#for example i told Marinette said to Alya she is Ladybug

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Can I ask what do you mean that Félix is “far from the only victim of the issue?” What other characters have this issue from Miraculous?

When I said, "Felix is far from the only victim of this issue," I was referring to the ongoing problem of inconsistent characterization. Generally speaking, characters should act according to their own internal logic. When they do, they come across as reasonably consistent, predictable, and - most importantly - realistic.

I'll talk in depth about the concept of consistent character logic and how you get around it in a moment. Before I do, I want to give a few examples from the show to demonstrate what I mean by inconsistent characterization as we must understand what the show is doing wrong before we can discuss how to do it right. This issue is so widespread that I could go character by character and give examples, but for the sake of brevity, I'll just pick the first three that come to mind.

Alya

In Chameleon, we get this exchange:

Alya: A good reporter always verifies her sources. Can you prove [that Lila] doesn't actually know Ladybug? Marinette: Well I–uh… I… I… Okay! You want proof she's lying? Hey Lila! You forgot your napkin!

In this scene, Alya comes across as massively hypocritical because we all know that Alya isn't holding Lila to the same standard that Marinette is being held to. Alya will happily believe whatever BS Lila spouts and even post it on the Ladyblog for all the world to see.

We also know that this habit of not verifying sources isn't a new thing for Alya. We saw it bite her in the ass a couple times back in season one with things like the Lady WiFi incident where Alya thought that Chloe was Ladybug based on little more than circumstantial evidence.

But at the same time, we get things like this scene from the start of Feast:

Alya: Now you know back in the day sculptures were painted, right? Most of the paint vanished over time, but tiny microscopic pigments still remain. Thanks to this special app, witness how it originally looked. But here's the big thing. All these works of art have something in common. It's the same symbol! Look, everywhere. (Marinette gasps as she imagines Master Fu's mission) It's like some kind of secret society emblem. As if a kind of Order of the Guardians has been watching over the superheroes since the beginning of time!

This scene showed off some serious research skills. Alya uncovered secrets that the guardians had kept hidden for centuries or possibly even millennia! And this isn't the only time where we see Alya pull off this kind of quality research. If you pay attention, you'll realize that she clearly wasn't kidding when she says that she checks her sources!

In other words, depending on the episode, Alya is either a brilliant reporter who does her research or a tabloid journalist who takes anything she's given at face value as long as it makes for a popular blog post. There is no consistency nor is there a gradual change over time. The quality of Alya's journalism jumps back and forth from episode to episode depending on what the writers need it to be for the plot to work.

Nino

Nino is the holder of the miraculous of Protection and we were told many times that a miraculous must suit the person who bears it, so Nino supposedly embodies the spirit of Protection. And yet, in the season five episode Illusion, we see him:

Out his secret identity for no reason

Out his girlfriend's secret identity for no reason and without her permission!

Purposefully antagonize his best friend's father even though he knows that Gabriel and Adrien have a very tense relationship

Willingly get someone akumatized without taking any precautions to minimize the damage that akuma will do

Does that sound like a protector to you? Does it even sound like someone who should be made a part-time hero? I'd say no. Especially since Nino doesn't apologize for any of this. He happily justifies his own behavior and is even treated as being in the right. The only sudo-apology we get is this:

Nino: Mr. Agreste, I owe you an apology. All your troubles today, the pizza, the pasta, the chocolate, all that was... that was a plan to help Ladybug and Cat Noir. And it worked, dude! I mean, sir... Ladybug, Cat Noir, look! (shows a picture of Gabriel’s akumatization) Magic lightning! That's how Monarch gives his akumatized villains the power of the Miraculous!

Which is followed by everyone praising Nino for uncovering a thing that we now know goes nowhere. The heroes never try to track down the "lightning" Nino caught on film, so he risked Adrien's relationship and freedom for nothing. If that's protection, then count me out!

Adrien

At the start of season two, we get Glacitor, which gives us this exchange:

Cat Noir: There's a boy? Who is...? Ladybug: It's— I can't tell you who it is. We can't know anything about each other. Our identities must remain a secret. We're both superheroes, Cat Noir. We don't have a choice. (There's a silence. They look at each other sadly. Cat Noir walks closer and smiles before he hands her a rose, which Ladybug takes) Cat Noir: I get it, Ladybug. Your friendship means everything to me. (kisses her cheek) You can keep the rose. It goes with your costume.

And then, in this same episode, when Adrien is alone with Plagg, he says:

Adrien: Perhaps Ladybug will love me someday. I mean, like, I love her. I have to believe. In the meantime, her friendship is the best gift of all.

Driving home the fact that he truly meant what he said to Ladybug. He is happy to just be her friend, though he does hope that, one day, their relationship changes.

Then, towards the end of season two, we get Frozer which has Chat Noir do this:

Cat Noir: For you, M'lady. (kneels and showed the rose on his hand.) Ladybug: Seriously, Cat Noir? You're about to transform back! (points his ring) Cat Noir: So what? Ladybug: Well, if you transform back, then I'll know who you are and then... Cat Noir: And then we won't keep secrets from each other anymore. (transforms back to Adrien and Ladybug is shocked) Adrien: We'll be united, more powerful and free, we'll defeat Hawk Moth, then we can both run away to an island! (Ladybug smiles a little bit) Far away from everything. We will live off nothing but fruits, and we will have a little pet hamster and we will name it- Ladybug: Cat Noir! (It was revealed it was a daydream from Cat Noir) I can't accept this rose from you. I told you already. I'm in love with someone else. Cat Noir: I know, M'lady. But if he weren't here, would things be different between us?

And this:

Ladyice: Cat Noir. We need to set up a trap for whoever turned the city into a giant ice rink. (throws yo-yo) Icecat: (bitterly) My feline instincts prefer to track and observe before I attack. You go your way, I'll go mine. Ladyice: Please don't tell me you're mad at me about the rose. Icecat: There may be a certain chill now between us. Ladyice: I get it, but we should really focus on saving Paris right now. Icecat: We don't always have to do everything together, after all. It's not like we're a couple. (skates away) Ladyice: Cat Noir, don't get all pouty on me!

And this:

Adrien: I hope this helps you get more students to sign up. (walks away with Kagami) Kagami: You still keep doing what other people want you to do. Adrien: No, I just want him to be happy. And I'm not changing my target. Even if it means failing over and over again, because one day, I will succeed and hit it.

Oh yeah, he's totally respecting Ladybug's "no" and prioritizing their friendship over his feelings! This is top tier dreamy romantic lead writing!

On Characterization

By now, you hopefully see I what I meant when I said that Felix is far from the only character to have magical personality changes for the sake of The Plot. No one is safe from being rewritten. Sometimes characters change permanently without a real explanation. Sometimes characters ping pong back and forth. Other times they're so weird and wacky that you truly have no idea who this character is supposed to be. This is a problem because well written characters tend to be predictable. That doesn't mean that you'll always know exactly what a character will do. It just meant that a character's actions should make sense to the audience.

But, if you're a writer, how do you do that?

Allow me to explain!

If you want to write a solid, believable character, you have to keep them logically consistent. This does not mean that their actions need to be logical. All it means is that any character-based logic you establish has to be respected and followed.

For example, if you establish that Marinette can't talk to Adrien without messing up her words, then you cannot have an episode where she's suddenly able to talk to him because you are breaking one of Marinette's character rules.

If you have established this rule for Marinette, but your story needs to let Marinette talk to Adrien, then you need to do one of two things: create a situation that logically breaks her rules OR give her a character arc. That's just how characterization works! You establish a character, let the audience get to know them, then find ways to tell the story you want to tell while honoring the character you introduced the audience to. If your characters' are ping ponging all over the place and acting completely different from episode to episode, then you are failing at characterization.

Before we end, let's take a moment to rewind and explain what I meant when I talked about the two ways to get around a character's rules. We'll start with the easier way: breaking rules by putting the character in a situation that forces them to do something they'd usually never do.

Extenuating Circumstances

This is the first of the two ways to get around character rules and Miraculous occasionally does it well. For example, in Risk, they needed to get Marinette and Adrien to talk about things that Marinette and Adrien would never discuss, so the writers had an akuma make them talk. That's good writing! Special circumstances can - and often should - override character rules. No one will struggle to believe it if a pacifist becomes violent when their loved ones are threatened. In fact, in that scenario, keeping the pacifist a pacifist may make the character feel unbelievable depending on why they're a pacifist and the nature of the threat.

It's important to note that these rule breaking moments tend to be short lived like how Marinette and Adrien both reverted as soon as Risk was no longer affecting them.

Above, we discussed how out of character Nino was in Illusion, but his behavior in that episode isn't all that different from his behavior in Rocketear and I have no issues with Nino's writing in Rocketear. The reason for the discrepancy is that, in Rocketear, Nino thought that Alya was cheating on him. That's the kind of extenuating circumstance that would make someone act a little weird. In other words, Illusion's problem is not Nino's behavior, it's the context of his behavior. The writers simply didn't put in the work to make Illusion feel believable.

Character Arcs

Now that we've talked about temporary changes, let's switch gears and talk about the way you make more permanent changes to a character's rules. Namely, character arcs.

People are probably more familiar with this tool, but I'll still quickly define it: a character arc is when a character undergoes a change in personality, behavior, and/or beliefs based on an experience or series of experiences.

Miraculous is terrible at character arcs, so I don't have any examples to pull from in canon. Instead, let's take the Adrien example from above and rewrite it to be a character arc where he goes from pouting about being turned down to accepting that he really is happy to just be Ladybug's friend.

It is incredibly common for teenagers to struggle with the concept of rejection. Heck, even full grown adults struggle with it! You meet someone and you're drawn to them and you start building up this wonderful relationship in your head but, before that dream even gets a chance to become reality, your love interest blows it up with a, "No." Instead of accepting that, "No," you become obsessed with changing their mind. If only they'd see you in the right light, you know that they'd love you like you love them!

Obviously that's not how things work and this point of view is quite problematic, but this is a kids show and Adrien is only 14. It's reasonable for him to need to learn this lesson. I'd even go so far as to argue that we need characters to learn this lesson in kids shows. And if you don't think it should be learned by characters who eventually do end up with their love, that's fine, I don't disagree. However, I do think the lesson still works so long as we get a good gap between the character learning it and the character getting together with their love interest.

On to the rewrite!

In this new version of season two, Chat Noir doesn't take the Glaciator rejection well. Instead of smiling and accepting it, he asks if he has any chance and he's devastated when he's told, "No." We'll even add a scene at the end of the episode where Adrien tells Plagg, "I'm going to change Ladybug's mind!" In other words, Glaciator now plays like Frozer and it also leads into a season-wide conflict where Chat Noir is good to his word.

Throughout the season, he keeps pushing things, trying to prove that he's the better pick and that mystery boy is a waste of Ladybug's time. This all culminates in the new version of Frozer, wherein Adrien decides to go out with Kagami to make Ladybug jealous. But remember, that episode only happens because Kagami is trying to convince Adrien to give up on his crush and crush on her instead. Aka, the exact same thing that Adrien has been doing all season.

As you may have already guessed, in the new Frozer, we see Kagami do the same kinds of things that Chat Noir has been doing to Ladybug because Kagami is equally desperate to prove that she and Adrien are meant to be. He just needs to wake up and get with the program!

The more Kagami pushes, the more Adrien realizes that this date was a terrible mistake. He also realizes, "Oh shit, is this how I've been acting? Gosh, I'm an awful friend! I'm going to ruin my partnership if I keep this up."

By the end of the episode, Chat Noir apologies to Ladybug and Kagami can either learn the same lesson or promise to not give up, leading Adrien to sigh and promise to suffer through her advances for at least a little while longer because he wants to try and get her to learn the same lesson he did.

From that point on, Chat Noir is totally respectful of Ladybug, but still very much in love with her. She can even say that she hates hurting him, to which he'll reply, "You didn't do a thing to hurt me, my Lady. You've been perfectly clear about what you want. I'm going to do my best to respect that because your friendship means everything to me. I don't want my feelings to ruin what we have."

I'd also have this conversation establish that the flirty banter is okay by both of them and have them both promise to say something if their boundaries change, but I'm not writing all that out. What really matters is that Chat Noir has now learned a valuable lesson and we can have all of the Ladynoir hi-jinks we love so much without any of that nasty, pushy undercurrent we get in canon. Instead, we now get some lovely, heartfelt pinning that's going to play so good when the reveal happens!

If you want to really have some run, you can even let Ladybug develop feelings for Chat Noir to really highlight how sexy respect is. It's up to your preferences, but I do enjoy a good "two crushes" crisis and Marinette's sexual/romantic alignment seems to allow for multiple crushes based on the Luka and Catwalker stuff.

