#hh valentino

[lanthart]

🎶 Nature abhors a power vacuum It leaves room for you and me 🎶

[milich96]

I gasped when he opened his wings

[d4rk-x-w0lf-17]

if we ever get a hazbin hotel/helluva boss crossover special, i want it to be an hour long and it's just asmodeus beating the shit out of valentino

[minzart]

can't convince me they don't do this once every week

[fandoms-and-salt]

My thoughts on Hazbin Hotel's villains, because I think they have a problem

Valentino

Val is just. where do i even start.

His introductory scene is largely comedic and makes his freak-out over Angel just living somewhere else the butt of the joke. The same scene conveys that he is already losing control over Angel and can’t do anything about it, since Angel is ignoring his calls, and Vox convinces him that ignoring this blatant misstep is the better option. This is an okay scene (i even found it funny), but it’s a bad villain introduction. Especially a villain that we are meant to take seriously and, from the perspective of the main characters, fear.

(There’s also an inconsistency with Angel in ep1-2 feeling free to ignore Val’s calls and messages, but in ep4 he is stumbling all over himself to please Val)

His introduction had to be made from the point of view of one of his victims to set up a proper tone of menace to him, instead of making it from the point of view of his fellow overlords, who view him as a whiny dumb piss baby. This scene would be okay a lot later down the line, in my opinion, when we are already familiar with what a despicable dangerous asshole he is, and the characters (Angel Dust) begin to step up to him more. We see his facade crumble alongside the main characters to reveal who he truly is without all his power and control - a whiny sex-obsessed loser.

There's also an issue of us not really getting a scale of his power. This guy is portrayed as an extremely forward hot-tempered dumbass, who has to be verbally guided to make a better strategic move than a “just kill and rape everybody”. He freaking licks the princess of Hell, talks down to her like she is one of his porn actresses, and physically assaults a person under her care right in front of her, and she is supposed to be someone more powerful than him, and he should know that.

This guy can’t manipulate and strategize for his life, so to compensate for this (and make his rise to power more believable), he needs to have some truly impressive physical power. And tearing apart some character offscreen and wielding some guns doesn’t cut, bc basically everyone can do that in hell, what makes him special? Show off how his vaping powers can really fuck people up, poison dozens, hypnotize them, make them addicted to him! Make him so uniquely dangerous that he doesn’t even need to be smart and cordial to rise to power!! Otherwise, how the hell we should believe that he owns the whole porn industry of the Pride Ring, including legally owning his workers, if the show puts more focus on his stupidity and lack of tact than on whatever power he has?

Like he is meant to be our main antagonist and threat, alongside with his TV boyfriend, until the angels come back in the finale, don’t just waste them away on lame jokes.

Speaking of which.

Vox

I like Vox. I like his voice actor’s performance and the voice effects and filters that they give him to reflect his mood. I feel like he had a better introduction than Val (which is not a high bar to clear): it showed that he is pretty smart, strategic, and image-conscious. With this and his heavily implied power to hypnotize and stalk people through his tech, the fact that he is in power and the threat that he poses are much more believable.

Anyway, this gets completely wasted 10 minutes into the first episode he appears in, when he gets verbally floored by Alastor. And he cried about it right after. And later in the same episode we see him fail again at another one of his schemes, bc he chose the most incompetent spy ever. Once again, silly comedy shatters any kind of illusion of threat that the villains might pose. Which also leads me to..

Alastor

Who is not really a villain, and this is kind of a problem. He really could have been a great threat and an antagonist, but i really don’t believe they are going to go in that direction.

Alastor is a very OP character and is the one holding power and control in basically any interaction he is in, including the villains. And since he is an ally of Hazbin Hotel, whose goals (the details of which we are not aware of) partially align with theirs, he completely fucks over any kind of tension regarding anything that might threaten the Hotel or it’s residents. Because you can just throw Alastor at it and make it go away. Because the writers just can’t have him lose.

And we don’t have any reason to believe that he would just refuse to help, because so far? He does whatever Charlie or Vaggie ask him to do. He might be a smug dick about it, but he still does that. He even agrees to film a TV commercial (twice!) despite his vocal hate of such technology. Furthermore, he has to make a deal with Vaggie so they don’t have him do something like this again (granted, this scene might hold some additional implications in the future, but so far this is all the context we got). Why can’t he just refuse to do things that he doesn’t want to do?

Which they could have fixed if they made his power more limited. Either by reducing the scale of his power so he is at most on the same level as the villains,

OR have his presence and help be limited. Make that the characters often can’t access him for help or he just. refuses to help them. He even says that he is here to have fun and watch them suffer, so wouldn’t them struggling to, idk, get rid of Sir Pentious, for example, be entertaining for him? Or balance out his help with instances where he causes conflicts and problems on purpose. Beyond just him annoying Vaggie for comedy’s sake.

And if any of this is what they are actually going for, then you need to make it a point to the audience that yes, this guy is powerful, but don’t expect him to productively help with any of the narrative threats and problems.

And lastly,

Adam and the angels

I don’t like Adam. He is annoying as hell and his jokes are drawn out and not funny at all. The logistics of him being an angel when he is Adam and when he acts like this, give me a massive headache that is related to a whole other topic i’ll need to make a separate post about.

Despite all this, Alex Brightman is doing a great job selling how utterly insufferable he is. His song is also pretty good, one of the more memorable ones in the show. And he (and the angels by extension) is also the most menacing and competent villain on the show so far. ...Do you see my predicament here?

