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miraculouscontent · 4 years ago

Text

Askplosion #12 2/4:

.:New Miraculous Asks:.

Anonymous said:

Can people just STOP calling Marinette a "stalker"? Like, seriously? Especially TV Tropes. They have her listed under the trope for "Stalker With A Crush" and even have a video source of her(from Copycat) which was taken WAY out of context. They also listed her under "Stalking Is Funny If It Is Female After Male", which IS an existing double standard, but Marinette is still not an example and wouldn't be even if she WERE a stalker, because Wayhem's stalking actually WAS played for laughs!

Granted he was stalking another male and we don't know if he has a crush on him(but if he did it would be...unfortunate), but it's still an example. Plus, they claim that Volpina is about her learning her lesson regarding her stalker tendencies, but that no matter how many times she learns it, it never seems to stick. Yes, because everything is Marinette's fault and she's the stubborn shallow bitch who needs a kick in the ovaries, it's not, you know, the writers making her look bad/OOC!!!

THIS. ALL OF THIS.

Oh my god, I cannot tell you how infuriating it is to see “stalker” get thrown around like that. I would need two hands to count the amount of words that have lost meaning to me because people throw them out wildly and without any self-control. Stalkers engage in far more aggressive and obsessive behavior than Marinette, and usually also feature them harrassing whoever they’re stalking (such as calling them a lot), and they also never stop when they’re asked to. Marinette doesn’t fit the description of harrassment at all; Chat Noir does more than her and I don’t even call his behavior “harrassment” because that’s another word that’s lost all meaning by now and I wouldn’t use it in the first place.

Anyway, I think the Wayhem example is valid because Marinette’s crush on Adrien is written very much like a celebrity crush, so it’s similar territory.

On the note of “Volpina,” I do not understand it considering that Tikki was all on board with Marinette following Lila for the sake of getting the book back; that was one of the cases where there was an alternative motive out of just “follow Adrien” (which is not really something we see Marinette frequently doing; usually when we see her watching Adrien, it’s because she wants to approach but can’t bring herself to).

And yeah, most of the time, it’s just the narrative. The show basically puts it all on Marinette to solve all her personal problems (while constantly piling more stuff onto her) instead of getting active encouragement (no, eye rolls, verbal jabs, and groans do not count) from her friends and Tikki.

Like, what am I supposed to expect from Marinette when her friends still actively support Adrienette? By supporting Adrienette, regardless of the comments they make, they’re supporting Marinette’s behavior. Same with Tikki.

Anonymous said:

Have you noticed that with love interests of Marinette and Adrien, it's always the girls who like Adrien who are shallow, mean bitches and competition to Marinette(like Lila, Chloe, Kagami at first), while the boys who like Marinette are nice, friendly, and have no competition between each other whatsoever, sometimes not even knowing there IS competition(Adrien, Luka, Nathaniel). It's just really unfair and sexist because it's like girls can't be civil/friends and must fight over a guy.

That’s been a common topic of salt for a long while, yeah, I just don’t talk about it much.

It’s a difficult subject because I’m the type who can’t hold it against the guy characters (so I won’t dislike Kagami for “being similar to Chloe/Lila in terms of aggressiveness,” for example) because it feels wrong to, but I can hate the trend itself.

It’s also doubly unfair because Marinette’s crushes blip away quickly (like Nathaniel and Nino) while Adrien’s crushes stick around specifically to upset Marinette, so it’s like the show is saying, “if there’s a character who loves/supports Marinette, they gotta either stop or leave” (I’m pretty sure I got a “Didn’t Need Burrow” about the narrative sending Luka away and I don’t doubt it).

Anonymous said:

Personal Heacanon: Marinette and Chloé used to be friends until Marinette found out what Chloé (and Sabrina) has been using her commisions (mostly elaborate traps "to guard off thieves") for. This is why Chloé has it out for Marinette specifically. This is why everyone stood by as it happened. This is why she hates liars. This is why her "friends" are so casual at making jabs at her self-stem (they never believed she never knew what Chloé was truly up to). And also why Lila had it so easy at gaslighting everyone againts her (she's "relapsing" and it's easy to think she "deserves it").

Dang. That’s intense.

Yeah, Punch has given quite a few ideas about Marinette and Chloe previously being friends if I recall correctly. I like the idea even if I never use that kind of idea myself.

Anonymous said:

I feel like Adrien could be a really cool character if they focused less on romance? If that wasn’t his only motivation, and they developed his friendships more, and they didn’t have this entitlement. I also would like more actual friendship in regards to adrien & marinette? And him actually having interest in her but denying it bc he thinks he can only like ladybug. I feel like the sexism of the creators/writers are seeping into the character a lot and ruining it, too... It makes me really sad.

I’m hoping Adrigami will help adrien sort out a lot of his stuff bc Kagami doesn’t take any crap, and I actually really like their relationships, but I don’t have much hope. I would love for the show to use her and this relationship as a way to call out and develop adrien, but I doubt that will happen bc that would mean acknowledging his flaws. It’s just disappointing, really....

Yeah, Adrien could’ve been interesting, especially if they used Adrimi to its full potential, but they don’t. The show also has a history of letting Chat Noir get away with things and not punishing him so I wouldn’t be surprised.

Anonymous said:

Honestly, I don't even ship the love square anymore, but Fanon Adrienette is a thousand times better than canon Adrienette(the same goes for every other side of the love square, obvs). It's what the canon should be but we fans can only wish. Take, for example, the whole "she's just a friend" statement. In canon Adrien makes it because he genuinely sees Marinette as that and nothing more(which of course isn't bad, it's just sad when Marinette's always humiliated for the sake of getting his love).

In fanon, he makes it because he's actually in denial about his feelings for Marinette(which reminds me of a definition for "just a friend" on Urban Dictionary, which had Adrien drawing her name with hearts and flowers around it, and yet, when Nino asked if he had a crush, he STILL insists she's just a friend!), but realizes his mistake later.

