#I'm going to make this rant about miraculous.

[sir-david-von-templo]

YES! Exactly this!

Worst of all, this is the main culprit of why so many audiences in so many fandoms get so many characters, fuck, so many WHOLE NARRATIVES and metaphors so, so fucking WRONG.

Filler episodes allow us to know our cast. To establish how they interact with each other, as well as their virtues and flaws. More importantly, they allow the serious moments to have more gravitas. Because now you are empathizing with the characters that are going through it. You want them to survive them, because now you know how they live they day-to-day.

I'm sure we all know all those stupid memes talking about "Character Development" that really are talking about disgraces that occurs to ome character, from losing a battle to having another character dying. Well, that poor understanding of what Character Development is can be directly attributed to how many times filler episodes are ignored, and, in some point, considered non-canon by the fandom. After all, without filler episodes being a breath between tense moments, how you just make the seriousness of a situation feel bigger? adding more brutally grandiose moments, of course!

genuinely one of the worst things that’s happened to television in the last few years (exacerbated by streaming services) is death of Filler. going from 20 episodes to 8 because “we didn’t really need that episode where the main characters went to the beach right? it had no long lasting effect” but we DID!!! we needed to see how they act without the Big Bad Plot and to establish the dynamics between the characters and lay in the sun (do they forget sunscreen? how do they react to a thieving seagull? do they get buried in the sand or do they do the burying?). the plot isn’t everything. the action doesn’t hit as hard without the quiet moments. give us character development and our little scenes back

[luckylazylurker]

Can someone direct me to the part of the Miraculous Ladybug fandom that celebrates the fandom and characters as a whole without making it all about shipping/the love square?

I miss it and I'm scared to go looking by myself lol

Idea! Like or reblog this if you're someone I can follow, comment/message me directly if you want to have an active discussion about fandom and the current episodes.

(Fair warning, I'm only up to like Reunion for the most current season!)

[corkinavoid]

A list of things I've done that pissed my mother off, but as Batfam + Team Phantom edition

Bruce: got into a verbal fight and held a year-long grudge at my teacher for not giving me a fair grade at an annual competition, and proceeded to go out of my way to win said competition next year

Alfred: refused to eat her food, got told to cook for myself and did so, ending up with both my dad and sister saying my banana bread was the best thing they've eaten

Dick: swung on the bungee rope over the dry riverbed turned into junk yard, fell, miraculously did not die, went to that same bungee rope the next day

Babs: organized a stake out, found out which neighbor had been messing with trash bins when everyone blamed raccoons, called said neighbor a raccoon for the next three weeks

Jason: kept reading books at night with a flashlight, when said flashlight was taken away, lit a candle and accidentally almost set the house on fire

Tim: fled to a different country across the globe without telling anyone except my sister, who's been 7 at the time, and did not respond to any calls or messages for three months

Steph: picked a dress with glitter for a dinner with her relatives after specifically being told not to, was forced to change, but took my revenge by exploding a glitter bomb in the car when we have already arrived at the relatives' house

Cass: responded with 'sorry I didn't quite catch that could you repeat' to her very long rant, over text

Damian: successfully clawed and gnawed at a classmate's face after they destroyed my painting

Duke: was the leader of school rebellion over the 'no wigs allowed in school' rule in sixth grade, managed to convince two teachers to join, ended up with the rule taken down

Danny: accidentally shocked myself with a tazer I stole from her handbag, cried, when she came to ask what happened, showed her by repeating the accidental electrocution

Dan: pushed my maternal aunt into the pool and watched her flounder, knowing very well she is a bad swimmer, when confronted about it later argued it was the kiddie part of the pool and she could not have drowned

Jazz: told her I was in love with a girl she disliked, when she voiced her opinion on it, made a whole argument about how I'm supposed to learn from my own mistakes and not from her experiences

Dani: zoned out while she was yelling at me, came back to her saying 'you're no better than a pig', impulsively told her 'it's because of genetics' and started oinking

Sam: painted my nails and toes on my left hand and left foot black, dyed my hair purple, but only on the left side, as well as got a piercing on the left eyebrow, while the whole right side was left 'natural'

Tucker: learned to change the wi-fi password and held power over the internet every time she took my electronics away by asking a friend that lived nearby to come by my house and using their phone to change the password

Bonus:

Selina: repeatedly stolen antique jewelry from grandma because she, in turn, stole it from my other grandma

Valerie: turned rogue, teamed up with the opponent team in lasertag and helped them win over my own teammates

Talia: threatened a person I will carve their eyeballs out with a spoon if they ever as much as look at my sister funny again, a month later gave them a decorated silver teaspoon as a birthday gift

Jack Fenton: failed my driving license test seven times, three of which were on purpose

Maddie: ruined her plans of my picture-perfect marriage by friendzoning a son of her friend, claiming I'm saving my love only for the important things like mozzarella

Vlad: scared my sister shitless by telling her a scary story about ghosts under her bed and then hiding under her bed and making 'boo' noizes

Clockwork: purposefully made her experience deja vu by wearing the exact same clothes and greeting her the exact same way in the exact same place for three days in a row

[livelaughloveluffy]

comfort - trafalgar water d. law

a/n: listen... i was always a law simp pre-wano..... but wano law 😭😭😭 you will always be famous. and the brain rot is just so intense for him that i had to write this fic

a/n: i'm still adjusting to my antidepressants and literally have 9 labs due this week so forgive me for not being insanely active; i'm mainly just trying to survive 💀

nothing but fluff here! 💗

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when he comforts you:

-the captain goes above and beyond to silently help you out. chores you were supposed to do around the polar tang are miraculously already done, a cold glass of water and a small snack left on your nightstand when you wake up, your laundry folded and put away.

-and it doesn't stop at that. law wants to make sure you can relax and destress, so this sweet man will run you a bath, dimly lit with candles and a glass of wine, and he'll stay to gently wash your hair and give back massages. fully allowing you to just enjoy the warmth of the soapy water and his touch.

-he'll always make time in his schedule for cuddles, even if that means the two of you are crammed into his desk chair, he'll hold you tight to him, gently stroke your hair, and whisper sweet nothings into your ear.

-while advice isn't law's strongest area of expertise (he's much too pessimistic and blunt for that 💀) he is a fantastic listener. once he knows you aren't looking for a solution to your problems but just someone to support you while you rant, he'll sit through hours and hours of ranting and rambling, attentive eyes on you, his hand on the smalls of your back rubbing soft circles into you, even when he's busy he'll always lend an ear to your problems and a shoulder to cry on.

-he's a lot more affectionate than usual when he notices you haven't been yourself. pda suddenly doesn't bother him anymore, and he won't leave a room before giving you some kisses, his arm will be around your waist as he address the crew, or he'll grab your hand and intertwine his fingers with yours.

-when you're sick, injured, or on your period: law will provide literally the best cuddles you could ever ask for, his silk sheets against your body, the smell of his cologne filling the room, his warm body next to yours, your head on his chest, he'll let your fingers trace over the lines of his tattoos with absolutely no protesting. he's going to do the most for you, and if you didn't know him as well as you do, you'd truly have no idea who was leaving little chocolates and love notes on your pillow, a new book on your bed, your favorite drink stocked up in the fridge, and the fresh flowers on your nightstand everyday. he'll never address it or come out to take credit for it, he'd just do it. the captain will shower you in kisses much more than usual, on your cheek, the top of your head, a small peck on your lips, he's much more affectionate as its the subtle way he expresses his love and worry for you.

when he needs comforting:

-law is not the kind of guy to talk about his problems. a lot of this is because he struggles with verbalizing his feelings, worries, and stresses, but also because he doesn't find any relief in it. you instantly know when the captain needs you by the way he asked for you to meet him in his office. the second the door closes, he's picking you up, wrapping your legs around his waist and holding you so close to him, the faint scent of bourbon vanilla fills your nose as you bury your face into the crook of his neck.

-there's nothing the captain loves more than the feeling of your fingers tangled up in his soft dark raven locks, with your face resting against his chest you can hear the way his heart beat slightly slows fully enjoying the sensation of your touch.

-law finds lots of solace in hearing your voice, it's simply music to his ears. he'll listen to stories about your past or adventures you've been on, rambles about your hobbies, what you did today, anything and everything. he loves the distraction it provides him as well as the comforting ambient noise it provides while he works.

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a/n: soft law my beloved 😭😭😭😭😭 i totally forgot the whole "when you're sick" section of this fic when i first posted it, so i panic wrote that shit so damn fast 💀 it's been a minute since i wrote one of these 😭😭

a/n: enjoyed this fic? here's my masterlist!!

a/n: if you are interested in being added to my taglist: here's a google form!!!

[majesticarlette]

Enemies

Adrien Agreste/Chat Noir x Ladybug!Reader

"Surrender your Miraculous, Chat Noir!" You shouted as you glare at him from above on top of the Eiffel Tower.

"Dream on, Ladybug." He smirked and fires multiple Cataclysms in your direction. You used your yo-yo as a shield to protect yourself and fled the Eiffel Tower.

The city of Paris is once again troubled by a megakuma and after you just de-evilized the butterfly, a wild Chat Noir appeared. It's exhausting to deal with two birds with one stone but it's worth it. He was able to expand his powers, making the fights between you more difficult. He could fire multiple but limited cataclysms now. If he expanded his own powers, you sure also did. It's only fair to fight a lion if you're also a lion.

Chat Noir followed you as you escape the Eiffel Tower. Fortunately, he isn't as sharp as a knife, and with your street-smarts, you were able to lose him.

"This is taking too long, I have a date later." You groaned and you activated your second lucky charm, and it gave you a superglue. At this point, you're not going to question how it is used, but to figure out what to do about it fast.

You came back to where the fight was and scanned the environment, and you didn't spot anything to use the superglue with.

"You sure ain't good at hiding, huh, Ladybug?" You turned around and saw Chat spinning his baton, and you finally knew how to end this thing at once.

"Eh, you didn't even catch up to me given your cat abilities. Lame." You rolled your eyes trying to provoke him. He charges at you, and you two get into a fight worse than a catfight.

You love angering the cat in front of you, and the way he's slowly losing his cool from you dodging his scratches satiates an itch in your brain. You don't really hate him in the beginning, you actually wanted to cooperate with this kitty but something about the two of you just don't click. He doesn't plan his punches, he's impulsive, arrogant, doesn't like getting told what to do, and claiming he's a solo flight in fights.

Even actual cats don't behave this way, they won't exert much energy for this crap. Ugh!

Chat Noir growls and starts exerting more strength in his moves trying to bring you down.

"Oh... I see sweat, Kitty. Are you having a hard time? You think you're the only cat who's gonna lose to a bug?" You laugh earning a yell of rage from him. At this point in the fight, you're just dodging his offenses and waiting for a sign to use your lucky charm.

"You think you're all that?! You can't even defeat the megakuma by yourself!"

"Please, you think you did anything? You acted like a cat who broke a glass and thinks he did something great. In short you made it way worse!" He managed to scratch your suit earning a clean incision on your arm. You flinched at the sensation and let out a gasp.

