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This makes me very happy

and they are together happily ever after

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Do you reckon Nathalie is letting the council think she’s the one using the butterfly miraculous? They wouldn’t have any reason to think someone else got it because who else would know where to look for it? It would be logical to assume that.

So what is Nathalie’s angle here? It’s clear that all she wants is to care for Adrien. She hasn’t been team Gabriel since the start of season 5. She was also willing to turn herself in until Ladybug convinced her not to for Adrien’s sake. She wants to do the right thing, but she’s caught under this mysterious council of powerful people (including her own father, which I’m sure only complicates things).

As long as they think she has the butterfly miraculous they need her. She’s the one with the power and they can’t do anything to her or to Adrien. I’m not sure what they could do, but I wouldn’t want to risk pissing off a group of powerful people who have obviously questionable morals.

She’s walking along the edge of a knife on limited time. The council will eventually work out she doesn’t have the butterfly miraculous, and that she’s had the ladybug miraculous within her reach for months now.

I’m sure she has some sort of plan but I can’t see a way out of this mess.

I am so excited to see more sides of Nathalie and how she will play a bigger role in all of this.

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I’m loving this theme of parents and authority figures this season. Being able to dive into other character’s stories and see everyone’s growth as a whole is so good 😍

I love the little side Adrienette those two will always be slightly misunderstanding one another until the day they die honestly 🤣

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I don’t see it that way. Nathalie is stuck still under Gabriel’s shadow and now we find out there’s a whole council of powerful people expecting her to continue with the mission?

This gal loves Adrien. She wanted to turn herself into law enforcement at first but Mari convinced her not to for Adrien’s sake. I truely believe she is on the side of what is best for Adrien. But she’s stuck in a terrible position with no way out. Even her own father is expecting her to continue.

I am so ready for double agent Nathalie and all the complicated decisions that come with that as she tries to do right by Adrien.

Literally what was the point of Nathalie's "redemption" last season then????

Deadass why have her cut ties with Gabriel and stop pursuing the miraculouses only for to be back at square one like nothing ever happened

Like

HUH???!???

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Im sorry I can’t with his baby clothes 😭🤣

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There is a much bigger discussion to be had about how Nathalie is influencing Marinette in her actions, but for now, I just wanna give my 2 cents on a detail I've now often seen interpreted in a way I don't agree with:

People say this was Nathalie leaving Marinette to tell Adrien the truth on her own, but, in my opinion, this was just a heated Nathalie leaving the room after Adrinette immediately changed the subject matter to something else:

Like, Nathalie was PISSED at Gabriel here. She wanted to destroy the letter to protect Adrien by not allowing Gabriel to have a voice (which stays in line with the froggy plushy carrying past Gabriel's voice into the present too).

And lbr, there ARE 100 other ways to get the information from the letter to Adrien (by showing him Emilie's videos, for example). You don't HAVE to give Gabriel a voice and Nathalie considered it wrong to let him have one. Period. She did not at all agree with Marinette, but they were too quickly interrupted by Adrien entering the room, so this discussion literally was stopped before they got anywhere:

Nathalie was PISSED and did the same thing Ivan did and kept quiet about it and left the room because she and Marinette werent on the same page while Adrien is present.

I totally get holding Nathalie accountable for not helping Marinette more (and believe me, I'm GLAD Nathalie's inclusion takes a solid amount of accountability away from Marinette), but in my opinion, saying that this moment is Nathalie abandoning Marinette to say the truth on her own is just.. objectively wrong.

Adrien entered the room, talking about something else and Marinette immediately goes all in on that topic, too. In Nathalie's eyes, Marinette just showed that she's not gonna treat the letter as the important subject matter as of now, so Nathalie took her heated mood somewhere else. That's all.

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What the hell nathalie?!

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"Your father's pancakes lacked sweetness"

Go, Nathalie, roast that fucker

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ah ok that explains Sublimation

My brother in akumas, if my boyfriend suddenly decided to run along a stranger just because he was having an existential crisis and then become friends with her, i would have reacted like Marinette, specially since the previous episode was her being insecure about being a good girlfriend

Actually, no, I would have reacted worse lmao

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Yes please 🙏

Soooo we're definitely gonna be getting a flashback episode later on, right? Like Origins in season 1? Because Climatiqueen was definitely not the first time they ran into the new Butterfly Holder. Especially since Alya and Nino already revealed who the first - or one the first - victims was, back in Illustrhater.

