#((But we would've been essentially making our own canon at that point.))

[morethansky]

***TBB FINALE SPOILERS***

"The Cavalry Has Arrived" aka MY OTP IS CANON NOW

A truly absurd amount of meta and thoughts and screaming under the cut:

Overall

• I...loved it????? This is the biggest plot twist of all for me. Like I've said incessantly, I've had so many issues with the writing choices for this show, and I'm so grateful the brainrot set in so I could start watching it through a fandom lens and have way more fun with it than through a media critic lens and being a hater. But like...that was actually really satisfying to me within the parameters of where the show had led to in the last four episodes??

• As everyone on the planet probably knows by now, I would've been much happier if this show had led to the Batch choosing to do the right thing and joining the clone resistance, and if we never get another clone series, I will continue to be unbearable and salty about the lost potential of telling that story. But after Echo left and we stopped following his story, I gave that hope up. And ofc nothing about my criticism of this season is invalidated. But given the pieces on the board, I'd pretty wholeheartedly give the finale my stamp of approval!

• I'm ultimately glad that this show ended on a "We don't leave our own behind" note, because that's the clone energy and general Star Wars energy I'm looking for, and they did a great job of applying that theme to every non-villain in this episode, minor and unnamed characters included—but it's still so darkly funny for them to have continued to push this idea even though the first season is literally about them leaving their own behind and moving on. And then Crosshair calls them out on it. And then he just...leaves himself behind. Even in their first appearance in TCW, the Batch's entire vibe is that they keep trying to convince Rex to leave his own behind lmao. I just feel like the show wanted this adage to tie everything together, but then forgot to keep applying it somewhere along the way. But hurrah for this abundant use of it!

• My overall biggest criticism was that even within this one episode we got back on the rescue/captured/rescue/captured treadmill. It's the biggest plot crutch of the show. It's so goofy that Omega and Echo rescued both the children and the imprisoned clones by themselves. The setup made it so that by going to rescue Omega, Hunter, Wrecker, and Crosshair actually put her in more danger. And because they were there, more clones died, wtf!! But I do like the narrative flip—Echo and Omega were both saved by the Batch in their introductions in this era, and here are they are being the ones to save them in return. Omega and Echo also are the characters in the main cast who deserve the rescuer plotline the most, since they have been consistently portrayed as helping those in need no matter what.

• Hilariously, one of the most pivotal roles that the Forest Trio plays in regards to the GFFA at large is that they were essentially Rampart's rideshare drivers, thus enabling him to be there and force Nala Se not to hesitate to destroy Project Necromancer.

Rampart and Nala Se

• Hemlock saying his work makes him indispensable is fantastic dialogue; it just seems like some dickish thing he would say to shit on Rampart, but it ends up giving Rampart the idea to try to leverage his work to become indispensable himself, and in saying that line, Hemlock ushers his own ruin!!! This is the kind of script work I've been begging for.

• Also I was so right about Rampart being like a Kallus foil! That infamous shot of him in his sad, sterile room after Bahryn is mirrored here with Rampart sitting in pretty much the same position, except his path is the opposite from Kallus's.

• They did an EXCELLENT job with Rampart's fate. I was worried they were neutering him these last couple eps, even if the comedy was gold, but this was very well done. Everything that happens leading up to his death makes complete sense for his character, and it accomplishes the very key plot point of destroying Tantiss. At the start of the season I couldn't figure out how and why the Batch was going to end up delaying Project Necromancer for like thirty years, so I feel validated that they pretty much don't. Very typical of this show to not have the protagonists do the heroic work, but fuck it, I like this instance.

• The humanizing of Nala Se in this show has always been a bit of an interesting choice given that this is feels like such a direct successor to TCW and she was so clearly a villain there. But although they don't quite redeem her, her motivations and her fate were also artfully executed here. Her conversation with Omega pretty much takes into account every Nala Se scene in this show, which is a great way to wrap her character up. And I really like the mirror of Nala Se giving Omega her datapad in the season premiere, and Omega giving Nala Se a datapad here. Both times, Nala Se is determined to set Omega free.

• And I'm so glad there was a follow-up to the destruction of Kamino as well! Nala Se getting a bit of revenge against one of the beings responsible for the genocide of her people and destruction of her homeworld is not something I expected at all, and I love it. And the setup of Nala Se picking up the detonator and Rampart picking up the blaster is just fantastic, because you know from just those two shots that Rampart is willing to kill to gain Palpatine's favor for himself, and Nala Se is willing to die to make sure the being she loves will be free.

Echo and Omega supremacy

• Give me an Echo-led rebel show where he convinces all sorts of people in the Empire and the underworld to defect/help them, please!!! He's so good at it, completing Emerie's turn so efficiently! We have to assume Rex is also good at it given his cell and that he has clone spies and even undercover agents, but every time he sees Hunter he has tried and failed to recruit him lmao. Also REX'S NAMEDROP but him not showing up surely means...we'll see a continuation of his story soon after this...right??? Also this means Howzer still lives, oh, thank god.

• "Because it's exactly what I would do." Strategist Echo comeback yessss!! A nice little callback to the Techno Union arc that kicked this story off as well. And HELL YEAH Omega's relationship with Echo is my favorite out of all of her connections, and I'm living for their spotlight together this ep. I'm extremely invested in found family stories not relying on nuclear family narratives, and I love that you see throughout the show that Echo doesn't "raise" Omega like a kid—he trains her like a cadet. Like someone who he intends to be his equal, which is a nice and very appreciated contrast to others treating her like a precious sheltered baby.

• Their goodbye scene in "Truth and Consequences" is one of my favorites in the show, and I just adore that when Omega is upset, Echo doesn't coddle her—he reminds her of her duty to watch over the others, giving her a purpose and a reason to stand tall. When he conveys that he was worried about her and thinking of her while she was captured, he gifts her a weapon he designed and made for her during that time, so that she won't have to be defenseless after being defenseless for so long in captivity. It's so clone trooper, and I love it and the glimpses these details give us about clone culture and how the older clones cared for the shinies and the cadets and showed their love for each other.

• I also liked that Omega couldn't have escaped without Tech's training, since slicing was so vital. And all her stealthy stabbing is of course reminiscent of Hunter. And finally some emotional payoff for the ongoing bit about Wrecker being afraid of heights! I'm weak for inspirational Star Wars quotes, and this show hasn't had many, but "Just stay focused on what's ahead, not what's below," is a lovely one.

Forest conversations, my beloved

• The Kiners scored the fuck out of this episode!!! So many clever, thoughtful reprises. This is the first reappearance of Crosshair's theme that's played on the synths since he began healing! And then it segues into a soft violin tremolo version that makes me cry, and then it intertwines with "The Sacrifice" from Tech's death, ouchhhh. I have a lot of meta I need to write out about the tracks "The Reunion" and "They Always Work It Out" and how they say so much about Hunter and Crosshair, but I can't believe how well my analysis paid off in the cues in this scene! More on that in another post.

• Gosh, Wrecker's injury scared the shit out of me. But I love him so much and I'm glad he got at least a little moment, even if he didn't really have a story arc here. Or you know, in the entire damn show. And I ultimately liked that the purpose of it wasn't just to freak us out but to give them a plausible disadvantage and to give Crosshair someone to fuss over the whole time and act more recklessly because of it, thus reiterating this key character trait of his.

• I love Crosshair being worried about Wrecker and Hunter and them being worried about Crosshair. That's the squad content I crave and have been missing!! Unfortunate that it specifically has been happening when Omega is out of the picture. Writers, I swear to you, you can do both.

• Can't believe it took another half season for someone to say something about Tech's death, and it was Crosshair, who wasn't even there?? Cool line and sentiment, but man, so frustrating. I like this callback to his conversation with Rampart, though. "Depends on who's giving them" and in this first act he keeps trying to give those orders himself. Thinking of Rex on Umbara: "We're not programmed. You have to learn to make your own decisions."

• God the forest conversations in this ep and the previous one fed me so much. Hunter saying, "And so do those clones" had me literally jumping out of my seat and cheering. Baby boy, it took you so goddamn long, but thank you for finally actually giving a shit before the conclusion of your story. And "It's what I deserve," hnghhh that's the good shit, and it hearkens back perfectly to "I belong in here." And Hunter immediately telling Crosshair hell no made me very happy. And then later Hunter saying "Crosshair—" when he's worried Crosshair is still going to sacrifice himself, but Crosshair reassures him that he'll be right behind them... My heart! What a Crosshunt feast we got in this ep!!!

• Can't believe we also got so many Crosswrecker moments from the get-go and they kept coming! And my three precious little Techwrecker crumbs: the way Crosshair specifically chooses Wrecker to say the cutting remark about Tech to; the way Wrecker bows his head because that was right on target; and Wrecker being the one to watch Tech fall and to scream, "Don't do it, Tech!" in "Plan 99" yet the one to say with such conviction here, "We've always known the risks. And so did Tech." That's just so...finally accepting your beloved is gone ;_; Not really deserved by the text, which kept all but a total of like maybe one total minute of mourning off screen for some fucking reason, but.

Clone X, more like Clone Sexy

• There aren't nearly as many Clone X dudes as I expected?? I guess Crosshair's situation wasn't that rare after all? Or do they just run through them super quickly because Rex's team keeps taking them down?? Regardless, god, THEY ARE ALL SO SEXY. The way they animated their movements was so creepy and hot. And them not speaking was so eerie, I loved it. And then the moment that CX-2 did was so effective and terrifying!!! But remembering that those were clones in there is so, so heartbreaking.

• I really like that Echo really felt like both a clone trooper AND the resistance agent he is now this whole episode, and Hunter, Wrecker, and Crosshair actually briefly got to feel like commandos. The slick stealth and silent communication was also very sexy.

• MY GOD, I loved these action scenes. They were lit and choreographed so cool, they were super intense and had real consequences and close brushes with death, and the logic of the fight flow was really good, too. A character being incapacitated because they went to try to help an ally is always a wonderful driving force for action and gives it that crucial character-driven element that raises the stakes, and is great for making sure the main characters aren't too OP, and there was a ton of that here.

• Hunter and Wrecker getting shot by laser cannons and Hunter pushing Wrecker away from the blast made me shriek in terror AND THEN CROSSHAIR SHOOTING THE PILOT DEAD ON NO HESITATION NO ANXIETY NO TREMOR BECAUSE HOW DARE YOU HURT MY HUSBAND I'M FUCKING LIVINGGG. And then Wrecker stumbling over to Hunter and lifting the debris like he does in TCW. Boom, three pivotal character-driven action scenes in a row that divulge a key characteristic of each character! Excellently written and directed.

