#(i see ladybug as a huge role model for most of the characters in mlb hence why they didnt want to disapoint her)

[sillyangstfic]

I love the Chloe Nino friendship dynamic bec they’re both very socially intelligent

Nino is very perceptive but also very laid back. He won’t interrogate you if you’re up to something, but he definitely knows

Chloe is very observant and has no chill. She can and will demand answers, eavesdrop, and stalk you on your secret social medias

I consider them both gossips tbh, and putting them together, good luck getting anything by them

[miraculousfanworks]

How To Analyze a Character

Have you ever been reading a fic and found the character is not recognizable that causes you to say “I don’t know who that is in that Marinette suit but that’s not Marinette.”

Or when you’re writing there’s that one character you need and you just can’t get inside their head to save your life. 

This essay is going to delve into how to analyze characters and how they work in stories. It will help you both articulate why you do or don’t like a particular character or their interpretation, and help you in your own writing of that character.

Characters, as well as other elements of a narrative, can be broken down into collections of  recognizable elements often called “tropes.” (For the comprehensive taxonomy see tvtropes.org.) These commonly recurring literary and rhetorical devices, motifs or clichés can be combined in unique ways. They exist as recognizable and namable concepts because the same patterns are used over and over again in the creation of stories. We can use named tropes to describe what we are seeing in one story and relate it to other instances of the same phenomenon. 

The advantage of recognizing the tropes that describe a character means that we can import into our understanding of them all of the other instances of that trope we have come across, and then compare and contrast these characters. 

For example, both Chloé and Adrien exhibit the “Well Done, Daughter/Son!” Girl/Guy trope, desperately seeking the approval of a distant and withholding parent. (Faramir in the Lord of The Rings and Shinji Ikari in Neon Genesis Evangelion are also prime examples.) Knowing that they are both participants in this kind of relationship we can see how it plays out differently. 

Gabriel seems like a deliberate ass, but occasionally manifests approval as when he played the duet with Adrien before sending him off to  the Kitty Section concert in Capitan Hardrock.  Audrey is entirely un-reflexive in her horribleness, dismissive rather than demanding and only ever recognizes Chloé’s worst feature as admirable. Kagami is also a “well done daughter!” girl and it informs how she relates to Adrein, Chloé, Marinette and Ladybug, providing both for character connection and thematic contrast.

On the production side, tropes can be used deliberately to construct a character to achieve a particular purpose. Adrien was created using the standard tropes of the fairy tale princesses beauty, musical talent, kindness to all creatures (even Chloe), kept looked up by an unloving parental figure. By creating a stereotypical Disney princess but swapping the gender it causes us to think harder about the assumptions we make about Princesses.

Symbols work the same way. We use symbolic images and language in media because it allows us to reference all the other ways and places that symbol is used. It becomes a shorthand for much bigger units of meaning. Pure originality would be completely unintelligible.

For example, Marinette displays two flower motifs on a regular basis. One is the cherry blossom spray across her shirt. Commonly this is associated with both love and passion, as well as purity and transitory beauty. In China, the last three are more closely associated with the Plum blossoms that decorate her purse, chair, and diary. Along with the additional significance of  perseverance and hope, we can see that her dreams for the future, however heard she works for them, may not turn out as she plans. 

The cherry blossom, in China, is a symbol of passion, strength, and feminine power and sexuality. As Marinette has this symbol peeking out from behind her jaket on the left side of her shirt, it represents how her civilian persona hasn’t fully come into the power she displays as Ladybug. Adrien’s kwami was chosen to be a Black Cat specifically to call up all our associations with them and bad luck as a counterpoint to Ladybug and her Lucky Charm.

Pikachu, I Choose You!: Artistic Decisions

You would think this wouldn’t need to be said but remember, remember, remember: these fictional characters are not real people. Why does that matter? Because everything you see on the screen or on the page is the result of a choice made by the writer or artist. 

Images and dialogue may be selected deliberately, thoughtfully, thematically, instinctually, carelessly, haphazardly, or stupidly, but they are there because the authors and illustrators and creators selected them to be there. 

