Do you have any Coronabeth Worsetwin thoughts about Abigail's reaction to finding out Ianthe become a Lyctor in HtN ("Blast. It should have been Coronabeth. Ianthe never was quite the thing")? I love Abigail but ngl I am also a Corona Worsetwin truther in part because I would find it much more satisfying for one of the series' designated Rational Moral Adults to be categorically wrong about Corona.
OH I love this! I hadn't really thought out it until now, but my first reaction is that it might have been just the general "Ugh, yuck, Ianthe?" vibe that she seems to evoke, since she's very much unpleasant on main. But when thinking about it more in-depth, I think Abigail's perception of WHY Corona would be more suited to Lyctorhood depends on which qualities Abigail thinks a Lyctor should possess that Ianthe lacks.
One thing about Abigail in HtN is that she is as much of an atheist as you can get in TLT, but also she seems to have a sort of romanticised view of John (calling him "the Kindly Emperor", "I've longed my whole life to give him my findings") and I wonder if this extends to her conception of Lyctorhood as a sort of state of idyllic quest for knowledge — "the beauty of necromantic mysteries" as Harrow puts it. She's also the leader of a House known for its diplomacy, influence, and not-so-subtle expansionistic ambitions.
So, is she thinking about Corona's diplomatic skills? Her political knowledge? Or — because at this point she still believes Coronabeth is also a necromancer — is she thinking that Corona was the better necromancer than Ianthe, as it was widely speculated?
Going wildly off into headcanon land, we know Abigail has anti-Cohort sympathies (as per Judith's files) and I wonder if that plays a part. We know that Corona regards the Houses's expansionistic strategy as inefficient, but I don't think it's something Abigail would know. Maybe she just thinks Corona would be able to assert authority over the Cohort better? (One of my pet speculations is that there's some antagonism between the Cohort and the Lyctors, and if that's actually a thing Abigail could be aware of it.)
I think it's a combination of Corona's people skill, her personal experience with both twins, and the fact that Ianthe actively puts off everyone she meets.
(If anyone has any opinions about Abigail here PLS feel free to add, I too love her but she's one of the hardest characters to figure out for me)
Personally, a solid 40% of why I am a Corona Worsetwin truther is because I think it's hot. The rest is her everything in NtN / AYU from the threatening suicide to statecraft scheming, with a smattering of that one Taz interview <3 I'm excited to see her wreck havoc in AtN.
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Alastor's Deal (Thoughts, Theories, and some Predictions)
This won't answer the who, but aims to dig into the why, and plausibly narrow down the terms of the deal. Long post ahead!
Evidence
First off, the finale was incredible! But what Alastor's song showed was that his ""death"" against Adam wasn't entirely a surprise, but rather planned. Alastor's song revealed that he was looking for a loop in the contract, a way to slip past the deal without having to directly break it. He already made a deal with Charlie for a favour, but that might have been a safety net of sorts, something to guarantee himself a fighting chance if his "dying for the hotel" plan failed.
His surprise was at how fast it happened, not that he nearly died. Alastor craves control, he wears his smile for control, he makes deals for control, his magic highly influenced by controlling others too. His Modus Operandi is control, and he faced the battle it started with him being in control. He was outwitting Adam, he was faster, sneakier, even kept his hands behind his back while dodging just to show how little effort it took. But Adam's weapon sending an angelic beam of power? That wasn't in his plan, that wasn't in his control.
Control is something Alastor seeks over everything, which is why the deal is so brutal for him. The deal takes control from him, and his constant smiling and jokes and contained urges for violence is him trying to have some sort of freedom. It's highly implied that, unless it's for the hotel, he hasn't used his magic for his own reasons. He hasn't eaten or killed anyone unless it is for the hotel, and even that was implied to happen only during the Mimzy incident. He hasn't gotten to make any deals either, at least no real deals, no deals for souls.
I'm far from the first one to say that his deal is forcing him to help the hotel, but it's only now that we see the true extent. Alastor's entire personality, goals, and being has been changed against his will. He is now a tool for the hotel, the sword and shield, the magical provider, bringing them whatever they need to succeed despite the odds. Without him, it would just be Charlie, Vaggie, and Angel Dust. Sir Pentious wouldn't have joined, repairs would've taken far longer, the staff would've been just Charlie and Vaggie, et cetera. Even his deals are just him trying to gain something out of helping the hotel.
