It is easy to see why, with the community she has fostered, Vivienne Medrano felt the need to retcon the Stolas/Blitz relationship. Having a very vocal minority of fans who find morally grey representation of queer characters somehow an attack on those who identify as LGBT. It comes from this purity mindset that queer characters must be portrayed as morally right as possible. As such, the inherent blackmail premise had to go. However, Medrano lacks the experience or skill to be a show runner and completely missed how this change made the relationship even worse.
In the initial premise, it appeared that Stolas took advantage of Blitz taking advantage of him. Seeing an opportunity to tie down someone without consequence and never having to face a fear of rejection due to Blitz's own inherent selfishness.
Blitz has the choice to decline the engagement for the book, and all he loses is his business. It is established that he has a found family in his business and coworkers, however, so there is that need to keep the business in order to preserve his new chosen family.
However, this keeps the emotional commitment tied to Blitz. As abstract a concept this is, ultimately, this setup keeps the stakes tied solely to Blitz. Radically speaking, this is Blitz's choice just as much as Stolas'. He could choose to start over at any time, and we see he is a character who has routinely done so in the past. Losing his business does not necessarily include losing his found family either. So the blackmail doesn't ever reach the same level of exploitation as the old homoerotic animes Vivienne and the rest of us grew up on, like NO MONEY. There is an option for Blitz to decline without any necessarily lasting damage to him
Additionally, by keeping the stakes as far removed from Stolas as possible in the beginning, it has a very clear starting point to travel from. Starting off at "This is a transaction" to "This is a relationship" very clearly lays out a plan of navigation. There are a multitude of ways to get to the same place in a narrative, so from the transactional starting point, have one or both of them find conflict in the relationship. Have one or both find themselves becoming genuine in their little game. There are many ways to do that, and this was the clearest idea we had at the start of the series. Effectively speaking, this was the DNA, or blueprint, of Helluva Boss.
However, the internet has changed, and what was once considered grown is more akin to an extended teenager. Factually speaking, there is plenty of evidence to show that humans are maturing even slower than previous generations, so the ability to think critically, conceptualize moral ambiguity, and rationalize around emotions has been delayed in the younger generation of those below the age of 26. Which unsurprisingly makes up the majority of Medrano's most vocal fanbase.
In the effort to make the story less problematic on the surface, it has become much darker than that. The childhood friends plot, as previously mentioned, killed any forward trajectory the story had. Rather, it literally restructured the plot to make the present also the end. But that also means the only reason Blitz and Stolas are together is because of that one day when they were children.
Blitz breaks into Stolas' home to steal the book and manages to keep Stolas occupied before trying to just leave. There is no implied desire that Blitz even has an ounce of attraction or even affection for Stolas within the dialogue or the animation. Instead, it maintains that everything Blitz is doing is for the sole purpose of getting the book.
Once Stolas is incapacitated and Blitz has the choice of his own to either follow through or grab the book and go, he chooses the latter. There is no sequence of Blitz being genuinely interested in the developments going on. Stolas is not also having an effect on him, and is shown to be instead playing up the personality in a comedic way to achieve the ultimate purpose of his being there: to get the book. It could have been that Blitz also became aroused during the foreplay and chose to instigate the sex on his own, taking Stolas' obvious enthusiasm as a means of "What the hell, why not? I'm feeling what he's putting down."
But that is not what happens. What occurs is that Blitz tries to leave, and the only thing that stops him is Stolas calling him his "first ever best friend." Seems like it's not meaningful, but the animation highlights an explicit desire to leave, but being torn against something else. Unfortunately, being someone's childhood best friend doesn't naturally conclude in sex, so the idea that just because they were friends should result in sex feels, bluntly put, rather incel-ish.
But what would result in this emotional conflict within Blitz is much darker. Imagine for a moment that you have isolated everyone you love in your life. Your family, your friends, everyone who ever knew you from that time in your life that you should be able to look back on happily, but can't. Everything is tainted by loss and resentment directed towards you, even if justifiably so. And then there is one person who remembers you from back then who doesn't hate you.
However, if you don't sleep with him and just steal his book, then he's going to hate you too.
That removes the ability of choice for Blitz. He either HAS to have sex with Stolas or lose that one thing we know is more important to Blitz than anything: his emotional connections. While there is no real emotional connection between Blitz, there is an argument to be made of having a true trigger response based on whatever happened between him and Fizzarolli. Additionally, one could conceptualize how Blitz may suddenly put so much more value into this relationship with Stolas now as a means to retroactively keep his past close.
It hamstrings Blitz to the point of there not being a choice. He can have sex with this weird guy he only met once when he was ten, or lose that very last person from his past who doesn't hate him, causing Stolas to hate him too. It would be the last nail in the coffin that Blitz is just unworthy of being loved by anyone. So he prostitutes himself.
This can only be framed in such a manner due to the addition of the childhood friends trope. Which somehow makes that connection also even creepier. That the only reason this becomes a case of true manipulation (intentional or not, the writers are aware of implications, or should be), and prostitution is because Children, adds a slime coating of ick to the idea of these two characters having a sexual relationship. That it isn't because they even know each other as adults. They don't but immediately culminate into sex based on their childhood selves, which is frankly disgusting.
So Medrano has not only kneecapped her own story moving forward, but has succeeded in rewriting the part of the show we actually wanted to happen into a disturbing quagmire of adults having a relationship involving prostitution and blackmail because of a fantasy idea one had of the other when they were both children that he has not only never let go of, but perverted and distorted to the point of debauchery.
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