Distracted, Chat Noir took this advantage to reach his staff from behind. He extended it to knock you out of the fight.

You flew from the impact and held onto his staff. You groaned from the pain and checked yourself from any more damages. As you were standing up, Chat Noir used his extended staff to knock you out of your balance, once again falling on your ass.

He chuckled at your state retracting his staff. "You think highly of yourself--"

"And you don't?!--" You hiss

"Shh! I'm talking!" He glared at you. "This is why you're so hard to deal with, you're so stubborn!" As he was about to rant his troubles about you, he saw you wiping blood from your injured arm. His eyes grew wide, did he cause this? If he did... Why would he even care? You deserved it! You don't believe in him! Is it deep, though? It might get infected...

He shook his thoughts and tried to put his staff back but it won't budge. He furrowed his eyebrows and held onto the other end to try and get it off the other but both ended up stuck. He groans in annoyance while putting much force to get it off, yet no luck.

You laughed at the scene and stood from where you were. "I told you, you don't plan ahead. I guess curiosity really killed the cat." You used your yo-yo strings to wrap around his ankles and yanked him up on the street lamp.

"Admit defeat?" You held up the super glue you used on his staff and pinched the cheeks of his upside down face. He only furrowed his brows further. "You know your face could get stuck on that expression--" As things were getting your way, beeping was heard from the two of you. "Not now!" You retracted your yo-yo from him. "This isn't over!" You ran away, leaving him on his own.

You let out a sigh after de-transforming back to your civilian self. You were exhausted from fighting two people today. Why can't Chat Noir surrender his miraculous so you can give it to the person who deserves it, like Marinette! Why did Master Shifu give it to him to begin with?

Your thoughts were interrupted when your phone was alarmed. "Oh, no! I totally forgot!" You really need to have a hero/life balance, how will you get to know your other half if you always prioritize hero duties?

You ran your heart out to the park to meet your date today. Panting, you scanned the area to see any signs of him but he was nowhere to be seen. Yeah, he already went home, it's really rude to make your date wait for a while, he might've felt embarrassed.

Sighing for the second time, you turned around and decided to walk home. "(Y/n)! Wait!" The familiar voice alerted you and looked around for the source, and there you saw him, Adrien. He was running towards you.

"I'm sorry, I was late! We hid from the megakuma and only stepped out when it was clear." He panted, catching his breath. Yeah, you and Chat Noir really contributed to his lateness.

"Are you okay? Were you hurt from the villain?" He cupped your cheeks checking you for any injuries.

"N-no! I'm fine, really!" You tucked your hair behind your ear, feeling flustered by his presence.

Little did you know, Adrien noticed your arm injury. It's really identical to what he did to Ladybug.

Yeah, you did not only forget one thing.

[alchemistc]

I've already written this a million times between fic I've posted, tag rants, and my notes app, but now I'm thinking again about Buck and Tommy first meeting and:

Howie pulls away from the hug a few seconds too soon for Tommy's liking. It's been a long time since he's seen him in person, since before the car crash, before the stabbing, before all the fucked up shit that's happened to the 118 since he left, and he was maybe hoping for - more.

The LAFD are a bunch of fucking gossips and he's heard his fair share about them all, names passed vaguely around in group chats and ladder bars, stories blown even more out of proportion than all the actual miraculous survival stories. The two guys Howie gestures at with thumbs over his shoulders both look familiar, and he's already trying to place their stories before Howie introduces them. Brown hair-brown eyes-killer jawline gives him a twisted grin as Howie introduces him as Eddie, and he reaches across to shake Tommy's hand, firm and even. Tommy can tell before the handshake is over that he'd served.

That's Diaz. He'd texted Howie the night the kid had been buried fucking alive and somehow lived to tell the tale. He can't quite pull the memory, but Tommy's pretty sure he'd been the one at the 118 who'd been targeted by that crazy sniper, too.

The other one, bright eyed and staring around like a kid in a candy shop, looking like he might vibrate right out of his skin - shocks of bronze in his hair from the overhead lights and eyes cast silver-blue in the twilight, jolts when Howie reaches back and up to smack at his chest, standing at attention and catching Tommy's eye as Howie introduces him as Buck.

Jesus fucking Christ

Tommy's gonna die tonight.

Between Howie's sporadic communication and all the gossip, Tommy knows about Buck. Kid's a magnet for a shit storm. And Tommy's about to fly them straight into one.

"Uh, h-hi," he says, cheeks rounding as he leans in with a devastating smile, hand extended.

Tommy feels like he's been hit by a fucking truck.

"You, uh - call me Evan," he says, and all the air sort of whooshes out of Tommy's lungs at once as he shakes Tommy's extended hand.

Oh.

This is a bad idea. Capital B capital I bad. Tommy can't tell which one of them is extending the handshake too long, but he's actually kind of hoping Howie will fucking say something about it, make Buck-- Evan -- let go.

"He's gonna need that hand back, Evan," Howie says, an inflection on the name that Tommy won't understand for a good few months.

He ducks his head bashfully, shakes up, down, one more time, before he lets go, and Tommy can feel his own gaze chasing the silver-blue sparks of his irises as they dip out of view. Shit. Fuck.

This is fine. Tommy's worked with plenty of attractive guys. He's worked with plenty of guys he's felt a spark with, right out the gate. He's a fucking professional. He's flown out of enemy gunfire, into firestorms fed by 80 mile-per-hour winds. This is fine.

From what he remembers of the early days at Harbor, when he'd kept up better with Howie, this Buck guy isn't even in the wheelhouse of men who'd be interested, anyway. So. That's that.

"Nice to meet you, Evan," Tommy says, and doesn't miss the pursed lips and raised brows shared between Diaz and Howie when Evan's face lights up like a Roman candle, head tipping back up at an angle and his smile wide wide wide -- too wide for the suicide mission they're about to undertake.

Christ.

"You too, Tommy," Evan says, and Tommy sticks his hands in the pockets of his flight suit to keep from doing something insane like press his fingertips into the pink-swatched skin over his brow that might be a birthmark.

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

When I first saw a Miraculous Ladybug salt post it was the usual Lila takes away all of Marinette's friends Adrien does nothing Marinette becomes super successful Lila gets exposed blah blah blah

When I see posts like the ones you post where people give actual constructive criticism about the characters and not favor one character over the other has made me realize that these are fictional characters and its not their fault they are the way they are. Also they're 14 what kind of 14 year old makes good choice's? Especially when they have the fate of the world/universe on their shoulders

If anything the character I really blame is Master Fu. He was obviously meant to be some sort of mentor figure for them or at least Marinette's mentor. He was the one to tell and encourage Marinette to keep everything a secret from Adrien. Comparing him to other mentor like figures in the world of superheros he isn't really all that helpful.

Compared to DC Ladybug and Chat Noir do not have any adult superheros to help them. In DC younger superheros have entire superhero families to help them out and if not that than they have other adult superheros to help them or they have an actual team. We know that other miraculous holders exist and the order is back I have a vague idea as to why they can't help but I still find it weird as to why they are around if not to help. Like phones and the internet exist do they not?

Sorry for they rant, I want to know what your thoughts are on this?

Your rant was fine! I don't think that I've talked in depth about mentors as a concept and I should both because I love mentors and because Miraculous has completely failed to give us any good ones. This is a writing failure not because good mentors are required, but because the show chose to have mentors characters and then not use them.

Before I get into the topic at large, I want to start with a brief discussion of mentors in shows aimed at young children as Miraculous' intended audience is young children and that fact is worth keeping in mind when discussing what Miraculous did wrong and some of the ways that you can fix it.

Shows aimed at kids generally avoid adult characters in major roles for the very obvious reason that the intended audience is kids, so you want the kid and teen characters to be the stars. This doesn't mean that adults aren't allowed to save the day or have important roles. It just means that they should be used sparingly. This is why mentors are a great addition to kids shows. They allow adult characters to be deeply involved with the plot without anyone expecting them to intervene because that's not their role in the story. They're not here to be the hero. They're here to guide the hero.

One of the powerful things about this setup is that it allows the writers to give the real kids watching at home real advice about real life problems. For example, if Marinette comes to Fu to talk about feeling alone and overwhelmed, then he can give her real, practical advice that would apply to anyone who is feeling alone and overwhelmed, but no one expects him to directly intervene because he's supposed to say hidden.

A lot of these elements apply to mentors in media aimed at older audiences, the rules just apply for different reasons, so I'm going to stop reminding you that Miraculous is for elementary school kids and focus on the failed mentor issue as it would be an issue no matter what Miraculous' intended audience was.

When it comes to bad mentoring, a lot of people focus on Fu and I get why. At first glance, he's the classic wise old Asian man who is supposed to be there to guide the protagonist on her mystical journey (not getting into the racism issue here, just know that I'm aware of it and that Miraculous dropped the ball on this in a lot of ways even though they absolutely could have made it work.) But Fu isn't the main focus of my ire because, while the writers seemed to have designed him around the mystic Asian trope, they never actually wrote him like a mentor.

He doesn't train Marinette and Adrien in the ways of the miraculous. He just sneakily gives them their miraculous and then disappears from their lives for quite some time. So he's not around to get them properly started on their hero journey. That's strike one for the mentor role.

Strike two is the fact that we never actually see him mentoring Marinette. I don't think that she ever went to him for advice? If she did, then it wasn't a big element of their relationship. When I think of Marinette and Fu, I picture her going to him to grab a miraculous or two before booking it back to the ongoing fight and that's about it. The guardian training she supposedly had was all off screen, so we have no idea how close they were or what he even taught her outside of potion making. Even that wasn't really him teaching her something. It was them working together to figure out a puzzle because Fu never completed his own training, making it impossible for him to properly train a successor.

Strike three is the fact that - outside of the King Monkey incident - Fu never gets directly involved in helping team miraculous. He's never gives them feedback on fights or works with Ladybug and Chat Noir to strengthen their bond. He doesn't even help them track down the two missing miraculous or hand out the temporary miraculous on Marinette's behalf, a choice I still find super weird. "This fight is super hard and we need help, so I'm going to leave Chat Noir to fight alone while I go get said help!" is absolutely nonsense logic and one of the many examples of the writers desperately needing to let Marinette hand her responsibilities off. Why wasn't this Fu's job?

This brings us to fix one: if you want the guardian to be a mentor - which is a role they arguably should have - then the guardian needs to be actively involved in Marinette and Adrien's lives in an on screen way. For this to work in the context of Miraculous - a show that really wants to focus on the teen characters - then the guardian probably needs a teenage apprentice who isn't Marinette and that apprentice will be the one doing the mentoring.

My pick for this is Luka for two big reasons. The first one is that his calm personality is perfectly suited to a mentor. The second one is that it seems insane to me to have the snake be a temp holder. The snake should be watching every fight, but staying out of the actual fight so that they can use their power whenever it's needed. That's the perfect role for a mentor character to fill. Someone who is active in the plot, but only ever as a support because their power stops them from getting more involved.

Moving on to the bigger issue.