Alastor is bound to the hotel and his powers are also bound to the hotel. He cannot be selfish, he cannot do anything unless it's for the hotel no matter how desperately he wants to do otherwise. And yet it seems like his powers are limited too.
Alastor has immense levels of powers, so much that he was taking down a large portion of the angel army single handedly. Had Adam not been there, it's not outlandish to claim that Alastor could have taken down the angel army by himself. This is why he was feared. This is why "no one crosses the radio demon". If these are his powers when their limited, imagine just how powerful he truly is?
The last evidence I'll state before moving on is that Alastor didn't return back to the hotel until it was rebuilt, yet still didn't use his magic to cause chaos.
To simplify, on his end the deal forces him to use his immense power for the benefit of the hotel. He cannot actively do anything to bring harm to it, and he cannot use his magic unless it's for the good of the hotel. And he cannot escape from the deal if the hotel is destroyed, so the deal isn't about the physical hotel, but rather the concept of it. As long as the hazbin hotel exists in the heart of those involved, Alastor is bound to help.
Why?
Now the why? I believe that, whoever he made the deal with him was, they want the hotel to succeed. Not only that, I believe that by forcing Alastor to stay there and help while limiting his capability for violence, they are also trying to rehabilitate Alastor.
Wherever Alastor was before the hotel opened, it was somewhere where he couldn't interact with anyone. He was forced to be gone, only until the hotel opened. If the theories of Alastor making a deal with Lilith is true, then Lilith's character is important to consider. From what we know she is powerful and worked to bring dekonkind together. And that she too disappeared 7 years ago.
It's confirmed that Alastor destroyed many of the worse evils that existed in hell, the only ancient overlords that remain are civil and take part of overlord meetings. They are controlled, contained. There's more structure, and the only truly out of control, dangerous demon to remain would have been Alastor. It's possible that Lilith realized that she could use him to "clean up hell", waiting her time until Alastor was the last remaining biggest threat. That was when she pounced, seven years ago to capture him in a deal. We don't know why he would accept such a limiting deal, but I'd wager that it could have been for his life (either she was threatening him, or he nearly died and made a deal for his life).
Now that the deal is made, Alastor can't bring mindless chaos. If anything he is doing the most to help demons be saved from the extermination either through redemption or protection (we also didn't see him prior to the last, so perhaps he's also bound to protect during the extermination too?).
All while Alastor is handling and ensuring the success of the largest and most helpful demon-centered support system, Lilith is on vacation. Almost like Alastor is acting in her role, a mimicry of a spiritual successor of sorts. He's helping rally the demons together, helping shape Charlie into a better leader, helping prove demons can be redeemed. All while Alastor is either witness, participant, or manager of the strategies used to redeem sinners. Alastor is only a few steps away from taking part of the redemption program himself.
If Alastor's deal was with Lilith, then she's getting everything she could want. All the uncontrollable evils/overlords destroyed, a muzzle on (one of the most) powerful sadistic demons, someone to help guide her daughter, help demons redeem themselves, protection for her citizens from being killed or further tortured, and she finally gets a vacation. She'd be getting everything she could want, with the bonus of possibly rehabilitating Alastor in the process.
It's no wonder Alastor is so desperate to break out of the deal, to find a backdoor in the contract. This goes against everything he stands for. The stories of him broadcasting screams? Of killing overloards and owning soul after soul after soul? That is the real him, and it isn't exaggerated. If Alastor wasn't chained, he'd have the power and strength to destroy large swaths of hell himself. If he decided to do his own extermination with angelic weapons? He could kill as many demons as the angels do and more, because he wouldn't be limited by a single day period.
If his deal is with someone else? We simply don't have enough information yet to name them then. Whoever it is, they would have to believe in demonkind's potential for improvement, and possibly fear what Alastor is able to do.
Predictions
The last thing I want to touch upon is how Alastor might be able to escape the deal. First is what he tried, which is "dying" for the hotel. Or, more precisely, for everyone involved in the hotel, it was as if he died, so why would they still depend on him?
Next would be for the hotel to be destroyed, and considering that we don't know if Alastor was briefly free while he recovered or if he was just hiding out somewhere new because he couldn't stay in the hotel because it didn't exist, this one is still iffy. If part of his deal is staying at the hotel to actively protect it, the he was temporarily freed from that condition. Yet once it was rebuilt Alastor returned, proving that the destruction of the hotel building wouldn't free him.