In canon, Adrien thinks Marinette is Ladybug only because it's convenient for him since she's in love with him. In fanon, he actually does notice things about her that make her similar to Ladybug, and falls for her BEFORE knowing their identities because he sees the same qualities of bravery, strength, and femininity that he sees in Ladybug(I remember one fanfic where Marinette stood up to GABRIEL'S overprotectiveness, and Adrien could only admire how much she resembled Ladybug in that moment).

In canon, Chat is ignorant of Ladybug's feelings and agency and doesn't comfort Marinette when she's sad; instead, she has to comfort him. In fanon, Chat Noir cares about how Ladybug feels and values her agency, his jokes are genuinely funny(although canon Chat can be funny too, it's just the where and when), and he backs off when Ladybug is uncomfortable. In fanon, Chat Noir genuinely helps Marinette when she's sad and sometimes comes to see her just because, not out of plot convenience(and calls her "Purrincess" a lot more, why did the English dub just change it to "little lady"?).

It makes me think, maybe, just maybe, if these things were canon and the world was fair to Marinette, I might actually ship it; it might actually have a fighting chance against Lukanette and Adrimi. But while all these things are cute, it only makes canon more disappointing. Fanon is doing what canon should be doing. Fanon is supposed to build off of what canon gave us and expand on it. Fanon shouldn't create its own alternative because canon isn't giving us enough to chew on, it shouldn't have to.

Sadly, I think most of the fans, including the Adriennette-shipping ones, should be on some level in charge of the show; things would be SO MUCH better for the main ship(which isn't even progressing that far) and SO MUCH fairer to Marinette if that were so.

I feel this very much so. The show has been around for a long time and fandom can shape a lot of things. I think the love square wouldn’t be as beloved as it is if not for the fandom expanding on it and making it better (obviously, in some cases, they don’t make it better, but the love square is plentiful so there has to be some good takes out there).

Some shows do in fact let the fandom build off the foundation it makes and then you have things like Astruc outright lying and saying that Chat apologized in “Frozer” when he, in fact, did not, which makes everything more muddled.

maxwaspace said:

What is your opinion of the Scarlet Lady webcomic by Z.O.E?

I’m not into the love square no matter how better one might do it (it’s been soured too much for me in the show), but I do get happy seeing Zoe’s art and wondering how she’ll change/expand on the plotpoints in certain episodes.

Anonymous said:

Not sure it anyone's already said this but-

Canon Audrey: you're fired!

MC Audrey: you're hired!

Okay but hear me out.

Canon Audrey being put in charge of dealing with Miraculous’ writers, MC Audrey put in charge of hiring new ones.

Anonymous said:

Something the genuinely scares me is how close some people’s predictions where for miraculous I just saw predictions people made for season 3 and it’s worrying that the worst possible scenario for them ended up happening beat for beat.

The show can be very, very predictable that way. The way I’d describe it is that I do expect these bad things to happen in really convoluted and dumb ways, but it still surprises me by exactly how predictable it ends up being. I mean, I catch certain things really easily and the phrase, “the whole episode just flashed before my eyes,” is something I commonly say.

Predictability isn’t entirely bad, but when the prediction is unwanted? Yeah, there’s a problem.

Anonymous said:

You could basically summarize the difference between what Miraculous fans want and what the Miraculous writers want by using the John Mulaney "Delta Airlines" bit as a template.

I had to get said bit explained to me since I haven’t seen that one, but yes, now I can confirm.

Anonymous said:

How do you think Chat Blanc would play out if Marinette and/or Adrien were already dating other people? Like if Marinette had already moved on, do you think the narrative would punish her for it?

I imagine it would have Adrien still be crushing on Ladybug and he’d break it off with this other person when he realized that Ladybug is Marinette, which the narrative would then promote as “the correct decision” because they’re soulmates and such. If Marinette has moved on, she probably won’t care about his advances, which would lead to Adrien getting upset and maybe being convinced that an identity reveal would solve the problem and/or speeding up getting Hawk Moth defeated/arrested.

Marinette would probably be blaming herself for not being “sensitive enough” to Adrien/Chat’s feelings, which is what led to him being akumatized.

I could also see the girl squad forcing Marinette to give Adrien the present similar to canon, but maybe the beret doesn’t have a heart and Marinette isn’t actually interested, but rolls with it because the girl squad insists on it (probably convinced that she’s denying her own feelings).

Anonymous said:

What do you think constitutes as a "strong female character"? Do you think the girls and women in Miraculous Ladybug are "strong female characters"? Why or why not(I'm sorry if this sounded like a school assignment, by the way!)? Because to me I feel like a lot of them are given depth and focus, but they're often forced into stereotypes, and let's not forget how the show derail's Marinette's character for a joke. But lots of people think a strong girl has to be boyish or else she's weak somehow.

“I'm sorry if this sounded like a school assignment“ dfhgkfdgfg

I guess it depends on what you consider a strong female character. Like, can a shy female character be “strong” if maybe she holds firm to her morals or can fight people off?

I think Marinette has the potential to be a “strong female character” but the show nerfs her using her crush on Adrien (which raises so many red flags that I can’t cover here) and all it’s really done for her is get her laughed at and humiliated. If her life didn’t revolve and get ruined so badly due to her crush on Adrien, I think she’d be a strong female character (I know what the Season 3 finale did but I’m not buying any of it until we see proper results in Season 4).

That’s not to say that characters with crushes can’t be “strong” but it has to not control their life. I mean... okay...

Would Sabrina be considered a “strong female character” if she recognized Chloe’s treatment of her and worked hard to get out of it? Is the want and attempt to move on from something what constitutes “strength,” or do they have to succeed?