As I said up above, Fu doesn't actually get my ire. While I wanted him to be a mentor, he never once filled that role and he didn't really need to because the show already had mentor figures that it was actively using and using poorly. Those figures are the ancient magical creatures that follow our heroes around, dispensing terrible advice whenever they feel like it. That's right, as much as it pains me, Miraculous' biggest mentor failures are Tikki and Plagg.

The miraculous did not need to have magical creatures associated with them. They could have just been magical jewelry that Fu handed out and explained. Instead, the writers chose to give us the Kwamis and I don't disagree with that choice. I like the Kwmais! The problem is that they're used in the most lackluster, asinine ways you possibly could.

The Kwamis are not presented as oblivious to the world and unable to give advice. They give lots of advice! The problem is that advice tends to suck! I can think of many examples of times where the Kwamis made everything worse, but let's look at the one that grinds my gears the most: Plagg's actions in season four.

In Rocketear - the episode where Nino gives Adrien an incredibly inaccurate picture of why he knows Alya's secret identity - we get this:

Adrien: I still can't believe Ladybug entrusted Alya and Nino with those Miraculous. Plagg: Of course she did. She's the Guardian. Adrien: But they're a couple and they know each other's secret identities. Plagg: So...? Adrien: So, why does she make it a rule that we can't know each other's identities but it's okay for them? Plagg: She's the Guardian, the Grandmaster Cheese Ripener, and you and I are just cheese on the platter. She decides what's on the menu.

Hey, Plagg, maybe don't tell your clearly upset and vulnerable teenage holder to just suck it up and deal with it when he's feeling alone and betrayed? Maybe encourage him to talk to Ladybug about his feelings so that he can get the full story? Knowing that they learned their identities during the Scarlet Moth incident would probably do a lot to smooth over Adrien's hurt feelings.

What's even more rich is that the episode Kuro Neko lets Plagg go off on Marinette for not appreciating Chat Noir:

Ladybug: What's gotten into him? I didn't do anything. Plagg: Didn't do anything? Well yeah, you did! You've been neglecting a very classy piece of camemebert on your plate for too long! And as a result it got runny, and moldy! Ladybug: What? Cat Noir never gave me any camembert. Plagg: Of course not, Cat Noir is the camembert! For a while now, you've been neglecting this camembert— I mean Cat Noir, and going on adventures with the all other cheeses! Ladybug: But he should be happy about it, it gives him more time off. Plagg: Cat Noir doesn't wanna have time off, Ladybug! He is in love with you! And your persistent calling on all the other heroes has broken his heart.

Dude, if you saw all of this going on, then why didn't you say something??? You and Tikki are in the same location for multiple hours five days a week. Go tell her how your holder is feeling and figure out how to fix the situation! Or be an actual mentor and encourage Adrien to talk to someone about his feelings! At the very least, cut up a wheel of cheese, sit down, and listen to your kid so that he feels less alone!

Also what exactly do you want Ladybug to do to fix the problem you presented? Let Paris burn until Chat Noir decides to show up to today's fight? Refuse to use the temp heroes even if it means losing a fight? None of those are valid solutions when the problem presented in the episode is Chat Noir missing fights. Especially when we know that he's doing it on purpose. Why are you yelling at her instead of working with her to come up with an actual solution? You are such a terrible mentor...

To be clear, I don't think any of this is intentional. I don't think the writers want Plagg and Tikki to come across as actively hurting their teenage charges via bad advice. I think Plagg and Tikki are supposed to be seen as good and helpful, but they can't fill that role because they're tools of the narrative and the narrative has really wacky views on what good advice is. Thus nonsense like the example I discussed above or Plagg and Tikki picking new holders instead of guiding their holders through an identity reveal.

I personally adore letting Plagg and Tikki be good mentors in my own stuff. It falls under the same category as Alya and Nino being terrible friends on screen. I acknowledge the problem and then delight in fixing it by writing the exact opposite setup because what is fanfiction for if not heavy self indulgence?

[portraitofalinkonfyre]

I’m literally going feral over ur fierce deity fics I’ve been dehydrated for so long and these are like a tall glass of water

Could I pretty please with a cherry on top request a Fierce Deity x reader where Like theyre Just hanging out together and fierce is just really gently putting flowers in the readers hair and they’re watching the sunset together and fierce just thinks the reader is really pretty while they’re yapping about their day

THANK YOU SO MUCH IN ADVANCE IF YOU DO DECIDE TO DO THIS BUT YOU DONT HAVE TO <333

CONSIDER IT WRITTEN. Fierce Deity is literally my weakness, so I'm ecstatic more people love him!

Braided Daisies

Pairing: Fierce Deity x Reader

Warning(s): Tooth-rotting fluff and philosophical discussions that probably shouldn't be read before one's morning coffee.

Masterlist

There was a clearing a mile's walk from your house. It was small and quiet, filled to the brim with tall, swaying grass. In early spring, a myriad of flowers bloomed among the vegetation, as if sprinkled by the gods themselves. But its best feature was by far its proximity to a staggering, craggy cliff, and the accompanying view that followed for anyone lucky enough to stumble upon it.

"—And THEN I told him I don't make the rules around here, but nooo," you ranted to the Fierce Deity from your sprawled position on the grass. You had originally intended to come here alone, but it seemed you had an adventurer in your midst. That, and the fact that it was becoming increasingly hard to refute him when he looked at you with such... care? Want? You weren't quite sure, but from the looks the other boys would shoot him, you assumed it was deep. "—of course I look rich enough to be the owner... in my work uniform!"

"That is... unfortunate," mused the deity, looking almost offended. When his gaze turned menacing, you realized you probably shouldn't have shared your troubles with a literal guard dog of a god. "If you require assistance—"

"Nope, nope, nope," you waved your hands frantically. "I am not dealing with you mauling someone."

The put-off expression on his face would have made you cackle if you hadn't known his offer was very much real. "Shame."

Shame?!

"I'll stop baking if you kill someone," you leveraged, holding back the urge to laugh when his expression turned to one of abject horror, then what you could only assume was his version of a pouty face. "Don't look at me like that, I will do it."

There was silence as you held his gaze, setting your jaw in what you hoped was a stern expression. Miraculously, Fierce was the first to break eye contact, leaning back on his arms with a deep sigh. "You are brave," he said, and there was something soft in his tone that you couldn't place for the life of you. "Have you always been this way?"

It was such a him question, yet you had to stop and process why in the world the Fierce Deity wanted to know something so mundane about you, a mere mortal. It couldn't have been genuine curiosity... but there was no other explanation. "I... maybe? It depends on your definition of bravery, I guess."

"And what is yours?" He was getting closer, practically casting a shadow over you. A callused hand drew forward, capturing a strand of your hair, rubbing softly, and the notion that he was feeling your hair threw you for the greatest loop of your life.

"Bravery is..." you trailed off, averting your eyes. What was bravery? To say one had bravery meant they had a strong character... some could even say a heroic one, but it felt too simple an answer to give to such a being, especially when he gazed down at you with a warmth you hadn't felt in a long time. Not even the burning tangerine of the horizon—smattered with flashes of gold and honeysuckle— could ignite your skin in the way his eyes could. "...immediate."

Impossibly, the deity leaned closer, tone expectant. "Immediate?"

Fuck, he was practically on top of you. "I-It's not like courage, because that comes slow and is more moral based, but..." you gulped. "I guess bravery is what happens in the moment, as in the choices you make when there's no time to make them."

"I see," rumbled Fierce as he withdrew, resuming his cross-legged position next to you. As if on instinct, you raised yourself onto your elbows and huffed.

"Why do you even want to know?" you questioned, emboldened by the falling sun. "You're a god and I'm just... human. I'm sure there's a million more interesting things out there."

"You speak as though my curiosity is an insult," intoned the deity, gaze fixed on the bleeding horizon. "I can assure you, it is not."

And that was all there was to it, really. You knew the topic had died as soon as he fell silent, though it didn't mean you were giving up just yet. You reached out, picked a nearby daisy, and offered it to him. "Can you braid?"

"Excuse me?"

"You said you wanted to discover," you defended lightly, even though there was no need to. "Hair braiding is easy when you get the hang of it, but it's a lot easier to learn using someone else's hair."

A beat passed, and you thought for sure he was going to reject the idea. That is, until his hand twitched up to take the flower, examining it with keen eyes. You took it as an invitation to scoot closer—already parting your hair in preparation—until your legs brushed his own and your chests were nary two feet apart. "Okay," you relinquished the flower and put the head at the top of the braid. "You're going to want to cover it with one section like so, then keep braiding like you normally would without letting the stem fall, capiche?" You held up the half finished braid for inspection, eventually pulling it apart and offering him the flow. "Now you try!"

There was determination in the Fierce Deity's eyes as he relinquished the flower and did as instructed: laying the head at the top of the brain and incorporating it with every cross and pull. His touch was so gentle you could have mistaken it for the wind pulling your hair, and you wondered it he feared anything harder than featherlight pressure would shatter you, though that was most certainly not the case. Before you knew it, he had reached the bottom of the strands, and was merely holding it as to not fall apart. You took that as a cue to snap a hair tie on that sucker and shoot him a happy grin. "It looks great, awesome job!"

But the Fierce Deity remained silent, simply gazing at you with eyes softer than silk before rising to his feet. You tilted your head in confusion, about to ask where he was going, when he bent down, plucked another daisy from the earth, and plopped down behind you. "What are you—"

A heavy hand laid itself on your shoulder, applying gentle, firm pressure as the deity's voice rumbled in your ear. "Be still, I am only using the skills you have shown me."

And, without preamble, he sectioned your hair like a pro and began to braid while you sort of just sat there, questioning everything that had lead up to this point. He was so close that you could feel the press of his muscled abdomen against your very unmuscled back, and it was doing unspeakable things to the beating organ in your chest. A sort of choked gasp left your lips when he reached down to capture your wrist before pulling a hair tie from it, but you forced yourself into silence—he seemed to enjoy it, so who were you to deny him—?

"Have I upset you?" Came Fierce's voice, clear as day. His actions with your hair halted, and you nearly morned the loss of his body heat when he pulled away.

"I— what?" How in the world could he have upset you? There was simply no way.

"You are quiet," answered the deity, as if it made perfect sense. "I ask again: have I upset you?"

"No?" You could hardly comprehend how he came to such a conclusion, but you would do everything in your power to rectify whatever misunderstanding he was living under. "How does that have anything to do with me being upset?"

"You talk when you are happy," and he noticed?? Did he think you were upset because you weren't rambling?

"Well, yes," dear lord, he was too precious. "But I can be happy in silence, too."

"Ah," you felt a wave of relief when his hands fell on the braid again, lifting it for what you could only guess was inspection. "I had assumed you disliked quiet."

"Funny, because I thought the same."

"Then it appears we both assumed wrong," stated the deity, and you couldn't have agreed more.

The fading light was filled with laugher as you regaled him with more stories from work, throwing in a few embarrassing childhood ones when things became dry. During this, Fierce fitted two more braids into your hair, each with a different flower. You could hardly wait to look in the mirror when you arrived home, an idea that seemed less and less pleasant as your conversation dragged on.