The next possible way could be the death of the hazbin hotel spirit. If Alastor (or outside forces) were able to destroy Charlie's hope for the hotel just like Lucifer's dreams were crushed, perhaps Alastor would be freed. Considering how the finale went, it would take a lot for this to happen.
My final idea, and the one I predict will happen, is that Alastor outfits the person he made the deal with. He doesn't find a true "out", but rather will manipulate them into giving his power back. And this? I believe that Alastor's deal with Charlie was made for this reason.
If indeed the deal was with Lilith, and part of the deal seems to be ensuring Charlie's dreams come true, then Charlie is a delightful way for Alastor to manipulate the situation. How? Who knows, but I think that this will be a large part of the conflict of season 2.
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You know, thinking about it, I was wrong before. Nico has more reason to trust Hades than Percy does Poseidon at the time of the incident in TLO!
If you think about it, Percy's only evidence that Nico should've known it was a trap is that "[Nico] know[s] what [Hades]'s like", but... Nico's view of Hades would be much different from Percy's. Remember, Nico has a room in the palace at this time; Hades couldn't send him to his room the way he does later if he didn't have a room to be sent to. He's been living there! Hades allows him to live there! At this point Nico doesn't know that Hades used to visit him, Maria and Bianca regularly or that he actively stepped in to protect Nico and Bianca from Zeus and keep them safe until the time of Titan's Curse, but he does know that Hades is letting him live in his palace. Gods don't do that. Percy has to nearly die to even get a brief visit to Poseidon's palace, and he very openly knows that Poseidon wouldn't have claimed him to begin with if he didn't need him. Not to mention Poseidon has that whole thing where he explicitly tells Percy he wishes he didn't exist, which... is the sort of thing that's gonna have a negative impact on how you view your dad.
So when Percy says that Nico knows what Hades is like, what he's saying is basically... "The Underworld is evil and Hades is evil, how could you not know that," which is kind of an incredibly shitty thing to say to the child of Hades living in the Underworld? I mean, it is kind of just "You shouldn't trust your father because I think he's evil and the Underworld is evil", if I was Nico I'd be very concerned about what Percy thought of me when he started spouting that shit. Anyway, while Hades is far from a good father at this point in the series Nico still knows him as the father who is letting him live in his palace because he has nowhere to go, stepping well outside the usual bounds of gods interacting with their kids in the process. Hell, unless I've forgotten something (possible), it's entirely possible that by this point in the timeline Hades has already told Nico about Camp Jupiter (which would show a huge amount of faith in him, again above and beyond any other godly parent). Hades can be kind of a dick because all gods are dicks to their kids, but Nico has no particular reason not to trust him! Especially given Nico has exactly zero other adults in his life offering him any support and at this point in the timeline he doesn't remember his mother, so Hades is basically all he's got and he has no points of comparison other than his also-a-child sister who kinda sorta abandoned him (not going into her reasoning here but it was A Thing that would probably influence the way Nico thought about... caregivers, I guess, for lack of a better term to describe the twelve year old put in charge of her little brother) and Minos (who is... Minos. Enough said). It makes sense that when Hades says "Do this small thing for me and I'll tell you about your mother" Nico believes him, because while Hades has been awful to Nico at times there's no evidence that he's ever lied to him. Why should Nico doubt his father who gave him a place to stay when he had nothing and no one just because that father happens to be Hades and the place to stay happens to be the Underworld?
...Also in hindsight knowing just how much Hades spoils Nico (for a godly parent at least) in the future makes the "You know what Hades is like" thing kind of hilarious. Ah yes, the guy who gives Nico a place to stay when he has nowhere to go despite gods Not Doing That, tells him at least some of the gods' most guarded secrets and essentially takes it on faith that he'll keep his mouth shut, lets him get away with breaking the law that the dead stay dead without even a slap on the wrist, promises him a place in the palace when he eventually dies (which may or may not imply that Hades intends to make Nico a god when he bites it, but it's certainly not normal procedure for Underworld kids), tells him to his face he deserves everything, and backs up that claim by fulfilling his wishes with no payment required or debt accrued just because Nico asked if Hades thinking he deserved everything meant he'd do so (because Nico is a little shit, we love to see it) despite Hades claiming that wasn't actually what he meant. Why would Nico trust that guy? (I know, I know, it's not proof of anything at this point because most of that hasn't happened yet. But it is funny how completely Percy's claim that Nico should distrust his dad is eventually proved wrong by Hades spoiling his kid rotten.)
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