Masquerade

"This is my escape. Where I can forget about it all. How much I hate… everything. A place where I can get high and not have to think about how much it hurts. And, maybe, if I can ruin myself enough in the process... if I end up broken, I won't be his favorite toy anymore. And, maybe, he'll let me go..."

- Angel, dropping his facade to Husk

Masquerade is the fourth episode of the first season of Hazbin Hotel, and the fourth episode overall. It premiered on January 19, 2024, on Prime Video.

Synopsis

 * Angel struggles to juggle his work and his time at the Hotel. Charlie decides it's time to put her 'Princess' status to use with Angel's boss.

Plot
The episode begins with Angel Dust being tied to a chair by a Hellhound mobster, threatening to kill him if he doesn't tell him the stash. Angel tells him to do his worse before the Hellhound strips himself and starts "raping" him into submission.

The scene is revealed to be a amatuer hardcore pornopgraphy movie by Angel as part of Charlie's "Show and Tell" exercise. The other occupants were appalled that Angel is showing him the best pornographic movie that won the Sex-x-xi award. Sir Pentious and Charlie finds this movie to be painfully uncomfortable, to the point where Charlie shields her eyes; Vaggie was more annoyed that Angel would show them a porn movie; and Niffty doesn't seem bothered by it, but rather was more interested. Husk doesn't seem all interested, calling Angel a fake for making a poor;y convincing interrogation scene to the point where he insults Angel for his bad written script, which Angel responded by insulting back. Husk knows all kinds of Demons he's seen, and reveals the resident's problems: Sir Pentious was insecure and lonely, Charlie was always wanting to solve problems that are not her own, Vaggie is hot tempered who hates herself, Niffty is just being sadistic, and Angel was fake. Just then, Valentino calls in for "emergency shoot" scene. Charlie tries to stop him from leaving because they need to finish the exercise and that Extermination is fast approaching, but Angel leaves because she cannot fix his problem with his boss, which gives Charlie an idea.

At the Porn Studios, Angel was working on a BDSM shoot involving burglars for a gangbang scene when Charlie unexpectedly arrives, much to Angel's shock. He demands to know why she came to the studio, and she tells him that, as Princess of Hell, she has come to speak with his boss to get some time off for the hotel. He tries to make her leave, but Valentino notices her and invites her to have a role in his studio, but Charlie, begrudgingly, declines, and wishes to speak with him right after his work. In the middle of the shoot, Charlie unexpected tries to invite some of the camera crew to the hotel, which ended up causing a fire that destroyed the set, before Valentino uses his moth wings to douse the fire. Angered, Valentino takes Angel into his makeup room where he reprimands him for having Charlie take over his battles, beating him senselessly, and reminds him that he still owns him, and shows him his contract where he sold his soul to him. Valentino threatens to kill her unless Angel gets rid of Charlie and out of his studio. After entering the set, Charlie notices Angel's beatings, and gets angry, nearly goes in full demon, and threatening Valentino for treating her friend until Angel stops her. He tells Charlie to get out of the studio, angrily telling her to stop helping him because she's only making it worse. Despite Charlie's plea, Angel tells her to leave, and Charlie breaks down crying before running out of the studio. Guilty, Angel expresses his suffering under a music video, Poison.

Angel returns to the hotel, deadbeat and exhausted after a long night of work, and consults to the bar with Husk at the counter. He demands to have the hardest drink Husk could make, and Husk knows that Angel wants the one where he can forget the night. Husk calls him out for being fake again, and Angel throws a tantrum before storming out. Vaggie and Charlie has Husk get Angel back safe because he's the one who started the argument, much to Husk's annoyance.

Husk finds Angel at the underground bar, drinking to his misery with other loan shark gangsters. Husk gets himself one until he realizes that the loan sharks were spiking Angel's drink with drugs from Valentino. He grabs Angel out of the bar and fights with the loan sharks who were on Valentino's payroll. Angel gets angry, telling Husk that he doesn't mind if he gets drugged, high, or self-destructive because with his struggling workspace and his time at the hotel, he comes to the bar because it was the only place he can escape to without the stress of dealing both at the same time, so that when he's broken to work, he'd be free from Valentino because he owns his soul.

