#I dont know characterization

[taitavva]

yaldabaoth couldn't help but make his whole team overpowered huh ... how are the phantom thieves supposed to survive ?? "oh noo akechi ur so hot haha .. please don't kill me" brilliant strategy pego (entire ask under cut)

[ACTUALLY UR PUTFITS WERE SO ON POINT. I HAVE 2 OUTFIT IDEAS 4 HIFUMI & SHIHO (MINUS MASKS) & 1 mask idea for yuuki but idk what else. i was thinking for the leaders it would def be chaotic but goro has most metaverse experience so hes the leader. ken kinda acts like mona in giving useful tips abt personas etc and hifumi takes on the role of makoto where she gives out different strategies (her, ken, & goro debate over these tips & strategies but usually end up doing them anyway). I have an urge to show u these outfits omg. i can ramble abt these outfits & their personas for forever .. i chose jormungandr for yuuki, skadi for shiho hela for hifumi, and persephone for eiko. ik its not very in the literacy scene for them to all have deities as personas but... goro breaks it with loki anyway, so ..

explainations:: hela & jormungandr are 2/6 of loki's kids in norse mythology, aiding him in the ragnarok/end of the world, and hela is sentenced down to the underworld to be the goddess of that realm since she was born half alive half dead, and she's sentenced to it by odin (basically. kinda the zeus of norse mythology, like the "king" of all of them) because she's the daughter of loki & all this other stuff .. chose her for hifumi because hifumi's mom basically forces her to be a shoji star after hifumi's dad and yeah. jormungandr i chose because hes kinda just a sleepy little guy: in norse mythology he's known as "the World Serpent" and he wraps around the entire ocean with his tail in his mouth kind of in a constant sleep until the ragnarok (all of loki's kids --aside from 2, one being dead & the other being a gift to odin-- including loki himself, are kinda trapped somewhere before the ragnarok happens) and he's not talked about a lot but he aids in so much and he's important (like how yuuki is kind of ignored by the pts, the dialogue options being horrid, despite him aiding in them. also yuuki is the bm's navi in the au & he runs a "revenge site" like how Strega/takaya sakaki, jin shirato, & chidori yoshino do in p3-- strega also does death calling cards , mainly shown in the novels which is p cool.. first ppl to use mental shutdowns despite not beinf called that then either. i love strega sorry. they all agreed to it because shiho wanted to deal with more people like kamoshida, goro wanted to deal with more people like shido, hifumi wanted to deal w more people like her mom, etc).. i chose persephone for eiko because in greek mythology, persephone is (most commonly accepted form of the myth) kidnapped by hades and forced into marriage with him by eating a pomegranate out of the underworld .. point blank, persephone reminds me of eiko being trapped and persephone's shown to overcome it , ( honestly eventually making the underworld & hades her Bitch. she kills the goddess/nymph of mints and creates the mint plant because she got too handsy with hades).. also hifumi and eiko are a little gay for eachother so why not have their personas be, too? anyway. SHIHO!! i chose skadi for her because skadi , in norse mythology , is both jotunn (giant) and a god like how loki is, but she's an accepted form of it because she was given over to the gods as a peace treaty, and thats pretty important to norse mythology i'd say (like how rooftop scene is important to kamoshida arc), and skadi claws up the aesir (council of gods) thru both her marriage (ann? ann. hehe.) and her own sheer will (shiho's recovery and goro's ..... questionable aid.) and skadi just fits. the goddess of mountains and winter? sign me the FUCK UP.

Anyway . this was long I apologise]

[meruz]

i had. so many of these drawings lying around and i thought i would just like rearrange them but instead i ended up slapping together like 3 random battle nexus bgs IDK

of course this is heavily just borrowing @the-trashiest-pada's rise stuff...!

[mamayura]

Adrien not knowing what he wants

Hot take about Werepapas, I guess:

I actually like that Adrien said "I don't know" when asked what he wants/ who he wants to go with at the end of "Werepapas"

Cause the people who had to learn and come around in this episode's conflict were the ADULTS, not Adrien.

Adrien has already said that he isn't alone, he's living with Nathalie,

and Milly, too, acknowledged right away that Adrien has known her for most of his life so for Adrien she should count as more much than just an employee by now.