Granted, this is not a very high bar to clear, as established with. the other ones. For example, in contrast to the pilot, we are only told about how dangerous and deadly the exterminator-angels are. “[Sinners] never managed to kill one of us [angels]” “In the latest extermination, [angels] killed the highest 18% percent of our [sinner] population” etc etc. We don’t see the angels killing anybody on screen, we barely see the aftermath of the extermination.

What we do see is the panic and helplessness with which most of the hell population treat the exterminations, including Charlie. We see Charlie struggling to convince Adam of her plan, barely able to talk back to him, which sells Adam as the more powerful in the interaction. We see Adam not showing all his cards to Charlie, like the fact they are planning to completely wipe out the whole Hell/Pride Ring, showing that he is not completely stupid despite his whole deal (well, there’s implied to be some kind of plan here, but i’ll talk about my problem with the logic in another post).

Otherwise, we don’t have anyone else to compare with him, since Charlie is the only one who interacts with angels on-screen. But all of this so far gives a suitable illusion of how dangerous and powerful the angels are. But what will happen if angels are faced with our all powerful Tumblr Sexyman Mary Sue? Will the universe let Alastor lose and then collapse in on itself? Or the other obvious option?

Anyway, in conclusion, Hazbin’s villains are not very good so far. Their main problems are the fact that the writers can't properly establish their threat and lever of power, or they undercut this with unsuitable comedy. Also, they don't know how to use their OP main character, so they won't ruin the stakes of the story.

[strivia]

Angel Dust + Trying to keep Charlie away from Valentino

[irishk0rn]

Vox/Val conversations

⚠️Abuse mentions⚠️

This is NOT canon!!! I have not watched the recent episodes, only leaks. This is my own headcanon and projection.

Val is not empathetic. Plain and simple. Has some ASPD traits. Born that way, died that way.

His relationship with Vox is complicated. Vox is the closest thing to love and empathy he has ever felt for another person and it makes him very possessive over Vox.

His relationship with Angel is very different from Vox’s. He is Angel’s boss, and views him as his subordinate, which is how he registers his desire to hurt him. because it’s fine. And it’s not that he doesn’t know it’s twisted and fucked up and wrong. In fact that part thrills him. It’s why he continues.

He doesn’t care.

With Vox though, he sees him differently. He does sometimes TREAT him as a subordinate, but he doesn’t see him that way. He sees Vox as this little, wonderful man who opened everything for him.

Vox is not safe from his abuse.

With Angel Dust, he doesn’t feel the need to emotionally trap him. Angel already knows he’s being abused and because of the contract and his source of income, he is already trapped. Emotional manipulation is unnecessary work.

With Vox, though, even though he’s so smart, and self sustainable, he needs to be manipulated into staying. Manipulated into believing Val will change, having his self esteem decimated, watering down the significance of the emotional and sometimes physical abuse.

It’s the only way that Valentino knows to keep Vox centered, and put. Because he could never live without Vox if Vox left him.

Valentino DOES care about Vox, when it comes to convenience or when they are in a chill point of their relationship. He DOES love Vox, the only way he knows how to.

Just not more than himself. But the narcissism is hidden in their relationship, which is why Vox continues to come back.

Because Vox loves Valentino.

[temporaltourguide]

[part 1], use these icons with credit.

reblogs appreciated, also i hate valentino a lot and i would love to put him in a saw trap like the reverse bear trap or bed ripper.. but i couldnt stop myself from making a few matching icons.

[tomanyquotes]

Velvette, to Vox/Val: You know how divorcing parents tell kids that it’s not their fault they’re divorcing? Yeah, you seem if your parents ever got divorced, it’d be entirely your fault. And they’d tell you that.

[fandomdumpsterfires]

Reposted per request of a follower to swap vel and vox, just the vees being stupid lmao

[viktheviking1]

Maybe some of you already realized this, but this scene is EVEN MORE HORRIFIC than I realized (tw rap3, abus3)

We all know that Val's saliva and cigarette smoke are hypnotizing, maybe even intoxicating. And as we can see here, Angel Dust relaxed a bit under the spell, and is both literally and figuratively blindfolded.

But once he's slapped, the blindfold comes off, and like a patient in surgery coming out of anesthesia too soon, Angel Wakes up. We see the fear and horror in his eyes as he realizes what's happened.

It then immediately cuts to Valentino, smiling wider; implying that he realizes that Angel is awake. He knows that he's fully aware now and is in horrific pain, experiencing trauma. And he's enjoying it.

[poisonicing]

tried something new with shading and I really like it!!! anyways happy early access to all the sexy bitches that bought the ultimate presale bundle (me)

[midnightdemonz]

I DON'T LIKE VALENTINO'S VOICE, EITHER! No offense to the voice actors, obviously, BUT IT DOESN'T FIT HIM! (In my opinion)

[havendoesthings]

Forgot I can show here my sketches of the asshole himself- xD

He's a silly guy when it comes to designing him, what can I say :eyes:

[strivia]

Feeling unhinged about this. Angel wanting to protect Charlie for one, I love their friendship. 🥺😭💕

But also, I feel like it speaks to how Angel sees Valentino that he thinks he could be a threat to Charlie, literal princess of Hell and daughter of Lucifer.

[tealdune]

little interactions with the vees and my oc