#get to know marinette

[anna-scribbles]

adrinette exes & marichat! part 3!

(part 1 / part 2 / part 4 / part 5)

[ryssbelle]

Drew a bunch of Marinettes in a bunch of different artists styles it was a lot of fun!!

Artists who's styles I mimicked: @buggachat @hamsternamedmarinette @ladybeug @sabertoothwalrus and @anna-scribbles all epic artists 🤟😎

[zoe-oneesama]

Some "Special" Girls! And the late girls.

Ko-fi | Patreon

[coffeebanana]

okay but what if. video game designer marinette...

[bigfatbreak]

funniest part of getting to this part of the plot is old readers vs new

it'll be fine i PROMISE, RELAX,

[mari-cherri]

when u friend-zone ur girlfriend but like in a different way than before whos actually also friend-zoning you but in almost the same way as before and you’ve kissed but you also havent kissed yet but the all the times you kissed it was NOT currently in the relationship where you havent kissed yet and you spend all day being absolutely disguising about one another until nightfall when you proceed to sneak out and meet up again and insist on how just friends you are while you gush about your partner who you were making kissy eyes with all day (and not actually kissing)

big fan of the new love square dynamic we got in the second half of season 5, quite possibly be even stupider than before

[familyagrestefanblog]

Screw it, I'm gonna ask the question:

When has Marinette really struggling to make friends ever been a thing in the show? People are now using Marinette's anxiety as an excuse for why she struggled with behaving in any way normally around Sublime, as well as using it as "duh" explanation for why Adrien is in the "right" for saying that it is a normal thing for Marinette to not know how to befriend people.

But WHEN did she ever act like this while trying to make new friends or form a connection when it wasn't actually explicitly about Adrien?

Cause that's the thing: Adrien is incorrectly projecting the way Marinette treats him onto her treatment of Sublime, saying that this is normal for Marinette.

But its not.

This whole "you only have one chance to make a good impression to become someone's friend" has never been something Marinette's character thought or acted like. She has countless of friends, even more connections everywhere, she's the widely beloved hero of the city, and a team that trusts her and follows her every word.

Her anxiety can get a BIT in the way here and there in how she treats her regular friends (so excluding Chat Noir), but she never did THIS before to make a friend.

Her anxiety can have her badly judge people who she then treats worse, but once she gets over herself she barely has a problem to try and reconnect with them and be their friend

She ONLY treated Adrien like this, hence why he incorrectly projected onto Sublime. What are you all TALKING about that thats the REAL reason for her behaviour?

Shouldn't yall Marinette stans KNOW your fav well enough to know she never did THIS before?

Why are you all LYING?

[bugsandboos]

reading everyone’s thoughts on the london special and marinette’s actions have given me a serious case of deja vu in relation to the s5 finale, here’s why

a very very VERY common reaction from the fandom i saw to the finale was “why are the writers letting gabriel get away with being a hero why isn’t he being held accountable horrible finale horrible writing i hate this show etc etc etc”

before i share my thoughts on this for like the thousandth time i just wanna mention i DID cry during the finale, partly because i was in shock and also because i HATED it. but now i genuinely believe it was one of if not the smartest thing the ml writers have ever conjured up and i just. fucking love it. (point is: i understand disliking it. that was me at some point, until i began to consider the implications of the “ending”)

similarly, a reaction i’ve seen to the london special (mainly from ml salters) is “why would the writers let marinette lie to the world when it’s so clearly morally wrong she’s such a horrible person she needs to be held accountable blah blah blah”

something both the s5 finale and the london special share is that THE ACTIONS THAT TAKE PLACE IN BOTH. ARE NOT MEANT. TO SIT WELL WITH THE AUDIENCE

NO writer on ml is trying to convince a fan that “gabriel was actually a hero because he made one selfless decision (that wasn’t even that selfless?????)”. NO writer on ml is trying to convince a fan that “marinette is completely right for hiding the truth about gabriel from not only adrien but also the whole world!!!!!! no one should ever find out!!!”

the entire point of the finale and special is to make the viewer uncomfortable, as we watch marinette sit with her questionable choices, watch adrien refer to his father as a hero and watch their class throw a party. none of this is supposed to make us feel at peace with the way this arc has concluded.