My conflict is always... I want to give Marinette credit for trying to move on from Adrien, but I know that it’s just the writing trying to make things seem tense/strained just to make it feel “better” when they actually get together. You see it all the time in anime/manga where a misunderstanding/self-doubt ends up hurting the relationship of the main ship; it’s to force conflict and separation, giving the ship something to overcome so they can get together.

I will say though that shy characters can be strong, physically strong characters can be weak, and so on. What defines a “strong” character may be vague to me, but I take it as I go. I would like to say that Marinette is a strong character on her own because she wants to improve even if she fails, but I also don’t want to give the writing credit for something that ultimately means nothing. I want to say that she’s strong but the narrative seems to do everything in its power to tell me that she’s weak.

Let me give a non-Miraculous example: say that you have a pacifist character, but there’s a villain who has done terrible things, cannot be redeemed (plz do not swarm my inbox with “anyone can be redeemed” comments, this is a hypothetical), and any method besides killing them right there and now would lead to more destruction/lives lost.

You might say that that the pacifist character would be “strong” in sticking by their morals and trying to find another way even if they ultimately would fail and the villain would get away, but an argument can also be made that the pacifist is being stubborn and letting people die because they are unwilling to rethink the morality they’ve chosen. Is a pacifist a pacifist if they’re letting the blood of other people spill because they themselves aren’t willing to have the blood be on their own hands? Are they “strong” because they stuck by what they believe in or are they “weak” because they refused to expand what they believed was “right”?

You could apply that to Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender (I know he’s not female but stick with me here). He was faced with having to murder the Fire Lord to the point where a past reincarnation who was raised on the same values as him didn’t agree with him. I think it was acceptable for him to try and stick to his morals and find another way, but he came up empty and the show had to give him a way of taking away the Fire Lord’s power so Aang didn’t have to make that choice in the end (there’s also that thing with the rock to his back and having to give up Katara but we’re not getting into that).

People could argue that, “oh, he admitted to himself that he’d have to kill the Fire Lord and then he got the Deus Ex Machina so it’s okay!” but the problem there is that the narrative basically gave two options: Murder or Take Away the Guy’s Bending, but there was incredible risk involved in the latter option. Aang almost lost himself against the Fire Lord and risked everything so that he would not have to kill him.

I would argue it makes him weak. I would argue that needing the narrative to favor him makes him weak (which is one plus for Marinette I guess the narrative is usually against her???). The lack of ability to understand his past lives and see things from their perspective made him weak for me, as him holding so stiffly to his values made it appear that he felt his ways were “better” than everyone else’s (which had been a long-standing problem for me and I never forgave him for “The Southern Raiders”).

Anonymous said:

What do you think of adriens mom Emilie. Like what do you how do you feel she wound up using the peacock miraculous personally I’m leaning into her being a villain due to the fact that there aren’t any stories of a peacock hero (unless they retcon that) and that her husband is well freaking Gabriel who has no real form of morals. Also I can’t help but think of how they got the miraculous in the first place. Anyways overall what do you think they will do with her or think of her right now.

I see her like I see any dead mom in media (I know she’s comatose, not the point); a tool for angst. Her reasons for using the peacock could be anything (might even be that she was given it and simply wearing it was damaging to her, or she transformed once to try it out and that was that), but I just don’t feel strongly about her because I’m not invested in the Agreste plot.

Me personally, I headcanon that she’s kind of like Bustier where she appears good but is actually very damaging. Instead of the generic “good mom who tried to do good things for her son but folded to angry dad’s demands,” I would like to imagine that she’s selfish in her own right and was part of the reason for Adrien never going to public school; she’s possessive herself (a contributor to why the Agrestes are so wealthy) and wants her son to remain close to her even if she genuinely cares about him and should want him to be able to go and learn from the world.

But I imagine they’ll probably make her either “pure good mom” or “villain like Gabriel where she’s ‘sympathetic’ but also evil.” The show has never been good at doing gray morality (see my MC Audrey for example) and usually messes things up if they try.

Anonymous said:

Honestly, I don't like Mme. Bustier, but if they DARE pull the pregnancy jokes with her--and I don't mean "pregnancy puns", like those would be ACTUALLY funny without offending anybody, but "ooh, she's pregnant so now she's moody and has wacky cravings and screams at everybody and is a nightmare to be around" and other things that just scream "male writer who mocks female biology and doesn't understand women", I'm going to cry. We already don't like Bridezilla, and this isn't any better.

Ugh. I don’t even like pregnancy plots in general or anything related to pregnancy (my followers who have been around forever and know of my hatred towards babies: wow what a shock!!), so adding on “jokes” like that?

Hard pass. I already don’t like Bustier so the mere idea of her potentially getting any focus there--

Anonymous said:

What do you think of the Alyanette ship? Personally, I'm ambivalent to it, but I can sorta see Alya being bi and having a crush on Marinette but Marinette doesn't like her back. Or she could have a crush on Ladybug. But I don't like the idea of it being mutual, considering how pushy and invasive Alya is. It also doesn't make sense for her to so insistently push the love square if she likes Marinette. But perhaps that's where some of her sarcastic quips come from: jealousy(cliche I know).

I’m always here for bi representation (no one can take my bi disaster headcanon’d Nino and Kagami away from me), but I actively dislike the Alyanette ship. I was okay with it back in Season 1 but it started to fall off in Season 2 and officially die in Season 3.

I don’t judge people by what they ship (...much; there’s obviously that little part of me that can’t help giving the side eye) but yeah, not for me.

Anonymous said:

As a different flavor of angst: Can you imagine Marinette’s class going to Riverside park in NYC and Tikki spotting the Jeanne D’Arc statue? I always wondered what it would have been like for Tikki to see Jeanne burned alive by the people she swore to protect. I think Nobody briefly touched on this for Witch Hunter, but not many people I have seen (probably missed something) talk about it. What do you think?

