#((TL;DR: I'm officially jumping this ship's ship.))

[citrusella-flugpucker]

Hey, I don't think we're the right target audience for your post on the bad management in Habitca. I don't mind reading it and stuff but I just think it's better if you email them, or post it on their website so stuff actually gets done

((So... I'm glad you brought this up politely because I have had a Week in the "people dissenting" department, filled with vitriol and flames, and this ask's phrasing is a welcome departure from *vague gesture* all that. But here's the thing. This post's function was to address staff and to let people know the things that have happened over the past week or so.

I could email. Sure. (My email address is no longer a flame notification minefield so it's an avenue available to me.) But that would not accomplish all the aims of this post. One reason I made it is because I thought people other than staff should also see it, so that they can know what's happening. I'm sure staff would love if I email them instead of doing something like this, because it would stay behind closed doors. They could read all this in an email, respond to it (or not), and not actually end up changing or addressing my actual concerns (this feels likely, from other correspondence including emails that I've had with them in the past few months). I don't think emailing staff is going to do anything more than I'd get out of making a public post that @'s their official Tumblr blog, and a public post fulfills the extra function of making information known to others who are not staff.

But citrusella, I hear you shout, you could still post to the website! you say. That could be public and let other non-staff know!

But if I may direct you to the hostile and contentious environment section of my post, I am afraid to do that--and I'm not the only one. If I post about it on the website in any capacity, even just to express my feelings in staff's general direction, it is my current understanding that I could be flirting with a mute or an account ban, and I'm not ready to take on that kind of risk because I have things on the site that make it so that I cannot jump ship easily yet. I'd rather not be forced to before I'm ready.

In a perfect world, no one would be the target audience of this post, because nothing would have happened to cause me to feel like making it and thus there would have been no post to target-audience. But this is not a perfect world, and I believe in this world the target audience is people who are willing to read my posts and people who are willing to read posts about Habitica. Perhaps my target audience is even, dare I say it, everyone? I think this is important for people to know about even if it's the first thing they've ever heard about Habitica. Informed decisions and all that.

TL;DR: If this were some timeline that is not this one, maybe emailing or posting on-site would work but they have caveats that do not fit with the reasons I made the post in this timeline. It's an open letter for a reason, and I intend the post to cast a wide net as far as "target audience" is concerned. The target audience is whoever is willing to read and care about the fact a service is treating its patrons this way.))

[miraculouscontent]

I can't be the only one who was bothered by the ending of the latest episode. Not the memory wipe thing, that part was obvious. I mean how smug Cat Noir was when he found out he kissed Ladybug. I swear, every time he says he's entitled to ladybug, I just want to punch him in his smug face. There's no way MC Cat Noir would act like this, right?

*deep breath*

I’m sooooo tired of Chat acting like that. I was already lukewarm at the episode (not because it was “bad” or anything; as I stated early, I have a bias against fanservice and memory loss plots), but that ending made me livid.

Chat is so unbearably smug about the whole thing. They just got their memories back and Chat wastes no time in flirting with Ladybug and insisting that they “make a good couple.” Ladybug is clearly annoyed and tells him to stop, but Chat doesn’t even care.

And you know, this honestly isn’t even out-of-character, nor does it take any “mental gymnastics” to understand the mindset here. Chat has been consistently ignorant of Ladybug’s feelings.

“Prime Queen” is easily the best example (though I could’ve thrown “Syren” and “Frozer” in here too). Ladybug keeps insisting that they’re not a couple, but Chat eggs on the idea that they might be. He continuously stays oblivious to the fact that Ladybug is uncomfortable with the personal questions that Nadja is asking, to the point where Ladybug has to drag him out and Chat still doesn’t get what she’s doing. Even after Ladybug makes it clear why she left, Chat brushes her concerns off and acts like they’re TV stars instead of superheroes. He keeps seeing his superhero status as a luxury and not a job.

And, I don’t know, maybe that’s what he sees Ladybug as too: a luxury. He certainly seems to care when Ladybug is about to be eaten alive (”Animan”) or made to not exist (”Timebreaker”), but when she’s implied to have vague problems of her own (”Glaciator”) or has specific emotional problems, Chat disregards it.

In this episode, once he knows that Alya has a picture of them kissing, Chat just stares down Ladybug with a grin, leans forward, touches her face (which is lowkey rude because Ladybug pulled away in discomfort after she realized they were holding hands post-Miraculous Ladybug), and turns her head to a giggling Alya holding up the picture.

Because of course, Alya doesn’t care either. Ladybug said outright that she loved another boy, but Alya either didn’t hear or didn’t care (which she should because that’s a major scoop), instead posting the kiss to the Ladyblog without context.

(By the way, if I may derail for a bit, that is possibly the most stupid thing Alya has ever done. Ladybug isn’t just some superheroine who Alya doesn’t know on some level. Ladybug trusted Alya with the fox miraculous three times, yet Alya risks throwing that all out the window just to get some views on her blog. Ladybug said that she loved someone else and I simply do not believe that neither Alya nor Nino heard that. Even if they didn’t, no one knows if Ladybug has a boyfriend and that picture would put a giant thorn into everything if she did.)