• Also I am SO SO SO HAPPY that we're getting to see this protective Crosshair come out in full force!!! This is the Crosshair who risked his life to try to save Mayday, who shouted hysterically when Hunter fell into the ice and was so desperate to get him out, who worried over Omega on Teth. I also really like this contrast with how he was about Echo—"Echo's on it." He knows Echo will get the job done and be safe and that's despite his former prejudice against regs. He's worried about Hunter and Wrecker and that's despite previously spending time trying to hunt them down. And when he suffers consequences, it's because of him worrying about them, and that's so delicious.

• Finally got to hear Crosshair screaming! And Hunter was already the screamer in this show, but goddamn does he get to scream in this episode. Thank you, directors, for this whump material! My man Steward Lee never lets me down.

• THE WAY THAT WHEN CROSSHAIR IS TRYING TO SAVE WRECKER HE REACHES FOR A DC-17 OMG!!!! I feel so validated! And just like with Mayday, he's incapacitated afterward...

• God the way CX-2 waits to be tossed the vibrosword and then leans down with it while Crosshair is already incapacitated is SO brutal, like this is not a battle injury. It's straight up what Anakin fucking Skywalker does to Count Dooku just before he becomes a Sith Lord, like holy shit, dude. This scene is so cool and I've watched it 10,000 times over the past 24 hours, but also why did he do that lol, is he just supposed to be particularly cruel?? Obsessed with tormenting Crosshair for some reason?? Also, these vibroswords are exactly how I've pictured Ahsoka's being in A Future for Us :D

• At this point I was like, uhhh, the messaging of Crosshair struggling with this psychomatic hand tremor since the first episode of the season and then the symptom literally being taken out of his........hands sure is a Choice, especially coupled with how they've treated Echo (or you know, not). When they showed him still with the symptoms later, I was very relieved, AND THEN HUNTER LITERALLY CURES CROSSHAIR THROUGH THE POWER OF THE LOVE AND FAITH AND TRUST HE HAS FOR HIM IS THERE ANYTHING MORE BEAUTIFUL IN THE WORLD???? But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Echo is the GOAT

• "You were helping us, Dr. Karr?" / "I am." I love this subtle line and how Emerie acknowledges that she wasn't sure of her loyalties before but is certain now. And I love that she says such a clone trooper thing, "You have my word," and then doing the clone shoulder pat, especially in direct contrast to the natborn kids hugging Omega just before.

• "Hey, kids. ...And other kids." is just so fucking 501st, I can't explain it. I'm just so ecstatic that they did Echo such justice in the end, giving a nod to everything about his character, even his dorkass cadet personality. And it wasn't just so he could die, thank god!!!

• Like Echo even got a DARTH VADER homage??? That's his mass-murdering general (affectionate). More on this here!

• Also is there anything more Big Dick Energy in the world than Echo eviscerating Rampart—who either the clones would recognize as a former vice admiral or at least see his captain rank plaque—with what may not be a theme this show really earned but is ABSOLUTELY a theme that Echo deserves and has shouldered for over two seasons...and then just straight up shoving him out of the way so that he can talk to his brothers???? And with his stormtrooper helmet—which is like Echo refusing to dirty his hands (including his new, long-awaited one) by touching Rampart oh my god??? Sexiest man alive.

• So the answer is no, there isn't. Fives is hollering from the afterlife. Half those clones immediately developed a crush on him in that moment. That one clone later placing a blaster in Echo's arms so gently confirmed this for me (remember the symbolism of Echo making the energy crossbow for Omega? He even gives her his borrowed blaster in this scene), but it's so sad that he died because of it, whyyy.

• Also I love the "Clones don't leave our brothers behind" riff on the "We don't leave our own behind" adage. It's very fitting that Hunter would put it that way because he only means his squad (+/-1), whereas Echo would see it as meaning his people.

• And I love how when Rampart first shoves Echo, the clone in front that Echo's been talking to prickles and makes brief eye contact with him, to be like, "Should we take him? I've got your back." I felt that girls (gender neutral) in the bathroom energy so hard.

• The clones helping each other out of their cells made me so emotional. And it's the same way that Hunter and Crosshair do later...

• Echo asking for volunteers, just like Rex did on Umbara..................

• I think this post is breaking and I'm still only two-thirds of the way through my rewatch, oops. And yesterday I stayed up until 8 a.m. after I put it on again after watching it for the first time... I'm so normal about this show. More tomorrow!

• Part 2!

[sflow-er]

would kill to know more about august’s relationship with his mom like youre telling me your son gets caught for committing a crime and you still dont care enough to even come see him and see whats going on 😭 maybe im looking too much into it bc i wanna dissect him like a lab rat but really like she seems so neglectful

Hello anon! Thank you for the ask 💜

I've felt since first watching S1 that August's mother Louise really is neglectful. Let's look at the glimpses we get of her:

Erik says to Wille in S1E2 that she sent August to Hillerska shortly after his dad's suicide. Fair enough, I'm sure August wanted to go and probably lashed out at her for "not making life easier" for Carl Johan. But she seems to have essentially just left him there without any proper followup on how he was dealing with everything. His grief, their financial situation, his sudden responsibility having to take over from his father... As his mother, she should have made sure he got some help - counselling with Boris for example, but that clearly didn't happen. Based on all the issues August developed in the time leading up to canon, he has dealt with precisely none of his trauma, which also left him so very open to Erik's abuse and influence at Hillerska (as we now know).

She let August believe she would get the boarding money for him up until S1E3, only to turn up at Parents' Day and tell him to get it himself. By selling some of his father's belongings that she must have known meant everything to him. Yeah, that was probably the best and only solution, but the way she handled it was abysmal. And then she seemed surprised that August was angry and disappointed... Whereas August's reaction seemed to hint that this wasn't the first time she let him down (at least in my interpretation).

She was nowhere to be found in the aftermath of the video. August returned to Hillerska early from Christmas break, and it was plain to see he wasn't doing well at all. But we didn't get a single hint of her trying to reach out, nor did she seem all that worried when he suddenly called her weeks later and told her to buy a random horse (despite saying before that he would rather die than tap into his inheritance). She did ask why, but when he said "because I want to", she just dropped the subject.

And as you pointed out, we also didn't see her after he was caught. I'm sure we're meant to infer that August has been in touch with both her and Rickard since Rickard is representing him, but her absence from our screens or even the dialogue leaves a very specific taste. He may be 18, but he's still her son, and she should be there when he fucks up to the point of committing an actual crime. Asking what the hell he was thinking and demanding that he talk to someone about all his problems. This could've been brought up when he had to start seeing Boris after his fight with Wille, for example.

(Not to mention the missed opportunity of having her ask how he feels about having to sell Årnäs for the settlement! I will forever be bitter that this happened off camera and we didn't see August's reaction at all. It would've benefited the story on several levels to actually show his pain.)

So yeah. We could well see Louise again in the finale, but considering August still considers Sara the only person he's ever really been able to talk to... His mother definitely hasn't been there for him enough. I do not blame her for wanting to live her own life at all, especially as her marriage to Carl Johan was probably hell towards the end, but it sure seems like August is yet another example of how the adults in YR have let their children down.

[buckybarnesss]

laura hale: darling, dearest, dead

welcome to where i care way too much about teen wolf in the year 2023.

i have no shame.

i've been working on this meta for a few weeks now and it’s definitely grown past its original scope. at first, i just wanted to do a deep dive into the weirdness around laura’s death but of course that expanded as i sat down and hashed out my thoughts.

@renninflight 's tags on one of my posts really gave me the push for this because i've apparently just been waiting for the opportunity to talk about the mysterious murder of laura hale

shoutout also to my teen wolf buddy and tumblr mutual of forever @dear-massacre our teen wolf talks definitely helped, probably wormed their way in here and this wouldn’t have existed without you.

laura's death is the core mystery of the first season and i’ve always been intrigued by the circumstances surrounding it.

i’m definitely not the first to question the circumstances surrounding laura’s death but i’m going to put on my tinfoil conspiracy theory hat and discuss the events just prior to wolf moon and how laura hale haunts me the narrative.

buckle up buttercups this is long.

just to get this out of the way immediately, i need you to understand that teen wolf's plots and timeline were apparently written on a soggy napkin found crumbled up under the seat cushion of jeff davis's couch. season 1's story is the most cohesive but there wasn't a show bible for a long time, which explains its loose relationship with keeping consistent canon. this post on the teen wolf wiki from september 2013 says explicitly that some assistant was tasked with writing one. this would've placed it after 3a had aired but before 3b did. 

while i won’t be digging into the teen wolf timeline here, i will be working from my own understanding of it.

a lot of teen wolf is left to implication, inference and subtext as we the audience are locked into scott mccall's point of view and his knowledge of what's happening. this allows for scott to be ignorant about the world he unwittingly and unwillingly enters so that information can be doled out at a steady drip and the mysteries heightened.

that said, onwards to what has become my teen wolf magnum opus.

introduction: the dead girl

laura hale is the ultimate dead girl trope in teen wolf which is a show littered with the corpses of dead girls. it makes sense of course when you know she is the narrative sister of laura palmer of twin peaks fame. 

unlike laura palmer though, laura hale never gets to tell her story. she is dead before the show begins.her corpse is treated cavalierly by scott and stiles, desecrated by the argents and stripped of her personhood.

interestingly, david lynch’s daughter jennifer lynch not only a authored a spin off novel for twin peaks told from laura palmer’s perspective called the secret diary of laura palmer but also directed four episodes of teen wolf (silverfinger, i.e.d, perishable and codominance). 

it's a cool connection.

i like this quote from esquire about laura palmer and the creation of the dead girl trope:

“we don't see laura with any control over her circumstances. we meet her after she's been wrapped in a plastic bag and left to rot, which essentially leaves her narrative and legacy to be largely determined by those who are investigating her. we don't learn about laura through laura—we learn about laura by piecing together what she left behind.” 

laura hale’s murder also invokes a visual similarity to a real life beautiful dead girl as well.

elizabeth short.

elizabeth short is known to history as the black dahlia. her naked, posed, and bisected corpse was discovered in a vacant lot in january 1947. she was 22 years old. 