I’m indifferent to past holders getting mentioned and acknowledged; not sure how I feel about them given specific names and such (I kinda like seeing their designs and such but making them actual people from the real world? mmmm not here for that as much).

I like the idea though of addressing those real world things and having the kwami reacting to them. Like, it did make me genuinely sad in the New York special to see Liiri come out and call out Gilbert’s name, only to see this other guy standing there and we know that this Gilbert guy is very much dead by now.

On a related note, I’d be all for a special getting into a kwami’s problem and not making everything Marinette’s fault, so having Marinette maybe helping a kwami through theri issues and it leads into getting more lore on the kwami.

Anonymous said:

I just had an epiphany today: People who hate on Marinette for being "mean" to Lila/teachers telling Marinette to ignore Chloe and Lila and treat them nicely are the equivalent of real adults telling girls who are being bullied by boys that "he does it because he likes you." Ladies, raise your hands if something like this has ever happened: "Jamal tried to cut my cheek open with a razor!" "Oh, Aaliyah, he's only doing it because he likes you." Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it. Disgusting.

“Marinette, they’re just jealous of you, that’s all! Can you really get angry at them for that??”

us: yes

Anonymous said:

Thinking about Puppeteer 2 and how Marinette's identity could have been blown if she had talked to Tikki because of Plagg's incompetence angers me beyond belief because I know, just KNOW, if that had actually happened, Marinette would take ALL THE BLAME for it like there's no tomorrow. It would never occur to anyone that she normally talks to Tikki while she's alone and had no idea that the "statue" in front of her was a real boy AND her partner, or that Plagg should have said something. Ugh.

I KNOW, RIGHT????

That was such a big annoyance to me in that episode. They literally neglected the actual reality of what would happen (”Oh, Tikki! No one’s here, I could practice on this Adrien statue!”) for the sake of humiliating Marinette... again.

Anonymous said:

Your comment about how Ladybug always says she's "in love with someone else", as if that should matter diddly squat when the problem is with Chat not respecting her feelings on their own without another guy in the picture reminds me of a #YesAllWomen post I saw on Twitter. It read: "'I have a boyfriend' is the easiest way to get a man to leave you alone. Because he respects another man more than you." It's just like this except without the dating and the fact that Chat DOESN'T leave her alone.

And then you remember that the “someone else” she’s in love with is the exact person who’s disrespecting her feelings and you proceed to hate everything.

Anonymous said:

The statue scene in Puppeteer 2 could've easily kept its humor by having Adrien fall over when Marinette puts her weight on him and almost kisses him, then Marinette goes "Gasp! You're not a statue!" Marinette is always being forced to humiliate herself in the name of "love", even when she doesn't deserve it, so for once, let Adrien be the one utterly humiliated of his own doing. Then they could have a sad scene where Adrien ACTUALLY comforts her and...wait for it...LEARNS A LESSON.

Alternatively, someone who works on the statues comes in and, also mistaking Adrien for a statue, tries to do some sort of work on him.

Anonymous said:

Since we can all agree that this show is sadly not very good at girl power/inclusivity, how would you tweak the show to make it more genuinely female-empowering/inclusive(can include racial/sexual inclusivity)? Besides the obvious(including more female and/or POC writers on board).

Orientation-related inclusivity isn’t even that hard. Have a character get a call from someone and just be like, “oh, it’s my boyfriend/girlfriend,” and then other companies can just dub it if they’re so afraid of characters who like the same gender.

Firstly, I’d have Marinette learn and become more of a mentor character to other characters (male and female), lean more into more “females in power” (like Mylene showing genuine interest in being the next mayor), either less focus on the “girl antagonists are evil/unredeemable” plots or at least make them legitimate threats that don’t need the narrative to cater to them to make them threatening.

Secondly, Adrien needs to STOP being the one to keep telling Marinette/Ladybug what’s right or the way to do things. I can’t stress this one enough.

Thirdly, maybe not having a season dedicated to three guys getting miraculouses while all the girls are either questioned, self-reveal, or get their miraculous revoked. That might help. :P

Anonymous said:

The saddest thing is that I can see ML going through a "Fate: The Winx Saga" in the future and having an awful, edgy reboot to appeal more to adults.

Different writers probably but at what cost.

+ more sexualization obviously since that’s usually what “more adult” means; Audrey gets the cleavage that her design clearly calls for at least, but again, at what cost

Anonymous said:

I hate what TheOnesWhoMustNotBeNamed have done to the Love Square but I also don't like Lukanette and Adrigami (nothing against the characters themselves). This is going to be one of those shows that regardless what ship wins is going to disappoint around 90% of the fans.

No hate for not liking Lukanette/Adrimi, I understand that.

And yeah, there’s a <1% chance that they can pull out anything satisfying.

Anonymous said:

Off topic, but I realized why I don’t like Clara Nightingale’s design, there’s no light to her eyes, makes her look kinda dead, kinda evil.

DQ tend to do that when they’re the ones animating. I remember “Christmaster” doing particularly well with the eye highlights.

Anonymous said:

What do you think about the future Miraculous specials (Africa, Japan, Rio, Shanghai, London)?

Will be happy to see a new setting because it shows different cultures (though there’s always the chance that the culture is poorly-represented) but that’s basically it. Specials are usually just a cash grab that are just there and any expansion on lore and such is shunted to the side for the sake of love square drama, judging by the New York special.

Anonymous said:

I haven't watched the New York Special yet, don't think I can bring myself to tbh, but this whole time I thought Aeon was the name of the superhero persona, and that the fandom was collectively calling her civilian identity Uncanny Valley bc her model was that bad.

I was genuinely shocked to find out that her civilian identity is named Aeon and that her hero name is Uncanny Valley bc that is not only a stupid name, but kind of insulting since she's an android character of color. (Well, she's a character of color except for when shes running around as a pale naked superhero. Majestia, give your kid some pants!)

oof

Yeah, the Uncanny Valley thing threw me off too. “Aeon” really does sound like a superhero name.

