While not among the Fleischer Brother's best or the most innovative, The Cobweb Hotel is fascinating and well worth checking out. The story is on the predictable side and a bit cutesy once you take away the grim content the cartoon has and of the characters they're all good but the only really really compelling personalities come from the flyweight and particularly the spider. The animation is top notch, with the characters ranging from the cute to the grotesque, the backgrounds are rich in detail and it's very atmospheric(very well suited for such a foreboding setting) while still with a good amount of colour. It's also filled with a lot of innovative touches that are distinctive of Fleischer, especially in the opening sequence with the use of animated characters amidst live action sets. The music is lively but with a very haunting vibe, a lot of the scores in Fleischer's films are lusciously and appealingly sentimental but this score had a more ominous edge to it that suited the cartoon well without feeling too different.
It is understandable as to why some would find The Cobweb Hotel weird, the content with the way the spider traps the flies and the lengths he goes into doing so is quite disturbing. But the cartoon is not all grim, because once the flyweight gets more to do it becomes the standard hero vs villain premise that is cute and energetic while also showing the spider at his most sinister. And while The Cobweb Hotel is not a hilarious cartoon or rich with laughs, it's not without funny moments except of the dark kind, the prime example is the lyrics of the spider's song. The characters do engage, while the flyweight is a likable hero that you cheer on in the fight the most interesting is the spider, who is quite a creepy villain and added to my sister's fear of spiders. Other than his design and the freaky imagery shown in his opening song with the flies trapped Jack Mercer's voice work was a large part of the spider's effectiveness as a character, he voices the character with a menacing and quite gravelly hiss and has never sounded creepier. All in all, not quite a Fleischer masterpiece but fascinating. 8/10 Bethany Cox