Belzebubs

Our Review

JP Ahonen’s webcomic about a black metal family man made the jump to animation and lost none of its warmth in translation. Sløth, frontman of the world’s least successful satanic band, is a stay at home dad raising Lilith and Leviathan with his wife Lucyfer, and the show’s genius is playing every domestic beat completely straight: school interviews, in law visits, band practice in the garage, all conducted in corpse paint. The mockumentary confessionals, where family members speak to a documentary crew that is never explained, give it a Modern Family rhythm filtered through church burnings.

The black and white animation style, matching Ahonen’s original art, is striking: stark, expressive, and willing to hold a frame in silence long after a sitcom would have cut away. The satire is gentler than the premise suggests, aimed at both metal gatekeeping and liberal parenting culture, and the show is genuinely funny about the collision: Sløth coaching a kids’ birthday party like a ritual, or the band’s creative differences over a song titled anything at all. The family’s support for each other is the actual subject, which is why the comic’s fans stuck with it for a decade.

Thirteen short episodes go down fast, mostly released in batches on Yle’s Areena in Finland with international distribution through Banijay. The English dub cast, led by Andrew Wheildon-Dennis, is excellent and the bilingual release means it travels well. If The Addams Family had a baby with a Spinal Tap-style mockumentary and raised it on Norwegian church press coverage, this is that show. A small gem that deserves a way bigger audience.