I can’t believe they made her a robot and were like, “mannequin robot design.” I question so many things about the decisions made around Aeon fdkjgjfdg.

Anonymous said:

Do you think they’ll ever leave DuPont college, since it’s a middle school (essentially) and go to a lycee (high school)? I think they’re in their second year of four at DuPont, judging by the previous class picture.

I doubt it, unless we get more seasons? It would mean having to model a whole new school.

Anonymous said:

So I was reading again tikki brand boyfriend and this come to my mind and I have to share it with you.... Tikki is the mother in law of marinette in the future lol (sorry if this isn't the right blog to ask this) (I love yours au, you are amazing!)

(this is the wrong blog, yes, you’re looking for mc-lukanette, not miraculouscontent)

Thank you though! i agree, that’s cute, ahaha~

Anonymous said:

Did you know that there's a TV Tropes page for LadyBugOut?! And someone even left a review there saying they liked it and that they were sick of the Marinette embarrassing and wanted some Lukanette. They say your au is their favorite au in the fandom! Isn't that just swell?

Yes! And the TV Tropes page is fantastic! Thank you!

Anonymous said:

OMG IVE FIGURED OUT WHY MARINETTE IS UNABLE TO GET OVER ADRIEN!!! She’s under the influence of a love potion called Amortentia, which causes a powerful obsession from the drinker (it’s from Harry Potter). That’s why she’s so obsessed, and that’s why she can’t get over Adrien! She literally can’t while under the influence of the potion! She just needs to drink the antidote, and then she can finally be free!

Oh no!! Someone get this poor girl an antidote, STAT!

Anonymous said:

I was just reading your review of Silencer(which I totally agree with by the way), and when I got to the part about how Ladybug lost her voice and her powers are voice-activated, it got me thinking about how annoying Chat was being(as another anon noted, which I also agree with), and then it hit me. While it may just come off as his usual flirtatious banter that's innocent, the fact that he doesn't even seem to mind Ladybug not being able to detransform because then he gets to "be with her" forever and ever and ever amen just proves your point about Chat Blanc. He cares more about being with Ladybug than Ladybug herself, so long as she gets to keep being Ladybug "for him", that's what matters. Remember that the girl he fell in love with was the superhero persona and not the girl under the mask. He couldn't care less about who that actual girl is so long as she's his "lady" and loves him back. He just wants her to uphold the image of his strong and powerful "lady" that he admires.

(Glad you enjoyed the “Silencer” review! Thanks!)

Full agreement here! Chat isn’t really in love with Ladybug; he’s in love with the image he’s made of her and wants to keep it that way, no matter how much he may suggest otherwise.

Anonymous said:

Luka is soooo much more interesting with Marinette like, why isn't he the love interest? Same with Kagami for Adrien. To be honest it would be cool if the show set up the love square at first but then slowly started to change to Lukanette and Adrimi once Marinette and Adrien realized their crushes were just not working out. They can still have an identity reveal, but they'll refreshingly stay friends. But the writers don't have the ovaries to do that, I get it. -_- Such wasted potential.

They could’ve done a really interesting bait-and-switch but they decided not to. The love square is full of holes and flaws that they’re very likely never going to address (outside of anything used for that “gAsP maybe they won’t get together???” drama), so having it actually be addressed and be like, “okay, we’re better as friends,” would’ve gone over so much better.

Anonymous said:

I hear people complain all the time that Lukanette is toxic because Luka is merely the "second choice" for Marinette, and that she just uses him as a rebound when she fails to get Adrien's attention. But the truth is, that's not how it is at all. Luka's not anywhere near her "second choice". He gives her tranquility and stability, and she helps him loosen up and have someone to express his creativity towards. Plus, it's totally normal for teens to have two crushes whom they can't choose between.

THIS

ALL OF THIS

I am so tired of people saying that Marinette is “using” Luka in someway as if it’s a conscious decision on her part to take advantage him.

Luka makes her happy. That’s it. Luka is aware of how she feels and respects her space, but I guess that makes him a “pushover” and “he lets Marinette walk all over him” because he didn’t get upset with her and embarrass her in “Desperada” by calling her out over her Adrien blindness.

Anonymous said:

People who say "I like Marinette but she's getting to be pretty embarrassing sometimes" really don't get that the show constantly forces her into situations where she's embarrassed and made out to be incompetent. Like, it's not her that's embarrassing, it's the show that's always embarrassing her. Kind of like Serena/Usagi in the (shitty)DiC English dub of Sailor Moon. It's getting irritating to hear people continually rag on Marinette as if SHE'S the clueless idiot, rather than the writers.

There are some things that happen to her that she literally could not have predicted. Like, just saying, if I had someone claiming to be my friend, I would expect them to know I’m anxiety-prone and not pretend to be a statue just

Anonymous said:

Remarried Empress Anon: I can see Felix as the Duke and maybe Jagged Stone as Kosair (but an uncle and not her brother).

I agree with both of those! Jagged Stone as Kosair/Koshar, omg.

Plus, the idea of Luka and Felix being “friends” amuses me.

Anonymous said:

You know, I find Felix/Marinette content to be really funny. Because, Felix in fanfiction is a completely different character than his canon self- with a different personality, background, and maybe even last name. So, the entire Marinette/Felix fandom is literally just Marinette/oc except it's always the same oc

I struggle to get fully behind Felinette because so much of it does rely on fandom interpretation and playing with fanon in general (plus, having to clarify “I ship fanon Felinette” is weird).

I do however agree that it’s interesting that it ultimately comes to a character built on fanon grounds, and how much more acceptance characters get when they’re based on “canon”/originally canon characters.

Anonymous said:

How would you write the Miraculous PV version? Just wondering.