And Chat just... stares in delight, completely unaware of Ladybug’s feelings and even using the opportunity to brag about how they’re completely meant to be (while Ladybug glares at him, I might add).

Ladybug basically said, “I’m not in love with you,” and Chat responded, “Yes you are.”

That’s not right. That’s not respect. That’s ignoring Ladybug’s feelings for what he wants to see.

Speaking of which, I said before that Chat doesn’t care when he’s loitering around battles because Miraculous Ladybug fixes it, but this scene really proves it.

When Ladybug points out that it’s Chat who got them in trouble in the first place, Chat laughs. He thinks it’s funny. He doesn’t take her seriously because any “trouble” that happens is easily remedied by Ladybug’s powers.

And in that respect, yeah, Chat sacrificing himself can really only benefit him. He’s not needed for Miraculous Ladybug, he looks like a perfect self-sacrificing sweetheart to Ladybug, and all is fixed by the end of it anyway. There are no consequences for him throwing himself into danger when is it blatantly not necessary or there’s a much better and much more obvious solution (”Zombiezou” and “Chameleon”).

So, it makes sense, totally, but that does not mean it puts him in a good light.

Not that it would surprise anyone, but I might as well admit it right now: when I saw that kiss, I felt nothing. It was a completely hollow feeling.

These amnesiac characters spent maybe a half hour together before deciding that they’re in love enough to kiss, and… honestly, I get that. They’re emotional teenagers, they’re isolated, and they’re forced to work together to escape. They saw things that made them believe that they were a couple and it made them much more open and convinced of the idea. Aside from their kwami, they only have each other, and the desperation and want to survive keeps them as a duo.

But they don’t know anyone else. They don’t know their parents. They don’t know their own lives. Ladybug can’t remember the stuff Chat has done to her that made her uncomfortable and annoyed.

They only know each other in the vaguest possible sense because any more than that might not lead to a kiss in the end.

Adding onto the kiss specifically, if all the two know is what they’ve seen during the episode, those aren’t grounds for Chat to kiss Ladybug; it’s more the other way around.

They both know that Marinette has pictures of Adrien in her phone, but they were confirmed to not be a couple (or at least not had their identities revealed yet) by Fu. Adrien saw the video where Ladybug yelled loudly about her and Chat not being a couple, yet once Fu explained that they haven’t revealed each other’s identities, he must’ve brushed off any thought of why Ladybug was so adamant about them not being a couple before getting her memory wiped.

It didn’t matter if he could’ve hurt Ladybug as Chat at some point. It didn’t matter what their feelings for each other were pre-Oblivio. All that mattered is that they were “in love” now and Chat wanted his kiss.

He asked permission, certainly, which is much better than Chat’s standard behavior, but I would much rather them reassuring each other that they’d find a way to fall in love again instead of kissing.

The kiss isn’t anything except for a tool to embarrass Marinette. That kiss will only lessen the effect of a potential true non-amnesia kiss at the end of the series. I talked about it with “Gigantitan,” but showing the audience something they wanted to see yet having it be a lie is just a way to lessen the impact when the real moment happens.

To some degree, I get why this episode exists. It’s almost right in the middle of Season 3, which is around the halfway point if the show is stopping at Season 5.

It’s basically the writers going, “Here’s how things would go without the love square,” and also, “We know there’s still a lot of time until an identity reveal, so we’ll release this to tide people over.

But if they need an episode full of fanservice to tide people over, that’s a blatant sign that they know they’re stalling without substance.

A memory loss episode is the easiest way to appease the fanbase, and I can understand why the fanbase would be appeased. The majority of salt typically agrees that almost all of Season 3 is either garbage or lackluster.

So, naturally, when an episode that has shipping value comes out, right when expectations are at their lowest, of course there would be a reaction.

But I didn’t feel anything. I knew where they were going with the constant teases. The second Chat asked for Ladybug’s permission, I knew that something was going to happen. I knew Chat was going to go nuts and ignore Ladybug’s feelings yet again.

That’s just what Chat does. That’s what he’s done consistently, and I can’t support the supposed dynamic between them when it’s not as balanced as Chat thinks it is. I can’t support the canon love square in any capacity when Chat behaves that way and never learns.

And, to refer back to the anon, no, MC Chat Noir would never act like that. He would’ve shaped up by “Prime Queen” and been upset at Alya for taking a photo of something so personal and without context. Even if he had been thrilled that he and Ladybug had kissed, that moment should be private and between only them; it wasn’t for anyone else to see.

But… ugh, it’s not like I planned to write any sort of fanfic, but I honestly am not sure if I could even have the love square be canon to MC stuff, even if it’s different. I’ll give it a few more episodes or wait until the end of the season, but as someone who’s had personal experiences with being confessed to (and who’s had people assume emotions and disregard anything said otherwise), Chat’s behavior makes me so uncomfortable…