#hazbin analysis

[gg-ladybug]

You know, I wonder if Rosie thought Alastor was asking for her soul at first. Similar to how Charlie and Vaggiɇ (since the name change, she’s getting the Biltzø treatment from now on) assumed the same thing when making deals with him.

“What’s in it for me? I don’t work for free. You want help? Well, you know the fee!”

“I will not reward a snake like you!”

“You’ll watch them die unless you do!”

“Liar! You wouldn’t dare!”

“Quid Pro Quo, it’s only fair.”

“You really are a demon, pet.”

The whole scene, she was incredibly reluctant to give Alastor what he wanted in return for his assistance. Which is why I think she was acting on the assumption he was using HER idea of a fee.

He needed her help to raise the ranks of Hell, and he paid the highest price possible for it. And now she needs his help for whatever secret reason that may be. So it stands to reason the same would be required of her now the agreement was flipped on its head.

But then—

“You knew my game the day we met.”

JUST LIKE THAT, with a show of his broken cane and a reference to their old song, Rosie’s smiling. And not even reluctantly. She’s hook, line, and sinker.

He isn’t asking for her soul, he just wants his powers without the added strings of indentured servitude. In fact, he’s implicitly offering to keep doing the exact same thing as before, albeit with less leverage on her side.

Whatever her master plan is, he’s all in. The cards may be out her hands, but he doesn’t mind letter her peak at his.

They’re scheming together now, your honour!

[hyperthusiast]

I had a crazy, off-the-wall thought last week that I wish I had thought to share. In the wake of episode 4, I was thinking back to this exchange from season 1:

Obviously, Mimzy skirting around the word 'friend' was always kind of interesting to me, and now having more context from Mr. There-Are-No-Friends-In-Hell, it makes a little more sense. Seems like Alastor is rather reluctant to use that word, in general - whether that reluctance started before or after Vox remains to be seen, though.

But then I couldn't help but think that it was kind of curious that Angel very specifically called out the word friends. He could have just asked something like "So, you know Alastor pretty well, then?" or "So you to are close?" But instead, he very specifically asked what they were to each other, and even at the time, I thought that was kind of strange. I remember when I first watched the episode wondering why that was this approach. And then after Mimzy answers, Angel even goes onto say he "didn't know he had any of those."

So, in the wake of episode 4, I recalled this exchange, and my thoughts went basically like this: 'Wow, it's almost like Vox specifically asked Angel to ask that. But obviously that wouldn't happen! I mean, Vox even asked about using Angel as a spy, and Valentino said he wouldn't do it. I wonder if he ever tried to get information from him, though. Tried to get Angel to tell him what Alastor was doing, and somewhere along the line Vox made the offhanded comment of 'Alastor doesn't have friends', which prompted Angel's curiosity. But I don't see Vox just chatting with Angel, and if he tried to get information from him, surely Angel would've said something about it. Of course Vox could have hypnotized him to tell him stuff... but I feel like that's reaching. It'd be a decent plan on Vox's part, but we have no reason to think that actually happened, especially when the Vees already dismissed the idea of using him as a spy.' And then I dismissed the thought like an idiot!

I mean, I did think it was weird how after the Sir Pentious's plan fell through, Vox just gave up. I just thought that was one of those hand-wave things because of the show's time constraints. But no, of course the guy who always has a plan didn't give up! Because it's not just this season he's been hypnotizing Angel, it's been going on since probably shortly after Pentious failed.

Wait, sudden thought - when Angel confronted Pentious, this happened...

Obviously, this is Pentious's little snake-charmer defense mechanism and is entirely different, but maybe this was meant to be foreshadowing. It looks similar to Vox's hypnotism, and in a way, Angel being hypnotized was a direct result of him catching Pentious - if he hadn't, Vox wouldn't have needed a new spy, after all (well, on that I have my doubts, but you see the vision). This could have been a subtle nod to what was about to happen to him. It doesn't really matter; I just thought it was a neat touch.