I don’t think I could without drastically changing characters and at that point it’s not really the PV anymore. “Bridgette“ and Felix’s relationship is the exact opposite of what I like to watch/read about so yeah, changing both of them to what I like would either be too severe of a rewrite or me working too far within the restrictions set out for me.

Anonymous said:

There's a YouTube video claiming that someone will figure out that Marinette is Ladybug and that she will suffer...I mean, yeah? Isn't that what we've already been getting? I mean, not the first part, obviously(and when we have, it's been undone), but the second? Have we been watching the same show? No, have we? Because Marinette suffering, sadly, is not anything new.

lol “Marinette will suffer!” and us like “did you seriously use future tense as if Marinette isn’t already suffering??”

Anonymous said:

Am I the only one who feels like Miraculous Ladybug is feeling less like a magical girl show and more like just another superhero show? This isn't even because of "girl power" or anything like that, or the fact that there are male Miraculous wielders like Chat and Carapace and(long dreamy sigh) Viperion. This is because the outfits don't really resemble magical girl outfits at all and, after watching various magical girl shows both in and out of Japan, Miraculous is starting to feel like its genre is shifting from magical girl to that of "superhero" in its broadest term. And I know I said I wouldn't bring up "girl power", but the fact that so many of the girls aren't treated respectfully by the narrative and are pitted against each other, to the point where they're more likely to lose their Miraculouses or reveal their identities(which often culminates in losing their Miraculouses), only adds to this because the Magical Girl genre is about female empowerment and solidarity.

It's sad because I really don't want this show to become one of those shows where "there might be one or two girls, and she might even be the lead, but it's still mostly guys who are front and center doing the heavy lifting" that we get all the time. Things are starting to change for the better and I want Miraculous to capitalize on that emergence of female empowerment as much as possible. Plus, with the New York Special, the magical girl aspects of the show have been toned down if not obliterated entirely: the transformations for the superheroes only last one minute, and they feel more like the Avengers than Sailor Senshi(which I don't mean in the most literal sense, of course, I am in no way saying that none of them can be male.). Plus they pulled the whole "Samus is a Girl" thing TWICE! TWICE! Come on, if you're show is really about girl power, it shouldn't come as a surprise when girls are, well...powerful! And especially not in Magical Girl for obvious reasons.

So while I'm not saying it's bad for a show to shift from the original genre it was meant to be in(although it must be done carefully, otherwise it looks like you don't know what you're doing), and there is of course no wrong way to do Magical Girl(except for Madoka Magica and Yuki Yuna, do NOT go there!), it does make me wonder. And it's kind of disappointing, because I really love Magical Girl and I feel like shows like these could introduce the genre to a wider audience and could renovate it as well. But unfortunately they're going a different direction, and that makes me sad. If not for the transformation phrases/sequences and the fact that they have animal companions, I imagine most people would be totally clueless as to how on Earth this show counts as Magical Girl. It still counts as such for me, but it's deviating farther and farther away from the genre to the point where it becomes nigh unrecognizable, or like even the show writers forgot what genre it's supposed to be. Sadly.

Yikes.

Yeah, I can’t imagine how seeing this show must be like for people that are more savvy with magical girl shows. Me personally, I had to be told that it was a magical girl show because it honestly just gave off the “superhero show” vibes even with the magical girl-esque transformations.

Plus, with magical girls, you usually expect a group of girls? Here, we have Ladybug and Chat Noir, who the writers keep being like “they’re equals” which... yeah, that’s fine but it doesn’t really work with the idea that this is a magical girl show? I mean, “Party Crasher” was basically Ladybug and her reverse harem of superhero guys who just got out of a “males-only” party.

I dunno, coming from someone who doesn’t have a lot of experience with magical girl shows, it just doesn’t have what I would expect when I think “magical girl show featuring a healthy dose of girl power.”

Anonymous said:

I was once reading this review of Miraculous Ladybug called "Miraculous Ladybug is a Hot Mess: A Rant", and while it's a good video and you should watch it and I totally agree with everything she said(plus, it made me laugh a few times!), I had a huge issue with the way she made Marinette's stammering around Adrien to be ALL HER FAULT since he's never mean to her and is always patient with her(yeah, more like oblivious), but that "she's incompetent" and "cockblocks herself", which annoys me because Marinette on her own is not the incompetent one here(I also don't like the term "cockblock", like, can we not? But anyway...), rather, it's the writers who make her incompetent for cheap laughs and don't allow her to improve or let anyone(but Luka, bless his kind soul!) truly be on her side. She then had the nerve to say "Marinette needs to learn to define herself outside of who she's crushing on", when, NO, once again, the WRITERS are the ones who define her by her crush on Adrien.

It's one thing to blame a character for something even when she's clearly written by a writer, because characters are supposed to be consistent yet flexible and have free will in-universe. But when she's written this inconsistently/it's obvious the writers have it out for her(to the point where they even say it) it is nigh impossible to pretend it's an aspect of the character herself and not the writers at fault. THAT'S where you draw the line between blaming the character vs the writer.

In fact, speaking of Luka, she also said that she wants the show to get rid of Luka because he's just a "plot device" and has no reason to like her beyond the fact that she's a "funny girl". She also said that Luka is a stereotype of the "cute bad boys who are emo", when that's blatantly untrue. She's allowed to not like Lukanette but all the things she's saying really ignore the point of his character and that his life DOESN'T revolve around Marinette; the writers simply don't respect him.

Even worse, she contradicted herself by saying that Lukanette is pointless because "we all know that Marinette is going to get with Adrien; it's endgame so why does the show even bother with Luka?" Then right after that says that Kagami's okay and that it's okay for Adrien to move onto Kagami because Ladybug has rejected him as Chat so many times(which is apparently not the case for Adriennette because "MaRiNeTtE's JuSt InCoMpEtEnT" right?). So teenage girls aren't allowed to like other boys or date more than one boy, yet teenage boys can date as many chicks as they like. Nice.