Conclusion

You can make almost any character do almost anything if you play your cards right, but Miraculous isn't playing the game. The writers seem to do whatever they want and it's sad because there's a good show to be had here. Good characters, too. It's why I continue to defend them in spite of the mess that is canon. Every single character in this show could have been great if the show had put in the effort to make them great.

[comics-and-fanworks]

ML/DC Bio Mom (Starfire Part 2)

TW for swearing, mentions of suicide, bullying, minor violence

~~~~~~

Marinette’s soon-to-be former class watched in horror as she left with her bio parents. She wanted to leave Paris?? Why?! She was their Everyday Ladybug, they needed her! Who would plan their trips, run their fundraisers, help with their events, and so much more? They began talking amongst themselves, why did she want to leave, and what could they do to convince her to stay? The only two who didn’t look surprised about this development were Kim and Nino, Marinette’s only two allies left in the class. They new Lila was a liar, Marinette didn’t have a mean bone in her body, and they decided to stick by their childhood friend’s side even when it cost Nino his relationship with Alya and Kim his friendship with Alix and Max. They were currently texting Mari a play by play of their classmates’ plans, and soon their lack of shock was picked up on.

“What’s with you two? I thought you’d be more disappointed since Dupain-Cheng is your childhood friend,” Chloe snapped. Nino and Kim looked up from their phones, “Seriously? Why wouldn’t Marinette wanna leave? Our city is currently being held hostage by an emotional terrorist, and with all the shit you all have been putting her through-” “We haven’t done anything! MARINETTE is the one putting Lila through shit and you two took her side!” Alix shouted, cutting Kim off. Adrien could sense things were going south and tried to step in, “Guys come on now isn’t the time! I’m sure Mari-” “No dude, now’s the perfect time since we’re all here. Let’s start with the most recent examples shall we? Lila you said that Marinette’s parents never wanted to see her and that they gave her up because they hated her, then how do you explain the reunion we just saw? You also said she spent the summer doing sketchy things well why do Kim and I have texts from her all summer showing off the complete new wardrobe she had to make? How could she be doing illegal stuff when she was barricaded in her room making clothes?” Nino snapped. He had hit his limit, and so had Kim. Before Marinette asked them not to say anything, because she didn’t want their standing in the class to suffer any more, but they figured that since she was leaving, it was time. Marinette had also informed them about Adrien an his High Road advice, and Nino was almost akumatized. How could his best friend claim to care about Mari when he was fine watching her suffer? As Lila was attempting to think of a response, Juleka beat her to the punch.

“I just texted Luka... He told me that the time she wasn’t spending designing, she was hanging out with him, Kagami, Kim, and Nino. There’s no way she could’ve been doing anything illegal, she has an alibi.” Lila could tell her hold on the class was slipping, “But, but she sent me such awful texts! See! I have them here!” Lila showed her phone conversations between herself and a number, the class, save Nino and Kim, voiced their rage at Marinette. “She told me to kill myself,” Lila wailed, “And that the world would be a better place without me!” Alya shot Nino a nasty glare while going to comfort Lila, the turtle and monkey miraculous wielders were about to respond, when Sabrina piped up, “That’s not Marinette’s number Lila. Her number’s in the class group chat and it doesn’t match,” Lila froze, and so did her fake tears, “Oh... well maybe she has a second phone! That has to be it cause I can’t think of anyone else who’d say that stuff to me!” “We’ll find out,” Sabrina said as she hit the dial button on her phone. The whole table went quite as a phone in Lila’s bag started ringing, and before she could act, Kim swiped it and pulled out the backup phone. He declared triumphantly, “Looks like Marinette isn’t the one with two phones! The numbers match, which proves Marinette didn’t send those texts, you sent them to yourself and tried to frame her! You’re lying!” Finally it clicked for their classmates, if Lila had lied about Marinette’s parents, her summer activities, and her supposedly sending Lila awful texts, what else could she have been lying about? Adrien felt the need to step in, “Guys I’m sure it’s all just a big misunderstanding, there’s no need for any of this!”

“Really dude? We just proved Lila was lying about Marinette, and we have proof she was lying about other things Marinette supposedly did as well! Stealing an answer sheet? It went missing AFTER the test, and we had all seen her studying for weeks! Stealing the pendent? Her locker has no lock on it, and Alya has proven that it’s super easy to break into the lockers at school. Not to mention it was on top of all her things, if she really took it don’t you think Marinette would have hidden it better? And pushing Lila down the stairs? Well check this out,” At Nino’s cue Kim played the video on his phone, it clearly showed Lila walking down the stairs, sitting down, and wailing. “It’s amazing what a request for information can get you these days huh?” Kim laughed, before returning to a serious demeanor, “And that’s not even the worst of it. Adrien knew Lila was lying the whole time. He knew she was manipulating you all and hurting Marinette but instead of supporting Mari, he decided to try and gaslight her into staying quiet,” Adrien’s voice saying, “As long as you and I both know,” echoed around the now silent table. “And here I thought you were a decent person Adrien, if not a little sheltered and naïve,” Nino sighed, the lack of ‘dude’ drove home just how disappointed he was. 

As the class sat in shock processing everything they had just learned, Nino and Kim stood up to leave. Looking back Kim said, “I’m glad Mari’s getting the hell out of here. With all the shit you all have put her through, bullying her, destroying her things, and trying to ruin her reputation it’s amazing she hasn’t been akumatized yet! Come on Nino, let’s go help her pack,” With that the two boys left their classmates, who watched as they walked away, “We should give our evidence to Mari’s parents so they can go after the school,” was the last thing they heard from Nino as the two exited the cafe and headed towards the best bakery in Paris.

When they had arrived, Marinette, Tom, and Sabine had just finished explaining everything to Mari’s bio parents, including Hawkmoth and that their daughter was a superhero. While Koriand’r and Dick were both incredibly proud that their daughter was following in their footsteps, it pained them to hear what their baby had to go through. It pained Koriand’r the most to learn just how much Marinette had to repress her emotions. Tamaraneans were naturally in tune with their emotions, since that was the source of their power, and while they were very expressive in those emotions, they still learned to control them. To hear that her daughter had to repress her emotions to the point of barely feeling anything practically put her over the edge. The only thing keeping her grounded was the knowledge that if she lost control, she would be akumatized and would have to fight her daughter and husband. As they pulled their daughter into a hug, the bell over the door rang, and in walked two of her classmates. Dick remembered Marinette telling them about the two boys standing in the doorway, and that they were her only allies in the class. The taller one, Kim if he was remembering correctly, spoke first, “Hey Mari you may wanna put your phone on silent for a good while... Or change your number! We told them about Lila and Adrien, and well, Chloe never hid her bullying so they already knew about that! Our guess is in about five minutes once the shock wears off and they’re done yelling at Lila, Chloe, and Adrien they’re gonna try and message you to convince you to stay.” The two helped themselves to pastries Tom offered, and the boy with the red baseball cap, which Dick assumed was Nino, continued, “Anyways don’t let them effect your decision dudette, you’ve suffered enough, besides you won’t have to worry about Hawkmoth if you’re not in Paris! That doesn’t mean we want you gone dudette, we’re just worried what’ll happen if you stay.”

Marinette smiled, she was surrounded by people who loved her, and wouldn’t judge her for whatever decision she made, and while she’d love to stay with her adoptive parents and her friends, she knew that she needed to go with her bio parents for her own wellbeing. “I, I think it would be best if I went to Bludhaven. I’m really scared of what would happen if I stayed.” The group around her nodded, in complete understanding. “I still wanna come back and visit Maman and Papa though, and Nino, Kim, Kagami, and Luka too,” Marinette said. Starfire and Nightwing nodded, “Of course Baby Bird! You can visit whenever you want, and if you can’t make it to Paris, we’ll make sure they can make it to Bludhaven. We’ll cover flights and all that stuff, don’t you worry!” Dick hugged his daughter, even though he never wanted to leave his Baby Bird again, he would never keep her from Tom and Sabine. Sabine lit up with an idea, “Why don’t you have a sleepover with Luka, Kagami, Nino, and Kim? That way you could spend time with your friends before you head to America, and that would give the adults time to take care of things with the school. We need to beat some sense into that nasty woman who calls herself a teacher and your useless principal,” The other adults nodded in agreement, while the kids in the room cheered.  

Kagami and Luka arrived shortly after with their parents. Sabine and Tom had called and explained the situation. Much to their surprise, all of Marinette’s friends’ parents had agreed to let their children stay until she had to leave, their only request was to meet Mari’s bio parents so they would know who would be watching their kids when they went to visit Mari in America. As Mari and her friends ran upstairs to begin their sleepover, the parents got to talking. “So my name is Dick Grayson, Bruce Wayne’s son, and this is my wife Koriand’r! It’s nice to meet you all!” “Hello! It’s nice to meet you! Your kids have been amazing friends to our daughter, and words cannot describe how much we appreciate it.” As the gathered parents were sharing similar sentiments, Anarka said what they all were thinking, “You two sound exactly like, and look like the heroes Starfire and Nightwing, ” The two in question paused, glanced at each other, and sighed, “Yeah. We are. The reason we asked Tom and Sabine to raise Mar’i is because my wife’s sister is not necessarily a good person, and threatened to kill Mar’i. We wanted to keep her safe, and we knew that she was safer with them than with us. After dealing with that, we had a few more threats we had to deal with, and by the time that was done Mar’i was already seven. We thought it would be cruel to take her away from everything she’s ever known, so we contacted Tom and Sabine and told them that we were ready whenever Mar’i decided she wanted to meet us. We were surprised to learn everything that’s been going on in Paris, with Hawkmoth, Lila, and her class bullying her.” The gathered parents nodded in understanding, and decided to focus on how to go after Principal Damocles and Miss Bustier. 

Meanwhile, up in her room, Marinette and her friends were discussing what to do about Hawkmoth. “We could take him out now, before I leave,” Marinette suggested. The heroes gathered in her room looked at each other and shook their heads. “No. You’re still in a vulnerable state. You need time to rest and allow your mental, physical, and emotional health to recover before we go after Hawkmoth. With your wounds still fresh we can’t risk you being akumatized,” Kagami said, much to the agreement of the others. They looked over at where they had buried Marinette’s phone under a pile of pillows. It was blowing up with her soon-to-be former classmates trying to apologize and demanding she talked to them. “What if you all kept your Miraculous, so that way if there’s an akuma, you all can stall for time until I can get to the fight,” Marinette suggested. The four heroes agreed, and their respective Kwamii shared the sentiment. “Now all that’s left to do is figure out what to do with Chat Noir. If he finds out Ladybug is leaving the same time I am, he might put two and two together.” The group thought about it for a minute before Luka perked up, “What if we tell him that Ladybug’s family is moving just outside of Paris? That way we can account for you not being here to patrol for a while, and why it’d take you longer to get to akumas. We could tell him that your family was tired of dealing with Hawkmoth and decided to get out of his range, but you convinced them to stay close enough for ‘work,’” The group glanced at Marinette’s door. They half expected the cat hero to show up at that moment. After settling on a plan and making sure everyone had their respective Miraculous, the group settled in to watch movies.

Two massive bowls of popcorn and one romcom later, the group was debating on whether to watch Howl’s Moving Castle or Spirited Away when they heard it: A knocking on Marinette’s balcony door. They froze, there was only one person that could be, and it would be no use claiming Marinette wasn’t home, you could hear noise coming from the room. Before she could react Mari found herself stuffed into her bathroom, “We’ll confront him,” Luka whispered, “You hide here.” From the bathroom, she could hear what was going on, “Why did you expose Lila? She could’ve gotten akumatized!” “And let her lie about our best friend? No way dude. What Lila was doing was wrong! She could’ve gotten Marinette akumatized!” “Marinette’s tough she would have been fine!” The conversation was interrupted by what sounded like a popcorn bowl hitting someone’s head. “Ow! Why did you-” “Just because Marinette is though doesn’t mean she has to suffer so someone else won’t face consequences!” Yep, a brilliant throw from Kagami and rock-solid logic as well. “Well, she- Anyways where is she? She said she was leaving, er, Adrien told me she was leaving and I need to show her that’s a bad idea.” “Why do you care anyways alley cat? Marinette’s just a civilian.” “Cause! She needs to fix the mess she made!” “The mess LILA made!” “Well now the class isn’t talking to Lila or Chloe or Adrien and she needs to come back and say everything’s fine so things can go back to normal! So get out of my way!” It sounded like Chat had pushed his way through her friends, and the next thing she knew, her bathroom door was gone. 