when betty bersinger discovered elizabeth that morning she thought she’d stumbled upon a mannequin. in a way, she had. the person elizabeth short was is often lost amongst the sensationalized headlines, salacious gossip and speculation surrounding her case. instead, she has become the perfect, posable victim unable to tell her own story.

elizabeth short is the template for all the dead girls in modern media. 

what makes laura hale different though is how she’s a non-character within teen wolf despite her death’s significance as the unpreventable, fixed event within the show’s universe.

laura hale has the most in common with the other dead beautiful girls erica reyes and paige krasikeva. each of them killed before their full potential could be realized their ghosts left to haunt the narrative.

as i said earlier though, the circumstances surrounding her death have always intrigued me. i’ve always believed there was a sort of convergence of events happening prior to wolf moon that led to the inciting incident of laura hale's murder. 

we’re even told this throughout the show if you’re paying attention. 

one of the things i always wished we’d gotten from teen wolf was more information about not just laura herself but what exactly she knew prior to her death but we can infer quite a bit. 

let’s take a look at what we do know.

a history lesson: drinking poison from the same vine

to understand what happened to laura hale when she was killed we have to step back and look at what happened before the first scenes of the show. 

in particular we have to take a look at peter hale, the argents and the alpha pack. this means revisiting visionary among some other relevant episodes.

visionary is probably one of if not the most central lore episode within the series and it also gives us a glimpse of both talia and laura hale while they were still alive.

laura herself is more of an afterthought in this episode as she's never named on screen. 

so what does visionary tell us about laura?

it tells us that she was already in a leadership position within the hale pack by this time and is clearly put forth as talia's natural, intended successor due to her very presence at the summit. it also tells us kali, ennis and deucalion knew laura hale personally even if it was a fleeting acquaintance. 

in the finer details of the episode we learn a few other things such as talia, laura and peter were all aware of the threat of the argents. we learn one of ennis’s betas was killed in retaliation for killing two hunters. the death of the beta seems very cruel and unusual as we learn that he was shot through the throat, his claws were ripped out and he was cut in half. 

the last point in particular is notable as there’s only one hunter we know of that cuts werewolves in half. 

gerard argent.

motel california is just a few episodes prior to visionary where it’s revealed that alexander argent killed himself in 1977 at the glen capri motel after being bitten. gerard claims it was deucalion that bit his brother which is how he justifies his actions in visionary.

is it the full truth? doubtful. maybe alexander argent was bitten by deucalion and maybe he wasn’t but gerard seems to believe he was and that is what matters. 

belief in the teen wolf universe is a real, tangible concept but it’s incredibly important to the narrative conceit of this episode. gerard and peter are both unreliable narrators who purposefully minimize their roles in the stories they tell. maybe they even believe their own lies to a degree.

what we know as the audience as it’s proven multiple times throughout the series is that gerard rejects the idea of peace and is known for being brutal and cruel in his methods. 

visionary also goes a long way to illustrate that peter hale has always been, you know, Like That. he skulks around the story even in his own version of events where he’s trying to minimize his own role in paige’s death.

i believe that the non-existence of laura in his story except for a throwaway mention about how laura told derek about the packs being in town is two fold. one, peter was jealous of laura’s position in the pack and two, his guilt over killing her. 

peter’s guilt is an interesting thing because he is first and foremost all about the survival of peter hale but he does care about those he perceives as his. for him, killing laura was something he regretted but was necessary so that peter could gain the alpha power. 

laura was a sacrifice. 

another thing about visionary is the absence of peter and talia’s relationship but who else would’ve told her about derek and what happened? talia isn’t surprised when she finds derek in the cellar. 

over the course of the show we do not get a lot about talia and peter’s relationship which is a thing that keeps me up at night but i don’t think it’s too far of a leap to conclude that talia knew her brother’s nature and probably saw it as useful in it’s own way so long as she was the one holding the leash. the way peter advises derek is probably not too far off from how he advised talia. 

there’s a tiny glimpse of this in season 4’s monstrous.

meredith walker is subjected to peter’s inner ravings while he’s comatose as they somehow connected mental frequencies.

there’s parts in there about how he’ll be a vengeful god and remake the supernatural of beacon hills in his own image and blah blah blah it all tracks for peter but the parts about talia are interesting not only because it gives us a glimpse into how peter perceived talia but also because he specifically name drops the argents as the threat. 

is it the full truth? no. peter subscribes to the from-a-certain-point-of-view version of the truth and we have to remember this is peter just after the fire. he’s comatose, horrifically injured and on some level he’s aware that most of his family is now deceased.

what looking at this gives us is peter’s perspective and what he latched onto post-fire thus creating the peter we meet.

“i predicted this. i told talia this was going to happen. something like this was going to happen. i said they were going to come for us. the argents. they’re going to come for us. they’re gonna burn us to the ground. they’re going to burn us to the ground. did she listen? of course not. did anyone listen? they listened to her. yes! say that everything was going to be fine. that we were all perfectly safe. but she made us weak! she made us weak. and what happens to the weakest in the herd? they get picked off by the predators. we used to be the apex predators. until talia turned us into sheep.”     

there is another key point about talia and peter that i think cannot be overlooked. the removal of memories. she took the memory of the nemeton’s location from both him and derek after their experiences there and she also took the memory of his tryst with corrine that resulted in malia’s birth. 

i think what these things together tell us is that peter hale is vengeful and resentful but not just towards the argents but also talia but talia is beyond his reach. laura isn’t.

the last player that needs to be examined is the alpha pack. visionary gives us a version of events of why deucalion is the way he is and it ends with him killing his beta marco absorbing his power. this in itself isn’t actually all that interesting as this was the foregone conclusion. 

when you combine it with what jennifer tells derek in the overlooked though it was just a few months after this she is attacked by kali at the base of the nemeton, which means the creation of the alpha pack was already underway mere weeks after deucalion is blinded by gerard.

we know talia hale was aware of what happened to deucalion along with gerard argent’s involvement so it would also stand to reason she would then be aware of the creation of the alpha pack. i cannot imagine it would escape her notice that both ennis and kali’s packs were decimated by their alphas and then they joined with deucalion. that seems like a cataclysmic event that’d get through the supernatural grapevine quickly. 

if talia knew then so did laura as she was like i said clearly talia’s successor.

the mysterious death of laura hale part I: who cut laura in half?

let’s revisit the scene of the crime to examine the absolutely hinky circumstances surrounding laura's death and what the hell was happening in the woods the night scott was bitten by peter.

if i learned anything from gil grissom the first piece of evidence is the body. this is how we and scott meet laura hale.

i don’t think it’s speculation to say that peter hale killed laura but it was gerard argent who cut her in half. 

in the season 2 opening episode omega we meet gerard argent and learn of his propensity to use a broadsword to cut werewolves in half but it is chris that gives scott the warning.

chris: "scott do you know what a hemicorporectomy is?"

scott: "i have a feeling i don't want to."

chris: "a medical term for amputating somebody at the waist. cutting them in half. takes a tremendous amount of strength to cut through tissue and bone like that."

this foreshadows what happens to the omega at the end of the episode but it reminds the viewer that we’ve already seen a corpse like that.

it may be a drop in the bucket compared to all the trauma scott has experienced since that night but i don’t think laura’s severed corpse is a sight he’s forgotten. which is what i believe argent is counting on here.

he knows what his father did. 

he’s intimidating scott as much as he’s warning him not just about lydia but also about his father’s impending arrival and what gerard is capable of. 

by this point chris knows kate broke the code by killing the hales in such a gruesome fashion but what does kate say when chris confronts her in code breaker?

chris: “i know what you did.”

kate: “i did what i was told to do.”

gee, i wonder who gave kate the carte blanche on killing the hales? i bet he also used paige’s death as a way to manipulate her as we see him do with allison. he was in town after all when paige was attacked by ennis and subsequently died. it's not a stretch to believe that a seasoned hunter like gerard would be able to spot a supernatural death cover up via animal attack.

the argents talk a big game about their women being leaders but gerard is the puppet master tugging on kate’s strings just like he did allison’s in season 2. this doesn’t minimize kate’s own sociopathy. kate can be a victim and a perpetrator.

we know from visionary that the argents have been known to operate around the beacon hills area to hunt but they don’t live there until chris and his family move there just prior to wolf moon.

i think we can infer that gerard ordered chris to move to beacon hills in response to laura hale being back in the area for the first time since the fire and i don’t think he aimed to just keep an eye on her.

there’s another overlooked aspect as to why gerard would be very interested in laura hale. he wants to cure his cancer via the bite. in fact, i wouldn’t be surprised if he would have offered her kate in exchange for the bite. 

sure, it’s speculative, but i think there are enough pieces to support it as a working theory.

unlike peter there is never a confession from gerard about his part in the crime so why am i certain he did it?

let’s go back to the body for a moment.

while there’s a lot of gore, most of the blood is on laura herself. 

there’s a significant lack of blood either around or underneath laura. with the amount of trauma we can see on her body there should be a bloody mess but there isn’t.

also notice how her arms are splayed out. it’s like she was dropped there.

she also doesn’t appear to be all that decayed so she’s still pretty, uh, fresh.

so again why do i believe gerard cut her in half if peter killed her?

not only can we infer in the subtext from the conversation chris has with scott in omega but looking at the cut on laura’s body it is too clean to be from being ripped in half by an animal or a werecreature. 

however, a person with a sharp, heavy sword with the know-how that we know does this? seems a bit more plausible doesn’t it?

also kate literally tells us that hunters did it. she doesn’t name gerard but she informs derek in the tell: 

“yes, your sister was severed into pieces and used as bait to catch you. unpleasant, and frankly a little too texas chainsaw massacre for my taste, but quite true. but here’s the part that’s really going to kick you in the balls. we didn’t kill her.”

neither the audience nor derek know if kate can be believed. i don’t think she’s lying here. she’s taunting but not lying.

why lie when she knows how badly this knowledge will hurt derek?

she goes on to add:

“found bite marks on your sister’s body derek. what do you think did that? a mountain lion?”

this i believe was a fib. were there bite marks? possibly, but more likely from savangers than peter taking a bite out of laura.

also the fact that laura’s lower half was found by joggers probably means it was visible from a path which gives some credibility to the idea that the hunter's strew laura’s corpse around the preserve. they wanted it to be found.

not only would two pieces be less heavy than a whole body but it just shows how they don’t care. laura isn’t a person to them. she’s vermin, she’s subhuman, she’s not worthy of respect. 

