When Grace remembers how she wanted to kill Shirley, the death scene she describes is basically how Shirley died in R2 (shooting her and leaving Shirley in a pool of her own blood).
  • The scene of Lapis's return home is that of Reunited.
• No Smoking: A tapir denizen in the Curry Car has a large cinnamon stick in place of a cigar.
• Noodle Incident: London regrets the last time he let Easter use a phone.
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: Aaron's profile of the Unsub warns that despite his propensity for Asshole Victims, the killer should not be granted any noble traits in the public's eye...he's ultimately killing for himself, not others.
• Oh, Crap!: London gets this look when he sees Lexi, Goh, and Hazel look shocked about Easter revealing how Grace murdered Utahoshi.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Easter notes that Grace has begged before, but it must be serious if she's asking denizens to hide.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Grace's parents learn that their daughter has appeared after being missing for eight years... Only to find out she's dead. And the worst part is that they're mostly responsible for it for their neglect and never showing any love for her.
• Psychotic Smirk: When told that Grace is dead, Kisaragi's response is this.
• Rage Against the Reflection: Grace destroyed a mirror in the Birdcage Car upon seeing her face with the Apex mark.
• The Reveal:
  • Part 2 reveals where Grace got the name of "Apex" from; when she and Simon were in the Library of Flying Books, Grace got it from a dictionary.
  • Grace became Warbler presumably because she tried humming Tuba's lullaby to block out the bad memories.
  • London's number is now at the three digits. To give you a comparison, he started out with 5 in the 400 Rabbits Car and it got up to his wrist by the Desert Racetrack Car.
  • Sarang, who's all but confirmed to be connected to Ogami, has a scheme in mind that involves a creature that can move cars around and the Signal Car.
• Riddle for the Ages: What happened to Simon's soul is never revealed as even One-One has no idea what happened. We'll get to that in a few cars.
• Rousing Speech: Vermillion City's mayor Rhett Myrtus gives one to have the citizens learn to be brave to speak the truth and extend a hand out to others who need it, so the events that Sara and Parker put on it will never ever happen again.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • To symbolize how shit is going down, London has swapped his normal white getup for a black one.
  • The car where Grace has her Freak Out has her in a birdcage, which shows how she's a prisoner of her own thoughts and actions.
  • The chapter that shows the last days of Grace Monroe is "Serene Grace". A Pokémon with that ability can boost the aftereffects of a move. Grace's desire to not be alone or seen in the wrong caused the birth of the Apex and a decade of massacre across the Train.
  • Cecilia, Grace's mother, wears lavender gloves like Grace used to do. In a way, Grace was trying to emulate her.
  • Grace essentially has a red 'A' on her face like a woman who had a red A on her breast as a reminder of everything she did and her sins will be remembered for a long time.
  • Through the story, Lexi has held on to the forms that Chloe picked for him (a Kyorinrin and "Specter of the Black Forest"), while also holding onto her original, spitefully biased ideas and an idealized vision of her. Once he decides enough is enough that he needs to move on, he ditches both forms in order to take one of his own making.
• Sacred Hospitality: Those who accept to undergo a redemption project at the Hazbin Hotel get Alastor's full protection. Alastor uses this as a reason to defeat Mad Ben for hurting London, Easter, Toby, and Lucy.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: As stated by the author, the first two parts have no Alola scenes to highlight how dark it's going to get. Sure enough, the Pokémon scenes return just as things are getting planned out for everyone to move on.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: Lexi makes a new outfit based on the crane, a symbol of loyalty, hope, and gratitude and it's the outfit he makes for himself, not as something Chloe gave to him.
• Spared by the Adaptation: An alternate Shirley Fenette survived her assassination thanks to the train picking her up and creating ripple effects, though the story does mention that while this also made many things go better, not all of the tragedies of canon were averted.
• Speak Ill of the Dead: Several remarks about how Grace 'got what she deserved' keep Hazel from revealing Warbler's status as a reincarnated Grace. Kisaragi says "Very" when Goh asks if he's happy that Grace is gone and Tokio is the only one out of the former Pokemon trainer passengers who shows no sympathy for Grace's passing (due to him being a victim of her actions).
• Take That!: One of the victims of Ogami was Leo Akaba, considered one of the worst characters in the anime who got away with a ton of shit in the end. For a bonus, Word of God confirmed that this Leo was killed BEFORE he stepped foot into Academia.
• We Are Not Going Through That Again: When Kisaragi states he's gathering his "scattered cards" of Project Solitaire, London states that they will not go through the hell of those going again.
• Wham Episode: Considered the Cyan Desert Car of the story and it shows.
  • Toby and Lucy confirm that Grace is dead and was killed by Ogami, a fact that Goh reveals.
  • Mad Ben has lost all his alien forms but now makes a deal with Sarang and Vox.
• Wham Line: The end of Part 1 has Lucy snap after Easter proclaims how Grace will come in to raise hell and reveals what was confirmed in the previous chapter:
  Lucy: The reason that Grace isn't coming is because she's dead!
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The Happy Endings Car acts like this, allowing someone to look at the happy endings of passengers who made it out of the car. Lapis Lazuli, Shirley Fenette, and Chloe Cerise live happily ever after, Simon is dead and Grace has no happy ending.
• You Can't Go Home Again: Grace sees an announcement how the Mall Car has been cleaned and everything in it is set up for auction, meaning she can't return to the car she called home which Chloe warned in the Fog Car. And when she died, her body is dropped off at the office of the mall where she was first picked up, so she can never return to her true home either.
  Chloe: You won't have a home to return to. Anywhere.
  • The same thing applies to the Apex because they can't go back to the way they were and must work on healing and getting ready to go home.
• "You!" Exclamation: Easter does this to Lexi before he goes on a tirade about why Lexi was imitating Specter.
• Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: Mad Ben gives one clap to Paul over how the trainer murdered an Apex, reminding Paul about how apathetic he was and the punishment inflicted for that mistake.

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