agrestrospective

[agrestrospective]

S1 The Bubbler: Fuck that guy in particular

When Nino comes to the Agreste Mansion to plead for Adrien’s birthday party, you can see the exact moment Gabriel decides to turn Nino into an Akuma-Villain. He starts with inviting Nino into his house and calmly explaining his choices, then gives that (pictured above) pensive stare, then shifts to yelling at Nino to leave the house, “just deciding” that he is a bad influence and banning him. The framing makes it seem like what Gabriel “just decided” was to Akumatize Nino, and he laid it on thick to get Nino more mad for a stronger Akuma-Villain.

[agrestrospective]

S1 The Bubbler: Deception

In this episode, there were 3 (arguably 4) deceptions centered around Adrien and his perception of what happened. I note this because characters deceiving Adrien through lies and omitted truths is a much-repeated phenomenon that dramatically affects the course of the Agreste Arc to the very end.

1) Chloe realizes she forgot Adrien’s birthday was today. She goes to him to say her gift must have been delayed by delivery people, then quickly leaves to order Sabrina to order Adrien a gift in her stead. However, due to Bubbler’s actions, the gift Sabrina ordered was delayed to another day. The purpose of her deception is to cover up that she forgot Adrien's birthday and to escape the negative consequences of forgetting (i.e. Adrien thinking worse of her). This is the one lie he might have actually discovered was a lie, but we never see this plot point resolved on-screen, since it's barely consequential.

2) Nathalie relabels Marinette’s birthday present to Adrien, telling Adrien that Gabriel got it for him. The purpose of deception, interestingly enough, isn’t to make Adrien not think poorly of Gabriel, but rather to cover Nathalie’s ass. This episode, we see Gabriel ask about the gift he (allegedly) ordered Nathalie to get for Adrien in his stead, but when she tells him he never ordered her to, he yells at her that he did, which she placatingly agrees with. This early Nathalie is very much a stock secretary afraid of being fired by her demanding boss. The fact that her deception is purely practical and impersonal, only about maintaining her job and not about manipulating Adrien, makes it, to me, one of the less offensive Adrien-based deceptions in the show.

3) Marinette discovers that Adrien thinks her gift to him is from his father, and she decides not to reveal the truth to him. The purpose of her deception is easily the most altruistic, not wanting to hurt Adrien with the reality that his father didn’t get him a nice birthday present (actually got him no gift at all). If this episode stood alone, I would think this is a pretty sweet moment. Unfortunately, this moment is only the beginning of characters (including Marinette) denying Adrien a complete and true understanding of his reality to control his physical and/or emotional reactions as they see fit, including “for his own good”. Marinette wanting Adrien to have a good relationship with Gabriel is great, but she doesn’t understand that Gabriel actually does suck, and Adrien deserves to know this so that he can appropriately deal with his circumstances. She didn’t improve their relationship, she just convinced Adrien to give Gabriel more leeway for Gabriel to exploit. Ultimately, this specific deception is not very offensive to me, but the fact that this facet of her character doesn’t develop beyond this point (in fact, it only gets worse, with greater and more offensive lies and omissions to come) is what offends me so much.

4?) Adrien asks Nathalie “My father get back to you about my birthday party?”, for her to reply “Well, uh, he doesn’t think it would be a good idea.”. So we know that Adrein asked Gabriel (likely through Nathalie) about having a birthday party some time in advance, but Gabriel only responded (again through Nathalie) on the day of, effectively at the last minute. While no deception is explicit, I think that Gabriel decided well in advance that Adrien wouldn't be allowed to have a birthday party and put off telling him, leaving Adrien to meekly wait for approval that was never coming until it was too late for Adrien to do anything about it, including keep pestering Gabriel or plan something behind Gabriel’s back. Hooking Adrien on the (false) possibility of getting what he wants to keep him docile and un-rebellious is such a Gabriel move that I can’t help but to consider the possibility.

[agrestrospective]

S1 The Bubbler: Moral of the Story?

[Moral of the Story?] is the first of a repeat segment where I talk about the episode’s intended moral, usually either criticizing the moral itself or how the episode delivers the moral. [The Bubbler]’s moral is something along the lines of ‘adults are good, and also good for kids’, with Bubbler voicing the counterargument. To quote the episode, Bubbler says that adults are “total party poopers” and “controlling and bossy”, and says that “Kids need freedom, fun, let loose, and live it up.”. Ladybug responds by saying that “Kids need adults” and that “adults keep children safe and protected. They care for their kids. They love them.”. My big problem is with how the rest of the episode either poorly serves or undermines the theme.