In return, Husk reveals his past: he was a powerful Overlord, but the more power he obtained just by collecting and dealing with souls, the worse his gambling addiction became, and he lost it all, which made him desperate enough to gamble and sold his own soul to an Overlord: Alastor. Husk knows what it's like to be trapped with his soul in the hands of a Overlord, but he expresses through a song which Angel agrees to sing on: Loser, Baby. As they finished singing, the loan sharks came out to get back at Husk, and a gunfight ensures between Angel and Husk and the loan shark mafia. Angel and Husk managed to kill them all, with Angel feeling a lot better now.

Angel and Husk return to the hotel, with a frantic Charlie apologizing for ruining his day, and Angel apologizes back for yelling at her. Charlie cries with joy that Angel is getting better as Vaggie takes her away, and Angel and Husk gets a drink at the bar.

Characters

 * Employees of the Hazbin Hotel
 * Charlie Morningstar
 * Vaggie (cameo)
 * Husk
 * Niffty (cameo)
 * Alastor (flashback)
 * Residents of the Hazbin Hotel
 * Angel Dust
 * Sir Pentious (cameo)
 * The Vees
 * Valentino
 * Vox (non-speaking cameo)
 * Velvette (pictured)
 * Travis (cameo)
 * Loan shark demons

Locations

 * Hell
 * Pride Ring
 * Pentagram City
 * Hazbin Hotel
 * V Tower

Objects

 * Husk's umbrella
 * Husk's playing cards
 * Husk's dice bombs
 * Angel's tommy guns
 * Love potion
 * Beelzejuice (name only)

Songs

 * "Poison"
 * "Loser, Baby"

Instrumentals

 * "Loser, Baby"

Trivia

 * The film Angel Dust shows the gang at the beginning of the episode has him in his pilot outfit.
 * It is revealed that Angel Dust sold his soul to Valentino.
 * Additionally, it is revealed that Husk was once an Overlord, before going to Alastor for help with his losing streak in gambling. And, thus, trading his status and foregoing his soul to him.
 * Portions of the dialogue between Angel and Valentino in the former's dressing room were partially adapted from the fan comic "Red Smoke" by Raphielle II (credited as Arielle Somerville), one of the series' main storyboard artists.
 * It is revealed that Valentino's coat is actually his pair of moth wings that he keeps wrapped around himself.
 * Travis is shown to be one of the directors of Valentino's studio. It is unknown whether this is his job, and, if so, how he was hired by Valentino.
 * One of the poses Angel does on his bed during the Poison music sequence is a nod to the official artwork of his redesign announcement.
 * This is the only episode to receive a +18 rating (as opposed to the standard +16), as this episode contains graphic depictions of sexual abuse.
 * Additionally, when the episode original aired it had no warning. Later, the episode starts with content warning about graphic depiction of sexual abuse.
 * This is the first episode wherein Alastor does not appear.

Cultural References

 * The episode title, masquerade, refers to a false display or pretense, referring to Angel Dust's facade.
 * The scene where Angel leaves with his sunglasses on may be a reference to a similar screenshot the official Hazbin Hotel Twitter posted as a teaser during pride month.

Continuity

 * Angel joking about how Valentino has poor eyesight may be a reference to the ADDICT music video, wherein Valentino had exactly three paper bills he couldn't seem to stop counting.

Errors

 * During the scene where Angel Dust says he is going to "do all of you" his butt freckles disappear.
 * In some scenes, the black eye Angel received from Valentino earlier on in the episode disappears and suddenly reappears after he tells Husk that he knows more than just being a sex addict.
 * Throughout the scene where Valentino crouches to Charlie's eye level to talk to her, his neck appears and disappears.
 * When the Loser, Baby song starts, the puddle Husk put his feet into disappears.

Transcript
View the episode's transcript here.

Gallery

 * Masquerade/Gallery