When the sun was all but a speck in a sea of navy, you reluctantly started the trek back, noting how insignificant the darkness seemed when you had Fierce by your side, expression attentive as he listened to you talk about nothing in particular. It puzzled you how he seemed to hang off of every word, but you assumed it was merely loneliness. Had it been lighter outside, or your attention sharper, you would have noticed the crimson flush painting his cheeks a deeper red than the very horizon.

The plot got away from me a bit, but I still think it turned out great. Hope y'all enjoyed!

[sweetcloverheart]

Clover Rants Miraculously: Unearned Defeat

Maybe it's the bitter Chloe Stan in me, but I genuinely do hate how her (And Lila's, frankly) "Downfall" in S5 was never actually about her bullying victims coming together as a community/group to finally stand up for themselves, but about the writers taking every opportunity possible to mock her (and her fans indirectly) because they were that desperate to get the audience onboard with her constant on-screen ridicule. Marinette wasn't allowed to actually stand up for herself against her, to get others to stand up for themselves, to get the class and their teachers to put their feet down in face of her cruelty and commands and finally say "No. I don't care if you're going to call your dad down to have me fired/expelled/exiled. I'm noting doing what you asked. I refuse to buckle under your threats anymore. The answer is no."

Instead, it's 27 episodes (and two specials) of "Isn't Chloe so stupid and dumb? Look at how stupid and dumb she is! She's too dumb to tell Felix and Adrien apart despite being their friend for years. She's too dumb to hide the fact that she hasn't been doing her own homework since Primary. She's too dumb to know Gabriel's tricking her into taking over Paris. She can't even spell 'Democracy' or scheme without Lila needing to hold her hand! What a moron, am I right?". Her friendship with Adrien gets ended over a randomly inserted event from a year ago rather than her steadily growing toxicity that's clearly changed her from the girl he befriended years before, just so Chloe can rant and rave about how evil (and stupid) she is, too much so to even apologize. Sabrina gets downgraded from friend/lackey to punchingbag/slave with nearly zero explanation on how the transition happened, before suddenly being inserted with morals during a scheme (when the upset's clearly more about her being upstaged by Lila) when she barely showed any remorse/reluctance before now and throwing Chloe under the bus to save herself under the excuse of "redeeming herself" to prove further that Chloe is too dumb and stupid to appreciate her friends. Her father, who constantly indulged her whims and turned the whole city upsidedown in her name even when unasked, calls her "Selfish and heartless" to a close friend, and barely reflects on how he might of had a hand in how that came to be, before tossing her to her neglectful mother as a "they deserve each other" punishment for her stupidity and evil. An entirely new character is introduced specifically to talk about how evil and stupid Chloe is and blaming her for her expulsion before getting casually tossed aside. An evil version of Marinette's existence is all but directly blamed on Chloe's bullying rather than the post-apocalyptic villainous dictatorship she lives under that forbids helping people, and even then, nothing comes of the mention as it just exist to remind the audience that Chloe is evil and stupid - even in alternate universes. We dedicated a section of the London special on how Chloe's too evil and stupid to change just to have it there (instead of actual being in London so the episode name would make some sense). Her defeat doesn't come from a clever plan, or the power of cooperation, or even love in the face of difficulty - instead, it comes from spyware and the heroes deciding "Nuhuh" as their transformation timers run out and the narrative shrugging before giving them a freebie by claiming they've "Grown up" without explaining how.

Even when Marinette is finally given the chance to shut Chloe down, it just...rings hollow, because it more about making Chloe look foolish and letting us laugh at her tears than making Marinette seem strong for finally standing up to the girl who's apparently tormented her since they were in diapers and yet somehow she's been beating the blonde down for the past 2-4 seasons with minimum effort. And even, it feels unearned because not only has Marinette not been allowed to build up to her defeat of Chloe to this point, she isn't the one who took her down anyways - convenience did the job for her and she just showed up at the right time to reap the benefits.

Marinette and all the people Chloe hurt should have been given this chance to grow and finally get back their agency from her, to finally defeat Chloe on their own - but instead, they're made passive players and props to the writers personal hit pieces against the loud fan minority on twitter, because a group of adults decided their personal hateboner against the fictional child antagonist they created was far more important than the story they were supposed to tell

[rogueddie]

Lost in You T | 1,247 words Prompt for @steddielovemonth: Love is when you look at his lips for half the conversation because you can't stop thinking about kissing him

Steve had a problem.

Or, no- Steve has a problem.

He did think it was a one off issue, something that would sort itself out if he just ignored it for a while. But, instead, it only seems to have gotten worse.

He really, really wants to kiss Eddie.

At first, he didn't think anything of his staring problem. The world was ending, people were dying, there wasn't time to worry about small things like that.

Although, even after they defeated Vecna, Steve continued to stare. He continued to dismiss it as a normal, totally platonic thing.

As Robin said; "it's almost embarrassing how long it took you to realize".

But, at the time, it had felt so normal. It still does.

Eddie's a good looking guy and Steve has eyes. Of course he's going to look at his best features. His lips just... are the one that draws his focus most of all.

He's sure that no one would blame him, either. With how full Eddie's lips are, how he tends to bite his lower lip when he's stressed, how he pouts so much when he's asking for favors, how he licks his lips whenever he looks Steve over, looking so plump and pink and-

... well. At least he knows he has a problem.

For a while, he thought that it was that simple. He had thought that he was doing a miraculous job of hiding how distracted he always gets, how he gets lost in the daydreams.

"And I know I'm boring," Eddie says, casually. "But-"

"Wait, what?" Steve interrupts, confused. "You're not boring, who said you're boring?"

"C'mon, don't lie to me, man. I know you hate how much I drone on about shit."

"No, I don't? If I didn't like hearing your rants and that then I wouldn't ask about those things."

Eddie huffs, looking always, shoulders hunching as he mutters, "coulda fooled me."

"Eds, where the hell is this coming from?"

"You don't listen to me!" He explodes. "You just- I don't know. Your fucking eyes glaze over half the time- and I know you don't care about this shit but could you at least pretend?"

"Wh- oh. Oh, no, that's... that's not because I think you're boring, I swear."

"Why then?"

"That... I don't know if I should say."

"Right," Eddie mumbles, shaking his head. He gets up, grabbing his jacket off the armchair next to him. "Of course you can't."

"Wait, where are you going?

"Away from you."

"But- I just don't get it right now. Like, I need time to figure some shit out, you know? I don't wanna tell you one thing now and then have to take it back later. You know? It's... complicated."

Eddie pauses, before slowly turning back to look at him.

"You just need time?"

"Yeah. That's it, I swear."

"And then you'll tell me what the fuck this is about?"

"Promise."

But, uncomfortable and uncertain, Eddie keeps his distance after that. He is careful to avoid group hangouts, using Corroded Coffin or Hellfire or his uncle as an excuse when needed.

He even lies about being ill one time.

It only serves to make Steve feel guilty about his own confusion. Especially considering he's no closer to figuring his mind out than he was when they spoke.

He has to get it right though. He's not sure they'd be ok if Steve assumes he wants to kiss Eddie because he wants to date him, only to later realize it's only lust.

Steve's sure that it would sting just as much to assume that it's only lust and later, when it's too late, to realize it's love.

"That sounds like a terrible idea," Lucas points out.

Out of everyone Steve thought would figure out why Steve and Eddie were so tense all of a sudden, he didn't think it would be one of the kids.

"It's the best thing I can do right now," Steve points out.

"No, it's not?" Lucas frowns at him, expression a mix of frustration and disbelief. "The best thing you can do right now is talk to him. Actually tell him why you need time. Tell him that you're worried about disappointing him."

"I'm not gonna dump all this shit on him."

"Jesus, you're worse than Mike."

"Hey-"

"He doesn't know any of this, Steve. He's probably thinking of the worst case scenario. What if he thinks you're going to kick him out the party?"

"I can't do that," Steve can't help but snort. "Even if I wanted to, I don't have that sort of authority over you brats."

"Steve! He doesn't know that! You have to talk to him, soon. He's not going to wait forever when he doesn't even know that he's supposed to be waiting or what he's waiting for!"

"But what if-"

"No."

"What?"

"I have to pick up Erica. I've told you what you should do, so do it."

Lucas makes a shooing gesture at him once he's out the car and, reluctantly, Steve turns the car around.

He heads to the trailer park.

"Hey," Eddie greets, looking him over. "You had enough time now?"

"Sort of," Steve winces. He shifts, glancing behind Eddie. "Is your uncle home? We should... talk."

"He isn't," he steps back, gesturing Steve inside.

Steve steps inside, hovering in the middle. He turns when he hears the door click shut.

"I have a problem," he blurts. "I mean, uh... Robin has always teased that I never know if I love a girl or just want... but that's- I was worried that I was, uh, maybe doing that with you? And I don't want to rush into anything or have this turn out like-"

"Woah, woah, woah. Slow down, big boy, you've already lost me. What does this," he waves his hand between them, "have to do with the girls you date?"

"Everything. Eddie, I'm not ignoring you because you're boring, I can't stop... I can't stop thinking about you."

"What?"

"You've got really nice lips, dude."

Eddie blinks at him, eyebrows disappearing behind his fringe. "What?"

"What do you mean, what? I know you like me, it's why I don't want to rush into anything and then later realize it was just, like, lust. I can't do that to you, Eds."

"So, wait, ok," Eddie waves his hands around, face scrunched and voice high. "Wait. You've known that I like you this whole time?!"

"Yeah? It's fine, I don't mind, it's no big deal."

"It's no- what the fuck, Steve!"

"Was I supposed to tell you that I knew?"

"No- or, yes- but not- ugh!"

"Whatever, ok, that's not the point! I just- I don't want you worrying and thinking this is because of anything bad. I still need time to figure this out."

"To figure out if you want to fuck me or not?"

"Oh, no, that's not a maybe, I definitely do. I just don't know if I might, like, love you too." Steve scratches his jaw, pondering on that while Eddie flails. "Well... I'm pretty sure there's a crush there at least. I don't usually get so distracted by the idea of just kissing that I check out of conversations."

"Fucking hell, Harrington, you're ridiculous."

"What-"

Eddie strides over to him, taking his face in both hands, cutting him off with a kiss.

It's barely more than a press of lips, but Steve feels alight.

It's better than his daydreams could have prepared him for.

[judasgot-it]

Dad! Jouno headcanons...

He just looks like a stressed as hell father here. Someone help him.

Before ->

To be totally honest, I don't think Jouno would ever plan to be a father. He would never plan to be one simply because he is completely aware of how horrible of a person he is

Why would he bring someone into the world who could be exactly like him? Or worse, he would end up being a horrible parent?

He would just avoid any topic about it.

So parenthood is 100% an accident. Also, this guy would probably try to convince his gf to get an abortion at some point, cause he probably thinks he would make a child that's just that horrible

I feel like the best chance of him becoming a parent would be him not knowing about it when he got arrested and was forced into being a hunting dog. Can't tell your gf to abort when you're in jail ig. Also now he is legally obligated to pay child support. GOTTEM!