Back to what I was saying, we actually know for a fact that Angel was under Vox's hypnotism for at least part of last season. In the little montage we got at the end of the last episode, we saw this text exchange between Angel and Vox:

And this isn't from this season. This shows them fortifying the hotel before the extermination - specifically, I believe, the rest of the hotel preparing while Charlie and Alastor are in Cannibal Town and Vaggie is talking to Carmilla.

And then there's this -

That's the same robe Angel was wearing during Poison, and what happened at the end of Poison?

This weird little exchange that none of us could figure out what it meant!

And when Angel gets back to the hotel, he's rubbing his head like he has a headache - the same thing we see him complaining about in episode 5 of this season. Not weird on its own, all things considered, but coupled with everything else, Angel absolutely just underwent some hypnosis here. Don't know if it was the first time or not, but I think it's safe to say that Angel was a sleeper agent at least since episode 4 of season 1.

Anyway, all this is to say, Vox told Angel to ask Mimzy if she and Alastor were friends. My guy needed to reassure himself that Alastor doesn't have any friends, and it wasn't just him.

[cocogum]

One thing that I really want to point out during the final battle was how Abel said that he wasn't the braver son. NOT the bravest.

There's a very big difference there.

If he had said in this scene that he wasn't the bravest son, that meant he wasn't the best at keeping his composure between his siblings.

But in this case, he actually said "braver" which implies he's comparing himself to someone else.

Is he talking about Seth?? OR CAIN????

Abel knew that a major reason why Adam didn't like him was because he saw him as a wimp. So...was he talking about Seth or Cain here?? I think there was a greater chance that he meant Cain because it would emphasize the connection between Abel and Cain even more, since he did die because of his older brother.

And if Cain was in fact the braver son, then...uh...that's fucked up lol

[rat-rambles]

Alastor is in the earily stages of obession with Lucifer.

What do you mean he gets up and the only thing he does is look for lucifer.

What do you mean he walks around with Lucifer's matching cup in hopes he might run into him.

What do you mean the first time you see him in how ever long he's been kidnapped he gets as close as possible and starts messing with him.

What do you mean the whole reason he went back to his crazy ex is becuase Lu thinks he aint shit and he's got to change that.

Obsession.

[the-irreverend]

I love the little detail where Angel Dust is always shielding his eyes when he's trying to escape Vox after learning how Vox hypnotizes people.

Yeah, he's not simply putting his hand over his wound! He's actually trying to make sure Vox doesn't brainwash him again!

It really shows how adaptable, sharp, and versatile Angel Dust is, especially since those qualities were needed to be able to survive the ordeals and evils he's faced in hell, especially at the hands of the Vees.

I know it's only a small detail, but it's a very neat one!

[cyanidesunday]

Ok so as funny as calling Alastor a fraud is, it's also missing a LOT of nuance in his deal with Rosie and this nuance is. Kind of crucial. So I think it's important to clear up now that:

Alastor did not "cheat."

There's a very small detail about his deal with Rosie that actually makes it VERY different from the other kinds of soul deals in the show. Most of the other soul deals are very straight forward, classic selling-your-soul type things: you are given (blank) in return for selling ownership your soul to the person giving you (blank). Or, in slight variation: your soul is taken by (blank) in exchange for whatever you asked of (blank). It's kind of one-and-done thing. You make the deal, you're contracted until one of you dies permanently (presumably) or the deal is forcibly broken with. Simple, right?

This is NOT what Alastor's deal is. His deal isn't giving Rosie his soul in exchange for power, it's Rosie giving him power and keeping his soul until his debt is paid. There's a very clear "out" clause. He didn't sell his soul, not really, it's just being held from him (like a frozen credit card, if you will) until he pays Rosie back by completing whatever "task" she has for him. Granted, we don't know what this task is or if either of them even though, so this could be a loophole Rosie exploits to essentially keep him on a leash forever, but I really doubt that she doesn't have some modus operandi that Alastor is integral to and will honor their agreement afterwards.

