I am now thinking about Essek as, essentially, Anna Ripley for the Ruby Vanguard, and it's genuinely horrific to imagine but it's not a real timeline so it's hilarious. It is so funny in concept. He's a glorified postdoc with no mandatory ethics trainings, no future, and nothing to lose. Also he just got handed the power of a thousand suns with absolutely no oversight and a mandate to "do your worst".
This has such extreme "horse loose in a hospital" energy. No one knows what Essek will do next, least of all Essek! He's never been in control of the power of a thousand suns before! He's as confused as you are!
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The Exorcists’ Masks of Virtue
The vast majority of Exorcists in Hazbin Hotel have a notable design element that other angels don’t: their masks are missing an eye. Specifically, the right eye.
I believe this is a reference to the Bible, Matthew 5:29. Jesus says, “If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.”
He’s being hyperbolic. Mr Free Healthcare was not pro-mutilation. What he means is that you have to be willing to make sacrifices to prevent sin. The context of the eye metaphor is him condemning adultery and warning that even something as easy, casual and small as a look full of lustful intent can lead to further, worse sin if you don’t notice your sin, hold yourself accountable for it and do the work to not let it influence your decisions. This will probably be hard. It could be very, very painful. Changing your perspective can feel as horrible as plucking out your eye, so many people can’t bring themselves to do it. But although it won’t feel that way in the moment, it’s healthier for our general wellbeing in the long run to abandon traits and behaviours that damage ourselves and/or others.
(You may notice that Jesus’s teaching that you can have sinned, redeem yourself by giving up sin and thus escape damnation is the founding principle of the Hazbin Hotel. You may also notice that it contradicts everything the Exorcists believe.)
The Exorcists seem to follow this idea of painfully excising badness for the sake of the greater good devoutly to the point of placing it above teachings like ‘Thou shalt not kill’, with their job being to remove sin, in the form of sinners, to protect Heaven. Hence the missing right eyes. They’re a declaration of moral righteousness and inability to stumble.
But the truth is that the Exorcists all have their right eyes. Their flawlessness is a facade. Underneath, they are untouched, think themselves morally untouchable and, as shown by their horror and outrage when even one of them is killed, would much rather be physically untouchable too. This perfectly represents their complete unwillingness to acknowledge their own faults, let alone improve. They are never the ones who sacrifice. They force the sinners to sacrifice and don’t compensate it with any salvation. They metaphorically rip out the sinners’ eyes, but still condemn their entire bodies as inherently, permanently sinful. So they’ll just have to do another Extermination to get the other eyes! And another one to cut off their right hands! And so on until there’s nothing left.
The only exception to the rule is Vaggie, both in appearance and character. Her mask has the left eye crossed out instead. Even before her expulsion, she’s set apart to the audience as an Exorcist who has the capacity to, shall we say, see a different side of things. Her mask having its ‘sinful’ right eye reflects her understanding that the Exorcist worldview is wrong.
When she almost kills a demon child, her hateful vision clears. She discards the part of herself that’s an unquestioning, merciless agent of death, terror and grief… and as punishment for what Lute perceives as treacherous weakness, gets her eye plucked out.
Of course Lute leaves her with only the ‘sinful’ eye. It brands Vaggie forever as the inversion, a perversion, of what the Exorcists are meant to be.
You know, all this talk of eye removal in the Bible reminds of another line - ‘an eye for an eye’. Adam directly quotes it in “Hell is Forever”. He uses it to frame the Exterminations as Old Testament-style punitive justice; the sinners did harm and so they receive it. But putting aside the debate about how ethical the concept of revenge is, the entire point of taking an eye for an eye is that it’s proportional. The punishment fits the crime. If someone cuts your eye out, you shouldn’t murder their whole family in front of them and then slowly disembowel them to death. That would be the sin of wrath. You should just make them pay without excessive pain or collateral damage. This is the fairest form of revenge.
The Exorcists don’t do that! The Exterminations aren’t proportional to the wrongs of all they hurt, nor was Vaggie’s brutal punishment equivalent to her extremely mild insubordination. Lute literally takes Vaggie’s eye, and more, after Vaggie does nothing to her! That’s the opposite of the phrase! Adam and his soldiers are wrathful and cruel, deriving satisfaction from others’ suffering. But they just can’t stop going on and on about how disgustingly evil the sinners are, in total hypocrisy… despite some of the sinners being far better people than the genocidal Exorcists are… it’s like they’re obsessed with specks of dust in the sinners’ eyes when they have massive logs stuck in their own. Oh hey, that’s in the Bible too!
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sometimes when total strangers commit the crime of being annoying in my reblogs i DM them or reply @ them before blocking simply due to the autistic need to be understood. BUT i have rules for when i'm allowed to do that.
1. i'm not allowed to do it without running the scenario past a groupchat to make sure i'm justified in annoyance and not simply evil (due to migraine, hangry, etc)
2. i have to make it constructive and helpful feedback, such that they can avoid getting blocked in future interactions. which sometimes makes me feel like i'm some sort of tumblr user manners training wizard. eg:
> CHUMMY INSULTS are only funny if you are already MUTUALS WHO TALK. try upgrading your FRIENDSHIP before attempting this maneuver!
> if you don't wish to ANNOY other USERS, try NOT leaving long, off-topic REBLOGS. such REBLOGS may result in other USERS taking the BLOCK action against you, and/or being targeted by a PISS ON THE POOR attack in future interactions!
> unloading your PERSONAL TRAUMA in a STRANGER'S INBOX unprompted is a BOUNDARY VIOLATION!
many such cases. obviously don't phrase it like this unless your goal is to be insanely condescending. but anyway i recommend doing your best to at least mentally frame your feedback this way if you're going to block the motherfuckers anyway.
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MY GOODBYE.
w/o text under the cut (+ au lore?)
They're both hurt by each other's actions, they're both suffering and dealing with their grief in their own way. Clara lashes out in response to being hurt, meanwhile Phil just stays silent and keeps to himself, not uttering a single word as he lets himself register what has been done.
They're both good, but also both in the wrong. Just unfortunate events, and unfortunate timing. And to clear and add things up:
Clara has no relation to Phil (Springtrap), they've only known each other for a short period amount of time (which means they aren't married or any of that)
That also doesn't mean they weren't friends during this though, but unfortunate things happen. A lot more than people would want, so their relationship is very rocky and bad, as for now.
Clara and Phil have a potential of getting together, but it isn't guaranteed. Nonetheless they care a lot about each other and act like a sweet old couple, with occasional teasing the other here and there, but it's all in good fun
Both have lost someone during this.
They'll still remain friends later in the story, their relationship isn't tainted forever
Both fought each other during this, the only sign of it happening is Clara's subtle bruises on her face in the panel. Phil can manage himself just fine, however Clara is just human. (?)
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Me: I am so normal about Shanks and Buggy, what do you mean? Hahahaha!
Also me: The Crane Wives has a song called "Never Love an Anchor" and it's basically about cutting off a relationship before somebody gets too dependent and ends up weighing you down and anchoring you instead of letting you follow your own path. This describes Shanks and Buggy's relationship perfectly because despite being surprising for many people, Buggy was the one to leave Shanks. He left because he recognized doubt and hesitation in Shanks, the one he gave up his dream for, and realized that if he stayed with him he would never end up making a name for himself and would end living on his shadow forever, and-
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