“Marinette! You can’t leave Paris! You have to apologize and fix everything!”  Before her stood a very angry Chat Noir, his belt-tail was swishing back and forth, just like an angry cat. Marinette looked around, she was trapped. The only way out of this would be if any of her friends got the jump on Chat, or she transformed, and she was not about to risk her identity being exposed. “NO! It’s not my fall Lila decided to lie! It’s not my fault Adrien decided to let my class treat me like shit! It’s-” “Adrien did nothing wrong!” “Why are you even taking his side in this?” “Cause he’s my friend and he’s right-” “So you think I should be akumatized? You think my stuff should be destroyed? You think I should be shoved, tripped, have things thrown at my head?” “IT WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU HAD JUST TAKEN THE HIGH ROAD! YOU’RE COMING WITH ME AND FIXING THIS!” At that Chat grabbed her wrist and began to drag her towards the trap door. Luka, Kim, Kagami, and Nino tried to stop him, but there was little they could do without revealing their identities. Marinette struggled and tried to break free, wondering why the hell his timer wasn’t done yet. Chat threw open the balcony door and was about to pick Marinette up and leap away... but was met with a readied starbolt right in front of his face. Looking up Marinette saw her bio parents in all their glory. Her mother’s powers were activated, and she was floating just above the balcony. Her hair was literal fire, and she was glowing. Behind her on the railing was her father, batons ready, and looking like he was about to break Batman’s no killing rule. They were not in costume, since they rushed up as soon as they heard their daughter screaming and someone else yelling at her, and quickly put two and two together. Starfire spoke, her voice icy and cold despite the roaring wildfire of rage she felt, “Let go of our daughter. NOW!” Chat quickly dropped Marinette and leapt away, too afraid to fight two adult, trained heroes, and too afraid they’d take his ring. Marinette collapsed into her bio parent’s arms sobbing, while her friends gathered around. They kept watch, waiting to see if Chat would return. The other adults quickly ran upstairs, and Nino, Luka, Kagami, and Kim filled them in one what happened.

“If Chat Noir is bold enough to try and kidnap Marinette, then it’s not safe for her here,” Tom practically growled. What he wouldn’t give to be Weredad right now and pummel that mangy alley cat, but that was not what Marinette needed. Sabine nodded, “We’ll have to speed things up. If her classmates somehow convinced that cat to join them, then Marinette isn’t safe anywhere in Paris. We can’t afford to wait, if he comes back we might not be able to get to Marinette in time, there’s also a high chance she’ll be akumatized in the next few weeks. Her classmates will be hounding her, and now we have Chat Noir harassing her as well.” Dick picked up his phone and sent a few quick texts, “We can have the Wayne jet ready in thirty minutes, and we can leave for Gotham tonight. Bruce is taking care of everything, we’ll stay in Gotham for a bit, and then head to Bludhaven, If that’s alright with you, Tom, and Mar’i.” Sabine and Tom looked at each other and nodded. They hated to see their little girl go, but they knew it wasn’t safe for her in Paris. Marinette’s friends hugged her, and promised they’d come and visit. She also promised her friends and adoptive parents that once things were safe she’d come back and visit, and until then they could video call. She packed her things including the Miraculous box, and then tucked in her bio parent’s arms, she made her way onto the Wayne’s jet. Looking back at her family and friends waving to her (Noting each of her friends had their Miraculous) she waved back. Her bio parents assured her everything would be okay, and that they’d do everything they could to make sure she was comfortable in America. She would be going to a new school, a fresh start. All anyone would know is that she’s from Paris, it was a chance to recover and make new friends. For once she felt hopeful about where her future was headed, and as she thought about all the possibilities, she drifted off to sleep wrapped in her father’s jacket, with her mother stroking her hair.

[familyagrestefanblog]

Marinette's memories after the wish

A detail from the end of "Re-creation" that just isnt letting me go is that Marinette still calls Monarque, well, MONARQUE towards Su-Han and Alya:

Even though she has very clearly told them where she was as we can gather by her pointing out the double wedding ring (meaning Su-Han and Alya could also know that Adrien is a Sentihuman which... *sigh*...) and having searched the basement:

Meaning she was open with them about the fight having taken place in the Agreste mansion and that Gabriel was involved and yet Marinette is weirdly still calling Gabriel Monarque here.

That is such a loaded detail. It could legit be a whole game-changer about Marinette "keeping" Gabriel's secret because it could straight up mean that Gabriel's wish changed both Adrien's AND Marinette's memories of him.

For all Marinette's words directly imply here she lost here memory of having figured out that Gabriel is Monarque and she thinks of them as two seperate men again. The most likely explaination here would be that Marinette may remember Monarque having crumbled into dust before he could win through Chat Noir's cataclysm from "Destruction"

But still remembers Gabriel Agreste having made the wish in desperation since, honestly, the given circumstances were PERFECT for that.

All the wish had to do is put in to Marinette's head that Gabriel and Tomoe were direct victims of Monarque as for a long time and they had to work with him, or agreed to, to keep their loved ones and lives safe. Gabriel in this case would have been the main victim which the finale pretty much perfectly set up for everyone to believe:

All Marinette has to think is that whatever happened to Emilie Agreste was Monarque's fault and he was pressuring Gabriel into helping him by threatening to do the same with Adrien, which was likely then instead done to Nathalie when she found out about it.

But Adrien would have still remained leverage nr. 1 against Gabriel as his son and same goes for Kagami for Tomoe:

This would be the perfect cover story for why Gabriel and Tomoe created the Alliance rings since parents will do alot to keep their children save and it can even be twisted into "explaining" the way Adrien and Kagami were treated by their parents if it happened under Hawkmoth's direct wrath and threat.

Gabriel himself is not only the only adult member of the Resistance he is also said to have been the person who then filled in Chat Noir's place when Ladybug was partnerless against Monarque when the final battle went down in his home where Emilie was kept to maybe be able to save her life?

This you can genuinely twist into Gabriel then not having been able to live with so much regret for what his involvement has caused that he sacrificed himself by making a wish, which Marinette now would still be remembering like this:

The chain of effect for how suddenly everyone who seperated themselves from Gabriel by now would think of him and Tomoe (Andre for example in "Collusion") would go on and on and ON washing Gabriel's and Tomoe's hands clean while Tomoe continues, who I have no doubt would have kept her memories all together.

I also would say that Lila and Nathalie still have their memories but I also gotta be honest, thats a whole can of worms I have to properly think through. My main point here is Marinette still calling Monarque "Monarque" despite what went down and what she told Su-Han and Alya and the possible implications of that concidering how well the rest of the finale sets up the cover story of Gabriel and Tomoe having been used by Hawkmoth all along by using Adrien and Kagami as leverage against them.

It just works too well and it would fit with how Adrien suddenly had a ALARMING perspective change regarding his father after the wish, which, NO, isnt god damn normal as trauma response jfc.

This would mean that Adrien and Marinette would go through season 6 in the new reality possibly figuring out bit by bit that their memories arent right to get an easier exporation phase for the new reality, and then season 7 has them know again what we left of in the old one.

Or Marinette is straight up lying to everyone now, even to Su-Han and Alya. Who knows at this point? But I truly hope that's not something they will put on Marinette's character even if at this point I wouldnt exactly call it out of character either.

[yolowritter]

A few other lucky accidents in MLB I have noticed:

Nora is a kickboxer, wears those weird armbands, and insists to be called by her ring name. To a martial arts buff, that means she practices Muay Thai and got really serious about the culture, that includes those armbands (called pra jiad) and immense importance for the ring name (in Thailand a Nak Muay will often change their legal name to match, and will ALWAYS include their training camp in their name). It also explains why a bulldozer like her has a trickster name: the ring name is given by fans, and whoever gave it must have decided she looked like a deadly spider but didn't know Anansi is a trickster.

Marinette's grandmother is named Gina Misurati. Because in neither Italy nor France one changes their name to match their spouse (mrs. HUSBAND NAME is a courtesy title), and her bike, a Moto Guzzi V7 Sport (it's identical), has written Misurati on it (it was obviously a reference to Maserati, but they stopped making motorbikes in 1960, and none of their bikes looked like Gina's anyway).

Diplomats have horrible working hours that get worse with higher rank, and diplomat kids are often "weird" and forced to grow up too fast. By happenstance, Lila's first mother is barely home, and Lila shows surprising maturity at the oddest moments (like when she flat-out told Marinette that a boy wasn't worth fighting over and offered to help her with Adrien in exchange of friendship).

Paris didn't have their own city police until 2021. Roger is from the NATIONAL police, meaning he shouldn't answer to the mayor... But he does, so SOMETHING must have happened to cause this transfer of authority.

Felix' outfit is identical to Eton's uniform minus the ridiculous hat and overcoat. I suppose it fits his social standing.

Sabine can use her spatula as a weapon. That spatula is nearly identical to a Monk's Spade, a weapon used in Shaolinquan.

Speaking of martial arts, in Chameleon Lila uses actual MMA techniques to overpower Ladybug, and Felix' claim of using Karate points to Wado Ryu thanks to those dodging moves of his.

And the big missed chance: Savate. Not only it's France's national martial art, Paris is where it was improved in the street fights of the Belle Epoque... But nobody in the show practices it. The old non-sport style includes the ancestor of Parkour, cane fighting (now mostly practiced separatedly as La Canne), garrote (the contribution of Paris' gangs), throws (already present in Paris, where Greco-Roman Wrestling was born and practiced before being rebranded), and elbow and knee strikes. It would be perfect for out heroes, both of them... Yet they don't practice it.

Yeah, it's honestly such a shame that these awesome details/references are just either never used or a one-and-done deal just to make a cool easter egg. And sure, Gina's bike for example could be just that, a cool little character detail. Maybe while the bikes did stop getting made in the 60s, she got herself an old one and re-vamped it as the years went by. Adds flavor to her character. Admittedly I don't know enough to talk about the model, but I trust your skills when it comes to identifying the make. Also, I was always sure that changing your last name to a spouse's (like mrs Dupain-Cheng) is optional, like a courtesy as you said. I don't know enough French people to tell if it's a rare occurance or otherwise, but still a nice tidbit of info I'll file away.

Nora is honestly another prime example of wasting some awesome character building because they can't bother to do the research behind the design. Sure, she looks cool and somebody might have said "give her wrappings on the arms, that's awesome" and the designers went with it, but we clearly see that she is a Martial Arts buff even in the way she talks to Alya and co. Why they never bothered to lean in on that even as a background detail, I'll never know. I know it's unreasonable to expect any group of writers to focus on every single character beat, and that Nora doesn't appear enough to really warrant the focus, but it still would be cool to see even through like, one or two lines from Alya. A reference to the Anansi metaphor you mentioned or a word from Nora about the cultural inspiration. It would have been cool.

Continuing down the martial arts road, I did notice Lila's MMA moves in Chameleon, but it seemed more like a case of the writers/animators deciding on cool moves than them paying proper attention and using the correct style of fighting. Sure, they might have and in that case kudos to whoever greenlight that decision, but it always felt a little accidental to me, just for the sake of the action scene itself, you know? At least with Felix we get a proper explanation, and it does honestly build up his character with a cool detail. Not sure if Karate was the best fit for the reasoning here, but any explanation is a step in the right direction at least.

About Savate...it honestly would be an awesome inclusion. Sure, the heroes fight with their superpowers and weapons most of the time, but some the close-quarters moments like the rooftop scene in "Ladybug" was the perfect chance for Adrien to bust out a good throw at Hawkmoth. Speaking of, one might make the argument of Gabriel using La Canne moves, (and I honestly haven't seen enough to dispute that), but to me it looks like he handles his weapon more like a sword? Sure, fits in nicely with Adrien's fencing allowing him to fight back in a 1 vs 1, but we already have quite a few characters who swordfight this way. Tomoe and Kagami do, as does Adrien like I mentioned. It would have been much more visually interesting to give Gabriel a separate style of bladework, especially since his weapon is in the name. In general, I'd love to see a good knee-cracking kick from Ladybug, so I totally agree with you.

I do love Felix's outfit though. It's a cool reference to those who get it, but also stands on it's own as a cornerstone of his design and adds more to his character and personality. Especially with the entire fandom (me, I'm the fandom) writing about him habitually keeping wrinkles off his suit at all times and staying perfect. I refuse to believe Colt Fathom did not do a number on this kid. But yeah it's also just a cool outfit to put him in, and I appreciate that!