Remember that the characters only exist to serve the story and everything about them ideally should serve to move the story toward its conclusion.

This is especially pertinent in an animated–and especially a computer animated–show because everything has to be made specifically for the show and they are expensive to make(MLB costs ~$460,000 an episode). That’s why you get only one outfit for most of the characters, except when absolutely necessary.

Saving their production budget for other things is  why Theo Barbot has all of the odd jobs in Paris, there seems to be only one cop, Sabrina’s dad, and Alec and Nadja are the only people on TV. If you take a look in Bubbler, the first episode aired in the US, you can see that the school, the bakery, the hotel, and the Agreste Manor are all within one block of each other.

CallMeDale posted this to the Miraculous Fanworks Discord. Source unknown. Image originally from Bubbler.

What this production cost means for analyzing a character (or anything else) is that everything we see in a visual medium is important. Everything about a character has been picked for some reason. How they look, how they move–even how they stand says something about who they are as a person, who they are in their relationships, and who they are as an element of the story.

I did a fairly comprehensive essay on Chloé as a character so I want to walk through some of the things I looked at in order to write it.  

Character at First Sight: 

First impressions are vital. Because Marinette is picked to be our eyes as the OP starts (“In the daytime I’m Marinette,”) we know she is supposed to be our heroine and point of view.  Everything that happens after that is to be judged in relation to her. The first time we see Chloé in the show is a whole 5 seconds into the opening, when she and Sabrina walk past a face-planted Marinette. Immediately afterwards, Chloé runs back in to glomp Adrien and push Marinette out of the way. 

From these few brief seconds we know that she is both rich and domineering, Sabrina is walking just behind her with a huge designer purse and bookbag, obviously in a subservient role. Chloé laughs at Marinette, which establishes her as an antagonist to the Heroine. Chloé pushing Marinette out of fram when she comes back shows that she exists in part to block our Heroine from Adrien, our Hero, whose expression shows he really doesn’t appreciate the attention.  

Not even three seconds of screen time and we already know who Chloé is in relation to three people: Marinette, Adrien, and Sabrina.

How much time a character gets in the beginning of a story also sets up how much brainspace  we allocate them and our expectation of their importance. This is one reason I prefer Bubbler as the “first episode’’ (US viewing order) over Stormy Weather (South Korean/International Viewing order). Stormy Weather spends the first few minutes on Aurore, Mirielle, and Alex before getting to  Mari, Tikki, Manon, Alya, and Adrien. Bubbler in the same first minute sets up Marinette, her parents, Adrien, Alya, Chloé, and Nino and all their relationships.

By choosing your descriptions carefully you can get the reader to think of other things without directly mentioning them. Ladybug’s costume, mode of travel and name all callback to Spiderman (she even does the upside down hang in Dark Cupid), and even though the iconic phrase “with great power comes great responsibility,” is never stated its influence is felt in the persistent characterization of Ladybug as ‘all business’ in fic, even though she is more playful in canon. Master Fu is modeled after classic inscrutable mentor Mr. Miyagi from the original Karate Kid movies, it gives him an air of perhaps more wisdom and knowledge than he actually possesses.

Come on Let’s Vogue: How the Look of a Character Informs Us

Now let’s look at what we get from the elements selected for Chloe’s character design. Slender, pale, almost-white blonde hair, sunglasses on the top of her head, lots of blue eyeshadow, yellow jacket over a black and white striped shirt, white capris and black and white flats. All of this says she is the top of the social heap at her school. Combined with her glomping and trying to kiss Adrien and we can guess she is–or at least wants to be seen as–romantically “experienced”. Yellow is a happy color, it’s what makes a printed picture look bright. Often, though not always, it is associated with success and general goodness (i.e. a heart of gold) so she is initially portrayed as a person who doesn’t have any cares. White jeans and shoes point to both her status as someone who doesn’t have to work and a certain level of naivete. 