Personal theory tho.

He probably wouldn't be jumping for joy at the thought of parenthood tbh. If anything, he is freaking out. I feel like he's in between denial and freaking out. Probably gave some weird rant about the government.

During pregnancy ->

If he's miraculously there (I think the last part is more plausible. This would be his #felonera) then he would be stressed as hell

Dude knows that it's inevitable (unless he throws her down the stairs. or smothers the baby. He probably thinks some weird shit it's Jouno sorry) so now he has to prepare for a very near future of being a father

He can't have sex for what might be the next few years. He has to learn how to take care of a baby. He's made Tecchou-like food combo's now. His life is hell.

Jouno I think would only be dramatic for a month and then get over it quickly -> he has two people relying on him now. Even past his kid being born, he will inevitably have to take care of his baby mom for a while after and will have to provide. Like a dad.

He probably loves the attention and the title it gives him. Probably starts owning it and is thinking 'yeah, actually, I'm going to be an awesome dad' because he gets brownie points for doing the bare minimum as a man

Dude would be kinda ridiculous and do lots of shit just so he can get praise. He's going to be a great dad, so yea, ofc he's going to buy weird useless shit no one would actually use. It's what good dad's do (he's not even pregnant and is suffering from baby brain I think)

Is probably terrified of touching his gf because he is more than aware that his child is in there and it unnerves him. Probably is super freakish about the most random shit, like drinking coffee or going up and down stairs since he can hear whats going on.

His normal level of anxiety goes through the roof during this time. I feel like they won't ever go back down again.

During the birth he would probably be supportive although I think the sounds and smells would be so horrific for him that he would vomit and be kicked out by nursing staff

I feel like the birth was so bad for him to hear (sensitive hearing would be terrible. and smell) that he would be crying as if he pushed a baby out of his hole

Raising that Child (early years) ->

The early years are the worst for him. He still is in a stage between "I want to be a good dad" and "I'm a horrible person I literally have fucking killed people. He doesn't know I have killed people and enjoyed it"

Would have this crisis with a literal baby btw. Probably has full on very serious conversations with his kid about morality when his kid still drinks from the tit

I don't think he'd enjoy being around his kid fully until he starts actually forming full thoughts. Obviously, he loves him, but he enjoys weird kid questions much more than a baby who shits himself

Eggs him on too, tries to make him think until his brain hurts. He thinks it's funny, making a seven-year-old wrap his head around the concept of global shipping and LLCs.

He wouldn't give his kid normal child entertainment. It's all educational and weird shit. Also is very picky about their toys, he's basically a beige mom but its about noises and smells. NEVER give his kid something like slime, he'll go insane.

I think he's 100% the 'bad cop' parent because he would have a lot of rules that a little kid wouldn't get. I feel like the other Hunting Dogs would get on his ass about it

I think Jouno probably worries a lot about giving his kid a good childhood since I doubt his was good - he was alive during the great war as a kid, he turned into a criminal, and he's an ability user. not the best circumstances.

100% has been forced to bring his kid to his job, but he doesn't actually introduce him to any of his actual duties. Torturing? He can't know about that.

Jouno lets his kid hang out with his colleagues -> probably Tachihara, who I think would play the best 'uncle' role out of all of them

Later years ->

Personally, I think Jouno would have a son, but I don't think its a curse. I think it would actually be a sort of blessing, because Jouno was probably a lot nicer of a person before whatever fucked up shit happened that made him the way he is now.

Mentioning this cause I think his son would probably be a direct reflection of who he could have been -> more happy and carefree, and less on the offensive about everything

So when his kid gets older, Jouno is probably some weird guy who tries to tell his kid everything he 'wished he knew at that age'

Probably got his son to have a sex talk from one of the hunting dogs doctors. it was a traumatic bonding experience for the both of them.

He definitely fake kidnapped his kid like 3 times in case something happened. Jouno is a super soldier, but his son is not. He needs to learn how to stab people.

Gave his son a gun/knife. Insists he brings it school, no he does not care if it's against the rules - he literally is the law. His son is also a target, so it is necessary in his eyes.

God please someone stop him he thinks someone is going to murder his son every second of every day

I'm pretty sure his son is some dweeb that Jouno is almost jealous of - like he never got the opportunity to be a dork who cries about homework. he was too busy killing people in his gang at that age

Jouno definitely drops the most insane dad lore. "I killed werewolves in Kenya once" while in the middle of a PTA meeting

Worst PTA mom btw. He WILL interrogate his sons teachers and pull up their records, he is the worst parent. He really shouldn't be allowed there actually

Is a lot nicer to his kid when his son is older.

He isn't his 'best friend' but he tries to do everything he can to be a good dad -> he lives everyday thinking that it'd be his last one with his family, so he tries not to leave with a bad impression

Jouno probably lies awake at night with the thought of what his last words could be to his family

The bitchy teen years would be the worst cause Jouno would probably have the best comebacks, so any sort of argument would be shot down immediately.

i dont think he lets arguments fly at dinner. If he's even there. He would be very busy, so I think his schedule would be erratic. Although I think his son would be the same and stay up at 3 am and get a lecture from him

The hunting dogs all try to teach his son about basic things like shooting and self-defense -> Teruko definitely shot at him once or twice so he knows how to avoid an assassination attempt.

Was actually really proud that his son graduated from school and is a relatively normal member of society. He never even killed someone, that's a high achievement!

[silverskye13]

Silver I know next to nothing about the alien franchise and movie, I am giving you full permission to use this ask as an opportunity to spread propaganda to get me (and anyone else) to finally watch it

So it's, so like, the thing is, right. I'm not a movie tech kinda person [though it is technically impressive, the funny little tricks they did, like not having the budget for a Big Space Ship Derelict so they are a scaled down model that the director's kids in space suits walked up to so it would look bigger, and it was shown to the audience on a shitty CCTV because they didn't do a big matte painting of the set they filmed the tiny one, projected it onto a wall, and then filmed that.] So my rant isn't going to be about how technologically cool the movie was for 1979 on a less than optimal budget. But what I do like, what I excel at, is breaking down themes and tropes. And my god. My god. Just. Ugh. [Flails my arms.]

So a basic rundown for the movie, spoilers ahead, and my analysis of how fucking cool it is:

Basic gist of the movie: The crew of the commercial mining vessel Nostromo are awoken halfway through their trip back to earth by a mysterious signal, calling for help on a far away planet. Upon going down to investigate, one of their crew members is attacked by a strange alien parasite which attaches to his face. This kicks off a tale of increasing horror as the new alien kills off the crew one by one, culminating in Ripley [the main character] blowing up the ship and fleeing in an escape pod, not sure if she'll ever be picked up in the vastness of space -- with the ships cat, who miraculously also survives. [We all know Jonesy is the real main character 💜.] Along the way a plot by the Weyland-Utani corporation is revealed, one of the crew is discovered to be an android, and there is a lot of alien screeching.

Now! The themes that I go absolutely feral over can commence.

The horror of the movie, the reason why the alien is scary, and lethal to humans specifically, is it is a creature built for efficient survival, and this is a trait that Ash, the ship's science officer [and resident hiding android] highly praises in the critter. He describes it as beautiful, elegant, pure in its efficiency. The perfect organism. Efficient.

Humans, by comparison, aren't efficient. We are social. And efficiency preys on social needs. For example:

The xenomorph eggs can survive for ages [in the derelict they're found on, the dead alien who drove the ship is described as fossilized. These eggs have been here for thousands of years. But they activate immediately when a curious human pokes around them. It isn't a fast process. Kane is poking around for a few minutes, looking at the movements of the creatures in their eggs, making observations. Curious. Curiosity is an inefficient trait -- he would have survived if he had climbed out of the hole the eggs were in and left, or even waited for the rest of his team to enact quarantine and investigation procedures.

Speaking of quarantine! When Dallas and Lambert bring Kane, newly infected by an alien parasite, back to the ship, Ripley locks them in the airlock. There are quarantine procedures. We can't risk the whole crew. But they are scared for Kane's safety. He might die without help. They break quarantine. If they hadn't broken quarantine, the baby alien would've been born in the airlock, where it would get spaced the moment it was born.

When the face hugger parasite dies and Kane seems to return to normal, what they should have done to attempt to reinstate quarantine was put him in hyper sleep. His body would have been frozen in a stasis which might have frozen the parasite or, if it hadn't, would have left the new baby alien trapped in a stasis pod. But Kane, haggard and scared from his ordeal, asks can we please have one more meal together before I go to sleep? And that one meal is long enough for the new xenomorph to be born, and release terror on the ship.

There is more. Parker would have lived if he hadn't gone to find the cat by himself, leaving the safety of his group. Dallas would have lived if he let Ripley go through the vents, but he was the captain and he didn't want to risk someone else's life so he went instead. Brett would have lived if he'd left Lambert behind when she was being attacked, or if he'd hit the xenomorph with the flamethrower instead of insisting Lambert get out of the way first. And Lambert would have lived if she'd run instead of being paralyzed in fear by the creature killing her friends. And the xenomorph? Wasn't even eating it's kills. No gore. Little blood. It was killing them because it knew they would kill it, and it was neutralizing threats. Efficient.

The xenomorph is very clearly engineered for survival, and it's survival depends on killing the inefficient organisms around it. Even it's acid blood is described as a survival mechanism, not an offensive mechanism.

Okay Skye, we hear you talking about how scary the critter is because it's not a social creature. That's an interesting observation, but it's still just a monster story, right?

Well, let me tell you an alternative story. Just a little to the left of the original, but one I would argue is still very very canon.

You are an android built by Weyland-Utani, a company which is jealously hunting alien tech to use for its many space programs. You are placed on the Nostromo because there is a known anomaly in the area, and they want to find it. Your job is to get a specimen back to the company, all other protocols expended.

You are programmed to be efficient, so you get to work.

You wake the crew when you find the signal. You give them only the information they need to investigate: it is a signal that repeats every 12 seconds. You let them make the conclusion it is an SOS. Humans are social creatures. They want to help other social creatures in need. There is some arguing about whether they should go, but in the end an extra push from you sends them. Ripley, one of the more efficient members of the crew, keeps asking you why you haven't decoded the message.

"Mother [the super computer running the ship] is still working on it." This is true. She has only translated part of the signal. By the time Ripley realizes it's a warning, the crew is already on the way to the derelict. You tell her if she walks out there, they will have already figured out if it's a warning or not by the time she makes it to them. She agrees.

When they return with a specimen, Ripley [efficient, following protocol] doesn't want to let them on. But Ripley doesn't know you're an android, so when you break quarantine, and you tell her you just wanted Kane to be safe, she begrudgingly believes you.

When the alien is loose, it is easy for you to keep them from killing it. Humans are social, inefficient creatures, and you feel no empathy for their deaths. You do pity them though. Between you and the alien, their chances of survival are slim.

If only they were more efficient.