And he has not been trying to hide it whatsoever from Nathalie how much she means to him and that he wants to keep living with her. Literally the first thing we see in the episode's present time is Adrien running to Nathalie for comfort when hes crying over his dead mom, but she's pulling back so he does too eventually.

Marinette as pretty much unrelated main character doesnt know about this when she enters the conflict. Hence why she can effectively bring about development in Nathalie by challenging her long-established mind set and dynamic with Adrien due to Marinette's perspective adding a new angle and shacking things up:

Nathalie's inner conflict is one of my favourite things about the episode (and needs its own post if I get around to it), but for the context of this post, yes, she was the one who needed to come around. Not Adrien. He was already there from the get-go as we can see by him repeating the hug he started the episode with. Just now, Nathalie hugged back:

It was nice seeing Marinette help Nathalie take on her role in the end because Nathalie did the same thing Marinette did in Illustrhater for example. Acting like and saying things that eventually made Adrien accept that they don't want to be with him because, duh, that's now interactions work.

That's why he initially didn't say that he wants to stay with Nathalie in Paris when asked in the end. Nathalie too made him feel like he has to accept that that won't be an option, so he knew he had to decide between his grandparents:

The same Grandparents who had to come around in the end, too, and allow for Adrien to stay with Nathalie in Paris, even though both pairs of Grandparents are still the ones to officially hold the legal custody of Adrien (which I'm glad about that they did it like this and didn't bullshit some reason for Nathalie to get custody cause the episode is right, Nathalie has NO right to Adrien's custody whatsoever. They went with a very reasonable way to resolve this)

Its the ADULTS who had to come around. Not Adrien. Adrien already made it clear all episode what he wanted. But because all involved adults declared the outcome he wanted as a non-option, well, he honestly says that he doesn't know what else he wants (who he wants to go with).

And I- I just really like that Adrien was taking the situation serious enough to say "I don't know". That was very mature of him. To not just go with SOMETHING or go on about how unfair the situation is. Cause it definitely was, but this is a very serious legal matter that COULDN'T stay unresolved. He's an orphaned minor currently living alone with a person who's said to neither be an option as his guardian nor does she herself treat it like an option. This day COULDN'T end without at least some kind of temporary solution where he would stay now. It just couldn't.

I LIKE that he didn't repeat his denied desire that was already known to everyone around and instead seriously thought about the options he had.

I like that he loves and respects Nathalie enough to be the one person amongst Emilie, Gabriel, and now Marinette, too, who left the decision to HER if she wants to take on the position of his new mother:

As much as he wants to be with her, Adrien was characterized to understand that this is a massive thing to ask of Nathalie. He knows he means alot to her too but Nathalie was, by all accounts, objectively forced into this:

But especially by Emilie (look, I know she was literally dying slowly and painfully, I'm not judging her for wanting Adrien to be loved and taken care of. But I gotta ackowlegde that Emilie put alot on Nathalie without giving her a choice first):

In that regard I can't fault Nathalie for not having acted on her motherly feelings for Adrien and Emilie's last wish earlier than s5 (but God DAMN Nathalie, there is a difference between not doing it and actively making everything so much fucking worse!).

Adrien is the one person in this who respected how much was asked of Nathalie, so when she continuously acted like she didn't wanted to take on the role, he respected that. But this also means that the person who's responsible for Adrien coming to this "wrong" conclusion was Nathalie. Not Adrien. He's only acting accordingly to her actions and words:

So I like that Marinette got to help her in the end, because this is passive development that's very relevant to Marinette's character too. Even if I wished the show would hold Marinette to the same standards since both in Adrinette and especially Ladynoir Adrien gets mostly blamed for coming to the logical conclusions that Maribug doesn't like him or being with him in any way doesn't mean much to her because that's how she constantly acts like in almost every conflict ever. Over and over again. So I like that it was done properly this time around even if it's obvious that that was only possible because it was Nathalie and not Marinette.

And yes, I totally get not liking that Marinette is taking over the whole moment again. I'm not much of a fan of it either, to put it nicely. But it is wrong to say that Marinette is the one making the decision here and Adrien had no agency in deciding who he's staying with. Marinette is merely repeating old news she knows are true because that's what Adrien has been saying and acting like the whole episode and even already since season 5.