But she also has this very gothy studded belt around her hips. It is very obviously not holding up her pants. This hints at the darker emotions and experiences at her core. The black and white stripes of her undershirt hint at the way she is held prisoner by her past. 

Because we have been set up to see Chloé as the spoiled,rich bitch with everything she could want, when the facade cracks and we see just how awful her mother is it hits all the harder for us. Chloé’s invulnerable image is destroyed.

“What’s in a Name?”: Tagging as Character creation

Names are also a good starting place for getting into a character. 

Bourgeois comes layered with the connotations of wealth, but not too much, and shallow conformity. Chloé is derived from the Greek Khlóe, or ‘young green shoot’ (of a plant), which can also be interpreted as meaning 'blooming.’ Khlóe is an epithet, or nickname, for Demeter in her aspect of the Lady of Summer. We know the writers know and are thinking of these meanings because of these lines in Sandboy.

Nightmare Adrien: Marinette, for your birthday, I’m going to buy you flowers—

…

Nightmare Adrien: —hortensias, roses and Chloés. (Marinette shrieks)

Not only does her name sound like that of a Homecoming Queen/Cheerleader/trust fund baby, but it also indicates she is immature but with potential to become something more.

Queen Bee is also laden with meaning as it is a term used to describe girls in their teens who are at the top of their social pecking order (see Queen Bees & WannaBes). It perfectly describes bothe how Chloé acts but also how she perceives herself.

The Things You Do to Me: Character Action

Characters in a story are what they do and more importantly why they do what they do. If Marinette becomes Ladybug for the first time because someone needs saving (first Ivan, then Alya), and Adrien becomes Chat Noir in order to escape the gilded cage that is his house, Chloé dons the Bee miraculous in a desperate (and unsuccessful) bid to catch her mother’s attention. 

Attention seeking is part of every subsequent time that her hero persona appears in the story. Consider the implications of the fact that the signal on her roof is a Bee signal, not a Ladybug signal. The gestursal tic she has of always examining her nails, often with the other arm folded over her chest, is a visual shorthand for both her self-absorption and that her unpleasant personality is a defence mechanism. 

Dialogue clues are also important, especially things that come up more than once. Chloé’s persistent lack of remembrance of the Concierge’s name (Jean-whatever) shows her to be dismissive of the people she believes to be “beneath her” which becomes horribly ironic when we find out her mother doesn’t seem to remember her name. That Marinette is always  Dunain-Cheng, emphasizing her parents status as tradesman and that Marinette is not pure French operates as a persistent put down.

Chloé is a Hero with an F in Good, primed by the writers for the Face–Heel Turn which happens in Miracle Queen. They telegraph this event by the choice to echo her “once a monster always a monster,” line from Stoneheart, in the S3 midseason Stormy Weather 2. There she mocks Aurore with “once a villain always a villain.” Highly ironic given the number of times Chloé has been akumatized and prompted it in others. Her bad heroing serves to show that actions and motives are not always aligned and to highlight the selflessness of the other heroes. 

A great example of showing character through dialogue is Nino’s conversation with Gabriel in Bubbler. Nino was given a very distinctive, persistent, and casual speech pattern (“dude” in English), It’s so distinctive that Alya immediately recognizes that he is Carapace. The fact that he makes an effort to suppress it when he is trying to persuade Gabriel to let Adrien have a birthday party shows how much he cares about giving Adrien this gift. It’s part of what establishes him in our minds as such a great friend for Adrien (King of Bros!). Giving characters individualized vocabularies and speech patterns is one of the best ways to help distinguish them in both your, and the reader’s mind.

All Together Now!

As you read and experience more stories, you will recognize more and more common elements across the characters, places, events and ideas that make up the stories you read. As you recognize these building blocks, and how they can be combined and manipulated, they will help you understand better why certain characters do what they do in the story. You can then deliberately select them as you create your own stories to highlight desired themes, set up conflicts or call cultural resonances to your readers’ minds.  Remember what you write is a conversation between you, your reader, and the world around you. The more of the world you can bring into your writing the deeper it will impact your readers.