what people seem to be missing is that even if the s1-s5 arc has ended, the s6 arc is just beginning, CENTERED AROUND THE CHOICES THAT HAVE MADE US AS THE AUDIENCE FEEL SO UNCOMFORTABLE!! you’re completely ignoring the way the plot is set up if you think the writers are going to neglect gabriel’s storyline, because it is far from over.

i think it’s also important to mention that neither marinette nor adrien are at peace with what’s happened (even if that was implied during the s5 finale—the london special has provided us with this new information on their emotional statuses). marinette is clearly being eaten alive by guilt, seeking confirmation throughout the entire special that protecting adrien from the truth was the morally correct decision. adrien was obviously affected by his father’s death (contrasting the idea that he just “threw a party” without any emotional backlash), and will undoubtedly learn to grapple with his conflicting feelings on gabriel’s character throughout s6 (he sacrificed himself??? but he abused me??? but he saved ladybug and nathalie????? but he apparently assisted monarch?????)

POINT IS

no one is meant to be satisfied with the way things are in the miraculous universe at the moment. you aren’t supposed to want the truth about what really went down during recreation to stay hidden. if you feel uncomfortable with the current situation our main characters are in, GOOD! please stop the discrediting the writers, because your discomfort means they have done their job well.

[itriedwritingandhereiam]

Okay but Gabriel beefing witha random teenage girl is such a funny concept to me. Like bro, she's beating him in every department.

She's feeding Adrien actually food. She's giving him thoughtful gifts. She's spending time with him. She's an upcoming fashion designer who caught the attention of his very same mentor. She's petty as fuck and is not afraid to diss him and straight up verbally murder him over his shitty ass pancakes.

I can just imagine a passive agressive rivalry for being Adrien's best person if Gabriel had actually given a fuck about his son in canon

[anna-scribbles]

a NORMAL comic i drew BY MYSELF with NO HELP from @hamsternamedmarinette . in case u were wondering. <3

[sidsinning]

Showrunners put an ep like Derision out and expect me to like the principal, Sabrina, or the mayor after a single ep of righteousness

Suck me

[hirachat]

i fear i need to defend marinette dupain-cheng on the internet for at least the next month. i must defend my girl-fail daughter

[hufflepotato-18]

I- I- *muffled scream*

[bigfatbreak]

Birds of a Feather previous / next

[cookiedough77]

i know this has definitely been said in the miraculous fandom before but ladybug and chat noirs powers are definitely unbalanced, even though they have the most powerful miraculous, the black cat just seems like any other

ladybug gets a lucky charm, miraculous ladybug, and purify akumas

while chat noir just gets a cataclysm?

i propose that chat noir gets to purify akumas, like "destroying" the evil out of the butterflies, it makes the most sense

and this wouldnt even change much because if he sacrifices himself to an akuma miraculous ladybug will just make him appear again and he can purify the akuma then

im just saying it works better and is more balanced, and makes his miraculous more "powerful" in its own way

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

How to Use Absurdist Humor

I will often excuse away the “worst” of Marinette’s behavior with a very dismissive, “It’s an obvious joke, so there’s no point taking this as a serious character beat. Let’s not waste our time here.”

While I stand by that statement, I can see why some people struggle with this approach. Miraculous has made the unfortunate choice to tie the humor to parts of the narrative that have actual meaning to the audience. This undercuts the power of the humor, making it hard for some people to separate the humor from the actual character beats, so let’s step back and look at a show that did this right to show what I mean.

That’s right, folks, it’s time for more gushing about Kim Possible!

For today’s case study, we'll start with episode 17 of season one: The Twin Factor. In this episode, Kim is stuck babysitting her little brothers while on a mission to stop her arch nemesis. You may be thinking that Kim's "flaw" in this episode is the fact that she brings two 10-year-olds on a dangerous mission.

You would be wrong.

This is the lead-in to Kim bringing the twins along:

Kim: Er, speaking of forgetting, I totally spaced on the baby-sitting. Mrs. Dr. Possible: Kimmy, you made a commitment. Kim: Two commitments, actually. I'm suppose to go on a mission today. Mr. Dr. Possible: You'll just have to take the boys. Kim: Mom, can you please tell Dad that's a bad idea? Mrs. Dr. Possible: Oh, Kimmy. I'm sure Jim and Tim would love to visit a secret lab with you.