In terms of Roger and the police...I'm going to be frank with you, the show handles that aspect horribly. Sure, you could assume that they answer to Andre because he's the immediate authority figure and also a corrupt politician, but that's first of all not even remotely possibly without serious internal corruption of National Police, and second of all completely unreasonable! The police force's reaction to Akuma attacks used to be a big thing in Season 1. In Origins, they tried fighting Stoneheart on their own. And in Copycat, they try to apprehend "Chat Noir" for stealing the Mona Lisa. There's the seeds of an interesting dynamic between the heroes in masks and the boys in blue! But in Rogercop, they're being made into utter fools! Andre is very obviously under duress when he tells them to apprehend Ladybug and Chat Noir, and they just...start listening to the villain like mindless drones? In Maledictator I can excuse it, his whole powerset revolves around making new "laws" that those he blasts have to follow. Makes sense that Roger and co. would be the first responders and get beamed in 5 minutes flat. But in any case where an authority figure is forcibly giving orders, there is a protocol! A procedure to follow! A plan to be made! But...nothing! The show does absolutely nothing, and then beyond this point the vanish apart from another 2 or 3 times where police officers show up in the background somewhere, or as Akuma goons because we need grunts for an action scene. As much as I love "show don't tell", in this case I'd be happy with tell! A comment from a news report about how police have been instructed to stay out of the Akumas' way and help civilians evacuate is so easy to add, and it would change nothing except making Roger and his team actually usefull! As it stands, the entire concept of a police force exists only the few times Astruc needs it to. And don't even get me started on Chloe's coup of the Captial City of France!! I'm convinced this universe has no goverments, no presidents and no first responders for any situation, I swear...

About Lila's mother, yes! Finally somebody says it! Lila's mother is obviously overworked, she clearly does love her daughter but is physically unable to make time for her! This could be such a cool dynamic to see with Lila's home life, and like you said it perfectly explains why sometimes amidst her psychopathic tendencies there's a moment of unexpected maturity from her. Exploring this even gradually, even with us literally being drip-fed information, would have made Lila a much better character! There are so many layers here that remain unexplored, and I can smell the good content like a bloodhound! Sure is a shame that Thomas never bothered to include any of it... I swear, every fault this show has goes like this:

Cool Idea + Good Introduction + (Botched Everything-Else * No Follow-Up) = Miraculous Ladybug

Can't believe the writers made me do math for this show...or that when S6 releases we'll be able to make the "Six seasons and a movie" joke from Community. At least that's a silver lining...

P.S: I love Sabine's spatula. An elegant weapon, from a more civilized age...

[flightfoot]

I know a lot of the fandom are angry at Marinette for not telling Adrien about his father/the rings at the end of season 5 and I get it. She should tell him eventually. But people say it proves she hasn't learned anything from Season 4 and... I feel like what happened in Season 4 and what happened in Season 5 are two very different scenarios?

Like... in season 4, she's keeping technical secrets from Chat Noir- that Rena Furtive is active and several gameplans including her Ephemeral plan, Hack-san and the Sentibubbler one. She's holding her cards too close to her chest out of fear of losing control and not delegating enough. Once Alya is in the know, she has a new, closer partner in her and unintentionally neglects Chat, forgetting to include him in technical aspects that he should be savvy on. She needs to relinquish control and trust more, needs to keep her team in the loop on necessary knowledge. Chat Noir may have still been upset that it wasn't just the two of them anymore, but he'd feel better if he at least felt included as a partner.

The biggest indicator that she actually did learn something from this is her decision to no longer keep each miraculous at the end of Season 5. She relinquishes them to each holder. There are also small examples like her entrusting Chat with the rabbit miraculous early on, going along with his plan without a good explanation in the switcheroo episode and accepting Nino's lead without boggarting, being overbearing or trying to shut it down when he starts The Resistance. As in real life, character flaws will always pop up every now and again and while it's true that she is pretty much forced to work with Chat alone in Season 5, the evidence of her change is there. Chat is a bit of an afterthought in Season 5, but that's more a crappy narrative decision than Ladybug avoiding him.

Some have said she hasn't changed because Chat still doesn't know the other holders' identities, but that always confuses me because since when has that been a problem, for him or otherwise? There was a popular misconception of his line in Strikeback that he was demanding to know other identities when he was actually asking why she couldn't know HIS identity. Maybe that's where it comes from, but Chat has always been primarily concerned with the two of them sharing their identities.

My point is that Marinette learned a lesson about not holding her cards too close and trusting her partners. The climactic discussion was lacking but it's dishonest to say she learned nothing. She's changed her approach accordingly.

What's happening with Adrien at the end of Season 6 is different. This isn't some gameplan aspect that she needs to communicate to keep her trusted partner in the loop. This is a series of soul crushing truths that she has been saddled with communicating to her new boyfriend who just lost his mother and father within a year of each other. Like hey I know you're an orphan now and you're still dealing with that, but you should also know your dad was evil and victimized you and your friends continuously to bring back your coma mom. Not to mention, they were both controlling you from birth with their wedding rings. Because you're a sentimonster. You're not a real boy! Nathalie, your only trusted remaining guardian, was in on it before making a sharp heel faced turn at the tail end. Felix knew too and he told Kagami, but not you. Your dad asked me not to tell you right before he died so not sure if I should be betraying an evil dying man's wishes like this.

Not defending this choice. There's info in there that Adrien needs to know to protect himself. He needs to process his trauma- much of which she has no idea about. Just from a narrative standpoint, it's almost criminally disappointing and a failure to his character to keep it from him.

I also get why it's not at all easy. I get why the lessons learned in Season 4 finale do not help with this. Season 4 secrets were about controlling or withholding all the variables and information to avoid a technical failure and learning to trust others judgement. Season 5 secrets are about the moral dilemma of lying to spare someone emotionally. This is "I'm going to withhold this logical info for logical reasons without considering the emotional damage of keeping my partner out of the loop." VS "I'm going to withhold this emotionally charged info for emotional reasons without considering the logistical problems of not telling a sentimonster they're a sentimonster wearing their life on their ring finger." Sharing something that you know will crush someone inside out, that irrevocably changes all they know about their existence, that you cannot take back... is not the same as letting someone in on your gameplan.

It's a bad call and if this show has any wits, it will examine that. But it's easier said than done and not as "OMG DUH!" as people make it out to be. I can't even completely consider the urge to want to "protect" him insulting to Adrien because honestly, this would fuck anyone up. A secret like this is liable to land any kid in a facility for a bit for an existential meltdown. People have cracked over less. She doesn't even know how strong Adrien is. She doesn't know he's Chat Noir, who she's been through thick and thin with. The idea that what she's doing is a kindness, while flawed, is not unfounded.

Her lesson here should be 'Brutal truths are better than pretty lies' or 'Lies are not a kindness, they're a disrespect." Imo, very different from the motivations and the lessons learned in Season 4, even if the core of them both were withholding information. It's like...if you learn that a type of vodka makes you sick, you're probably not going to stop drinking it altogether. Lessons are complex. It's not going to be "I'll never keep a secret again." It's "I'll never keep a secret in this type of situation again."

Marinette hasn't learned the brutal truth lesson yet. Yeah, she did this small scale with the scarf in Season 1. That worked out for her, right? Even if you count Chat Blanc as a comparable secret (I've never really understood people who are mad about this. It's not like she knew what specific events led to it and it has no bearing on events in their current, future or past timeline. I mean I'd love if she mentioned it for drama. I just don't think she's obligated to?), sparing him the knowledge of it also has worked out in keeping him ignorantly content? Most of the more damning Season 4 secrets were oversights, technical planning and things that he was going to discover anyway that she just neglected to tell him. Emotionally inconsequential things that he wasn't made blissful by not knowing- quite the opposite- and were not lies told on his behalf.

So yeah. 2 different situations, 2 different motivations, 2 different lessons. One improved on, hopefully another to be considered and not swept under the rug.

The real question is: Will she tell Chat Noir? If she doesn't tell Chat Noir because she doesn't trust HIM with this information then I take back this entire ask. I admit defeat. Miraculous has made a clown of me once again. But I can't judge her on that considering she and Chat have not interacted since before it happened? We actually don't know how the writers are going to spin that yet.

So just some housekeeping to start off with, the situation in Ephemeral is very different from the ones in Sentibubbler and Hack-san. In Sentibubbler and Hack-san the plans were very last-minute, and Marinette was unable to communicate or even MAKE a plan in Sentibubbler, and for Hack-san, she didn't have an opportunity to talk to Chat before giving the earrings to Alya, and didn't seem to think of what his reaction would be to seeing a new Ladybug Holder out of nowhere.

Ephemeral, by contrast, had Ladybug deliberately lying to Chat Noir, saying that she wanted an identity reveal because it would make them stronger, in order to manipulate him into unknowingly revealing his identity to a third party, because she didn't want to risk him potentially not agreeing to reveal his identity to someone else. Very different situation.

I do agree that Marinette seems to have learned something from season 4 at least, in terms of relinquishing control and telling people need-to-know things about gameplans, with giving the Miraculous out to their wielders permanently helping to show that.

And the truths she's keeping from Adrien ARE more of the soul-crushing variety (or well, at least of the "likely to severely mess you up" variety). I do see why this would hit Marinette as a different sort of thing to keep from Adrien, since she's not telling him everything because she doesn't want him to get hurt, and he's dealing with a lot as it is.

The main issue is... why wouldn't she tell CHAT NOIR about this stuff? I mean, I could maybe see not telling him the Senti stuff under the premise that that's a private matter, but there's no reason not to tell him that Gabriel was Monarch.

I'd love if Season 6 ended up conveying to Marinette more of the "she needs to be open and honest" message, with brutal truths being better than pretty lies, though I'm kinda doubting it'll happen.

[pisoprano]

I've been tagged for this game by @lady-de-mon-coeur

Rules: we're given specific words to find in our wips/fics, share the section they appear in, and pass it on!

My words were:

support, touch, realise

Reserve words: kind, truth, dance

Support:

From an as of yet unpublished chapter of The People You Call Home:

“Can you give our viewers some examples of positive thinking?” Alya asked. “Thinking about the support you have from your friends,” Chat said immediately. “Oh, absolutely,” Ladybug agreed.  “I know when I’m feeling my most down, Chat Noir is amazing at encouraging me.  And I have known amazing people who have done the same for me in my personal life.  To those people I say: you may not know you’re helping Ladybug, but you have no idea how much your love and support have meant to me.” “And what do you recommend for people who don’t have those supportive friends?” Alya asked, moving her microphone towards Chat Noir. Chat Noir looked right at the camera.  “To everyone who doesn’t have people who care in your life right now: I know how hard it is.  Maybe you had someone who loved you before, but they’re gone now.  Maybe the people who should care about you don’t give you the support you need.  Maybe you want to ask for help, but it just feels so impossible.  Please don’t give up hope.  You aren’t unloveable.”  He looked at Ladybug, then at Alya.  “You might be surprised how much people really do care when you find them.”

Touch:

From Loveybug's inevitable crash (with added bonus words that I wrote while I've been compiling/polishing all my Loveybug one shots):

“There’s nothing wrong with being you,” Tikki assured her. “You’re a great Ladybug because of how much you love people.” “But not a great Loveybug. She’s who I become when I let myself love too much and I lose control of my feelings and I’m just so nrgghhh!” she waved her arms wildly in the air, “and… no one wants that me!” “Maybe Catwalker does?” “Yeah, right.”  Marinette slumped in her chair.  “If he cared, wouldn’t he have touched me back by now?” So many times, Loveybug had wrapped her arms around Catwalker, whether that be a hug of greeting, holding onto his neck when he had carried her out of danger.  She’d even held his face in her hand once to kiss his cheek. He hadn’t told her to stop.  But he only touched her back when he had to. Didn’t that mean that he was secretly uncomfortable and only putting up with her because it was his job to do so?  With his constant formality and acquiescence, she wasn’t sure if Catwalker even knew how to say no. Tikki gave her an encouraging smile.  “You won’t know until you ask.”

Realize:

From Part 20 of Runaway Catwalker (Ao3 link):

Alya: You've just been so overwhelmed after losing both Chat and Adrien... I didn't want to burden you with even more things to worry about. Marinette: I get it. You were trying to be a good friend. Alya and Marinette grab each other in a hug that they both need. Alya: By keeping you in the dark?  I made Chat vulnerable by doing that!  I should have realized I was making the same mistake by not telling you. Marinette: It wouldn't have made a difference.  You're right: We should have told Chat about Rena Furtive.  And if you'd asked me before tonight?  I would have given you permission to tell Catwalker what Chat should have known all along.  He seemed so perfect, I never thought that he could be so untrustworthy.

Since I didn't use my reserve words, I'll let anyone who hasn't been tagged take them:

kind, truth, dance

And add a few reserve words of my own:

friend, laugh, real

[princess-of-the-corner]

Yeah, I’m p sure they just cherrypicked parts of the season that countered salt tropes, while ignoring everything else that just helped the salt. (Girl squad was waaaaaaaayyyy too pushy in GOS) (Alya is so fucking dumb in revelation for still believing Lila despite at the very least, one lie, being disproved in being Ladybug’s best friend)

Yeah I REALLY want them to address how Alya still believed Lila after Mari told her she was Ladybug.

I can even accept things that still allow for Alya to believe it! Just.... Not without addressing it. For example:

1.) Alya completely forgot that 'being Ladybug's bff' was one of Lila's lies because that happened four fucking seasons ago

2.) Alya admits that Lila may have been lying about being Ladybug's bff, but there's a chance that it was the only lie

3.) Alya admits that Lila may have been lying about being Ladybug's best friend, but she also thinks that maybe Lila /believes/ this. In a 'oh Ladybug saved me and we had a long conversation as she escorted me home so we're besties now' kinda way where Lila saw friendship but Mari didn't think much of it.

4.) Alya realizes Lila is lying about knowing celebrities, including Ladybug, but does not want to pass judgment on the idea of her lying about her disabilities. She may be lying about how she got said disabilities, but not the disabilities themselves(especially given she seems to have documentation that fooled the teachers)

5.) Alya understands that Lila is lying about celebrities and her disabilities, but assumes she is mildly harmless and attention-seeking rather than a vindictive bitch

All of these are fair explanations for why Alya did not go after Lila with a righteous fury. It also depends on Marinette not bringing any of this up with Alya, never telling her what she's learned/experienced.

[uptoolateart]

Alyanette's Breakthrough

So, I previously wrote an analysis of what I saw as the problem with Alya. It wasn't outright salt - more an exploration of her character arc and the hurdles I thought she needed to overcome. All these character flaws are built into the show, and I knew my frustrations with Alya had to lead to a huge moment of growth. We finally saw this in 'Elation', so I want to update my analysis of her arc.

My last post looked at two key areas:

1. Not trusting Marinette's testimony regarding Lila - and now in S5 Alya has taken this a step further and invited the wolf right into the fold. True, she has no reason to suspect Lila has teamed up with the main enemy - none of them do. And I guess she's trying to give Lila another chance. But this is another example of Alya not listening to Marinette's judgment, which leads to...

2. Not taking Marinette seriously. And I'm updating this because in 'Elation' we saw Alya make progress here, which was exciting.

Alya has always been super pushy, and I gave a lot of examples in my previous post, including times when she's flat out rolled her eyes at Marinette's miraculous worries in her role as Guardian.

And I posted separately about her still seeming to treat the superhero thing as a game, like when she shrugs off the fact that Cat just cataclysmed a human and wants to gush about how awesome Ladybug was.

So it was unsurprising to me that I spent a few episodes of Season 5 barking at the TV, 'OMG Alya, why does it MATTER if Marinette has moved onto Cat Noir??? Why is this your business?? Stop trying to tell her what she should / shouldn't feel. Just be there for her! She's really struggling!!'

And FINALLY, by the end of 'Elation' she got it. She went out there and told Glaciator where to put his judgments. But that speech wasn't just for him or the rest of Paris. It was her apology to Marinette. And what led to this moment of breakthrough was that Marinette had her own breakthrough.

For 4.5 seasons Marinette has listened to Alya tell her the 'right' things to think or feel. And sometimes Alya has made really good points...but sometimes she's crossed a line. I think it's important to listen to that external input, but not at the expense of your instincts (e.g. about Lila).

But is that all Alya's fault? No, because for 4.5 seasons Marinette enabled it, playing the dopey friend who never has a clue, not believing in her right or ability to be Guardian. And in 'Elation', she'd had ENOUGH. After all that time, she finally said something, really said something...and Alya finally listened.

I explained in another post how Adrien was exalted in that episode - but so were Marinette and Alya.

It's okay to make mistakes. It's those moments of self-development that make the journey interesting. I thought the end of that episode was friendship at its finest - not just because Alya did a great thing, but because she showed humility and acknowledged where she'd gone wrong.

Now she just needs to see through Lila....

[kisilinramblings]

Question!! I need help🐞🐈‍⬛🤭

Were LadyBug and Cat Noir’s memories erased(in the s5 finale) ??? like… every fight,adventure,talk basically everything that has happened while they were in their costumes:)) convos,when cat noir met with marinette,anything u can imagine,but,as i said,everything that happened when they were transformed ig. 🐞🐈‍⬛

Or Marinette and Adrien’s memories were erased. Ive seen this rumour a few times…

Basically: were ANYONES memories erased? If so,what?! 🤦🏼‍♀️

I'm sorry. What? Where does this come from?

Like, just one major scene that demolishes all credibility to that rumor, is when we see Marinette at the end repairing the Miraculous based on the notes from the grimoire, with Su Han - the Celestial Guardian of the Miraculous - in her room alongside Alya who knows she is Ladybug. Not only that, Marinette remembers that a Wish has been made. Previous scene also mentions the lie she has told Adrien as Ladybug, going with what Gabriel asked of her before he died (notably that Adrien never learns about Gabriel's secret identity). Plus, she is applying what she has learned from the mistakes she did throughout S4 - that power must be shared, not kept by on single individual, so never again someone could easily have access to all the Miraculous at once. Knowing to who each Miraculous goes and neither Chat Noir nor her are surprised to see the whole team of other Miraculous Holder all assemble and present. And Ladybug is very glad to see her Chat Noir back as well.

So, it looks like they still have their memory all right. I feel like this rumor was build under a misconception of how the Wish works. Based on Sass' example during Ephemeral, while yes, what's already written in red gets erased, it is the color of the ink that gets changed, not the content of what was written before the Wish.

Barkk did point out that no one knows how a Wish affect the world. That is most probably because Gimmi - who is Reality incarnate - change it so it always has been as such. Remember how Gimmi introduce themselves :

"I am everything that was, is and will be!"

Let's again use an example cite in the show. If someone wished for the strawberries to be green in exchange for the peas to be red, then no one would remember that the strawberries were initially red and the peas were initially green. Because the reality of that universe has been changed so strawberries had always be green, and peas, red. But outside of that detail? Everything stays the same. No alterations to history and events.

Gabriel only made one single Wish with his own life being part of the balance. Ever since Robustus, we know about the equivalent exchange. They keep reminding us that if you want someone to relive, one other person has to die. In this case, if one dies, then another one gets to live.

That is all that Gabriel's Wish did.

[disorganizedkitten]

You'll Survive Chapter 3

Miraculous Ladybug | 2018 | 602 | Ao3 | Masterlist | Prev | Next

Cookie for your thoughts?

“I hate politics.”

Marinette looked up from the containers of cookies she was packing as Chloe stormed inside.

“Who did what?”

“Okay so you know that rude Morel guy?”

“The one who was Akumatized last week?”

“Yeah, him. He is just so! Argh! I hate him so much! Even his Akuma design was stupid! And you know what he said to me thismorning?”

“Something rude, offensive and uncalled for?” Marinette guessed, now getting into a cupboard.

“Very much so!” Pollen cried angrily, buzzing out of Chloe’s purse.

“He’s ridiculous! He’s an absolute idiot!” Chloe plopped down on the bar seat, dropping her bag and crossing her arms.

“What set him off this time?” Marinette asked, setting a plate of cookies down on the counter between them.

“The upcoming party in our honour.”

“Seriously? How so?”

“I told him that he’d get to play ambassador to the heroes, since I couldn’t go.”

“And?”

“And he said, Oh! I can’t believe him!” Pollen shook angrily as she took over the story. “He said that Chloe was just a robot spy sent from Russia to dismantle Paris and then France’s peaceful structure and turn us into a rustic society full of animals! And then! You wanna know what he said next? Hm?”

Marinette handed a cookie to the furious Kwami. “I’m not sure I do. What?”

Chloe buried her face in her hands, but explained. “Morel, that stupid, ungrateful, inane, demanding, insensitive, self-centered, mindless loser! Ugh! He went on to say-” Chloe clenched her fists in her hair. Split ends could be dealt with. Otherwise, she’d ruin this guy. “Marinette, he said that Ladybug, Chat Noir, Rena Rouge, Carapace and Queen B are actually just people looking for attention, and that Hawkmoth is on their side. He said we’re a complete hoax who couldn’t care less about this city and that we’re corrupt examples to the children who want to be superheroes, and- Ugh!” Chloe threw her hands up. “I hate him! He’s such a lying, self-centered, dimwitted, power-hungry, emotionless, puerile twit!”

Marinette scowled. “That’s why you’re running for Mayor Chloe. Having Morel in office sounds like it’d be much worse than it’s ever been, even when you and Mme. Bourgeious had Mayor Bourgeious wrapped around your perfectly manicured fingers.”

“I’d be offended if that wasn’t true,” Chloe warned, taking another cookie and biting it angrily.

“Yep. Tikki’s asleep, but if you and Pollen want to watch a movie to wind down you should be fine.”

“I think we might. Can I borrow your red nail polish?”

“Sure. Let me sneak in and grab it.”

Marinette headed down the hall to her room, opening the door slowly to keep it quiet. Tikki and Wayzz had been having trouble getting any rest, sensing horrible things from the missing Miraculi, so Marinette wasn’t eager to wake up Tikki after the little bug had finally gotten to sleep.

When she came back, the requested nail polish in hand, Alya was collapsed on the couch, a stack of cookies on her stomach.

“Looks like you had a bad day too,” Marinette noted, grabbing another cookie for herself.

“She said she doesn’t want to talk about it and that she’s gonna drown in chocolate chip cookies and then have Nino carry her through patrol tonight,” Chloe answered, holding up a hand for the nail polish.

Marinette tossed it to her, and sat down in front of the couch. “Okay then. Who’s picking the movie?”

“I am!” Trixx shouted, shooting towards the disk shelf.

“Don’t wake up Tikki!”

“Sorry. Can we watch How To Train Your Dragon? Please! Stormfly’s sooo adorable!”

[lady-de-mon-coeur]

Lady in red

AO3

Rated G. Language: English. Words: 2,638

Summary: Since Alya got to know Marinette’s secret, she can't stop thinking about how Adrien would react if he knew that the famous Parisian superhero is hopelessly in love with him.

Chapter 1. Writing to reach you

Since Alya got to know Marinette’s secret, she has had no rest. There was now a constant buzz of excitement inside of her. She could barely sit still during classes. This secret was about to make her explode.

She went to the same school as Ladybug did! She was best friends with the Parisian superhero! Can one imagine anything cooler than that?

What made her cheerful excitement burn like fire was Marinette’s lovesick expression, which always appeared on her face when she was looking at Adrien.

Alya could swear she would burst out laughing if not for the classes. That naive blonde model boy sitting in the first row was totally unaware of who was sitting behind him.

She was dying to know how he would react if he knew that the most famous girl in Paris, the splendid, wonderful, unmatched Ladybug, was so shamelessly in love with him.

That right now, she caresses the back of his head with an unfocused, lovestruck gaze, a soft smile on her face.

That she has plenty of his photos plastered all over her bedroom.

That she sighs his name instead of eating her breakfast and going to the pool with her friends.

Alya could barely hold back a giggle.

Marinette must have noticed something was wrong with her bestie, because she started watching her suspiciously.

"What’s so funny?" she finally asked, irritated.

"Nothing," Alya said quickly. She would explain it later, so that no one would overhear them.

-x-x-x-

"What's the matter, girl?" Marinette snapped, as soon as they were alone in the locker room during a break.

"Uh, I've just been thinking that it's so funny that all the people around you don't know who you are. For example, Nadja Chamack had made you babysit Manon so that she could make a whole show about you. Marc and Nathaniel draw comics about you, and you help them with that, for crying out loud. I wonder what Luka would say if he knew he had dated Ladybug. What your parents' customers would say if they knew that it was Ladybug who helped to bake all the pastries they bought. And Adrien…"

"Stop it!" Marinette shrieked, blushing profusely. "I see what you're getting at, but I don’t think it's funny. For you, it's all fun and games, but for me, it's a huge burden. I'm obligated to lie to my loved ones all the time."

"Yes, I know, bestie, sorry," Alya said apologetically, adjusting the glasses on her nose. "I've just been wondering what their reaction would be, especially Adrien's."

Marinette suddenly became deadly serious, fixing on her the dirtiest look Alya had ever seen in her life.

"Don't you dare tell him!" she snarled.

"I won't, girl, calm down!" Alya said, taken aback, raising her hands in a defensive gesture. "But I think being Ladybug has its pros in the matter of your love life. Your costume gives you a boost of confidence, which means that maybe you can finally muster the courage to confess to Adrien."

"And then? I can't date him as Ladybug. Dating a civilian is extremely dangerous. You don’t know what you're talking about, Alya! If I ever confess to Adrien, I'll do it as myself."

Yes, after another hundred years, Alya thought with a sigh.

-×-×-×-

Sitting during the classes, Alya darted her eyes at her bestie from time to time. It was like the gears were suddenly set in motion in her brain. What she had told Marinette as a joke just an hour earlier, started making perfect sense.

Ladybug was a superhero everyone looked up to. Getting a love confession from such a famous and universally admired person would be impressive, to say the least. Even for a model who was used to getting piles of love letters from his fans.

And Ladybug was a human being under the mask. A girl who could and did fall in love. A girl who struggled with self-confidence and couldn't bring herself to confess to the boy she loved. And that girl happened to be Alya’s best friend.

Then there was Adrien, a famous teen model who everyone adored but only his closest friends knew how lonely he truly was. This boy deserved more affection. He should feel how special he is. Perhaps knowing that such an amazing person as Paris' beloved superhero is fond of him could make him feel more special than ever.

Alya delved into her thoughts so deeply that she didn't notice how and when her pen ended up in her mouth. Her unfocused gaze was wandering around the classroom as she bit the tip of her pen.

