Speaking of Fraud's tendency to show previous layers,
Something I have not seen a lot of people talk about when it comes to 8-3 is the way that the previous layers are shown--all layers, from Prelude up to Fraud itself (8-1 & 8-2 themes) are shown in 8-3; but not with the same frequency.
Gluttony is only there sparsely; there's the 3-2 arena, an eye in the double skull door room, and a switching room on the blue skull path. Greed and Lust are only shown minutely as part of the rotating rooms. Something about that appeals to me; Greed and Lust come to mind as King Minos & Sisyphus' domains; while Gluttony is, well, the Gabriel encounter!
Still, the layer shown the LEAST by far is Heresy (also a Gabriel encounter!!!), and it only appears in One spot: One of the platforms with an idol for the Hideous Mass in the space section (and isn't it interesting, how the only spot with a Heresy copy, is Fraud's version of Heaven? Something about idols being there, too?)
Violence has two spots: The room with the Deathcatcher that rotates based on your own movement; and the very end of the level, with the fight atop the Suicide tree. (EDIT: three!! The platform the Hideous Mass is on is Violence, can't believe I missed that lmfaoooo)
There's a lot to be said already; something about how Acts 1 & 2 and their Prime Sanctums were about Gabriel as a protagonist but also to build up your own presence, peaking in Violence and making you the star of the show, the layer meant to showcase just what V1's peak could be. Of course, all within Hell's command and entertainment.
Fraud has many ways to remind V1 that, actually, it's still very much in its grasp. From the switch from Final War to New Peace themes, moving V1 around like a ragdoll, or the puppet. It's interesting to me that the two spots Violence gets are a side of the room you cannot touch (oh, V1, you're not here to taste glory like in Violence!), as it moves out of your reach; and... the suicide tree, with a Power encounter to stand in for Gabriel (something so interesting about this layer's hammering in of Gabriel's absence; he definitely intrigues V1, being one of the few enemies it lets go as well as the first that ever spoke to it and enjoyed their fight--really, just another way of scaring V1 by teasing that there's something going on with him).
So, then, which layers are shown the most?
Prelude, Wrath (especially the Ferry's interior, with exceptions), Limbo, and Fraud itself, specifically the hotel theme.
It's intriguing to me that those are the most common ones; the Ferry is a spot of "rest" for many sinners in between layers; Limbo is "not quite Hell yet", not quite "punishment""" yet, and noticeably chill in comparison to everything afterwards. The Hotel is... A Hotel, still a place to rest, as twisted as Hell's version is; and the Prelude... is the surface, it's Home.
It may be a stretch but it read to me as if the layers being shown the most were almost a mockery of safety; with the Hotel and the Ferry being both temporary places to stay at, while Limbo and Prelude are moments of stagnancy for V1, where it can go nowhere but forward.
And the layers shown the least are, as I said, V1's moments "in control"; Gabriel and the Prime Soul's layers; the one all about V1's prowess. Idk, I'm very intrigued by Fraud's themes of loss of control, actually.