This very particular detail is what makes their relationship so interesting, but that's for another post. My point in bringing this up is that this isn't Alastor boosting himself on someone's power, not really. After all, it's pretty fair and completely transactional. He gets something from Rosie and he then pays her back for it, simple as that. To put it in a more mundane scenario: if you borrow an egg from your neighbor, you're probably going to let them take a measuring spoon next time they ask, because that balances it out. They just haven't done their balancing act yet. You're not dependent on your neighbor just because you borrowed something once, the scale just hasn't been settled, so to speak.

Because, really, Alastor doesn't NEED Rosie's power. Even with his staff broken (which seems to contain the magic Rosie gave to him), he's pretty damn powerful. Rosie definitely played her cards right in that regard, because Alastor very likely would've become an Overlord without any boost from her just fine, it just might've taken a few more years. He's no fraud. He's not even "cheated"—he's leveraged himself a head start that he's going to repay.

And it may seem incredibly skewed in Rosie's favor, but it's not really when you look beyond the soul-owning thing. Not only is it temporary, but they're both, at the end of the day, getting the same thing: power. Souls give you power, so Rosie gets power. Rosie gave Alastor power too. It's mutual. And with how she talks about him being "the one" (for her plans) compared to Alastor's ability to stand on his own, I would even argue that she might need him far more than he needs her. But that's also another post.

TLDR; If anything, this wasn't even really a boost, it was a business deal.

[thisbisexualbrainrot]

“We’ve been close for a few years now”

Not “friends” or “known each-other”. No, Vox said we’ve been close…that’s different than just being friends with someone. A close friend is a bestie.

A few is, generally speaking, 3-4. That makes me think they were close friends for, at minimum, 3 years. By that logic, how long they actually have known each other is presumably longer than that, right?

And Alastor reacted to him asking to be partners…like that?

I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say I think he wanted to say yes. I think he did think of them as close friends. But why would you talk to your bestie like that? That makes no sense??

Unless you’ve let that person get too close and suddenly realize that fact and need to sabotage it completely. So you turn to what you’re good at: being a complete fucking asshole.

This is right as Vox is asking him and he looks scared to me. Like he’s realizing just how far this friendship has gone and is like oh fuck.

[elsa-fogen]

Alastor fucked up himself by making a deal with Rosie?

once again was thinking about Alastor's powers, his deal and so on...

And then i saw this post... And remembered theory that Alastor is Roo's son... And because of the wording of this post i thought...

And i was like holy shit wait a second.

So, when Alastor summoned Rosie, she said that his soul is "unlike any". And if we assume that Rosie IS a sinner and isn't someone in disguise, HOW she could give him more power than she herself has?

Well, the thing is. She didn't. Alastor was always meant to end up very powerful in Hell. Maybe he wouldn't be as powerful at the very beginning, and would have to spend few years developing his power, but he couldn't have known that.

The staff contains green magic, since he couldn't properly use that while the staff was broken. Alastor's own magic is red. Pentagram glows red, when he's summoning Rosie and it changes to green, when they shake hands.

So, when he made a deal, Rosie tied him to the staff. And this, and her owning his soul actually limited him from growing more than just a very powerful sinner. And i think Alastor knows that: "once i figure out how to unclip my wings". And probably when he confronted Rosie about that, she hit him with "i'm a demon in hell, what else did you expect"

After the deal was broken (an i kinda believe Alastor didn't break it, but completed) Alastor finally owns green magic like his own, that's why he was able to use it in the final fight. And i think now he could just throw the staff away, but he is really used to it, and i believe it helps him to control powers more efficent and amplify it. He doesn't really need it anymore, but it's fully his now, so why not use it...?

idk, something something theory something something thoughts something something Alastor may be more powerful than we all think