she’s no better than bait to other werewolves to them. 

they leave laura to rot.

notice how kate never refers to laura by name instead calling her “your sister” to derek. kate lured derek out with insults towards laura but this one is the greatest of them all. kate is refusing laura hale’s personhood.

the final reason i don’t believe peter tore laura in half is we’ve seen how peter kills. claws from behind are consistent with how he goes at derek at the end of heart monitor and jackson in master plan or throat slashing which we see in the tell with the video store clerk, kate in code breaker and jennifer in lunar eclipse. 

or he mauls them viscerally like we see with the mute in the benefactor.

a creature of habit he calls himself.

in none of peter’s kills either as alpha or as a beta does he tear someone in half.

while peter hale is a dramatic king and doesn’t mind getting his hands bloody, i think he’d be offended if someone accused him of tearing laura in half. 

the mysterious death of laura hale II: why does peter kill laura?

speaking of peter, why did he kill laura?

the obvious answer is for the alpha power so he could fully heal..he says as much in wolf’s bane.

peter: “yes, becoming an alpha, taking that from laura pushed me over a plateau in the healing process.”

but with peter hale nothing is ever so simple. there’s always layers.

in alpha pact, peter gives derek this speech when he’s winding derek up about how to heal cora:

“you know, normal wolves never abandon an injured member of the pack. they care for it. they even bring it food from a kill and then regurgitate it into the mouth of the injured wolf. they even give it physical and emotional comfort by intensely grooming it. in a way they can do more than just ease pain. they can be instrumental in healing their own."

as i mentioned earlier, i think peter not only holds a lot of resentment towards talia for what he perceived as inaction but also towards laura.

after the fire, laura did what cora says in visionary they were taught to do when hunters find them.

cora: "waiting. hiding. that's what we're told to do when the hunters find us. hide and heal."

in all the trauma and grief, laura did the only thing that she could reasonably do in response to such a horrific tragedy. she packed up her little brother who she’d suddenly become the guardian of and put an entire continent between them and beacon hills.

in doing so she left behind peter. i don’t blame her for leaving beacon hills. she was reacting to the threat of the hunters by trying to protect what little was left of her family and herself.

you have to put on your own oxygen mask before you can help others.

however, in leaving peter behind he was left to not only slowly go mad but he was also left vulnerable.

peter may have felt laura not only abandoned him as a member of the pack but abdicated her right to be the alpha.

derek tells scott in riddled:

“my family didn’t just live in beacon hills.they protected it.”

laura left beacon hills unprotected and she left peter alone. 

peter killed laura for the alpha power he always saw as rightfully his so he could heal and do the job he felt talia and laura were both too weak to do. 

while peter killed laura his culpability does come into question. 

in co-captain he performs the memory sharing ritual with scott which gives us a small glimpse of peter’s memories in the moments before laura’s death.

laura enters the scene looking around as if she hears something and then laura calls out his name in question. when peter turns he doesn’t look like a man in control with his eyes rolling, mouth agape. 

his actions look autonomous. peter the man is not at the wheel. 

if we take what peter says in wolf’s bane at face value about how he was being driven by pure instinct then we can surmise that the wolf was in control and acted on impulse and peter’s deepest thoughts and desires. 

the same ones we hear peter raving and ranting at meredith in monstrous. 

vengeance. 

i think the truth seems to be somewhere in the middle. 

peter often downplays his own involvement as a manipulation tactic. so while he lacked inhibition, killing laura for the alpha power was premeditated as we know his nurse was acting on his behalf. i do wonder though if laura’s body hadn’t been severed by hunters would peter have resurrected her? 

what’s a little murder between family members, you know? 

the mysterious death of laura hale III: the conspiracy

there are two conspiracies in season 1.

the conspiracy to kill the hales and the conspiracy to lure laura hale back to beacon hills.

about three months before her death laura was sent the picture of the revenge spiral on the deer which brought her back to beacon hills. to the territory she had left unattended for six years. in pack mentality, derek says that laura came back to beacon hills looking for the alpha and that she told him she was close to figuring something out about the fire. 

luring laura back to beacon hills wasn’t just about killing her. that was the endgame, but first peter needed her to do the leg work in finding the conspirators that set the fire.

the conspiracy itself hinges on one person since peter was still unable to do all of it himself due to him still recovering and we know nothing about her.

nurse jennifer plagues me. her motivations for helping peter were never given. she’s merely a tool to help peter enact his revenge.

all we have are theories and i have found precious few in my searches through old meta.

the most popular theory and i use that word loosely is that she was jennifer blake sowing the seeds for her eventual return to take on the alpha pack. i’ve considered this one and i think a skilled writer could make it work, but within the context we’re given i don’t think so. 

i do believe jennifer blake definitely scouted out beacon hills just as the alpha pack did but i don’t think she and nurse jennifer are one in the same. besides, we do see nurse jennifer’s corpse in code breaker. 

another theory i came across was that she’s a banshee compelled in the same way lydia was by peter. again because we have such little information there’s enough room for it to be possible but i doubt it. 

the conclusion i have come to about nurse jennifer is that she’s someone like dr. fenris and brunski from eichen house. while we do not learn about eichen house until season 3b dr fenris is introduced in wolf’s bane and is in the search for a cure. 

mostly, i think she’s simply a reference to nurse ratched from one flew over the cuckoo’s nest. her nurse's uniform is even anachronistic. 

but what was nurse jennifer’s role in the conspiracy?

she is the one who sent the picture of the deer spiral to laura hale to spur her to come back to beacon hills. nurse jennifer is also the one who sent allison the text to come to the school during night school. like laura, nurse jennifer did a lot of footwork for peter to make his plans work and it’s a damn shame we’ll never know why.

the mysterious death of laura hale iv:  the fixed point

laura’s death is what i think of as a fixed point in the universe of teen wolf. the idea of which is something i shamelessly took from doctor who.

in doctor who a fixed point is considered a lynchpin of the structure of ordered history. they cannot be altered as any attempts to do so would unravel linear time. 

laura hale’s death is that fixed point. it was unavoidable, unpreventable. poor laura hale doomed by the narrative.

in the events surrounding the murder of laura hale there are two more players i haven’t really discussed. they exist on the periphery but are no less important. 

doctor alan deaton and the nemeton.

cora says this in visionary:

"they keep us connected to humanity but they're a secret even within the pack. sometimes only the alpha knows who the emissary is. derek and i had no idea about deaton."

as talia’s successor laura would’ve had to know who their pack’s emissary was.

this is confirmed in fury when deaton not only insults derek to his face but reveals that he made a promise to talia to help her children and derek recalls laura mentioning deaton indirectly as some kind of advisor. 

i say indirectly because if laura had told derek explicitly that deaton was someone who could help and advise than he wouldn’t have suspected him as the alpha in season 1. 

did laura see deaton at all during her time in beacon hills? i would say it’s probable but i get the impression laura played her cards close to her chest. deaton was very unnerved by what was happening and with laura’s death probably concerned for his own wellbeing. 

deaton doesn’t reveal himself to derek because he has no idea if derek’s the one who killed laura or not. there’s no established relationship between the two for trust to go either way. 

truly the greatest villain of teen wolf is miscommunication, but i digress.

now here comes the part where i put on my tin foil conspiracy theory hat. i believe laura was killed near or at the nemeton. 

an unintended and unacknowledged sacrifice.

peter may not have consciously remembered its location, but who's to say it didn’t draw him there. 

we know from jennifer’s speech in the overlooked that the nemeton had a small spark of power from paige’s death. it was enough power to keep her alive after kali left her for dead so it isn’t difficult to believe it could’ve drawn peter to it as well. 

we know gerard knows its location despite what he tells allison about him not remembering. i don’t believe that geriatric bastard anymore than i believe peter as peter is able to find the nemeton easy enough because he shows up to kill jennifer there.

now, i have zero proof of this. it’s all speculation from vibes and what we see in lunar eclipse but considering laura’s body was moved from wherever she originally died and was severed it’s possible. 

it’s easy to imagine a scenario where laura finds peter at the nemeton where he kills her and leaves her body where it fell. later, gerard and his hunters discover her corpse and in frustration and anger at his plan falling through, gerard decides to use laura as bait for either the werewolf that killed her, derek or whatever other werewolves come along. waste not, want not after all. 

either way an alpha’s blood is spilled there giving the nemeton just a little bit more power. 

in lunar eclipse allison, scott and stiles perform a proxy ritual sacrifice to find out the location of the nemeton so they can rescue their parents. it’s successful, but only because the nemeton allows them to know its location. 

in revealing itself to them it chooses them as its champions and.it’s magic takes them back to the night scott was bitten, to the fixed point in the teen wolf universe. 

laura hale’s death.

haunting the narrative: laura hale’s uneasy ghost

“and so, the woman dies. the woman dies so the man can be sad about it. the woman dies so the man can suffer. she dies to give him a destiny. dies so he can fall to the dark side. dies so he can lament her death. as he stands there, brimming with grief, brimming with life, the woman lies there in silence.”

by aoko matsuda, translated by polly barton

once the first season comes to a close and laura hale’s murder is solved she is no longer mentioned save a few precious times, but the ghost of laura lingers. 

laura haunts the narrative.

derek has forgiven many transgressions against himself and his person but he will never forgive peter for laura’s murder. her death underscores every single one of their interactions.

laura’s the specter that hangs between cora and derek. cora loses her sister twice and derek’s words “sorry to disappoint you” only speak to how he feels he cannot live up to the ghost of not only his mother but also laura.

this, however, is not the only way laura remains in the narrative. they allude to her in other ways. 

in anchors scott reprises the scene from wolf moon where he tells stiles they’re going to go out into the woods to find a dead body but in a reverse uno of wolf moon though, scott is able to save the naked hale girl in the woods and bring her back to her family.

at the beginning of party guessed, lydia has one of her banshee visions. if you pay attention you can catch a girl in the bleachers that doesn’t quite belong. in fact, she’s crying out distressed and frightened.

that girl is laura hale. 

while uncredited the actress looks a lot like haley roe murphy who played laura in the first season and the necklace around her neck has a red pendant that alludes to her alpha status.

lydia sees an echo of laura hale as a warning.

i like this shot in second chance at first line when scott is at the morgue. he pulls out the drawer containing laura's lower half and the pov for the shot is almost like laura is watching despite her upper half not being there.

the very last time we see laura’s body is after stiles and scott dig it up. 

from this new perspective, laura’s stare has gone from vacant to accusatory.

it’s a jump scare, the transition from laura as a wolf to laura as human. it’s meant to freak stiles and scott out and confuse them. 

what it’s always said to me though is how dare you.

whether or not it was intentional (and let’s be real this is teen wolf so it’s probably half and half if we’re being generous)  the murder of laura remains one of the most intriguing incidents on teen wolf and her being one of the most untapped characters.

i said earlier i wanted to know what laura knew before her death. what had she uncovered about the fire? had she learned about cora being alive? did she know about kate and derek?

the answer is that it doesn’t matter. It no longer matters because laura died. we can never know what she knew. 

in teen wolf it doesn’t matter because laura is a non-character while being the most important character of them all.

laura hale is the beautiful dead girl.

she is the inciting incident, the fixed point, the name unsaid and the spirit unexercised.