When the bell rang, Alya already knew the perfect solution to the problem. She chuckled to herself and started throwing her school supplies into her bag.

-x-x-x-

"No, Alya, that's the craziest thing I've ever heard! You can't be serious. I'm not taking advantage of my superhero status. That's just not fair."

Alya was sitting on Marinette's couch in her room, while the latter was pacing the room, waving her arms frantically.

"Who says you're taking advantage? Just a little boost of confidence for both of you, that's all. Can you please slow down so I can explain my plan properly?"

Marinette finally stopped the Brownian motion and sat down on the edge of her couch next to Alya.

Alya placed her hands on her friend's shoulders and looked her in the eyes.

"Look, girl, no one forces you into a relationship. You will just get the chance to finally confess your love to Adrien, just as Ladybug, if you can't bring yourself to do it as Marinette. And Adrien will get one more piece of evidence that he is loved and needed. Doesn't he deserve it?"

Marinette looked thoughtful for a moment, but then she sighed and slowly shook her head.

"It won't work, Alya. What if he rejects me?"

"Even if he does, you will know that you were strong enough to finally tell him how you feel. And then you can try again as Marinette."

Marinette gave her a sad smile.

"And what if he would feel cornered and forced into dating me, since I'm a superhero and he's so nice and gentle? No, Alya, I can’t do that to him. We can make him feel loved without involving Ladybug. Thanks for the pep talk, but drop it. Besides, I have no time for romance now."

Alya let out an exasperated sigh. How long will she have to endure this? Her bestie will definitely be the death of her.

If neither Marinette nor Ladybug are going to tell Adrien how they feel, Alya will do it. But she should test the waters first.

-x-x-x-

During the lunch break the next day, Alya took Adrien aside to finally talk to him in private, as far from Marinette’s suspicious gaze as possible.

"There's something I have to tell you. But before I do it, I have one question for you first."

Adrien raised an eyebrow.

"Of course, ask away!"

It was only now that Alya realised she hadn't thought of a way to tell Adrien what she was going to say.

"Have you ever considered dating Ladybug?" she blurted out after a moment's pause.

Ugh, that was lame. But there's no turning back now.

Alya could see that her question hit home.

A bright red colour bloomed on Adrien's cheeks.

He looked like someone who had suddenly heard his deepest thoughts being said out loud.

Or a thief caught in the act.

"Um… What? Why do you ask?" he mumbled.

"Please just say 'yes' or 'no'. I'll explain it later."

"No, I haven't." The sadness in Adrien's voice didn't escape Alya.

"Don't you like her?" Alya asked bluntly.

Sorry for prying, boy, but I need a clear answer.

Adrien's blush deepened.

"It's not that I don't." Now he sounded desperate, as if he had to defend himself. "Of course I do, Alya! I really do like her; she's fantastic. Dating her would be wonderful, but I'm afraid she doesn't love me."

He trailed off abruptly, apparently having realised that he had accidentally exposed his deepest feelings, and hastily averted his gaze, so he totally missed a happy smile that started spreading on Alya’s face.

Oh boy, this investigation surpassed all her expectations. Adrien in love with her best friend, that was perfect! Almost everything Alya could ever dream of as Marinette’s and Adrien's friend.

I wonder how long you have been having a crush on my bestie. There's no need to look so heartbroken, though, because your superhero does love you back.

"What if I told you she happens to love you back?" she said out loud.

Adrien looked up at her. He stared at Alya as if she were a ghost. His mouth fell slightly open.

"Are you sure, Alya? How do you know that?" he muttered.

"A little bird told me!" Alya grinned. She chuckled at Adrien's confused face. "Jokes aside, Ladybug told me that in person the other day when I was interviewing her for the Ladyblog. She told this to me in secret, which means the readers of the Ladyblog aren't supposed to know that. But I thought you deserved to know, since you're concerned."

"Is it true, Alya?" Adrien looked like he was about to swoon. His lovesick and pleading expression was so endearing that Alya couldn't help but smile. "Please tell me!"

"That's just as sure as I am standing here." Alya said. Never in her life had she been more serious than now.

Adrien brightened up. He literally began to glow. It was a miracle how these few words affected him. All his features started radiating warmth. He was a living example of so-called heart eyes.

Alya wished Marinette could see what effect her alter ego had on Adrien.

"Can I ask you for a favour, Alya?"

Alya adjusted her glasses and raised her eyebrows, waiting for him to speak, but she could already guess what he was going to ask.

"Can you please pass a letter to Ladybug? I know it might take a while until you get to see her again, but I don't care. I've been waiting for so long for this opportunity to tell her how I feel."

So it's obviously been a long time since you've been harbouring feelings for Ladybug, Alya noted to herself. Poor boy, if you only knew that the girl you're hopelessly in love with is actually so close to you.

"Anything for you, Adrien!" she said eagerly. "I don't know when I will have the opportunity to do it, but I promise to do my best."

Adrien's eyes lit up.

"Alya, you're an angel!" he exclaimed. "Tell me how I can reward you."

"If things work out between you two, just make our favourite superheroine happy. She deserves it. When I talked to her, I got the impression that she has too much on her plate."

"I promise you, Alya, if she gives me a chance, I will do my best to make her happy," Adrien said firmly.

You're such a sweetheart, Adrien. No wonder my girl is so in love with you.

Alya waited patiently while Adrien scribbled something on a paper sheet ripped out of his notebook. Then he folded it four times and put it into Alya’s extended hand.

-x-x-x-

Alya was genuinely happy for her friends. Those two were really made for each other. If only everything had worked out. Then she could die happy.

-x-x-x-

"Good news, girl! Guess what I have here."

They were alone in the locker room, and Marinette was rummaging in her stuff, when Alya came from behind. Beaming triumphantly, she took out the letter and placed it right before Marinette's eyes.

"A letter for you. I mean - for Ladybug. From Adrien."

Marinette’s eyes widened, and she visibly gulped.

"What?" she squeaked. "A letter?" A sudden wave of crimson blush started spreading on her cheeks. "How did you get it? Have you read… Do you know what it says?"

"No, I don't. Look, it's just that someone happened to have a talk with Adrien today and was asked to pass a letter to his idol, a certain polka dotted superhero."

Marinette stiffened.

"Does he know about you know what?"

"Yes, he does. But before you start freaking out, I have to tell you that I tested the waters before breaking the news. The boy has fallen hard. I wish you could see his face when he was told that his lady in red actually loved him back."

Marinette gasped. The blush on her cheeks was now so deep red that it made her look like she was going to combust.

"But Alya, that's insanity!" she cried out. "Why have you done that when I clearly told you not to?"

Alya sighed.

"Sorry, girl, I just couldn't bear seeing you two playing cat and mouse with each other anymore. I admit, perhaps I have been a bit overzealous, but it was definitely worth it."

"No, Alya, it wasn't! This is a disaster!" Marinette cried in a high-pitched squeak. "Now he’s waiting for my response. He certainly is asking me out in this letter. How do I tell him that I won’t date him?"

Alya took off her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Are you kidding me, girl? It's Adrien you're talking about! The boy you've been daydreaming of for ages has literally confessed his love to you! You can't just turn him down, it will break his heart."

"It’s just… "It's just that I don't have feelings for him anymore, Alya," Marinette explained, much calmer but in a sadder tone, not looking Alya in the eyes. "Besides, I'm a guardian now, and I must stay focused on the mission. I can't let myself be in love. I get distracted every time Adrien is involved."

"Now look me in the eyes and tell me that again." Alya said, crossing her arms.

"I've told you before, Alya, just drop it!" Marinette said, still not looking her best friend in the eyes. "I don't need a wingman. I can't have a boyfriend. No one should ever get near me. I'm a lost cause. So please, let's leave it at that. Believe me, it's better that way."

Marinette sighed and walked past Alya to the classroom with her head tilted down.

"But what about the letter?" Alya called out to her, waving the paper sheet she was still holding.

Marinette stopped without looking back and shrugged with feigned nonchalance.

"Do what you want with it. I don't care. It's not for me. The girl it's addressed to doesn't exist. I'm just a failure, not a cool superhero who can do no wrong."

Alya gritted her teeth in frustration. What a stubborn girl! She could have the boy she loved right there and then.

She wondered what the letter might say. For a moment she considered taking a look inside, but decided against it.

-x-x-x-

During the class Alya wasn't looking at Marinette directly, but she managed to take a glimpse of her with her peripheral vision every now and then.

As much as Alya could read body language, she could see that her girl was definitely nervous. She was fidgeting with her fingers, drumming her pen on the desk, chewing on her bottom lip, and squirming in her chair. Her lips moved from time to time, as if she were muttering something to herself.

Alya was about to say "A penny for your thoughts" when Marinette suddenly turned to face her.

"Alya," she whispered anxiously. "Do you still have the letter?"

Alya couldn't fight back a smirk. Curiousity seemed to get the better of her best friend. Perhaps Marinette wasn't a lost cause.

Without a word, she pulled out the letter in question and passed it to Marinette.

[chatnoiriscool269]

So I was just watching miraculous (as always) and I was just wondering in my head who has it worse Marinette or Adrien?

Adrien

I think Adrien has the worse home life because, well , his father is forcing a relationship on him when he already had a girlfriend and his father is well aware of this, plus his father orders him to do things he doesn’t want to do and Adrien can’t disobey him (either because he is a sentimonster or doesn’t want to disobey, most likely sentimonster) and there has been 1 episode where Adrien was sad and Gabriel didn’t akumatized him but in season 5 episode 10; transmission, Gabriel only resisted to give his son an alliance? Tell me that’s not f*cked up. And after he did that he just went back up, down (?) to his little area and tried to akumatize him. And with ladybug (scenario one, in the NYC special) he feels like he’s a burden and doesn’t understand how much ladybug needs him, so he gives his miraculous to ladybug. (Scenario two, Kuro Neko) Again Adrien feels like he is a burden but much more useless this time (let’s be honest he was in season 4 DONT COME AT ME PLS they just didn’t give him great potential in season 4) so he gives his miraculous up. But then he realizes how much he means to ladybug so chat noir comes back. Plus his moms dead so there’s that

Marinette

Alright so Marinette has a way better home life than Adrien, for example her parents let her do basically whatever she wants, she has free will, and she can do exactly the opposite of what Adrien can do, but then again she had a lot and I mean A LOT of weight in her shoulders, she is (again dont come at me chat Noir stans) the leader of the team, the guardian of the miraculous, she had seen herself dead (chat blanc) she has seen her partner akumatized, in Reunion (season 5 episode 8) she heard alix’s brother Jalil, reads aloud everything people of Paris have said about her (how she’s useless, she promised to protect the city and failed, lost all the miraculous, etc) and it makes her feel down, useless, and insecure. She had also been reminded of her trauma in her nightmare (sentibubbler season 4) and has a very high level of stress since she became ladybug/ guardian of the miraculous, she has also felt that she isn’t worth being ladybug, and in Transmission she says that she is pathetic and not worthy of anything. AND she told Alya she was ladybug and Alya still believed Lila, even when Lila said “me and ladybug? Oh yeah we are like this 🤞” When they obviously aren’t if Marinette HATES Lila.

I just find it ‘miraculous’ that Marinette and Adrien go through so much and they can hold themselves together so well, maybe it’s because they have each other but idk, who do you think has it worse Marinette or adrien. Comment your answer and reasoning (if you want) that’s all for now! Bye luvs 😘🫶🏻

[mduygu]

I love giving spoilers to kids under age of 10 who watches miraculous.

I tell them a few things and they're like wow really?

[ravennm84]

Doctor’s Note

We all know how Lila fakes having different diseases and medical problems, but what would happen if she actually got sick and her mother went to the school to drop off a doctor’s note and pick up Lila’s assignments? Want the answer? Warm-Fuzzies and please enjoy!

Greta Rossi could admit that she was a bit of a workaholic. Being the secretary to the assistant ambassador of Italy, in a city that was constantly under attack by a magical terrorist, was not the easiest job in the world either. It took a lot of early mornings, late nights, and even some weekends to make sure everything was prepared for her boss. But that didn’t mean that she wouldn’t drop everything for her one and only daughter when she needed her. 

Right now, for example, Lila was trapped in bed with a nasty case of strep throat. The poor girl had a fever, white pustules at the back of her throat, and could hardly stop coughing. It was only due to some very strong medicine that she was able to stop coughing long enough to pass out from exhaustion. 

She had contacted her work to let them know she would be taking the week off, and the ambassador had been very understanding. Stressing that he knew how dedicated she was to her work and that it was good for her to take time off for her family. It was only after Lila was sound asleep that she made the phone call to her school, she wanted to make sure they knew why Lila was staying home and that she would be in later that afternoon to pick up her daughter’s assignments for the next week.

The principal, M. Damocles was his name, seemed very happy to have spoken to her and said that he would have her assignments waiting when she came to pick them up. Also, if she could bring the doctors’ notes with her, that would be very much appreciated.

Checking again that Lila was sound asleep, she left a note on her daughter’s bedside table that she was running some errands, would be home soon, and to text her if she needed anything. 

Arriving at the school, she was surprised to see everything running so smoothly and that the reconstruction after the two month akuma attack had been gone so well. She was impressed that she couldn’t even tell the difference between the old and new parts of the building. But then, she wasn’t overly skilled with architecture or building construction, so that wasn’t a surprise to her. 