And apparently, any problem in a relationship or potential relationship is the girl's fault no matter what. She can't approach him because Goddess forbid girls not always be perfect and capable? She's incompetent and it's all her fault she can't properly talk to a perfectly nice, cute, FAMOUS boy. She rejects him every time he confesses despite him knowing it will fail. Her fault for being mean and not giving him a chance. She gets tired of chasing him and decides to look at someone else since it's not like she's legally married to Boy #1? She should stick with the original boy since they're gonna get together anyway. He gets tired of chasing her and decides to look at someone else since it's not like he's legally married to Girl #1? She should've realized his feelings for her and returned them since they're gonna be endgame anyway. Has this lady ever even been a teenage girl?

Plenty of teenage girls get tongue-tied around the one they love even if he or she is a perfectly nice, sweet person, it doesn't mean they're incompetent(especially when the girls are fictional characters in a world set out to punish them for not making progress and for trying to make progress at the same time, and the fact that the boy is a celebrity who is always made oblivious and kept distant enough from the girl so she can keep putting him on a pedestal and never truly get to know him). Plenty of teenage girls lose interest in one boy and so fall for another. Yet it's somehow only okay for boys to do it? Seriously?

And then for the episode "Ladybug", the reviewer continues to rag on Marinette, blaming her for the fact that her reaction to getting expelled was "I can't let that nasty Hawkmoth win", claiming she wasn't reacting like a normal teen or human in general would react in that scenario, completely ignoring the fact that it's TIKKI who doesn't comfort Marinette and forces her to focus on her duties as Ladybug and almost getting akumatized. She's right about the plot moving too fast, but she doesn't take into account WHY it's moving too fast, because the show doesn't focus on Marinette's inner struggle and what she has to go through. Instead of giving her time to process her thoughts after all that goes on and providing Tikki as a source of comfort and support(which she's, you know, SUPPOSED to be), they make Tikki berate her and force Marinette to push it to the side.

She's never allowed to feel. And that's why it hurts all the more when this woman insults Marinette for her perceived ineptitude, and she's fully allowed to dislike Marinette, critique her behaviors, dislike Luka, critique his role in the story etc., just don't reinforce a double standard as you do so and look closer: ultimately most of Marinette's problems are due to her not being permitted to FEEL. She's not allowed to be nervously in love, or be calm, or be offended, or be just not ready.

The writers keep pushing her in one direction, to be emotionless, to be selfless, to be nice, to be honest, to be "the mature/responsible one" to be a perfect little "Purrincess", to not push for or want anything for herself, even though the show is supposed to be about girl power! She does somewhat touch on that by saying that Ladybug never gets to "take a hit" and that the Marichat scene in Glaciator was too short, but she never goes into why everything is too-fast paced. And if she did, she wouldn't be saying everything she does about Marinette and Luka. Because Luka is more than just the "plot device" she dismisses him as.

He's like a calm oasis, the apple of the hurricane who keeps Marinette calm and just lets. her. breathe. He's possibly the only person who doesn't berate her, who doesn't mimic her, who doesn't insult her, who doesn't ignore her. And the one time he does, he apologizes RIGHT AWAY when he sees how sad she looks. And the funny thing is, I used to hate that scene, because when I first saw it, I thought "Oh man! Luka did the same thing as everyone else did once!" But now I see that it serves as a contrast, whether intentionally or unintentionally, to the other characters in the show. Whereas they never apologize for how they treat Marinette(and often she somehow ends up apologizing instead, sadly) and in fact seem oblivious to it at times or just don't care, Luka notices, Luka cares, and Luka apologizes. That shows that he cares about her and her feelings, unlike the rest of the characters in the show.

And while they do care about her, they're never held accountable for how they treat her. Anarka and Plagg are probably the only exceptions that I can think of(who contribute to the plot of course), but they're obviously not love interests, and the video doesn't talk about them, so I won't talk about them either. But my point is that this review, while good in other ways, is still problematic in this regard, for how it completely ignores Marinette's struggles and how they affect her, as well as the value of Luka's character(even if the show doesn't recognize it at times) and the POSITIVE effect they have on each other(especially since he actually, genuinely, wholeheartedly loves her and is patient with her, since Adrien is barely even her friend and Chat is pushy and entitled. And he has a life outside of her too, which this video chooses to ignore.)! So yeah, I'm sorry this took so long, but I just had to protect my favorite characters because that video did them so dirty. Thank you for coming to my Lukanette Ted Talk! Have a miraculous day! ;3

...Wow????

Can I just say wow??

Firstly, kudos to you for having the patience to not only write all of that, but simultaneous deal within Tumblr’s limitations while doing so? I almost wish I had a video detailing all of these topics (not exactly a video response to that person, but just detailing all of this without explicitly calling people out).

Secondly, I absolutely, 100% feel you on the double standards. I have seen so much hypocrisy in my experiences and it’s insane how people will bash Marinette relentlessly and then let Adrien off with a bunch of excuses, or hate Luka for essentially existing and then accept Kagami.

I also hate the idea of disliking Luka because he’s there to make Marinette feel better, and then liking Kagami because she causes conflict, like the implication is that conflict equals good and things that make Marinette feel loved and cared for are bad because love square endgame, I guess.

It’s exhausting, especially when Marinette is fourteen, clearly tries, but is getting no support. Like, have you ever thought how weird it was that Tom and Sabine seemingly knew back in “Gamer” that Marinette was crushing on Adrien, but in “Weredad,” they don’t worry about the fact that Marinette is into someone else or wonder what might’ve happened with Adrien, like if he might’ve hurt her in some way? If the assumption is, “oh, they just think that’s a teenage thing, flip-flopping between love interests,” well... Tom clearly takes what he thinks to be her current crush very seriously, and even if it was true that they presume she’s just flip-flopping, that really doesn’t show them to see Marinette as more than just a clumsy teenager-in-love stereotype.