“an anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young-- a dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.”  lenore by edgar allen poe

[thefirstknife]

I saw some confusion among people thinking that Eramis' appearance was random and that she had no business being on the station with access to the Warsats. I'd like to try and clarify some stuff about that.

Eramis was a constant presence this season; more so than Xivu Arath. It has been explained that Xivu Arath cannot invade with her army until the specifics of a ritual are fulfilled and that moving her army through the ascendant plane takes an extraordinary amount of energy and resources.

Some of Xivu's forces were here and acting on her behalf, yes, but largely the main enemy this season was Eramis. Eramis is already in the system and was very explicitly used by the Witness as the one who would act often and faster. The Witness spent a lot of time turning Eramis' friends and soldiers into Scorn for this purpose.

These Scorn are the ones that had the Seraph Station under constant siege. Every time we attack Seraph Station, it's canon because Scorn come back to life so every time we clear it, we have to do it anew. They've been digging in the Station for months, trying to gain access to the Warsat network and preparing for the final assault.

Eramis was not randomly on the Seraph Station; she was there because she's been trying to get there for months. We were fighting their attempts by uploading a virus into the network each time we're there, but that's never been a certain way of stopping Eramis and the Scorn army from wrestling control over the network away. Which is the point of us having to do it multiple times.

I know the Seraph's Shield mission only played dialogue once so if anyone needs a refresher:

Elsie Bray: I've gained remote access to the launch facility's subsystems, but someone is already in here. House Salvation Splicers are hacking the launch mainframe.

Eramis had splicers working on hacking into the station. As a matter of fact, they gained access to the station first.

Ana Bray: She's here? Of course. That must be how Xivu Arath plans of co-opting the Warsat network. The Hive can't do it on their own, so the Witness sends Eramis and her Splicers in to assist.

Ana explaining how Eramis being there makes sense because Xivu cannot gain access to the Warsats on her own, she needs Eramis to assist.

The whole seasonal story hinges on Eramis hacking the station to get to the Warsats and the Seraph's Shield mission was explicitly about us trying to stop her week by week. It just so happens that she succeeded hacking it at the end, before Rasputin was fully operational and ready to be uploaded without negative consequences.

Is the setup a little bit clunky? I think so, yeah, because the whole season is doomed from the start. We have to stop our enemies but it's the nature of the end-of-the-year story for enemies to win in some capacity. I also think that we didn't really have to kill Rasputin for the same effect and for the enemies to somehow get the upper hand; I think it would've been fine if Rasputin simply had to destroy the Warmind stuff but that he could've remained with us as an Exo.

But Eramis having access to Seraph Station and the Warsat network is not random or out of nowhere nor is it nonsensical. That was her entire plan the whole season. Actually her first big win, possibly also saved her life. Not sure how many failures from Eramis the Witness would've tolerated.

I guess the issue is that with the current seasonal structure, we expect the seasonal goal to be fulfilled and for us to walk happily into the sunset until the next season because that's how it worked so far. It can feel like we've been fighting our enemies for 3 months for nothing given that we've essentially failed and it almost caused a catastrophe. But I'm not sure how else to create a story (seasonal or otherwise) where things don't go as planned or where we fail.

There were multiple fronts to fight on this season and there's one where we dodged a massive bullet; Xivu Arath. We lost to Eramis because we had to think about the bigger picture and that is Xivu's invasion. Our loss to Eramis also took the Warsats out of the equation now so that's also a loss to Xivu. It's what we needed; a stalemate. It's not flashy or happy, but it's better than the alternative which is Xivu Arath's portal over Earth. So in that regard we succeeded. We lost the Warsats and Rasputin and almost the Traveler, but all of that was to prevent Xivu Arath from invading which we managed. For now.

[phoenix-before-the-flame]

Iam looking at your phoenixverse laxus design with both eyes OPEN 👁👁 but now im so curiojz as to what else the phoenixverse has to offer. PLEASE tell me youve got any headcanons about how zeref refived natsu. Like any thoughts at all on that?

Ohohohohohohohohohoho anon my guy my dude, my man (genderless) I am about to speak. Pull up a fuckin chair bro. Also puttin this under read more because uh, long lol

This is actually one of my favourite things to think about regarding Natsu (apart from yknow, END lol) and Zeref because it is such an interesting little story point.

For Natsu, the interest comes from the fact that he's not who he thought he was. Natsu's always confident about his identity, he's quick to announce who and what he is in a situation and he's proud of who he is. The knowledge that yeah sure, you are Natsu Dragneel, but uh Natsu's not who you think he is buddy- that Natsu, in some way died so many centuries ago but was pulled back and reshaped, reborn- repackaged even- into you in a body that you thought was human but is some almagamation of that and more? All tied to a book? Can he still say with confidence that he is Natsu Dragneel when he hardly knew the truths about himself? And if sayin that is even true when he could easily just be something molded to look like what Zeref lost? (Ofc we the readers know otherwise but imagine the dilemna man) The reality of it would've- should've- been earth shattering. It would've been an identity crisis and then some.

For Zeref, oh man. Zeref's whole thing stems from the fact that he loves Natsu. He loves Natsu so much (and his parents too i guess) that when the tragedy struck and he lost everything, it fucked him up. He just couldn't deal with the incredibly unfair hand that life dealt him that he was willing to turn the world on its head and essentially change the course of fioran history to try and undo what happened to him. To save something from his old life that he loved.

But heres the thing about Zeref's love. It's twisted. It's fucked up. It's dark.

Working years, decades- possibly even centuries- on the single minded task of reviving his brother (and why just Natsu? Why not the parents well? Why only the younger sibling? Did he intend to bring them all back but became single minded on just his brother?) could lead to obsession. Obsession with making him perfect, no longer just as a human but more than that. Stronger so he won't be killed as easily. Obsession with keeping him close, tying him to his soul in such a way that if Zeref goes, Natsu goes as well. Making sure that he's pulling the strings that when it comes to, when he finally closes his eyes at the hands of his brother, he has a comfort in knowing that his brother is going with him and he won't be left alone, like what his very first tragedy did to him. (Plus also making Natsu, his creation that he brought to life, kill him would be a back stab at Ankhserham. Because the god cursed him for fucking around with life and death, so having his demon kill him would be Zeref controlling the life he chose to create and determining his own death. It'd be a last gotcha).

Zeref may have loved Natsu enough to bring him back, and he still loves him in a way, but it's messed up. Because the whole ordeal of everything messed him up.

But I digress, this is just side stuff, your question really. How did Zeref really bring Natsu back?

Now since you asked specifically for phoenixverse, i can get a lil bit loose with canon details and not feel as restricted.

So we have our hard facts- Natsu and Parents die in Zeref's youth, Zeref fucks around tryna undo their deaths and finds out by getting cursed for doing this, then proceeds to use the curse to his advantage and over an undisclosed amount of time to create his demons and what not.

'Undisclosed amount of time' being the key thing here.

Canon implies that the time between Natsu's death, Zeref getting cursed and Zeref reviving Natsu happened within a relatively close period of time. And if it's anything I love, it's spacing out events.

I'd like to think that between the loss of his family and when he gets cursed is a decent gap of time, like a decade or so to really push the fact that he's so fixated on the loss. Then after getting the curse he sets to work of reviving Natsu over the course of decades to almost a century and a half.

(Am i implying Zeref to be a bit older than the 400 years? Yes, yes i am. The way I saw it the events of 400yrs past were inciting incidents i.e Zeref giving Natsu to Igneel, slayers gettin sent to the future, and not the actually set date where everything happened. And again, I like the idea of Zeref fixating on this for a very long time. Him being older drives home the single-mindedness and determination to get it done)

As prodigious as Zeref is, creating life and being the first wizard to do so, i don't think he could do it so easily within a few short years which is why i personally love the idea of Zeref taking so long to be able to revive Natsu. A touch of realism to something magical kinda grounds it in a way, gives it some weight at the very least.

Specifically Natsu being Zeref's final project ever and all the other demons he created over the years prior being experiments and steps taken to perfect the process so Natsu would be the culmination of all that he learnt (demons like deliora and lullaby being demons of inorganic matter given humanoid form-> tartarus- esque demons being humanoid demons with animalistic features (organic matter) -> Natsu, human demon and hybrid traits all working together in cohesion).

And speaking of a touch of realism, or sorta realism anyways, riddle me this.

Zeref needs something to make Natsu well, Natsu. Sure he could probs make a demon that looks like him, but thats not what he wants. He wants his actual brother so, what could he get to add into the mixture to really do that? Why a few samples of course :].

But Phoenix! I hear you cry, how could he have gotten samples if you said in your version that it took him forever to finally revive Natsu?

And so leads into the actual true definitive answer to your question anon.

Zeref, in needing the most important ingredient in the Natsu stew took things from the OG body to help build the new one. But! The kicker here is the samples I imagine him using aren't blood but instead, bone.

Maybe he realizes a decade or 2 down the line in his demon experiments that he missed a step in what he needs to see this through. Maybe he thinks he's too late because what can he do now at that point. Maybe he realizes that he can use not flesh and blood, but what remains for his plan. Maybe he commits another sin in the hopes of it bringing for another and digs up his young brother's bones. Maybe he whittles them down piece by precious piece over the long period of time after failing so many times (am i also implying failed Natsus? Failed ENDs? Hell yeah i am) and coming dangerously close to it all ending for naught, with the last shard of bone. And maybe after so long and so many atrocities, he finally succeeded?

