‘Neighbours’: can Haz win back his friends?

The truth is out about Haz (Shiv Palekar) on ‘Neighbours’ but can he win back his friends and stay out of prison?

If you don’t want to read spoilers for ‘Neighbours’, stop reading this article now.

This week’s episodes revealed that it was Wade Fernsby (Stephen Phillips) who was behind all of the deep fakes plaguing the Ramsay Street residents, and not Haz as it was previously thought. After winning Mackenzie’s (Georgie Stone) trust, Wade revealed that he used to be friends with Haz until he was targeted by Haz and his hacker friends, and his life was ruined. Wade also lied to Mackenzie that Haz had deep faked a video of him sexually assaulting a woman, and his ploy saw the couple split up.

Haz came clean to his friends through a series of letters but understandably, no one was very sympathetic. Proving that he wanted to make amends for his past, Haz came clean to Andrew Rodwell (Lloyd Will) and he now faces potential prison time for his actions. While Mackenzie and Holly (Lucinda Armstrong) have cut themselves off from Haz (for now at least), and Aaron (Matt Wilson), Jane (Annie Jones) and Nicolette (Hannah Monson), Byron (Xavier Molyneux) is trying to stand by his friend.

Is Haz trying to trick Wade?

Wade has threatened to target Mackenzie if Haz doesn’t help him commit larger-scale crimes with his hacking abilities. Viewers saw this week that Wade has used AI to create a fake and incriminating conversation with Mackenzie, and he’s determined to go after her if Haz doesn’t do what he’s asking. For a moment, it looked like Haz was doing the right thing but the end of today’s episode (Thursday 25th April) saw him agree to help Wade.

Surely he’s got to be tricking him right? While Haz feels he needs to make amends to his friends, especially Mack, is he really going to add to his list of crimes? Our gut feeling is that he’s working with Andrew to catch Wade so they can put an end to his nefarious behaviour once and for all.

Will Haz be able to win back the trust of his friends?

With only Byron on his side, Haz has a long road ahead of him. His actions aren’t going to be forgiven or forgotten quickly, and Wade’s attacks have put a number of Haz’s friends in the crosshairs. Add to that Haz’s already questionable behaviour with Holly a few months back, and it doesn’t look like anyone is going to be keen to look past what’s happened. Perhaps if he gets Wade locked up and protects Mack from a potentially career-ending attack, that might pave some way to reconciliation?

Where does Haz go from here?

That’s the million dollar question. How can anyone trust Haz when he’s not shown his true self or been honest about his past. Getting back together with Mack doesn’t look very likely and with everyone else on the street angry and suspicious, Haz doesn’t have many options. If he does get a prison sentence, he’ll likely lose Harold’s too. That’ll be a huge blow as at the moment it’s the only thing keeping him occupied. Whatever way you look at it, Haz is in for a very rough time moving forward.

‘Neighbours’ airs Monday to Thursday on Amazon Freevee.