This is how you do absurdist humor. Is this technically horrible parenting? Yes, but there is no way that anyone is taking this seriously. It’s just so over the top that anyone trying to criticize the Possible’s behavior comes across as completely missing the point.

The other important factor is that Kim’s parents are played as genuinely loving and supportive parents, just in a really absurd way. This is a very natural bit of loving family dialogue about a totally ridiculous version of a normal family conflict. None of these three characters show off flaws that we expect to see address here save for their complete lack of concern about Kim’s life-risking adventures.

If Kim’s parents were shown to be genuinely neglectful or if Kim’s adventures were played more seriously, then this humor wouldn’t work anywhere near as well as it does. It would still be an obvious joke, but it would stumble the landing if you knew that the episode would go on to see Jim and Tim die. (They don’t, btw. The absurdist humor carries on, I’m just giving an extreme example of a plot beat that would kill – or at least weaken – this humor.)

Another example of Kim Possible doing absurdist humor right comes from the next episode in season one: Animal Attraction. In this episode, Kim is up against Senior Senior Senior, an eccentric billionaire who pursues villainy as a hobby, leading to exchanges like this one between him and his son:

Jr.: Did we not leave Kim Possible on a conveyor belt to her doom? Sr.: Yes. A proper villain always leaves his foe when he's about to expire. Jr.: Why? Sr.: Well, it would be bad form just to lull about, waiting for it. Jr.: Why? Sr.: Tradition!

This episode has a lot of moments like this. Moments where Jr asks why they don't do the obvious, more easy/effective thing and his father blows him off because that's not how villains do things! It's totally illogical logic and it's great. I love it! Perfect example of absurdist villains and a great way to keep the show from getting too serious. The writers never wanted you to feel like Kim was in over her head.

If you look at these two examples and compare them to Miraculous, you'll notice a big difference. While Miraculous does occasionally pull off good absurdist humor, a lot of the absurdist humor is more questionable because it's tied to the show's central conflicts.

As an example, let's talk about Marinette's inability to confess to Adrien and all the nonsense tied to that. Her many failures and attempts to know him better are clearly jokes, but they have this serious edge because the show has not set up the love square as nothing more than a source of humor. This is our end game couple. The audience expects to see their romance developed. The longer the show goes on without doing that and the more absurd Marinette's attempts get, the less the comedy works.

Another good example is Lila's lies. There is a solid argument to be made that the writers are trying to be funny with Lila's extremely obvious lies, but it doesn't work because the lies are a source of serious conflict. Lila is working with the villain! She gets Marinette expelled! We want to see her outed! Every obvious lie she tells just grates on our nerves because this is not the time for jokes!

To be fair, you can use absurdist humor in more serious shows. Another of my personal favorites is The Good Place, which relies heavily on absurdist humor, but has a very serious and heartfelt overall plot. The humor works there because the show knew when to use the humor and when to be serious and also because The Good Place is not a formula show. It's a serialized show. One big story told in 20-minute chunks. This meant that the humor had more room to breath and could be more closely tied to serious conflicts. When every story has to stand alone and be finished in 20-minutes, that blending rarely ever works. You're trying to do too much.

Kim Possible's writers knew this, too. The two tie-in movies (Kim Possible: A Sitch in Time and So the Drama) are still comedies, but they both have far more serious tones because they had the time to do that. While the episodes run about 20 minutes, both movies run a little over and hour which meant they could be more serious than in a standard episode.

So why did I write all that up? Because I was watching Kim Possible and thinking about how much better the humor generally was and I suddenly realized how easy it would be to be confused by Miraculous' humor if you didn't have this kind of background. I've seen enough absurdist humor to identify it with ease and even I struggle with Miraculous at times. Like I'm still not sure if Lila's lies are supposed to be a joke or not.

If you're new to absurdist humor or struggle to interpret less overt humor? Then I can see how you'd take Miraculous way more seriously than the writers intended because a lot of the absurdist humor simply isn't absurd enough. That doesn't change the fact that it's humor and I'm still going to treat it as such, but I can see why it goes right over some people's heads and leads to complaints like, "Marinette has his schedule for the next three years!!!" That was a joke, but I get why you're missing it.