The decision was long made by Adrien. It were the adults who had to come around.

And beyond that,

I LIKE that Adrien said "I don't know" to the question which grandparents he wants to go with instead of the show having him make it all about his friends, girlfriend, or Ladybug. He only brings that up when he gets to stay:

Cause the question of where he would feel more at home and what is best for his future, when he has to completely start anew, is not just about his current friends, girlfriend, or his secret hero partner (who has made every precaution and decision possible to not actually have or need him in her life and job and he was made to accept that fully because that's her "rightful professionalism" same as killing your bf Ig)

I like that it was "I don't know" instead of "but my friends!", "but my girlfriend!", or "but I can't leave!".

Adrien saying "I don't know" means he thought of himself first and foremost and not everyone else:

I even like that "I don't know" means that he took the Graham de Vanilys into consideration despite how awful Emil was. Cause when the outcome Adrien WANTED (keeping his life in Paris by living with Nathalie) isn't an option, then he's perfectly in his right to not write off the possibilities he has with the Graham de Vanilys in London (and good heavens, I'm glad nothing ever brought up "but Chloé is in London! YIKES!").

I like that Adrien didnt write anything off when the decision was possibly about to change his whole future. Yes, saying "I dont know what I want" is a perfectly valid and even mature answer for a 14 year old orphan to give when they were JUST this day confronted with this situation that denied him the option he actually wanted:

And I also like that Marinette in the end didn't wasnt made to make Adrien's answer about herself in an usual moment of panic (in general, I truly LOVED how supportive Marinette was in Werepapas, even if the akuma battle incident is forever burnt in my love square heart in a very negative way. Yes, I think being willing to kill your boyfriend without trying any other solution first is bad, sue me ig. if that's what I'll be judged for, then I can live with it).

It is a far cry from Marinette in Representation for example being mostly written to make not getting to have her boyfriend near her out to be the biggest tragedy of Adrien being send to another country for good. I'm glad she got to be the supportive girlfriend for once instead of the show forcibly trying to falsely make her out to be the most important person affected by Adrien's tragic life. It was so refreshing and wonderful to watch Marinette getting to be in the lovingly supporting role of the relationship for a change, and it does WONDERS for her characterization.

While, of course, Marinette was motivated all episode to help Adrien not having to leave, when Adrien said "I don't know" Marinette knew that he's only taking the other options this seriously now because he can't have the option he actually wants.

She wasn't written to go into panic mode the second she heard Adrien NOT saying that staying in Paris is the most important thing on his mind. She knew the problem was laying elsewhere, even if I wished she hadnt made it abuut the Grandparents, but Adrien's right to CHOOSE (and yes, I'm fully aware that people will write this whole post off as salt because I didnt ignore or handwave away Marinette's consistent CANON characterization, even though that's not how salt works. I stand to what I said. More of Marinette as supportive girlfriend please, then we wouldnt have these problems)

I don't know how to end this with a nice little bow to wrap it up. I just REALLY like that Adrien said "I don't know", and how the episode treated the custody conflict for 95% of the plot which is very good for Miraculous.

[aroaceleovaldez]

just read the plot summary for Wrath of the Triple Goddess and. wow this is. painful this just sounds painful to read.

Why is Grover the incompetent inciting incident character? That is not his narrative role ever, really. That's like, the fanon conceptualization of his character where he's reduced down to comedic relief and nothing more. He's mostly exposition and support. Why not have the inciting incident be something about Annabeth's hubris - something that has gotten the gang into situations tons of times before in a way that doesn't put down any of the characters? Heck you could have even tied it into some Sea of Monsters stuff, like Circe having told Annabeth that she'd make a good sorceress. That'd be perfect for how this book literally just exists to be advertising for s2 of PJOTV. Or maybe call-back to Percy's introduction, where he talks about how he doesn't try to cause problems but problems tend to find him. Or use the established personalities of Hecate's animal companions from HoO, since we know they have attitudes. Just what are you even doing here????