Alya: Ms. Mayor, you were one of the first people to get akumatized by the new holder of the Butterfly Miraculous. Mayor Bustier: I was.

I'm betting that the mid-season two-parter is gonna be the follow-up to the London Special.

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From day one, there have been multiple theories and interpretations about what Adrien’s future career path and passions would be as we all wanted to see this boy be able to choose and discover something for himself rather than the dozens of activities his father was making him do. I believe the most popular theories in the fandom were Adrien becoming a baker or a stay-at-home. I think the popularity of these theories arose due to Adrien being good with kids and showing a fondness towards Marinette’s family and their bakery in early seasons. Furthermore, as Miraculous is built on subverting gender roles, and Adrien’s characterisation is more traditionally feminine with the narrative I guess we were building on that (and men taking on more domestic roles seems to be loved in fandom spaces in general).

However, I hadn’t quite seen running as a potential career choice for Adrien and most of us wouldn’t expect it either.

I, for one, didn’t expect it but I am not disappointed and I think it makes a great lot of sense for his character for three reasons.

Reason #1

As much as I love baker and stay-at-home dad Adrien aus, I’m glad that canon chose not to take that route in this episode. I think that choice would be more detrimental to his character rather than beneficial in our canon narrative.

As Thomas commented, so much of his character already revolves around Marinette considering that he’s pretty much all he has left and feels the most comfortable around her right now. (Even before his father’s death, his sense of identity seemed to revolve around her a lot as we saw him expressing that his love for her was the only thing he was sure of in S5. I think it’s because he’s been deprived of autonomy so much that he seems to be used to basing his desires around other people’s).

That’s why I believe him going into baking or being a stay-at-home dad at the future would not really help him grow as a character as both those choices still keep him under Marinette’s wing.

As this episode established, Adrien needs to figure and explore his passions for himself. Whilst Marinette will always be there for him, he needs to understand what he wants by his own volition.

(Having him make a breakthrough in discovering his interest for running without Marinette at the end of this episode was a great start!) Reason #2

I thought it was interesting how they started this sequence with Adrien looking up sadly at his big and lonely house before running away from it.

It takes me to what Sublime asks him later on.

This is what Adrien has wanted from Season 1: to run away and escape the four corners of his house to explore the outside world. It feels like a callback to Origins where I think of Adrien running away from house to start school. There’s also several times in the show where he runs away to escape the cold and lonely atmosphere his house brings.

The bars on the gate of the house in this scene also makes it look so much like a prison.

Of course, we now have Adrien standing on the outside of it rather than inside considering that the person who was keeping him in the house in the first place is dead.

It still doesn’t mean that Adrien thinks of the house as less of a prison. An association like that is hard to forget especially now that the house is where both his parents died.

But now, without Gabriel, we know he’s free to run from it for as long as he wants.

I also want to add that in Hinduism, running is considered as a physical response to escape distress.

Reason #3

Should someone’s passion really be built on running away from something else? Well no. But I don’t think we’re meant to see it that way. Adrien running at the end of this episode away from his house is meant to symbolise him finally breaking free from the Gabriel’s controlling influence. Him running away is mainly a step towards his growth.

Besides, running isn’t only seen as means to escape problems but it also signifies pursuit of a goal and taking on a spiritual journey for self-growth. (Dream analysis tends to associate both escapism and pursuit to running in dreams depending on the context and circumstance). This also fits Adrien’s character quite well. Not only is he escaping past trauma, but he’s taking on a new journey to explore what he wants in life.

So yeah, let the boy run!

I’m super excited to see where they take his characterisation with this one. The symbolism behind his potential passion/career choice is just gorgeous.

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Glad he’s finally holding on to her rather than whatever that weird arm thing was

oh my GODD the billboards changing when marinette and adrien were talking about having a passion vs not having one

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im so glad we can have family time in the kitchen in this specific spot. where nothing weird has happened.

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je t’aime~♡

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I appreciate that they haven’t forgotten Adrien’s literally famous

omg this is so precious, Gorilla is literally spraying the paparazzi with water. best dad.

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🥹🥹🥹

I can't handle this cuteness

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Anyone else hoping that episode one would show paris’ reaction to there being another supervillain?

It was such a cute episode though 🥹