The horror in Alien is not the xenomorph. The horror in Alien is when anything, primal creatures, androids, a particularly greedy corporation, preys on human social needs in order to get what it wants. There is significance in that Ripley, despite everything, chose to save the cat. She needed companionship. All humans do. She needed to save that cat. A cat that was cantankerous and mean, and hissed whenever it was held, was better than the cold efficiency of empty space.

Any system that prioritizes absolute efficiency will be inhospitable to human life.

[thebearer]

It's exam week and I'm drowning, I've been working on assignments since I woke up and now it's like 11 at night and I haven't made a dent. Could you imagine Carmen reacting to you doing that!?! Like he leaves for work and says goodbye to you after reminding you to take breaks but he comes home and finds you in the same spot hours later!!!! Oh no that won't do at all

i feel you babe :/ i just got done and still recovering.

carmen would walk back in and be shocked. at first he's like "no she def moved" then he sees you in the same stuff, hair messy, and hunched over and he's like?????

"take a break"

"carmen, stop. i'm busy-"

"-take a break." carmen is firmer this time. "save your stuff, and take a break. your eyes are going to melt outta your head. no way this stuff if even sicking anymore. you've been at it too long."

you start to protest and he sighs, looking at you desperately. "don't argue with me, please? i'll make you somethin' to eat and then you can go back."

miraculously, you agree. mainly bc you're starving.

he cooks for you, let's you rant about school and finals and your professors and your degree and your group projects. he even rubs your neck and shoulders when you whine about them hurting.

[kuromori4]

Gabriel Agreste's despicable request

I started this rant after watching the London special and I figured I should finally finish it and post it.

"Make sure Adrien never knows the villain that I was, and instead try and remember the times I tried to be a good father."

Who the hell does he think he is to make such a request?? He's relying on Marinette's desire to protect the boy she loves. He KNOWS that she'll do as he asks for Adrien. He's counting on it. And that's AWFUL. He has to know exactly what he's putting on her shoulders. He knows that she knows what an awful father he's been to Adrien. This isn't a heartfelt request to protect his son. This is a CURSE ON HIS ENEMY. A way to ensure that Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Ladybug, the major thorn in his side since day one, continues to suffer long after he's gone. Ladybug foiled all of his plans from the start, Marinette dared to win the heart of his son, whom he had promised to someone else without his knowledge. She was his downfall, and surely, in his mind, the (albeit indirect) cause of his impending doom.

If he really cared about Adrien, if Adrien's well-being was his real goal and final wish, then he should have given in. He should have decided, "You're right Ladybug, I fucked up. let's try and fix this, for Adrien." But NO. He chose to attack her, even after she gave him a chance to make things right. He wasn't willing to let things end on someone else's terms. If he was going to go out, he was going to do it HIS WAY. And he was going to make sure that his memory would never die, one way or another. So instead of doing the right thing and finding a way out of it that was less harmful to his child, whom he was about to leave an orphan, he steals the Miraculous and makes damn sure that his death will go down in history.

I don't give a shit if he changed the initial intention of his wish. He still wasn't sacrificing himself for some greater good. That's just how he wanted Marinette to perceive it, because she is good, and a child, and therefor easy to emotionally manipulate. He knowingly put both Adrien and Marinette into a position where a future of hurt and pain was inevitable. Everything Gabriel does is self-serving, right to the very end. His final act of villainy ensured that he could maintain control over his son's life even after his death, and keep his enemies suffering long after he's gone. And what's worse, he used the girl his son loves to enforce it. Which is the ultimate fuck you to Mari/bug if you ask me; forcing her to become the new keeper of his son's ignorance, maintaining that Adrien stays in the dark and never learns the truth about anything.

You could argue that he gave his life for Nathalie and that's somehow redeeming, but I argue that it was just another way for him to guarantee that his affairs were taken care of after his demise. Sure he does seem to care about Nathalie in some manner, maybe there's even some love there. (But as we well know, Gabriel's twisted 'love' seems to come at a price.) I'm sure Nathalie knows how to run his company in his stead, to make sure his assets stay in tact, and to a certain degree, maybe even thinks that Nathalie might carry on his mission, or at the very least protect his secrets. Even if she had a change of heart in the end and tried to stop him, she has been complicit all these years and knows most of, if not all of, his secrets and goals. She also has a position of authority over Adrien. She knows that he's a Sentibeing and where his Amok is, and has used it on him before. I truly think that Gabriel believed that Nathalie would help wrap everything up with a nice bow for him. Who else could he trust to handle his final affairs? Certainly not Tsurugi.

If Gabriel had turned himself in to Ladybug, he would have died alone, pretty much then and there. Without his wife. (Emilie's status of dead or nearly dead being unknown to us) Nathalie would have died, His company would fail, his contracts with Tsurugi enterprises would allow Tomoe to pick the Gabriel company apart like a vulture, and his empire would shrivel up. His son would know who and what he was, and would hate him. The plans he put in place for Adrien's future would fall apart, allowing for Adrien to grow and be who he wants without his father's influence. Maybe he'd be remembered for his villainy, but his accomplishments in life as Gabriel would be forgotten, lost, even resented. And what's worse, he would have lost everything to a couple of children. His son's girlfriend and her pet cat would be his downfall, his undoing. The great Gabriel Agreste, Monarch, bested by a young girl. Gabriel's blatant pretension would never stand for it.

His wish ensured that he got to be together with his wife in the end, Which was always his goal. It ensured that Mari/bug (And by extension, Chat Noir) would continue to suffer for daring to oppose him. He got his way. He won. IDGAF if he died. HE WON. He destroyed so many lives. He doesn't deserve the little comments in the special talking about "Rekindling what was still good in Gabriel Agreste" or "What finally made him a good father to Adrien." HE KNEW WHAT HE WAS ASKING OF HER. He knew what it would mean for her, and his son! The power he holds over Marinette and Adrien from beyond the grave guarantees that even with a new Butterfly holder, that he will ALWAYS be the formidable villain who defeated them. He will ALWAYS loom over their heads, wrap his fingers around their throats. He got to defeat his enemy AND look like the hero. He gets to have his cake and eat it too. He gave both of his identities a fucking LEGACY.

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

IOTA Reviews: Pretension

Oh joy, another Felix episode. Because the last one was just so good, wasn't it?

Let's get into the nineteenth episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fifth season: Pretension

We start off with Kagami and Adrien heading to school, with the former making plans with Marinette to spend a little time together, all while Argos stalks them. We then cut to Gabriel, who's attempting to heal his Cataclysm wound with a machine that drains the energy from his imprisoned Kwamis. It fails because... uh... uhhhh... it just doesn't?

Kaalki: I told you. No magic can heal this wound.

Barkk: A Cat Noir Cataclysm can't be healed!

Yeah, they just say nothing can heal the wound, and don't even mention the fact that we've already seen the Ladybug Miraculous heal Adren when he was wounded by his own Cataclysm in “Miraculer”. And before you say it was a weaker version of the attack, check out what Astruc said a few years ago when the subject was brought up.

Whether you want to take this as fact or not since it wasn't explained in the show itself, the point is that we've seen Ladybug heal someone who was wounded by Cataclysm before. Then again, considering the recent reveal, that episode only opens up another can of worms.

Back at school, Marinette talks with Adrien and Kagami about how Gabriel only sees her as some crazy fan, though she doesn't do a lot to help her case.

Tomoe arrives, and just like she's done this whole season, is only here to provide exposition while nagging Gabriel to get Ladybug and Cat Noir's Miraculous already. Gabriel comes up with a plan involving a gadget Felix accidentally dropped at the end of the last season. If you forgot, I understand, since it's a pretty weird thing to call back to.

Marinette: He feels worried and I would be too if I were him. He thinks I'm one of those fans who follows you everywhere, showers you with hand-knitted gifts and knows every single one of your middle name days.

Kagami: Isn't that what you used to do, Marinette?

Marinette: Yes... except no! I mean, yes, but I was doing it out of love and, besides, I've changed a lot.

Kagami: You are correct.

Marinette: Really? You think I've changed a lot?

Kagami: No. Well, not that much.

I love when even the show points out how little character development there is. Makes my job a lot easier.

Adrien goes with Marinette to talk to Gabriel about their relationship. We get a pretty somewhat chilling moment where Gabriel's kind father facade briefly fades as he orders Adrien to go to his room so he and Marinette can talk, all while he still puts on a welcoming image. After Plagg reminds Adrien that all Gabriel knows how to cook is pancakes, Gabriel then lectures Marinette about why he doesn't want her to see Adrien.

Gabriel: I don't think you understand, child, so let me put things differently. Life is like fashion. You think you have a choice, but all you have is the illusion of choice. And I decide what choices are given to you.

Marinette: You're wrong! (Shows Gabriel her sketchbook with her designs) Fashion is about listening to people, it's about understanding who they are, what excites them and creating the clothes that will help them express their inner world. Help them connect with others and make their dreams come true.

Gabriel: (Laughs and looks over Marinette's sketchbook) No, that's not fashion. That's making dresses for your dolls. Fashion is a product, a marketing strategy, an industry that relies on uninterrupted trend renewal that forces you to either throw away everything you have and buy more or, worse, to be out of fashion.

That bastard! I can't believe Gabriel wants to make an honest living by using market research data to his advantage! What a piece of scum...

I joke, but the rest of Gabriel's little rant is even worse, as he acts as if he decides what people like and don't like, even though he just mentioned the importance of keeping up with current trends. Seriously, this dude's talking as if the entire world revolves around his brand.

Gabriel: Thanks to the clothes I create, the celebrities who wear them, the advertisements I design and the Alliance rings that broadcast them, I create an idyllic vision. A perfection that everyone aspires to achieve, while keeping it just out of their grasp. You finally understand the difference, don't you? You listen to people's desires and create what they want. Somehow, people make you. Whereas I create people's desires. They buy what I decide to buy. They think what I want them to think. I'm the one who makes people. You think you love Adrien, but you're just under the spell of this world I've created. A world where Adrien is the star, shining high above. A world where you're just part of the crowd below looking up at him.

Let's see... a complete narcissist with an obsession with controlling others, puts on a facade to make himself look more approachable, uses his influence to sell something to the masses that are part of his greater operation, and acts as if his products are necessary for society to function when they're more of a luxury than anything else? Where have I seen this before?

Marinette goes against Gabriel's wishes and tells Adrien she loves him before rightfully telling him to piss off... through a pancake metaphor, for some reason.

Marinette: You know what the problem is with your pancakes? Way too much flour, not enough butter. You're using an old, completely outdated recipe. No one likes them like that anymore. And that's the good thing about being a baker's daughter. I don't even need to try them to know that they're tasteless.

You know, I could make so many jokes about the state of the show with this little speech, but I feel like it'd be too easy.

Meanwhile, Kagami tries to tell her mother that she's not interested in Adrien anymore, but we get the same crap Tomoe has been saying ever since Season 3. “You must follow our family legacy, Kagami!”, “Stop letting your emotions control you, Kagami!”, “I'm only blind for a cheap visual metaphor, Kagami!”, yadda, yadda, yadda. During this, Argos overhears this and outright kidnaps Kagami. Rather than call the police to report a kidnapping, Tomoe calls Gabriel, who had transformed into Monarch offscreen, and tells him to akumatize him (even though she's still carrying her useless Magical Charm), which he does, turning her into Matagi Gozen.