A few knocks on the door and she entered M. Damocles office. She had only met the man a couple times, but he had seemed like a decent person. It was a shame that he had been akumatized for so long and she was curious about what had happened to cause him to be akumatized, but she wasn’t sure if it was proper to ask him.

“Mme. Rossi, good to see you. I understand that Lila has fallen ill?” He asked, spinning around to grab a blue folder behind his desk.

“Yes, the poor dear has strep throat and has been coughing nonstop for days.” Greta told him as she pulled the doctor’s note from her purse. “Here’s the note you requested, do you have her homework packet?”

Damocles looked over the note for a moment before nodding and looking at her expectantly. “Thank you, do you have her other doctor’s notes?”

Greta tilted her head in confusion. “Does she need more than one? It’s just strep throat, she should be back to school after next week.”

“No madam, this is all I need for her current leave from school. I was referring to the doctor’s notes for her tinnitus, arthritis, sprained wrist, and her lying disease. That last one especially, and any information you can give me on accommodating that one so we do not have a repeat of the incident last month.”

Nothing in the world could have kept her jaw from dropping. What he had just told her? “M. Damocles, everything you just said is completely false. Lila has no such ailments, and I don’t think there is such a thing as a lying disease, unless you are referring to pathological lying.”

The man blinked back at her a few times before raising one hand to rub his brow. “Oh my, Mme. Rossi, I believe you and I must have a long discussion about the things your daughter has been saying and doing since she started school here.”

Her legs were stiff as she lowered herself into a chair, a sick feeling growing in her stomach as M. Damocles pulled a different folder out from his desk.

~oOo~

Over two hours later, many truths had finally come out. 

1) The school had never closed for months due to akumas. 

2) When M. Damocles had been akumatized, it had been at night and did no damage to the school. 

3) Greta was not the ambassador, but a secretary. 

4) Lila did not suffer from any diseases. 

5) They had been in Paris since Lila had started school, no globetrotting whatsoever. 

6) She and her husband were not estranged, he had simply wanted to stay at his dream  job in Venice and she would never force him to leave it for her temporary assignment here in Paris. 

7) Lila’s grandmother was alive and had never owned or given Lila a foxtail necklace. 

8) The phone number on file was Lila’s number, not Greta’s. And the email was supposed to be ‘.gov’ not ‘.com’.

Damocles had also called one of Lila’s classmates to his office, Marinette Dupain-Cheng. When the principal told Greta about the incident from the previous month, she was shocked. Then Marinette told them her side of the story; all the lies, the threats, and finally setting the poor girl up to be expelled. Greta had never been so angry with her daughter in her life. Sure, she had been a good little story teller and actress when she was little, but she never would have thought she could be so cruel.

By the end of her explanation, Marinette was practically in tears.

When she mentioned that Adrien Agreste also knew of Lila’s lies, he was called to the office as well. He was a little more reluctant to talk about what Lila had been saying, but Greta insisted that she wanted to know what her daughter had been doing since coming to school, so he told her. If she hadn’t been disgusted before, she definitely was now. Getting Adrien’s father’s employees in trouble, lying about being friends with Ladybug all while telling Greta that she was a useless hero, sexually harassing Adrien while the boy didn’t even realize that was what she was doing to him. She had become a Gabriel model without her permission, which meant that Lila had likely forged her signatures on the contracts, so she would need to contact M. Agreste to get that sorted out. One of the things that surprised her was hearing that Lila had been akumatized, not once or twice, but three times! 

Not long after that, M. Damocles dismissed the children so he and Greta could finish speaking. He told her that, due to falsifying contact records and two months of truancy, Lila was likely to be expelled. Greta accepted this, knowing that she would have done the same thing in that man’s position. In fact, she already had a plan forming on how to thoroughly punish her deceitful daughter. And since Lila had basically been quarantined for the next week and a half, she knew exactly what to do.

First, she began the paperwork to have Lila pulled out of Francois Dupont, effective immediately and asked to go speak to Lila’s classmates. After hearing what her daughter had put Marinette through, she wanted to make sure everyone knew the truth. Damocles allowed this, first pulling Mme. Bustier from the class to alert her as to what was happening. The woman was appalled to hear what had happened but insisted that she had been in contact with her for months via email, to which Greta informed her that it was not her email, but one that Lila had likely set up to keep the school from contacting her. This shocked the teacher to the point where she heavily leaned against the wall and M. Damocles had to support her to keep from collapsing.

When Greta was finally permitted to address the class and debunk the lies that her daughter had been spewing, there had been a lot of shock and questions to follow. But when a girl named Alya began furiously typing on her phone to blow up at Lila, Greta stopped her.

“I’m going to ask that none of you contact Lila from now on.” Alya and the other students looked at her in surprise, but she continued before anyone could interrupt. “I have already begun putting her punishment into motion and know for a fact that it will not be something she will forget anytime soon. So I ask that you do not call, text, or email her. If she attempts to contact you, tell her that you are busy and can’t talk. If she attempts to invite you over or make plans for the future, tell her that you are unavailable or that you already have plans. If she makes any threats or rude remarks to anyone, please forward those messages to me, I will leave my number for you to do so. Do this so that I may move forward with her punishment without her suspecting that I have discovered the truth.”

Having finally had the wool lifted from their eyes, the students realized just how much attention Lila seemed to demand on a daily basis. So, by acting like they were too busy for her or not in the mood to talk, that will drive her crazy and be a nice bit of revenge for lying to them. The class agreed.

After that, Greta headed home to find that Lila was still asleep but beginning to wake up, if the coughing was any indicator. While still having the chance, she called up her husband back in Venice.

“Pronto.”

“Mio amor, how are you? How are things at the school?”

“Ah, mia bella, the school is wonderful, though I must admit, my urge to see you and Lila grows by the minute. When will you come to visit me?”

“Very soon, actually. I’m afraid that you and I need to have a talk about our daughter.” About thirty minutes and a lot of cursing later, Ciro Rossi was now completely up to date on the actions of their daughter.

“I wish to say that I cannot believe Lila would do such things, but I can’t help remembering that boy, Roberto, from two years ago.”

Yes, Greta remembered him well. He had been a very popular boy at Lila’s school; handsome, rich, from a very well connected family, and from what she understood, completely dedicated to his boyfriend. She hadn’t paid him much attention until Lila came home crying that Roberto had attempted to sexually assault her. Greta and Ciro had refused to let such a thing go unchecked and went to the police to report him. During the weeks to follow, Roberto was put through hell; bullied at school, he was beaten up a few times, his boyfriend broke up with him, and his name slandered all over Venice. They had believed what happened to the boy to be justified… until proof was provided that he was nowhere near Lila when she claimed to have been assaulted. 

She suddenly recanted her story, saying that she must have been mistaken and someone that looked like Roberto assaulted her, but the damage had already been done. The boy and his family moved somewhere far away, and Greta and Ciro were forced to pay restitution to Roberto for ruining his name and reputation. Through her tears, Lila convinced them that it had been an honest mistake and that she hadn’t meant for any of that to happen. It wasn’t long after that, Greta received an offer to be the secretary for the assistant ambassador in Paris. Lila had begged her mother to go with her, claiming that her classmates were now bullying her for what happened to Roberto. Wanting to protect their daughter, they agreed.

Looking back on it now, and noticing the similarities between Roberto and Adrien, both Greta and Ciro were disappointed in themselves for not seeing the truth. Which likely was that Lila had tried to get close to Roberto for his money and connections, and when he turned her down, she lied about the assault to ruin his life, much like she had done to Marinette. And when it came out that she had lied about Roberto, her classmates had turned on her. So when she got the chance to start somewhere new, with people who didn’t know about her lies, she took it. Not caring if she harmed anyone at her new school while repeating old habits. But they were not about to let Lila do the same thing to Adrien or Marinette. Once Greta told her husband her plan, he was all for it and began preparing things on his end. By the time Lila was done being sick, her entire life would have turned upside down.

~oOo~

It took a lot more effort than Greta had expected to hide her intentions for the nine days it took for Lila to get over her case of strep throat, but she had been making good use of that time. 

She had contacted Gabriel Agreste’s secretary and asked about any contracts that may have been signed. When she told her she hadn’t signed any contract and that her daughter would no longer be modelling, the woman had no choice but to accept this and inform M. Agreste of this development. The woman also informed Greta that such a breach of contract would result in Lila being blacklisted from the fashion industry. She agreed and promised that she would inform her daughter of this once she was better.

Greta then looked into Lila’s savings and trust fund, of which she had control of since Lila was still a minor. She drained the accounts to pay restitutions to Marinette for bullying and slander, Adrien for sexual harassment; and then sent the rest of it to Roberto, along with a message that she was now completely aware of the type of person her daughter was and would be adequately punished very soon.

And to keep too much suspicion off of her, Greta began mentioning to Lila how her father desperately wanted to see her after she got better, so after the doctor gave her a clean bill of health, they would be going to Venice to see him. Now that she was watching, Greta saw the twinge of uncertainty at the mention of Venice, but quickly covered it with false excitement for going back to visit her father.

As the day grew closer that they would be heading to Italy, Greta also noticed Lila glaring at her phone with utter malice. She might not have known what was going on if Lila’s classmate, Alya, wasn’t keeping her up-to-date on what Lila was telling them. Her daughter was attempting to tell the class that she was going to be going on a trip with a famous singer after she was better, but her classmates were doing as Greta asked and treating the lies as if they meant nothing. When she accused Marinette of calling her a liar while she was sick and couldn’t defend herself, the class stopped responding. 

One message that was forwarded to Greta nearly had her abandoning her plan and confronting her daughter at that moment. It was a message that Lila had sent to Marinette, who had shared it with Alya, who then forwarded it to Greta. It read:

You fugly, no talent bitch! You think I don’t know what you’re doing? Those stupid sheep were eating up every single one of my lies before I got sick, and now they won’t even talk to me! Just you wait. When I get back to school, I’m going to ruin you in every way imaginable. No one will want to be your friend. By the time I’m done with you, I hope you kill yourself. Maybe I’ll convince someone that you tried to kill me and they’ll kill you for me. Either way, you’re dead. And even if you show someone these messages, no one will believe you over me. 

Greta forwarded the message to Ciro as well. He called her right away to discuss other accommodations that they would be making for Lila in the coming days. There was something seriously wrong with their daughter, and they refused to turn a blind eye to what was happening.

When the day finally came that Lila was better and they were heading to Venice, Greta instructed Lila not to pack her more expensive clothes as she would not want to lose them if their baggage got lost. What her daughter didn’t know was that Greta was planning on selling all of her designer clothes, jewelry, her electronics, and everything else to continue paying restitutions to Marinette, Adrien, and Roberto. And it wasn’t like she would need them soon, anyway.

The plane ride was a bit nerve racking for Greta, as she worried about giving something away and Lila figuring out her plan; but if she did, it didn’t show. When they landed at Venice Marco Polo Airport, she had to resist her sigh of relief. The plan was almost ready to be put in action. 

When she saw Ciro waiting for them in his dress whites, her heart sped a bit more. The man was, without a doubt, the most handsome man she’d ever met, and was the love of her life. Being away from him for so long was difficult, but what else could they do? Her husband was a Capitano di Vascello of the Italian Navy and had worked very hard to get where he was. Although he was semi-retired now and no longer served on a ship, he had followed his dream and became the Vice Principal for the premier naval academy in Venice, Francesco Morosini Naval Military School. 

He had gone to the school when he was younger and always claimed that it was the best experience he could have ever wished for. That being in that school saved his life. So when he continued into the navy to serve his country, he made it his goal to one day become the Principal of the school that saved him, so that he could do the same for other students. And now, they would be doing the same for Lila.

Greta and Ciro had thought of admitting Lila to Francesco Morosini when she came of age, but quickly realized that she was not the Navy type and did not want to force her into it. That choice was no longer Lila’s and she would be staying at the military school where it was Ciro’s job, not only as a father, but as an administrator of the school, to keep a close eye on any problem children.

Ciro embraced Greta and then Lila before taking their bags and walking them to his car. Lila was talking at length to her father about all her friends at school, all the happenings in Paris, and even mentioned her boyfriend, Adrien Agreste.