[breadandlottery]

[silently-standingstill]

love these two

[chromacryptid]

Some super self indulgent doc ock valentines uwu

[holy-reference-in-a-username]

Look out for magic mirrors~!

Congratulations you activated my trap card. Take a comic.

Ell: Holy shit they're idiots.

[lazaruspiss]

My name is Dick Grayson. I'm who you need me to be.

[navy-leader]

A softer beginning

[justladders]

PPFFFFFTTTAAHA

[mamawasatesttube]

coming out as boring or whatever but i must admit. i don't actually find boomer-sitcom-esque "i hate my wife"/"my partner is annoying and naggy"/"its cute and quirky to shit on my partner" jokes funny even if you make them gay. sorry. but its my truth.

[fortheloveofexy]

I have such a hard time conceptualizing Kayleigh Day in my head... like... what kind of person was she?

Clearly she cared about good sportsmanship (the spirit award is named after her of course).

She also had a fling with Wymack and chose to hide her pregnancy from him so that he could focus in his dream of building an exy team, so she seems to be selfless too.

We also know Kevin adored her and idolized her, so we can assume she was probably a decent parent while she was alive.

So how does somebody who is presumably that good-natured wind up being besties with Tetsuji Moriyama of all people??

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the Ravens were already formed when Tetsuji started asking Kayleigh to give him Kevin to train. Was she at all suspicious about the way Tetsuji was treating his players? Did she really have no idea what was going on in the Nest? Did she know Tetsuji was building a cult? Was she turning a blind eye for the sake of their old friendship? If she did suspect something, why on earth would she make Tetsuji Kevin's guardian? What possessed her to agree to that? Did she agree to it? Or did the Moriyama's forge some paperwork?

Or, alternatively - did the Ravens only become such an abusive team after Kayleigh died? Was it grief and a twisted desire to honor Kayleigh's life that drove Tetsuji to pursue victory at all costs, no matter how much ruthless cruelty he needed to inflict on his players?

[kacievvbbbb]

Just one of the many great tragedies of Mishanks' relationship is that sometimes Shanks wants to feel wanted just as he is, that even beyond the strength he is worth the effort he is worth being loved and unfortunately that just isn't something Mihawk can offer him it's just not something he can do, not as he is now at least. That's a level of emotional maturity that he just does not possess to be able to disentangle the strength from the man that makes no sense to him. Strength is all there is. Shanks is a person, has a life outside of his strength, his power is just another aspect of who he is but for Mihawk strength is his whole person, if he is not strong then he is nothing. If shanks is not strong well then....he's nothing to him.

And God that's a lonely way to live.

[two-entire-bits]

I have a confession. I do not care for the soc boys. I'm sure they have very interesting character traits and lore the actors and fandom have come up with and that is so fun and great and I know none of it and I am perfectly content with that. Shout out to all my mutuals who love the soc boys I hope you are having fun with your Ken dolls but I will not be joining you. keep slaying.

[mongeese]

Interesting that Kim is like almost always portrayed as being dominant and enjoying control in fanworks, which absolutely does have evidence in canon and is an interpretation I personally agree with to an extent. However, in the actual game, he's always letting Harry take the lead, letting you decide where to go, who to talk to, whether or not to take on additional cases, etc etc. Obviously, the doylist explanation for this is that Disco Elysium is a video game where the whole point is that the player can decide what happens and in what order, and Harry du Bois is the player character. Kim has to let you do whatever you want because otherwise it would be a boring and restrictive game. But if you look at it from a watsonian perspective, it can have so many different fascinating implications for Kim's character. Like, does he just implicitly trust Harry that much? Or does he trust the RCM that much, that he thinks any officer of the RCM must be worth following? Does he feel a lack of confidence in his own abilities to run the show? Is he simply more comfortable in a passive role? Is he just entertained by this deranged amnesiac man and wants to watch the show play out? Is he worried there would be consequences for stopping Harry from doing what he wants? Would it break some kind of unspoken rule (either for Kim personally or for the RCM) for Kim to outright refuse to let his temporary partner honor his strange whims? Kim is someone who clearly exercises an extraordinary amount of self-control, and is proud of it. But he doesn't appear to have any interest in controlling other people (at least in a professional context). I need to study him under a microscope