Matagi Gozen is basically Ikari Gozen, only instead of a centaur, she now rides a robot dog for some reason and has a bow and arrow now. Her powers are basically related to her size and riding a robot dog, mostly so we can focus on her Miraculous powers for the day. Even though Tomoe was seen wearing six Alliance rings before she called Gabriel, she only gets three powers, the Bee Miraculous' Venom, the Rooster Miraculous' Sublimation (which she uses to give herself an enhanced sense of smell), and the Mouse Miraculous' Multitude. It's really just the same setup we got in “Multiplication” with a few changes, and it's nothing special. Although, it's too bad that Monarch doesn't have the Dog Miraculous, as that would have really gone well with her powers.

As the four Matagi Gozen clones go on the hunt, Argos takes Kagami to the Eiffel Tower to hide out, where we get—wait, it's, it's, BY GOD, IT'S KAGAMI WITH A WOODEN CHAIR!

Argos transforms back into Felix, and unintentionally throws Matagi Gozen off the trail since she was tracking him through one of the feathers on his fan. It turns out that after that single conversation they shared last episode, Felix is suddenly developing feelings for Kagami, and the whole reason he kidnapped her, aside from “protecting her from her mother”, is to get to talk to her again.

Felix: We have so much in common, and yet, you're also so different. I've never met someone like you.

Kagami: We don't even know each other!

Felix: I know you. I've been following you non-stop.

Kagami: Even better! You follow me, you spy on me and now you've kidnapped me to get to know me?!

Felix: Uh... yes?

Kagami: You are utterly incompetent at social relations.

See? Felix isn't a sociopath who just tried to wipe out all of humanity last episode! He just needs to make friends, that's all.

Yeah, in case you can't tell, it seems like the show is still trying to course correct the characterization of Felix. Rather than the overconfident and manipulative wild card he was for his last five appearances, the episode is now trying to make Felix out to be a secretly awkward person with noble goals. Afterall, he saved Kagami, so by that logic, he has to be a good guy. Yeah, he technically stalked her like a creep, but it ended up being good in the end, didn't it?

After Marinette and Adrien transform into Ladybug and Cat Noir respectively, the Matagi Gozen clones start to track Felix through the scent of the aforementioned gadget. Right as Matagi Gozen finds Felix, Ladybug and Cat Noir arrive on the scene, giving Felix the chance to transform into Argos and escape with Kagami again.

Matagi Gozen: This is what heroes do? Not only did you help that monster escape, but now you're going to fight me? A mother trying to save her daughter?

Cat Noir: Hey, my lady. When you think about it, they're not wrong. We all want the same thing. If we let them save Kagami, we could seize the opportunity to get Felix's Miraculous back.

Ladybug: Too risky. They're under Monarch's influence.

Yeah, but you can't even try to negotiate a temporary alliance between Matagi Gozen? Yes, we know that she's working for Monarch, but the heroes don't know that. All we get is Ladybug asking Matagi Gozen to reject the Megakuma, and she goes back to fighting them. How interesting would it have been for Ladybug and Cat Noir to make an uneasy alliance with someone they don't know is working for Monarch?

After Cat Noir gets ignored during one of the few times he makes a decent point, he escapes to the sewer and detransforms, Matagi Gozen losing their scent trail. Matagi Gozen goes back to looking for Kagami, and decides to shoot her with some arrows tipped with Venom. Argos defends Kagami, and breaks up his fan to throw the pieces around and create multiple fake scent trails to throw off Matagi Gozen before detransforming. How Argos even came came up with this plan when I don't think he figured out Matagi Gozen could smell really good is anyone's guess.

As Kagami and Felix keep running away, Kagami asks the question I'm sure you've all been thinking.

Kagami: I don't understand. You have the Miraculous of the peacock, why don't you create a Sentimonster to get us out of here?

Felix: First of all, don't call them that.

Fine, “walking sin against nature” it is. Got anything else to say there, buddy? Maybe anything that isn't a half-assed speech meant to make the audience sympathize with you?

Felix: I refuse to create a being to manipulate them, control them, abuse them, and end up destroying them. When you bring a living being into this world, you have a responsibility towards them. Your duty is to protect them, love them, help them discover the true meaning of their existence. To deprive them of that... is monstrous.

Kagami: Are you talking about... yourself?

Felix: I'm talking about... us.

Come on dude! I said anything that isn't a half-assed speech meant to make the audience sympathize with you!

Okay, I've been putting this off long enough. Let's talk about Felix's ideology, his little speech, and, how it contradicts his previous appearances.

First off, for someone who refuses to create a Sentimonster to control and abuse, Felix had no trouble screwing around with Adrien in his first episode when his main goal was to get one of the rings from Gabriel. Hell, it makes even less sense why he'd keep that ring that we know can be used to control Adrien if his plan ultimately amounted to trading it away along with the fifteen Miraculous in Ladybug's possession.

Second, Felix literally created a Sentimonster to destroy humanity with just last episode, and he doesn't even mention that. Yeah, you can chalk it up to character development, but we don't even get a line about learning about the burden of ending a life you yourself created. It just feels like a way to make him seem more sympathetic after he went all “I'M THE GOD! I'M THE GOD!” last episode.

Third, and I'm just going to be honest about this, but why should I care about the life of a Sentimonster when the show has shown it doesn't care either? Ever since the end of Season 2, we've seen Sentimonsters be summoned and erased from existence left and right, and other than a single occasion (Ladybug), nobody has really brought up the fact that Sentimonsters are living beings too. Even putting that aside, most of the Sentimonsters we've seen have either been giant monsters, clones of other people, or mindless tools, none of which showed any desire to be alive other than to serve their purpose. It's only because Adrien, Felix, and now Kagami are revealed to be Sentimonsters that we should care about the ethics of summoning a Sentimonster in battle. Even in the last episode, Felix never brought up than Ladybug is essentially taking innocent lives whenever she de-evilizes an Amok.

And finally, the fact that this speech was used to set up a romance between Felix and Kagami, not because he saw a kindred spirit in her, but rather, because he believes that she's a Sentimonster too. You know that episode of South Park where Cartman tried to set up Token with a new girl, where the entire joke was that it was because Cartman believed that black people can only date other black people? This is basically that story with none of the irony. The episode seriously treats Felix taking an interest in Kagami specifically on the basis that she may be the same kind of artificial creation as him, as if he isn't capable of relating to anyone who also has to deal with abusive parents and isn't a Sentimonster. On a completely unrelated note, isn't it funny how out of the four rich kids with abusive or neglectful parents, Chloe is the only one who isn't a Sentimonster and is the least sympathetic?

Ladybug (having gotten a pair of scissors from activating her Lucky Charm offscreen) and Cat Noir try to stop Felix, but after a single speech from him, Kagami is now completely on his side for some reason.

Kagami: Felix is not your enemy! He's like me! He doesn't know how to express himself. Everyone is wrong about him! Including me.

Funny, I don't seem to remember you dooming all of Paris by giving over a dozen magical artifacts to a supervillain. Also, speaking from someone who struggles to socialize in real life, I can confirm that social awkwardness isn't really an excuse to kidnap someone. Just remember what happened in Misery.

Ladybug realizes that Felix and Kagami are vital to her Lucky Charm working, she decides to trust Felix. Felix then transforms into Argos and immediately escapes without contributing to the plan, while Kagami uses the scissors to cut the string of Matagi Gozen's bow after Ladybug and Cat Noir restrain the Akuma.

Ladybug then de-evilizes the Megakuma, uses Miraculous Ladybug to fix the damage caused by the fight, gives Tomoe yet another useless Magical Charm after the last useless one broke because it was completely useless, and Argos once got away without facing any consequences for his actions.

Afterwards, Kagami tries to stand up to Tomoe, but she orders her to hand over her ring containing her Amok—I mean, her ring that has absolutely no control over her, and is part of this thrilling mystery. Adrien also tries to stand up for Marinette, and Gabriel tells him to enjoy her time with Marinette... before saying he's moving to London next year. This is supposed to be a dick move, but with how often Adrien gets caught in the crossfire of Akuma attacks, with or without the mask, this is arguably the smartest thing Gabriel has done for the past five seasons. Adrien chooses not to tell Marinette about London, because I guess all that whining about hating secrets only mattered when someone else was withholding information from him.

The episode ends with Felix revealing that the ring Kagami gave her mother was a fake. Of course, this makes no sense because not only did we never see Felix steal the ring from Kagami, but Tomoe has a mental connection to Kagami, she should notice the ring is a fake. Also, you know how Kagami's arc so far has been a mixture of finding independence from her controlling mother while coming to terms with her breakup with Adrien? Get ready for all of that to be thrown out the window, because the writers are desperate to make him look good, Felix is now the one to save her from her mother and give her independence back, while also hinting at a relationship starting between the two. I'd say this episode fumbled the landing, but I haven't even gotten to the season finale yet.

This episode started out pretty poorly, and quickly went downhill afterwards. The idea of explaining why Gabriel's Cataclysm wound can't be healed was convoluted, Felix continues to be unlikable, Tomoe once again shows how terrible of an antagonist she is.

I'll admit, the chemistry between Marinette and Adrien was decent, but it's far too late to really establish a proper rivalry between her and Gabriel more than halfway through the fifth season, especially while discussing fashion when it's only been used to justify plots where she tries to make stuff for Adrien. The writers had plenty of time, yet rather than build up tension between the main hero and main villain, they decided we needed more episodes revolving around Chloe, Lila, and Felix.

Speaking of, Felix once again shows how poorly written he is. He was the one to instigate the conflict, it wasn't established if he even had a plan on what to do once he gets away with Kagami, and if anything, only made things worse because of his refusal to surrender, much less acknowledge his fault in this situation when the Akuma chasing after him is only as powerful as she is now because he gave his evil uncle multiple Miraculous to use for his Akumas. But no, he has to be the one to wreck Kagami's character arc and be the one to try and liberate her from Tomoe's influence because he's a good guy now! It says a lot when Cat Noir is the only one who still isn't trusting Felix at this point.

While it's nowhere near as bad as “Emotion”, this was still a really bad episode to follow up on.

THE BIGGEST IDIOT OF THE EPISODE IS...TOMOE

While Felix came dangerously close to winning the award, he at least showed more restraint here, and was able to throw off both Matagi Gozen a few times. Tomoe, on the other hand, got nothing to show any real intelligence, and if anything, proved she was just as incompetent as Gabriel is. She chose to nag Gabriel while he was suffering from the effects of his fatal wound, decided to akumatize herself instead of even considering contacting the cops to stop a single kidnapping, while ironically drawing more attention to herself in her attempt to save Kagami and stop Felix, decided to try shooting her daughter instead of the one who abducted her, and didn't even realize the ring capable of controlling her daughter was replaced by a fake when she should obviously be able to sense something.