“You would like him, Papa. He’s a model, a gentleman, and his father is the designer, Gabriel Agreste. And he treats me like a princess!” Lila gushed as she showed her father a picture of Lila kissing the blonde boy’s cheek. Greta had seen that picture and had even asked Adrien about it while they had spoken in M. Damocles office. Lila had apparently kissed him without permission when she took that picture, and then sent it to every girl in Adrien’s contact list to make it seem like they were dating. 

Ciro played along, asking questions about her classes, Adrien, the akuma situation that he had heard about over the news, and other things to keep Lila from growing suspicious. Sure enough, she prattled on through the entire car and ferry ride to Venice. Only seeming to look around questioning when they arrived at the Naval school, rather than their apartment.

“What are we doing here?” She asked, looking at her father in confusion.

The two parents dropped the act and glared at their daughter in disappointment and anger. “I’m surprised at you, young lady,” Greta started. “Did you really think you could keep lying to us? We. Know. Everything.”

They watched as her olive skin quickly paled. “What do you mean? I didn’t lie, I sw-”

“We know the school never closed,” Ciro interrupted, his tone leaving no room for argument or interruption. “We know about you lying to your classmates and teachers about having disabilities and diseases. We know about you changing our contact information on your school records. We know about you bullying and sexually harassing your classmates. We know about the threats you’ve made to that one girl. We know that you’ve been akumatized multiple times. We know the truth about what you really did to Roberto two years ago! WE KNOW EVERYTHING!”

With every word he said, Lila seemed to inch away from her irate parents and shrink into herself. At the same time, they saw the rage and contemplation in her eyes. She was angry at being caught and was already trying to think of a way out of trouble. Not that they would give her a chance to even try.

“But I didn’t li-”

“Lie number one, Ladybug is a useless superhero that let your school get damaged and spent months trying to deakumatize your principal, which is why you were out of school for two months.” Greta interrupted that time, pinning her daughter with a glare that she usually reserved for idiot interns who screwed up important paperwork at the embassy. “I personally spoke to your principal and looked into Ladybug. The school never closed. Ladybug and Chat Noir have always defeated the akumas and restored the damage thanks to their abilities. And you told the school that you and I were off globetrotting to places like Achu.”

Her eyes grew to the size of saucers. She was just beginning to stammer out an excuse when her father spoke over her.

“Lie number two, a girl named Marinette Dupain-Cheng has been bullying you because she is jealous of your relationship with your boyfriend, Adrien Agreste. We have seen the texts that you have sent that girl, the most recent saying,” Ciro pulled out his phone to read off of the text “‘...I’m going to ruin you in every way imaginable. No one will want to be your friend. By the time I’m done with you, I hope you kill yourself…’ Does that sound familiar to you?” 

“I also personally spoke to Adrien after I spoke to Marinette, and found out that not only are you not his girlfriend, but you have been sexually harassing him! You even showed us proof in that picture you took where you kissed him!”

“But that’s not sexual harassment!” Lila shot back at them as her panic grew.

“Any unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitutes sexual harassment. Your mother and I memorized that when you accused Roberto of assault, which is another thing you lied about! And let me guess, you wanted to use that boy’s popularity and family connections for a leg-up, but he turned down your advances since he was gay. You didn’t take that rejection well, so you told us he assaulted you. Is that what happened?”

“How did you-” Lila interrupted herself that time by slapping her hand over her mouth, quickly realizing that she had confirmed what her father had just said.

“Well, congratulations young lady. You have earned a complete overhaul on your life.” 

“What do you mean?” Lila didn’t want to know, but it seemed like she had no choice but to ask.

“Your modelling contract with Gabriel is done,” Greta told her, noticing her wince since they weren’t supposed to know about that either. “I spoke with his assistant and discovered that you forged my signatures on the contracts to let you model. They were kind enough not to pursue legal action against you, but they have asked that I inform you that you have been blacklisted from the fashion industry, so that career option is completely closed off to you.”

“Your mother educated your friends at school with the truth. They know about all your lies and have kept us apprised of what you have been saying, the rumors you have been attempting to spread about going on a trip with a random music star, and were kind enough to forward that threatening message you sent to that girl, Marinette. They are no longer interested in being your ‘sheep’.”

“Not that you will be returning to that school,” Greta continued. “Your truancy has made that impossible, even if we did want you to stay there to face the consequences of your actions. Which includes paying restitution to the people you’ve hurt.”

“Paying!” Ciro and Greta watched as Lila’s right eye began to twitch as she snapped at them.

“Yes, paying. I’ve already emptied out your savings and trust fund to pay back Marinette, Adrien, and Roberto for what you’ve done to them-”

“You can’t do that! That’s my money!” She screamed, stomping her foot at her mother like a five year old throwing a tantrum.

“Money that you earned illegally modelling after forging my signature. And you are a minor, I am well within my rights to take that money to pay for the damages you have incurred. I will also be selling your laptop, tablet, mobile phone, as well as the clothes and jewelry you left in Paris. Seeing as you won’t be needing them anymore.”

As she said this, Lila clutched her phone and hugged it against her chest. “How am I supposed to talk to anyone without my phone?”

“Pen and paper, and if you need to speak with your mother, there’s my office phone or the payphone in the barracks, where you will be staying.” 

The girl’s eyes grew impossibly wide as she looked at her parents in a panic. They couldn’t mean…

Ciro smiled the smile that he used to greet the families whose children were in need of discipline. “Welcome to Francesco Morosini Naval Military School, where we strive to give children an education that will help them for their future and the world that waits for them.”

~oOo~

There had been a lot of begging, crying, and screaming after that as Lila did everything she could to try and change her parents’ minds. This was a total nightmare for her. Forced to wear a uniform she hated. Surrounded by students, teachers, and her father; all of whom knew that she was a liar. No one gave her the type of attention she craved, but everyone was giving her the overly watchful attention she despised. She couldn’t even enjoy becoming an akuma anymore, as she was far out of Hawkmoth’s reach.

Greta and Ciro had gone out to dinner afterwards in an attempt to de-stress, only to get a call an hour later that Lila had tried to steal a boat and run away from the school. She was put on a 24/7 watch after that, now required to wear a tracking monitor wherever she went and was on bathroom and floor cleaning duty for the foreseeable future.

When Greta returned to Paris, she went about doing exactly as she promised. She sold Lila’s electronics, clothes, and jewelry; only keeping a pair of plastic stud earrings that her grandmother had given her. She met with M. Damocles again to let him know that everything had been taken care of. She contacted the Dupain-Cheng family to let them know that Lila wouldn’t be bothering their daughter again. That was probably the most pleasant thing she did, as they were a lovely family and sent her off with a box of assorted scones, so yummy! When she had them send a box of goodies to her husband in Venice, he called her a few days later and begged her to send more whenever she could.

Lila absolutely hated seeing her father enjoy pastries from the bakery of her rival’s family. That, along with being forced to talk to a psychiatrist three times a week to make her admit that she was a liar and to figure out why she feels the need to lie. All while wearing a horrible uniform and actually having to clean. She was in her own personal hell. How she wished that she had never gotten sick.

Taglist:

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[miraculermarinette]

I was thinking about the Sadrien angst this season and I don’t understand why everyone, even people who like Marinette immediately blame Marinette for all of it. If anything, she is only at 10% fault here. The rest of the blame goes to the situation (75%) and Adrien’s inability to have common sense (15%). Now, before you say anything, here me out. Here is a list of all the released episodes of season 4 and how they contribute to the angst this season.

Ep 1- Truth- No angst.

Ep 2- Lies- Only a little but it is not really relevant to the actual buildup.

Ep 3- Gang of Secrets- No angst

Ep 4, ep 7, ep 6, ep 8, ep 9, ep 10, ep 12, ep 19 and ep 21- No angst

Ep 11- Guiltrip- No relevant angst. Instead, he gets told how much he is appreciated.

Ep 13- Optigami- A little angst. Chat isn’t included in the battle and he makes a sad face because of that.

Ep 14- Senti bubbler- Angst. He gets left out of the battle and Rena Rouge tells him that Ladybug didn’t include him.

Ep 15- Glaciator 2- Angst. Adrien gets sad because Ladybug rightfully defended herself from his actions.

Ep 16- Hack san- Angst. Adrien gets sad because Ladybug didn’t tell him about her departure and leaves a stand in.

Ep 17- Rocketear- Angst. Adrien gets sad because Nino and Alya are allowed to know each other’s identities and he and Ladybug aren’t.

Ep 18- Wishmaker- Angst. Adrien talks about how Ladybug is dependent on other super hereos in the beginning so he has to think about his future and a job.

Ep 22- Ephemeral- Angst but it gets resolved in the end.

Now, we know that the Sadrien angst directly started from episode 13, because as I said above, Ladybug didn’t involve him in her plan. But, how is it HER fault and why is she blamed for it? He was not reachable and she had no choice. Sentibubbler, again Marinette is not at fault for bubbler trapping her and ALYA telling Chat that he is not needed that day. 

I don’t even need to explain Glaciator 2.

Hack san, Marinette tries her best to avoid going to London but she fails. She didn’t have time to tell Chat noir after that. Yes, it was a bit irresponsible, but still understandable.

Rocketear, Adrien doesn’t understand the difference between temporary and permanent superheroes, does he? Alya and Nino can be easily replaced. He and Ladybug can’t. On top of that, Nino told Adrien all those things, which led him to believe that he is annoying.

Wishmaker, I don’t think we can blame Ladybug for being dependent on other superheroes. Sometimes, not just cataclysm and lucky charm are the solution. She chooses who shall participate on the basis of who would be needed. She has no other choice and she can’t  risk losing just to please chat.

So, in the above examples, most of the reasons why CN is sad is not Ladybug’s fault. 

She keeps secrets from him? They are SUPERHEROES. She cannot just tell him her identity or the side superheroes’ identities. One thing she should have informed him about is the existence of rena furtive but I am not really counting that since it has not been brought up yet. If he is sad about that in the future, then I will surely talk about it.

Romance is the main plot of the show (which is disappointing considering how badly it is executed) BUT that doesn’t erase the fact that they are still superheroes. Many people depend on them and Ladybug can’t just risk all of them to make Chat happy. She has tried her best. She does not want to make Chat sad. She doesn’t even KNOW about all the drama going around her. Everything was created because of a misunderstanding someone else made. Just because she is the main character doesn’t mean she has to be responsible for all of this.

Stop blaming everything on her.

[flightfoot]

If Mari and Adrien swapped gender would people think still think the same about :

a) Prime Queen : Chat Noir kissy joke (there's still people fussing about it even in 2023 after all)

b) Glaciator / Frozer : Chat Noir act aloof around Ladybug.

c) Syren : Chat Noir leaving the field

d) Reflekta : LB saying CN is (basically) useless without his power.

e) Animaestro / Ikari Gozen : Mari being unfair toward Kagami and even low key (attempt to) bully her.

f ) Chat Blanc : Adrien knowing Mari identity and date Mari without saying anything about knowing.

g) Gang of secret : Mari told Alya her identity without saying anything to CN

h) Hack-san : Going away and give the miraculous without telling CN

I) The whole s4 because there's a lot of people said to "give Mari a break she's stressed" whenever people complain about her attitude and treatment toward Chat Noir

j) NY special : because there's still people blaming Adrien for leaving despite of him has no choice.

k) EPHEMERAL

L) Glaciator 2 : LB throw CN to trash bin

There's still some more of course but those are the one that came to mind a lot considering people keep talking about it.

Would people say "Give him a break!" When Male!Ladybug do whatever Mari did in s4 Or would people say "Yeah that typical male they're bastard like that" or variant of it? Would people think Male!LB throw CN to the trash as a joke or would it become harassment?

I'm wondering because I've seen some people tend to give females more "slack" than males do. Most reason I keep seeing is that "meh, males do that more often after all!" And it's just disturbing. Its the double standard that I really hate and seeing it in fandom make me feel annoyed.

The stuff with Prime Queen, Glaciator/Frozer, and Glaciator 2 would probably be treated differently by the fandom if Marinette was a guy and Adrien was a girl, I'm betting there'd be a lot more sympathy and leeway for Adrien in those circumstances from the people who these days bash him for those things. There does tend to be a double standard concerning things like slapstick and romance when it comes to men and women.

As for the rest of those examples, I don't think those are as dependent on gender. I think the differences in how people perceive those has more to do with how much they empathize with Marinette because she's the main viewpoint character, versus Adrien, who is not. The exact people who give Marinette more leeway while punishing Adrien for minor slights may well be more likely to give girls more leeway for the same actions as boys, but I think they're offset by the new people who would be prevalent in that scenario who'd give guys more leeway for stuff than they would for girls. It's not like fandoms can't be unfair and misogynistic towards girls, after all.