TL:DR Zeref snagged OG Natsu's bones and used those to help in the process of quite literally rebuilding him from scratch to give us our Natsu.

I dunno man, it just adds a layer of fucked up-ness to the whole situation of how far Zeref was willing to go- even defiling his brother's bones to get him back.

And on Natsu's side learning about all this would just twist the knife of his identity crisis even deeper (especially on that implication of failed END attempts before him).

Also like, by stretching out the time of events and making Natsu being the very last demon Zeref ever made bring so much for layers of meaning to the name END in itself.

END, being the literal meaning 'Etherious Natsu Dragneel'

END, signalling the last demon Zeref's made. An end to his experimentations.

END, as in the last and perfected version of his brother, with the last remains of OG Natsu's bones going towards his creation.

And END, as in Zeref's end, where he intends for Natsu to kill him thus ending his life.

[web-novel-polls]

Sorry for the confusion, what I meant was that I disagreed that Wei Wuxian's torture of Wen Chao was unjustified but agreed on all other points. And, yeah, as I mentioned, I think the novel is trying to convey how absolutely brutal and cruel his actions are, even if they are justified, and that's an important thing to understand when considering his character.

Also, I didn't know you were referring to people prioritizing characters over real people, which is just....why??? if someone feels a connection to a character, and they get some kind of enjoyment out of that, that's wonderful and people shouldn't come after them just because it doesn't agree with their interpretation. I mean, there are interpretations of MDZS that I think are more valid than others, and a lot of my issue is with people who read the novel but willfully ignore its themes. But Jiang Cheng being aro/ace is a valid interpretation, just as Jiang Cheng being gay is a valid interpretation. What we get (in the novel) is essentially that JC is not interested in women, which could lead to multiple interpretations. He's aro/ace, he's gay, he's too busy taking care of Jin Ling and sect leader business, he's scared to get close to anyone, etc., etc., etc. None of these go against canon and are perfectly valid interpretations. Also, even if they did "contradict" canon, there's plenty of coding and allegory in fictional works. If someone finds connection and comfort in a character, people should just leave them be. I'm sorry if I myself came off aggressive and wanting to argue, 'cause I really just wanted to agree with you about the MDZS fandom condemning other characters for their brutality while willfully ignoring our MC's own actions, but I do think that WWX's torture of Wen Chao is justified, even if it isn't right. But it most certainly isn't a "WOO! WE KILLED THE BAD GUY!" moment in the novel, even if we (and WWX) derive satisfaction from it. Also, I do think there is value in discussing different interpretations, but I mainly have an issue with how the fandom is so aggressive in trying to make WWX completely pure that they end up disrespecting his character and the themes of the novel, and especially the real people they're talking to. And, I mean, I also like to see him as pure sunshine boy when I choose to, but I can't understand people who put him on a pedestal while simultaneously condemning other characters for actions that are even quite similar to his.

Also, about my Xue Yang thing--- I don't think WWX would've turned into Xue Yang either, because WWX actually did experience happiness and family before his parents died, whereas Xue Yang never did (that we know of...I suppose he could've before he became a street orphan, but I don't get that impression). But Xue Yang's story clearly demonstrates that at one point he was naive and sweet, and he ended up so twisted and selfish specifically because he grew up an orphan on the streets, having to fight for survival against people who took advantage of him. If he had been saved by Jiang Fengmian like WWX was, it might've been an entirely different story. This is shown when Xue Yang actually is affected by Xiao Xingchen's kindness (he stopped the Night Hunts that resulted in Xiao Xingchen killing innocent humans), but at that point, it was too late. When Song Lan shows up, the progress is undone, because he'd already committed the crimes, and nobody is required to forgive him simply because he changed a little and stopped doing them.

So, I'm sorry if I came off kind of aggressive and rude, because I really didn't mean to, you just touched on something about the fandom that I have an issue with, and since I try to avoid the discourse, I really don't have any outlet. Didn't mean to actually start the discourse myself, lol. Thanks for your genuine reply, though!

Ask 1, Ask 2

First of all, I’m so sorry for leaving this ask in my inbox for so long, Anon… I wanted to answer properly and ended up psyching myself out 💀. But no, you definitely didn’t come off as aggressive and rude to me; in fact, your apology is what confused me lol.

Edit: I've deleted my response to "Wen Chao deserved it" since this isn't a conversation I can have in good faith. If anyone tries to discuss it again, I will just block them (not your fault, Anon)

[miraculouscontent]

Will you make an analysis of Chameleon? That... thing gives a lot to talk about

I had no plan to initially because I figured that the worst of it was in the teaser, but…

Well, you’re not wrong in saying that it gave me a lot to talk about.

[”Collecting” Thoughts]

I want to start by talking about this episode not as a singular episode trapped in a vacuum, but as a season opener. It’s bad enough that this episode exists on its own, but it’s important to compare it to The Collector in terms of how it acts as a follow-up to the Season 2 finale.

Volpina introduced the grimoire via Adrien and had Marinette visiting Master Fu. The Collector follows exactly in its footsteps, taking place immediately after and showing the consequences of Adrien stealing the book. The Collector was a GREAT follow-up to Volpina, with the only sad thing being that Marinette took the fall for something Lila did; in fact, Lila herself isn’t even mentioned. Still, it furthers the plot and was set up perfectly by Volpina to continue the story.

Now, what did Heroes’ Day do?

Catalyst brought back Lila and set up Gabriel knowing more about his own powers. It set up his closer relationship with Natalie (regardless of how people feel about that), which was followed up in Mayura by Natalie taking the Peacock Miraculous to protect Hawk Moth.

It was also established that the Peacock Miraculous is damaged in some way. There’s no visible wear on it, but it causes Natalie to appear sick.

With that in mind, what did Chameleon do to follow up on that?

…It brought back Lila. That’s it. No talks with Master Fu, no discussion on the Peacock; there’s just nothing. Even Mayura itself didn’t have Marinette/Adrien and Fu talking about the fact that they know Hawk Moth has the Peacock on his side now.

As a season opener, Chameleon is a complete and total failure. Catalyst had already brought Lila back and this is essentially just a worse version of the way that Catalyst did it (disregarding the fact that we were blindsided by Lila in the first place because she only got passing mentions until the Season 2 finale).

All Chameleon wants to do is set up Lila as an antagonist, and even that’s in the laziest way possible.

Heck. We don’t even get a new opening. It’s the exact same as season 2, which at least went through the effort to change the backgrounds and some images. It was effective to make it different enough to be recognizable.

The seating change that happens in this episode could’ve been something to help Season 3 stand out and be its own thing, but it doesn’t stick around. I know I’m gonna complain about that whole scene in a moment, but keep in mind that I’m complaining about how the seating change happened, not the fact that it happened at all.

That said, let’s go scene by scene, shall we?

[Opening Scene - A Lack of Care]

Marinette dashing into the school due to running a little late perfectly exemplifies how this episode is going to hurt you, and I don’t mean that in a good way.

Remember Fred? Mylene’s father and the guy from The Mime? Of course you do, because he was very nice to Marinette and she made him a hat

In this episode, however, he glares at Marinette when she bolts past him (not even knocking him over mind you; just running a bit late as students do from time to time). It’s just a dumb five seconds, but it’s a great representation of what you’re in for; typically good people that Marinette helped in the past turning against her. It sets the tone and everything.

Moving onto the actual meat of the episode though, might I say that one of the worst things a writer can do is present us with a better idea only to strip it away from us?

This episode does just that when Marinette presumes that Alya saved her a seat next to Adrien. That presumption isn’t really a stretch. Alya is her supposed best friend and everyone is sitting with someone else, so it’d make sense that’d she’d sit there.

However, not only did Alya not try to get Marinette that seat, but the thought didn’t even seem to cross her mind. She acts confused by the fact that Marinette even considered that she’d be sitting with Adrien.

That’s because Alya didn’t consider that herself. No one considered that themself. No one texted Marinette about this arrangement, no one asked her, and no one thought it was wrong to shove Marinette to the back row without her permission. Marinette gets the shaft and we’re not even given a reason why everyone thought it’d be a great idea (Marinette just talked about being worried that she’d be distracted by Adrien; it still would’ve been rude not to ask her, but that would’ve been a better reason to put her somewhere where she’s almost as far away from Adrien as possible).

That’s not even getting into the fact that Marinette took that seat herself all the way back in Origins. She worked for that seat. She stood strong against Chloe and that seat was her reward.

But then, it was taken away from her, like the seat was some sort of metaphor for all the care everyone had for her.

Enter Lila, who is a masterpiece example of how to annoy the audience as quickly as possible. She lies compulsively (most lies not even being believable), uses pity to gain affection, and gets incredibly petty when confronted.

Worst of all, aside from Marinette and only partially Adrien, everyone is fooled by her lies. Everyone falls at her feet and does everything she asks, probably both because they pity her and also because she’s the equivalent of a celebrity (saving Jagged’s cat, knowing Prince Ali, etc.).

Even Miss Bustier doesn’t care that Marinette’s been put in the back. When Marinette asks about it, Miss Bustier fixates on whether Marinette has a hearing/sight issue or not. Miss Bustier is supposed to be an empathetic teacher who cares about her students, yet Zombiezou over here doesn’t have a reason for putting Marinette in the back when Chloe and Adrien are sitting in the front despite having no issues with hearing or sight.

Also, talking about the classmates themselves, it’s easy to say that Marinette looks in the wrong because she said “no” when Adrien offered up his seat, but that’s not taking into account that of course Marinette wouldn’t want Adrien to move for her. She sees Adrien as a nice guy, so she wouldn’t think he’d deserve to sit in the back by himself.

No one in the class considers this though, because of course they don’t. That’s just how this episode wants to work for the sake of its disjointed plot.

Then, Lila makes it all about herself, which convinces the class to get upset at their “everyday Ladybug.” It’s a jarring transition from the Season 2 finale, to say the least.

I’ll admit: before I saw the akuma going after Marinette, I honestly thought there would be a twist where Lila was already akumatized and everyone in the school were just going off her whim due to a spell, with Marinette not being affected because she was late to class.

(Probably would’ve fixed it too. Add in an opening of Mari talking to Fu about the Peacock, then a scene after Lila’s de-akumatization where Gabriel checks on Natalie and talks about what good akuma-bait Lila is… you’ve got a passable episode right there!)

