Checking Out

Haunted Hotel's creator on merging horror and comedy for the ultimate dysfunctional sitcom

- WORDS: TARA BENNETT

IF YOU'VE EVER STRUGGLED TO get along with a sibling, imagine trying to do it when they're a ghost.

That's where writer Matt Roller's imagination went while he was working as a story editor/writer on the hit series Rick And Morty. Though he was a big fan of the tone and pace of what his boss Dan Harmon was doing on that adult animated comedy series, Roller tells Red Alert that his heart always drifted towards horror storytelling.

"I watch and read all the horror, so I wanted to build something that's as flexible as Rick And Morty in terms of the ability to riff on a genre, just for horror," Roller says of what eventually became his original adult animation series for Netflix, Haunted Hotel. Though it's characterised as a horror-comedy, Roller says he really thinks of it as a comedy about horror.

"I wanted to lead with the comedy and just be inspired by the horror," he says. "Ideally, it holds up as comedy and doesn't require you to know about horror to enjoy it. Our intent was never to parody horror. We're not trying to make fun of that genre. We're more embracing it and then running in a funny direction with it."

Boasting a premise as straightforward as its title,