[The Bubbler] has three adult non-background characters: Gabriel, Nathalie, and Sabine. The audience is privy to Gabriel’s horrible parenting, but because of lies and deception, Adrien (and Nino) are led to believe that Gabriel is better than he is. They come to agree with the moral of the story, but on false pretenses. Nathalie is kind and polite to Adrien, but is ultimately a self-serving stock secretary archetype whose only motivation is to not be fired. These two were designed to not follow the moral or learn from it, so the problem isn’t with them. As for Sabine, she should be the one adult that the story highlights as good and caring and loving, to show why Ladybug is the one to posit the pro-adult/parent moral. Instead, in Sabine’s only scene, she orders Marinette to clean her room and threatens to snoop through her room if she doesn’t. While the scene isn’t framed as a negative interaction at all, Sabine’s actions more closely align with Bubbler’s take on adults as "controlling and bossy", rather than Ladybug’s take. If the show wanted Ladybug to give a pro-adult/parent speech, Sabine’s actions should be her point of reference, demonstrating Ladybug's point for the audience, or at the very least not countering her point.

This [Moral of the Story?] segment gets off pretty lightly, with my problem requiring only the slightest of tweaks to make it cohesive. I will judge some others more harshly for their greater failures, but this one is pretty close to solid.

[agrestrospective]

S1 The Bubbler: The Agreste Parents Suck and Always Did

[The Agreste Parents Suck and Always Did] is the first of a repeat segment where I list the episode’s evidence that Gabriel and/or Emilie were bad parents to Adrien, in the ‘present’ of this episode as well as in the show’s past. Eventually, I will make a masterpost combining all of these segments into one large rapsheet, not to convince anyone of my thesis (by now, no one needs convincing), but to put all the evidence in one place.

1) Adrien and Gabriel never talk with each other this episode. The singular time they are in the same room, when Adrien addresses his father, Gabriel immediately turns around and leaves without saying a word to Adrien.

2) Gabriel not only doesn’t get Adrien a birthday gift himself, but fails to remember to order Nathalie to buy one for him (he claims he didn't forget to order Nathalie, but no one is convinced). Also, Adrien reveals that Garbiel has “given me the same lame pen for three years in a row.”. This implicates Emilie as well, who was alive at the time and could have intervened.

3) Gabriel forbids Adrien from having a birthday party. Adrien says that the party Bubbler makes for him is his “first one”. It is unclear if this is first birthday party or his first party in general. Either is bad, but the second is worse. Emilie is only implicated if he has never had any party before.

4) Some notable Adrien Quotes include:

{about Gabriel} “No, I’m pretty sure he was a downer back then, too.”

{to Nino} “My father, he’s pretty stubborn. It’s just best to stay out of his way.”

{to Plagg, about joining Bubbler’s party} “This might be the first day in my life that I actually get to do what *I* want for once.”.

[agrestrospective]

Season 1

For Miraculous Ladybug Season 1, I will be rewatching and posting the episodes in this order.

1 [The Bubbler]

2 [Stormy Weather]

3 [Lady Wifi]

4 [Timebreaker]

5 [Rogercop]

6 [Dark Cupid]

7 [Animan]

8 [The Evillustrator]

9 [The Puppeteer]

10 [Reflekta]

11 [The Mime]

12 [Mr. Pigeon]

13 [Copycat]

14 [The Pharaoh]

15 [Pixelator]

16 [Guitar Villain]

17 [Dark Blade]

18 [Gamer]

19 [Kung Food]

20 [Simon Says]

21 [Horrificator]

22 [Princess Fragrance]

23 [Antibug]

24 [Ladybug & Cat Noir]

25 [Stoneheart]

26 [Volpina]

I spent a fair bit of time trying to make this list as "chronological" as possible, with a few personal touches for best watchability. If you have ideas about the best episode orders, I am always down to talk about it.

[agrestrospective]

The Agrestrospective

Welcome to Agrestrospective, the Miraculous Ladybug Agreste Arc Retrospective Blog. My plan is to rewatch the entire Agreste Arc (Seasons 1-5) from the beginning, episode by episode, and give my analysis and commentary, generally from a retrospective perspective. I have already watched every Miraculous Ladybug episode before, but most I have only watched once, and I haven’t watched the early episodes in a long time. It will be a fun refresher on a show I have such strong feelings about.

Here is a list of rules and guidelines that I will try to hold my blog to and expectations that I will try to hold myself to. I’ll probably add new ones as I go along.

[1] As of this blog’s creation, I’m not very familiar with Tumblr or how to use it. Bear with me as I learn. Any advice is welcome.

[2] I have a lot of mixed feelings about this show. I will try to balance my love, respect, hate, confusion, and disappointment.

[3] I will not be malicious or hateful at other real-life people, including you, other Miraculous Ladybug Fans, other Tumblr users, and the people that work on the show. If you come to my blog with that, don’t expect me to engage.

[4] I’ll likely not give a full answer to a question bound to a specific episode or season until the blog reaches that episode or season, but I will always save it and tell you that I’ll wait to answer it when I get there. I’ll more likely answer a question not bound to a specific part of the story right away. I’ll make these decisions on a case by case basis, so your best bet is to ask anyway.

[5] I don’t have a strict schedule for the rewatch. These posts come out when they come out.