[raedshadowlegends]

Why Lore Olympus and Miraculous Ladybug are the Same Thing but in Different Fonts

Good evening, good day, hello and howdy. I am INCREDIBLY bored and I'm here to go on a nonsensical tangent about two pieces of media that I hate and have dedicated a vast amount of my free time to. This is all in good fun and all of my rudeness is intended to be satirical and/or comical unless indicated otherwise.

Now just to preface, if you know me then you know how much I dislike Miraculous Ladybug. Folks in my circle got to watch as I descended into madness writing a 64k word review on season 5. So I've spent an uncomfortable amount of time dissecting this show.

I have also spent an uncomfortable amount of time engaging with the shitshow that is Lore Olympus. And now my ass is gonna try and compare the two because there's a lot of shit going on here.

None of this is going to matter and it's all in good fun. Like I said, I am bored. And sometimes it's fun to compare stuff you hate.

Now let the insanity ensue. FP spoilers and MLB s5 spoilers below the cut btw.

To get a major difference out of the way, Miraculous Ladybug is a tv show. Lore Olympus is a webcomic.

But mediums aside, these two things still have a lot in common. So for the first comparison, I'd like to talk about the insecurity in both properties.

Insecurity

What I define as insecurity in this context is a piece of media that is too afraid to commit or adhere to a certain tone, story, style, etc. In short-- they don't know what they want to be.

Insecurity in Lore Olympus is a bit more obvious than with Miraculous so I'm gonna rant about that first.

Lore Olympus just straight up does not have a story to tell.

There are too many random ass plots being added and discarded on a whim for it to be a coherent story. A good way to explain it is kinda like this-- In this episode of LO, something cool new and interesting is set up and you have to keep reading to see what happens! And then nothing ever happens. Or it happens because the audience won't let the author forget so there's a half-assed attempt to wrap up that plot point.

LO is so insecure about what it is, it feels the need to add more and more to make it actually something. But what it is is a hollow story that lacks substance. So all of these new random plot points are kinda like bandaid solutions if that makes sense.

There are so many unfinished/under-utilized plot points that if you were to count out each and every one, you'd probably keel over dead before you finished. There's that many.

It's too insecure to commit to any one of them in the grand scheme of things.

I don't know how coherent all of that was so here's a shitty tl;dr

LO doesn't know what it wants to say anymore so it's just adding more shit to keep the reader "invested."

Yeah ok I think that makes more sense. As for Miraculous...

God. I fucking hate Miraculous.

It's insecure as hell and you can smell that shit from ten miles away. It's insecure with it's premise, I think.

If it just kept to the simple "monster-of-the-week" formula, I do not think I would have written so many words on it's fifth season.

Miraculous (apparently) had a grander story to tell beyond the "monster-of-the-week revert back to the status quo each episode."

But we don't see any of that in full swing till season 3, really. Which is a long ass time to get the ball rolling imo.

It's a little jarring to see the show go from the stupid kid status quo adventures to a heavy and emotional story??? And I say heavy and emotional with the most sarcastic tone possible because the only emotion I feel watching this shit is rage.

Despite wanting to make that shift to a serialized type of show, Miraculous was too scared to stray from the successful status quo format.

To explain a bit more I wanna talk about my review of the season.

While it is mostly filled with rude jokes and incomprehensible jargon, I bring up a lot of points in it regarding the state of things.

One of those things being the show's hesitancy to move the story along.

The fifth season was supposed to be a grand final battle and a conclusion to this story arc. But it was too scared to commit to that so there's way more episodes that are nothing but shipping fodder.

There are many episodes that season that just... feel the same. Just with different coats of paint. "Marinette is trying to date Adrien but she's awkward and clumsy and oh no! shenanigans ensue!" We've been doing this for 8 years.

If they want to tell a serialized story then they need to grow some balls and cut the shit we've seen a million times before.

Their insistence to stick to the status quo makes the writing exceptionally weak downright painful to sift through. It was too scared, too insecure, to stray from its formula.

That's a part of the reason why I think the season is paced so bad. There's so little time spent on the interesting parts of the story because they had to cram in as much shipping shit as possible. So by proxy, there was less time to tell a good story.

Both of these stupid ass properties don't know what they want to be. There are too many things being added and not enough balls to commit to any of them.

Now with both LO and MLB, we can all agree that the writing is pretty shit. Nothing new there. But shitty writing often bleeds into the characters and making them shitty by exposure. Almost like a spill of toxic waste, infecting anything near it and turning into a rotten pile of sludge and chemicals.

So yeah, the characters are ass as well. But I only wanna complain about the female leads for both of these things.

But just to mention Adrien and Hades, they are pretty similar. I won't go into detail but the short of it is, "Character with deep seated issues that could have been interesting, has a lot of potential, but is just kinda garbage in the end."

At least Adrien Agreste isn't monetizing death and has a bunch of shades in his basement doing his work.

Persephone and Marinette

So I always say that I don't like using the term 'Mary Sue' to describe a character. But as it turns out, I use that term a lot. So I'm not gonna lie about that anymore.

These two characters are Mary Sues.

Persephone first

Oh my god I hate Persephone a lot. She just ticks every box on my list of 'THINGS I HATE IN A CHARACTER.'

Which is funny because her character had a lot of promise and heart in the beginning.

I related to her a LOT when I picked up this comic before my frontal cortex developed. I related with her character and her struggles. Especially after the Apollo incident. That really stuck out to me. It was so powerful.

But all of those tiny things I liked about her character were stripped away. Her ambition to study in school? Poof, gone. Her charm? Not charming anymore. That kindness everyone in the story gushes about? I don't even think it was there in the first place.

Truth be told, I do need to reread this comic because the beginning is fuzzy as fuck in my walnut-sized brain. But I can tell you for certain that the way she was in the beginning is not who she is now.

And this isn't the case of a character going through an arc and developing and changing. She's just getting worse and the narrative treats it as a GOOD THING.

"Oh yeah, Persephone trashed Leuce's apartment instead of talking to her husband like an adult. She threatened to kill this nymph but you're supposed to find that endearing." Like, what??? I will not have a story try and get me to believe this is a good thing.

If this were a good story, Persephone's actions in that episode WOULDN'T BE REWARDED. But she's rewarded with sex for being a fucking psychopath towards a random nymph. Wow.

And that leads into my next point-- she can never be in the wrong ever.

AOW? Retconned, not her fault. It wasn't her fault she killed all those people. It's actually Eris' fault because she gave her wrath.

Trashing Leuce's apartment? She was in the right for that, apparently.

Killing people in a famine during the 10 year banishment? That's never explored, we just know she killed people, burned a library or something, and probably shot the president too. But it's fine, she's the good guy.

And most recently (and potentially the most frustrating);

Persephone causes winter.

Not her mother, Demeter, no fuck the myths. Persephone is the one who caused winter actually. AND SHE DID IT ON ACCIDENT SO TECHNICALLY IT IS NOT HER FAULT CAUSE SHE DIDNT MEAN TOOOO UWU She also probably killed a million flower nymphs in that snap freeze but its ok it doesn't matter.

WHAT?

WHAT THE FUCK? CMON NOW.

She's not going to receive any consequences for anything because she is just too perfect.

She's smarter than Athena, prettier than Aphrodite, better than her mother in every way, all the boys want her, she has a perfect body, she's pink, her eyes go red when she's angy, she has the most power of everyone in the world, she's a super rare fertility goddess, she has all the gifts, all the blessings, and none of the development.

It almost feels like a wattpad fanfic.

"My mom doesn't like me so she sold me to one direction and then I became queen of the underworld."

Yeah, I don't like her.

And the same can be applied to Marinette!

A character who is so blatantly perfect, the narrative fucking BENDS TO HER WILL.

She's a creepy ass stalker and has done some weird ass things to get close to this random famous white boy and it's all excused.

It's literally excused.

There is a rule about character backstories. They are supposed to provide an explanation for a character's behavior, not an excuse for it.

In season 5, episode 14 - Derision, we see a bit of Marinette backstory. Some stupid bullshit happens and Marinette essentially says she isn't going to say 'I love you' to anyone unless she knows literally everything about them.

She says a lot in that stupid ass scene but it's basically just saying that all of her stalking and creepy behavior is justified. Which it is not.

Marinette can do no wrong. The narrative won't allow it.

She's perfect in every way. And even when SHE is in the wrong, characters somehow find a way to apologize to her. Either that or she turns a situation about someone else into one about her self.

She's just the perfect character who ends up saving the world.

Fuck having Chat Noir face against his dad in the finale, Marinette has to girlboss all over the place and save the day but then actually lose because the "plot" demands it.

Oh yeah and she's probably never going to tell Adrien that his abusive dad was the villain they had been fighting for months. Do you think that's a good choice? I'll give you a hint; it is not.

It makes Marinette look like a HORRIBLE character but it's painted in a way that makes the viewer believe this is the right decision.

I don't think I need to get into specifics as to why that is wrong and disgusting.

If I had to make a prediction for this show going forward, she isn't going to tell him. It's going to be forgotten and she's going to be painted as the hero.

No flaws, no accountability, nothing.

Garbage character. Fucking hate it.

Both of these characters will never see consequences for their actions. Their bad actions are either excused or retconned out of existence. And that's not how you write a character btw. If you want them to be real, give them consequences. The world should not revolve around them. They should have flaws and issues that should be explored. But apparently that's too much work.

It's funny how both of these properties claim to be about feminism and somehow completely miss what feminism is

Miraculous thinks that feminism means "Girl power! Girls are better than guys in every way!" And Lore Olympus makes no attempt to be feminist at all. Women hate other women, and they don't get a lot of opportunities to explore and express themselves.

I could get into the whole purity culture shtick but that's a shitty rant for another day.

I've been ranting about this for a while and I got the big ones out of the way, methinks. I do want to get into the creators of both of these things but that is also a rant for another day.

Cause if I got into that now, we'd be here a while.

So let me just make a final comparison and wrap things up here. I don't think any of this makes a lot of sense but I hate both things and I'm passionate about it so I'm gonna keep rambling.

Miraculous Ladybug and Lore Olympus never attempt to grow as stories. They are both scared to try new things and to stick with it. Most of the time this results in rushed writing and horribly done characters.

It's so clear that both of these things are desperate to be something great but they just can't put in the work to get there.

Honestly, they both feel like the product of a team of yes-men. Bad decisions and errors slip by WAY too often and it's kind of embarrassing.

These are popular pieces of media and they have the resources to be great but they just aren't.

They're both too insecure to make something of themselves.

It's honestly really sad and I don't want this for either of these things. I want LO to be stunning and retell the myth of Persephone with the respect it deserves. I want MLB to be a serialized show with focus on the lore. Sure it can start as episodic but it can ease us into a deeper story and intrigue the viewer. But I want it to flesh out the world and be an entertaining experience.

It's sad but it's the way it is.

Who knows, maybe MLB season 6 will be good. And maybe LO will have a 4th season and it'll fix all the problems it has.

I dunno.

Thanks for reading this incoherent nonsense.