The problem with this scene is how immediately everyone glares at Marinette. No one spoke up for her to say, “I’m sure Marinette didn’t mean it like that.” Heck, even if someone just asked why Marinette was acting like this, that would’ve been something, because Marinette is so obviously acting like this for a reason.

It’s not even like I don’t see why Marinette gets put in the back; it’s because no one will see the akuma if she’s sitting back there all alone.

…In fact, keep this in mind, because I’m going to bring it up later.

Anyway, it’s undeniable that Marinette gets the most disrespect in this episode, but I’d also like to bring attention to Adrien. Yeah, he glared at Marinette (I know what the writing staff said; it’s irrelevant to me unless the episode gets edited), but consider how much Lila gets into his personal space and then remember that Nino is sitting right behind them. We see Marinette be plenty angry about Lila stroking Adrien’s shoulder because she knows that Lila is full of it and is taking advantage of Adrien’s good nature, but even if Nino doesn’t know, shouldn’t he be upset by a clearly-uncomfortable Adrien?

[The Cafeteria Scene - How to Kill a Character in Two Minutes]

(Note: shoutout to Nathaniel, who’s sitting by himself and not being pulled in by catering to Lila’s needs; both he and Ivan seemed to be the ones with the most questionable expressions in the glaring scene when referring to whether or not they’re angry with Marinette. I still won’t give them a pass because the general atmosphere of the scene implied that everyone was angry at Marinette, but still. Ivan and Alix also don’t seem to show up in the cafeteria at all, but both of them along with Nathaniel return for the ending scene where Lila’s still lying. All of them do NOTHING in regards to stopping her, so I won’t give them any points, but I still thought I’d mention it.)

One of the biggest reasons that Lila doesn’t work as the antagonist she should be is because she isn’t clever enough. Her lies are often not thought through and are only believed because everyone has been dumbed down due to the narrative wanting them to obey her every command to make Marinette progressively more upset.

And it’s honestly hard for me to see the characters acting like this even when I know that it’s not in-character. If it was just acting kind to someone, then sure, whatever, they can be dumb, but not when it comes at the expense of their relationship with Marinette.

It’s hard because these scenes still exist. Whether it’s attempted to be written off as a joke or not, I’ll still have to watch future episodes and see these characters interacting with Marinette with the knowledge that she nearly got akumatized because they abandoned her in her time of need and they never apologized for it, at least not here.

The jokes don’t even work most of the time because they’re centered around how much Lila is fooling everyone, which shouldn’t be joked about because people don’t want to see jokes being cracked about something they hate happening when they’re already frustrated by it!

Alya and Nino just make everything worse. Their presence in this episode does nothing but show how badly this episode is trying to make you ignore what’s happening to Marinette (and partly Adrien).

Let’s start with Alya, Marinette’s supposed best friend. Now, she was already on thin ice when it came to the Lila situation considering what she said in Catalyst, but she’s even more blatant here with how little she knows Marinette.

It takes until the cafeteria scene for Alya to ask Marinette what’s bothering her. Except, she doesn’t phrase it that way. She presumes that Marinette barely knows Lila despite having no evidence of that. In fact, she has evidence to show the exact opposite; that something bad happened and Alya should be wary of Lila because Marinette is wary of her.

And then Alya has the gall - the GALL - to ask if Marinette has proof that Lila doesn’t know Ladybug, because “a good reporter always verifies their sources.”

Says the reporter who was so sure that Ladybug owned the history book she dropped instead of wondering if she might be giving it back to someone.

Says the reporter who was so positive that Chloe was Ladybug when talking to Nino, based on little more than Chloe having a Ladybug outfit that probably tons of people in Paris do because they’re likely a popular costume in stores.

Says the reporter who posted a video, on her Ladyblog, of Lila claiming that she was friends with Ladybug, despite having no proof, no evidence, and not verifying that claim with Ladybug herself.

Give me a break. Even if Alya has just “improved since then,” that doesn’t excuse the fact that Marinette should be a trusted source and that Alya should realize her own contradiction because they’re talking about Lila in the first place.

If Marinette needs proof that Lila’s not friends with Ladybug, then where’s Alya’s proof that Lila is? Because Lila knows other celebrities? There’s a lot of famous people who Ladybug has saved but isn’t friends with (ex: Jagged Stone, XY), so what makes Lila so special? Besides, Marinette knows famous people too. Even disregarding that, Alya is basically telling Marinette, “You’re my best friend, but I also believe Lila over you because Lila is more special than you are.”

Marinette is not doing this out of jealousy; we’ve established this already in Frozer, which Alya was there for when Marinette was okay with Adrien dating someone else. Marinette would only be upset by Lila if she had a reason to be. Alya needs to stop minimizing Marinette’s problems by boiling them down to jealousy based on information she doesn’t have.

I just can’t even imagine how hurtful that is to Marinette. Her own best friend doesn’t believe her and doesn’t even have Marinette’s motive right.

Oh, and then Nino fixates on the fact that Marinette eavesdropped on Lila and Adrien instead of the fact that Lila lies constantly.

You know, Nino, who watched Marinette from a distance due to his crush in Animan. Is that a tiny offense? Absolutely (even Marinette has watched Adrien), but my point is, nobody has their hands clean.

Marinette stated right up front that Lila felt off to her, which should’ve implied that Lila could’ve been already akumatized and thus Marinette had every right to follow her to make sure so no one else would fall under her trap, but Nino presumes the worst of her and instead chastizes her for eavesdropping on Lila and Adrien.

We talked about it in the last segment, but Nino did nothing when Lila was getting in Adrien’s personal space. Nino, at least in this episode, is much more interested in criticizing Marinette’s behavior than actually doing anything about Lila’s.

And of course, the narrative neglects Marinette mentioning that Ladybug showed up to yell at Lila or that she saw Lila steal the book because they need to make it look like Marinette has no evidence whatsoever. It’s not like mentioning the book would be a big deal, because Nino knew in The Collector that Adrien had lost Gabriel’s book. All it’d take is, “I saw Lila steal Adrien’s book so she could get information to lie to him with. She threw it in the garbage when Adrien came by and then I returned it to Gabriel the next day because I didn’t know how to give it back to Adrien without looking bad.”

Then all it takes is asking Adrien and Adrien would probably admit, “Yeah, I remember last having the book with Lila.”

But no. Not even Alya and Nino can be on Marinette’s side. Marinette has to struggle alone because I guess they needed a hook for this episode and it’s “could Marinette get akumatized???”

If their story was actually of value, they wouldn’t need to set up a fake hook for a trailer. The story should be able to stand on its own without needing to set up something exciting that won’t actually happen.

Which brings us to talking about Lila.

[Freaking Lila]

Lila is a good character in concept. I love the idea of her as a foil to Marinette; Marinette hates liars but gets what she wants through hard work and effort, whereas Lila lies all the time and gets what she wants through no work at all and tons of emotional manipulation.

But there’s just not enough care put into her lies. When we see Lila, the reaction we should have is to think about how amazing she is at lying and how understandable it is that everyone is falling for it.

Instead, I feel incredibly annoyed at the fact that Lila is going around spouting nonsense that no one but Marinette ever tries to check out. It’s ridiculous.

And Chloe is completely left out of this equation; the only other person aside from Marinette who has real connections that’d be able to out Lila. Chloe gets nothing of value in the entire episode. Her and Sabrina just stay right in their original seats and do so little that you’d be forgiven for thinking that they were just copy-pasted from some other episode because the script writers forgot to include them.

Chloe also does nothing about Lila stroking Adrien, because the show still cannot decide if they’re friends and if Chloe has a crush on Adrien. Actual chances at showing what it’d be like if Chloe put her talents towards something good are thrown out the window because they needed all that run time to have Marinette be miserable.

Lila is also very annoying as Chameleon. I liked that she just grabbed the akuma to show just how antagonistic she is, but she acts really obnoxious as Adrien.

To a degree, I get that. She was mad at Adrien, so of course it makes sense for her to make him look like a fool.

BUT, if she’s supposed to be such a master manipulator, why not act similarly to Adrien but just with a meaner streak?

They could’ve done another twist here as well. Instead of showing Lila taking Adrien’s form, why not cut right to Adrien (but actually Lila) making fun of Nino and then taking his cap, but with a tone that’s much more convincing of Adrien? Heck, Lila doesn’t even bother using Adrien’s form to go mess with Marinette; she just goes for Nino and then starts jumping around like a lunatic.

And sure, it was funny to see her get turned into a clam and promptly destroyed (Ladybug had a pun about anemones that made me laugh way too hard), but what did she actually do as Chameleon? She ran around like an idiot, knocked Chat out with the kiss (as if parts of the fandom weren’t already tired enough of that; also, there were probably at least three different things Chat could’ve done to stop that kiss without throwing himself in the middle of it), and then makes people upset for stuff that Miraculous Ladybug fixes anyway.

She does less as an akuma than she does as a person. That’s not how akuma should work.

Though, I guess it’s hard to top what she did as a person considering Adrien’s role in the plot.

[Adrien the Doormat]

Lately, Adrien has garnered a certain… reputation. It started with little things in Season 1, but by the end of Season 2, those little things weren’t so little anymore and were becoming harder and harder to defend.

That brings us to here, where Adrien joins everyone else in the “not defending Marinette” club, but it’s worse because he’s aware that Lila is a liar. Yeah, he tries to passively get her to stop lying, but Marinette is who he should be worried about.

And yet, by the end, he tells her not to do anything. I would like to think that he was trying to say that Lila’s lies would eventually catch her in the act, but that was one of the worst ways to word it.

Firstly, she’s presumably been lying all her life. Everyone’s fallen for her ruse. She’ll have to make a crucial mistake to even make a single person wary of her.

Secondly, this passivity of Adrien has been a recurring problem thoughout at least Season 2. His friends might not be suffering exactly, but Lila’s making them look like fools and he’s just letting her go on unabated. Just imagine what the classmates’ reactions would if they learned that Adrien knew that Lila was lying the whole time and did nothing while they obeyed her every need (though this will very likely go unaddressed and no one will know that Adrien knows except Marinette). At his current levels of passiveness, I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if Lila starts being physical with him again in future episodes and he continues to do nothing about it.

Thirdly, yes actually, exposing Lila will make things better. It’ll keep everyone else in check so they’re not constantly falling at Lila’s feet. Adrien’s only thinking about Lila and (presumably) the fact that she has the potential to become akumatized again. He has yet to learn that some people just have to be put into place, even if it means fighting an akuma afterward.

Fourthly, making a bad guy suffer has turned them into a good guy. That was literally Chloe in Despair Bear and Malediktator. It was when the niceness was brought back and boundaries stopped being set that she returned to her old ways. So, no, sometimes being punished is absolutely necessary and Lila hurting more is an inevitability.

Fifthly and most importantly, this scene deprives Marinette of all the agency she has, putting Adrien on a moral high ground yet again. I understand where Adrien is coming from - that he and Marinette know the truth and can talk about it so neither have to be miserable over Lila - but he clearly hasn’t thought this through. They basically just got back from an akuma attack and he’s only focused on preventing Lila from being akumatized again.

Adrien could’ve even argued that Lila would just lie her way around Marinette calling her out, but he doesn’t say that. It makes it seem like he’s not at all concerned about how Marinette comes out of this and is just trying to make her feel better about doing absolutely nothing to solve her problems. I get that he already tried to help Lila and it didn’t work, which might also be why he’s taking the passive route, but again, that’s not what he says!

Adrien isn’t suffering from this like Marinette is. Marinette is close to a majority of the class and was miserable because no one stood up for her or believed her. Adrien is close to Nino, sure, but really, how many times have they even had passing conversation in the entirety of Season 2? It isn’t much!

We’ve done this before in other episodes. Marinette isn’t allowed to do virtually anything anymore without someone getting on her case for it, even if she’s in the right.

It’s damaging, to both her character and the narrative.

[Back in the Classroom - Go with the Quo]

I appreciate that Adrien sat down with Marinette instead of Lila, but what Adrien says about taking the high road simply isn’t true. This isn’t the high road; this is complacency in a bad situation. Sometimes, taking the high road actually requires a detour. Doing the thing that’s “morally right” can mean accepting that some morally wrong things may have to be done to uphold that rightness.

And, of course, we get no apology. There’s no apology for Marinette’s hurt feelings. Alya returns to sitting next to Marinette, even going so far as to ask teasingly if Marinette really thought that Alya would let her sit by herself.

An insult to the audience’s intelligence, if not their memory, given the fact that it’s literally what Alya did at the very start of the episode.

Lila also (expectedly) continues to lie, and while I’m thankful that Adrien isn’t the least bit pleased by her sitting next to him, I’ll hold my judgment until the next time they have a scene together.

Also, everyone wanting to change seats out of nowhere despite having no established reason is incredibly weird, considering it’s Ivan who started the massive change and he’s sitting next to Mylene. Sure, Marinette thought about getting distracted by Adrien, but after Ivan and Mylene have been in an established relationship for so long, I’d think they’d have more self-control! Nathaniel, I get, because he can draw behind Ivan without being seen by the teacher, but everyone else makes little to no sense to me.

Not only that, but… it’s Season 3. We’ve been deprived of Adrienette development so many times, and when we’re finally given a scene where Adrien and Marinette are simply sitting together in class, we’re deprived of it. It’s like what I thought of Frozer; does such a small piece of development really take the ship so far that it needs to be immediately taken away from us?

This means that, for the third time in this episode, we’re presented with an idea that’s way better than what they end up doing. We already saw Marinette trailing off about being distracted by Adrien, so seeing it again just tests the patience of the Adrienette shippers who were hoping for them to stay sitting together.

[In Front of the School - Dragged By a Marinette]

I will give this episode one thing in that the scene at the end with Lila isn’t bad. The moments where Lila and Marinette are alone are miles better than almost any other scene in this entire episode. (I’d complain about the fact that Tikki isn’t angry over Lila and doesn’t validate Marinette’s feelings, but I feel like I’ve been through this song and dance before. Also, Tikki tries at least, even if for a moment.)

And yet, when Marinette tells Lila off with such a simple phrase, I don’t feel all the emotions I know that the episode is trying to make me feel.

I feel satisfied that Lila was annoyed by the end of the episode - it wasn’t nearly enough but it was SOMETHING - yet I don’t feel confident alongside Marinette.

There’s this confidence from Marinette that everything will be okay; that it’ll all be fine because she believes in her friends and that Adrien is on her side.

But I don’t think I believe that. I don’t buy that; not with the passive Adrien we saw here and not with the way Marinette’s “friends” treated her. Instead of feeling confident, I feel a growing sense of dread that things could just get worse from here. I don’t know how, but if the class treats Marinette in the future with the same dismissiveness that they did here, I can only feel afraid that Marinette is going to get all that confidence sucked away.

It’s not a pleasant feeling.

[Did Anyone Ask For This?]

I see what this episode wanted to be. I see what it wanted to do. It wanted to re-introduce Lila and (presumably) set her up as a recurring antagonist for this season. It wanted to have this dramatic scenario where everyone turns against her and both her and Adrien are the odd ones out.

It just asks for too much. To enjoy the episode wholly and completely, it wants you to buy so many things it’s throwing at you: Lila’s lies, Marinette being trashed for the upteenth time, and a terrible lesson for the character it’s being centered around.

And what’s the alternative to the out-of-character behavior? That these characters actually are so stupid and disloyal to Marinette that they’d actually do these things? It won’t get rid of the bad taste in my mouth either way, but I’d much rather believe that this is just terrible foresight at play than actual character assassination!

And… sure. Maybe sometime far in the future (probably near the end of Season 3), Lila will finally be revealed as the liar she is and they MIGHT apologize to Marinette. However, I say ‘might’ because Marinette has been told not to do anything about Lila, so it’s entirely possible that Marinette will just be like “finally” to herself but no one will apologize to her because they’ll conveniently forget about what happened here.

Even if they do apologize though - even if Adrien is actually in the wrong and they plan on addressing that - it’ll be too little too late. As a standalone episode, this is terrible. This episode makes me want Lila to get her comeupance, and while the ending at least has her get annoyed, it’s not enough considering that 80% of the episode was dedicated to Marinette’s misery and Lila being irritating. We’re supposed to feel satisfied by the end of each episode, but I’m instead left with an empty feeling in my gut.

This is where the thing I told you to remember - how Marinette is shoved to the back so no one sees the akuma - needs to be brought back. When the episode shoves Marinette to the back seat… when no one hears Lila’s threat to Marinette and it never comes up again… when Adrien tells her not to act… and when Marinette receives no apology for everything that’s happened… it’s giving a very clear message.

It’s saying that Marinette’s feelings don’t matter. That, no matter what, Marinette must take the high road regardless of what she feels. She’s the superheroine, so she has to always been perfect and always be a role model. Anything else is disgraceful.

Revealing Marinette’s misery to anyone means making everyone else look bad, so Marinette has to suffer alone, with Tikki comforting her only so she doesn’t get akumatized. Everyone else looks in the right because they don’t know everything and Marinette is just left there with her feelings hanging in the air.

That’s why the teaser alone caused people to freak out. We’ve been shown this multiple times before and this was just the final nail in the coffin.

It’s fair to say that Marinette should be angry with her friends. I wouldn’t blame anyone for being upset that Marinette was centering all her hate onto Lila.

But… at the same time, if we’re looking at it from a realistic point of view, I can see why she does it.

It’s a coping mechanism.

Almost all of Marinette’s friends are in that class. If she loses them, she only has a few left.

It’s easier to blame Lila. It’s easier to pretend that her friends aren’t betraying her and that it’s all Lila’s fault.

Lila is a single target that she feels she can deal with. To Marinette, taking care of Lila’s lies means that everything goes back to the way it was before.

Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Her friends still need to apologize and promise not to repeat these mistakes in the future. Without it, their friendship is meaningless.

But that’s just how Marinette works. She’ll let it slide. She’ll let herself take the fall because that’s what she does. She’s been conditioned by episode upon episode to let people like Lila go around unchecked and feel better about themself just to keep akuma from happening even if it’d be more beneficial to do otherwise.

As long as it keeps the peace and lets Marinette keep her friends, she’ll do whatever passive thing she’s told to do.

Because, remember: at least in episodes like these, Marinette’s feelings don’t matter…

[seddm]

What would've been you're absolute ideal S4 for you? I'm talking purely subjective. What direction would YOU have liked the show to go in these with 21 episodes. Lets say you were fully in charge & you didn't have any creative restrictions (like for example you don't have to worry about them being a couple in Knight Shift & having them basically they want to smooch & be together forever despite TVY7). Curious how much you'd change for just your subjective enjoyment. I like you longer posts =p

Well none of this would have been doable in canon since a TV-Y7 Disney show is never going to put such a focus on a relationship or have two 15 years old characters talk about their future with such heavy emphasis on “us”, but if we’re just going for “dream scenario even if unrealistic”: have Tomstar end in Lake House Fever as a direct consequence of S3 not because “silly teens argue over a kiss”, but because the events that lead to the kiss bring both Star and Tom to reflect about their relationship; have Star be slightly unsure about what to do until Curse of the Blood Moon, have the episode be a chance to establish that Tom is 100% ok with their break up now while going for a plot that’s something like “Star and Marco fear the Curse might have forced their feelings but during the episode itself they realize that’s not the case and they get together as a couple”, have Starco grow slowly throughout the season, not being immediately “I love you” but “we know we like each other and care immensely for each other but we’re also worried this change in our relationship might ruin something”, with episodes like The Knight Shift and Beach Day addressing the same topics as they did in the actual season, thus helping Star and Marco realize how much commitment they feel for each other and how much they are the key to their respective happiness, thus leading them to be comfortable with being lovers and fully embrace their love as a potentially lifelong relationship near the end. Tom goes more or less through the same steps as he did in Junkin’ Janna and A Boy and His DC-700XE but without it being directly connected to Tomstar, thus closing his character arc and making him fully able to pursue his own happiness.

I don’t want to get too in depth with the plot, but I’d have liked for all the red flags about Eclipsa being a good person but a terrible ruler to have bigger effects, with the show still ending with Star free to do whatever she wants with her life because that’s important to the show’s themes and to her being able to enjoy being a teen for a bit longer, exploring and discovering life with Marco, but also make her connection with “Star is important for Mewni” slightly stronger. Maybe have Moon’s arc be different, lead her to understand Star’s point of view better, instead of just accepting it, and have Eclipsa and Moon be rulers for Mewni, the former being the face of change and the latter being an experienced and efficient queen, with Star not having any official role (yet), but still being considered essentially as and adviser, someone who has both the ideals and the drive and who truly understands what current Mewni is like (with strong emphasis on the “next generation” concept from Cornball!).