So yeah, the characters who are meant to be there to support her ask no questions, but here’s Luka with his sweet “you can tell me everything or nothing, you can be yourself around me,” line, and yet... Luka is the problem???

Sure, how dare this sweet boy NOT cause Marinette more stress. He makes Marinette feel better about herself and therefore he’s “pointless” (which, really, is the true mark of someone who doesn’t care about Marinette).

Ugh.

But yeah, in conclusion, people can have insane double standards when it comes to Luka and Marinette, and thank you for the Lukanette Ted Talk, this was a really good piece! You have a nice day too! ;3

(note: the below ask seems to cut short at the end and I didn’t get a message back about it but I at least wanted to have it here so the anon has (most of?) their story heard even if I can’t properly comment on it:)

Anonymous said:

Relating to the ask about Marinette imagining the events of the series. For me it would be realistic as I sort of see myself in her position for some parts, especially how her friends are represent (mainly Alya) and I can see myself picturing the events of the story (surrounding them) to some extent.

I'm continuing on to explain and rant about how I relate to Marinette. So about Alya's pushiness with Marinette's crush and how she won't let her move on. I used to be sort of friends with this person and one day we hanging out at school and she started badgering me to tell her who my crush was, even though I told her I didn't have one (I didn't have one but even if I did it wasn't her business, especially because we hadn't really interacted for a couple years).

She pressured me enough that I felt the need to make up a person, then she called me out just after I did it because she knew I was lying but didn't realise how uncomfortable I was lucky we were by ourselves so no one could hear how embarrassing it was. It still is but I sort have gotten over it (that's why I'm hear complaining). For her being made to sit by herself because everyone else paired of, I can relate.

I have never been the person who is really close with the friend group (probably because I'm quiet and struggle to interact with others), but I still I hang out during class time, but there have been times when two of the friends sat together and the other friend chose not to sit with me but just in front of me (the tables can fit two people at them) until one friend I went to primary school asked "what about [me]", so them she sat next to me.

The person I went to primary school with also has chosen to sit with the person who was not to sit with me so she could sit closer to the other two friends diagonally across from me on the table next to mine. I can understand Marinette in The Chameleon for how she would of felt when her friends turned in because I am left wondering if my friends even like me, although primary school friend sometimes tried to get to wait with them when we were waiting for the teacher to show up.

As I mentioned earlier I anxious when trying to interact with people who are even considered my friends so I wait for them to invite me to hangout with them. And for the ending of The Chameleon when everything went back to normal, in primary school we had this task we were told research a person and write a biography on them so as the teacher told us we were writing a good copy and the work in our books was a rough draft.

I wrote the information down as I would the good copy to make sure I was happy with it. When we were writing the good copy, I started to worry I had done something wrong as I had seen my friends work and they bith had just written down the facts. So as my friends and I kept having arguments and fights so I told them that I hoped I remembered to spell all the names correctly because they were not names I was knew how to spell which was true so they didn't question it as I could tell they did

#category: salt #character: Marinette Dupain Cheng #relationship: love square #character: Adrien Agreste #category: fandom #MC: Audrey Bourgeois #episode: Chat Blanc #character: Emilie Agreste #character: Caline Bustier #relationship: Alya Cesaire & Marinette Dupain Cheng #episode: The Puppeteer 2 #MC's Adjustments #adjustment: romance #category: staff #character: Clara Nightingale #episode: Silencer #relationship: Luka Couffaine & Marinette Dupain Cheng #relationship: Felix Graham de Vanily & Marinette Dupain Cheng #other: askplosion

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bartsugsy · 7 years ago

Note

I hope the use of Seal lyrics was intentional Lo (I mean I'm pretty sure it was lol) cos "my power my pleasure my pain" distracted me from the great meta (to be?) post you were making! But back on topic I feel you on all the unresolved shiz, I just don't think the show think anywhere near as deeply into it as us! I do think more effort is put into Robron (and Coira) then other couples which translates into longer story arcs, so there's still hope.. pleasure and pain... lol!

oh, yk i just can’t resist throwing nonsensical song lyrics into things

the show definitely doesn’t think about this shit as deeply as we do because… well, they’ve got other characters to worry about and we’re all out here like HERE’S 200 WORDS OF META ON THE SIGN IN THE BACKGROUND OF A SCENE WHERE ROBERT AND AARON ARE MAKING OUT

(i say we but that was me. i did that. I DID IT AND I STAND BY IT)

sometimes i do think though that… even if yes, ok, OK FINE, none of these scenes were made to withstand the level of in-depth scrutiny we put them under and no, i never needed to write a 3000 word essay on the confusing characterisation of rebecca white when she’s clearly, in the crudest terms, more plot device than representative of an understandable human and as such it’s all just sort of futile, but… sometimes, just sometimes, i think the bigger picture ideas aren’t actually necessarily off base

ok and i just got this ask from another anon, so hopefully neither of you mind, but i’m going to put this in here, because this ties in to the point i’m going to attempt to make (that’s really just me validating my inability to be succinct and my love of meta) lmao:

anonymous asked:

but i think - because its a soap - robert and aaron are never going to resolve any of their issues in a satisfying way. because if they were resolved and dealt with then the show wouldn’t be able to use those issues for drama. so i can’t really see their reunion addressing any of the january stuff tbh

on some level, i agree with you. i totally do. on another, broader-picture level, i think that… i think i’ve been surprised by the level of cohesiveness in the storytelling for aaron and robert - like, it’s not the most tightly constucted thing in the world by any means, and this is obviously coming out of me coming from the glee fandom, where we had literally no cohesiveness ever and so i’m probably just over-impressed by even the most marginal attempts to write a meaningfully constructed longer form story, but… but i think, given that it’s a soap and given how much content they need to produce and given the inconsistent treatment of a lot of the characters on the show, aaron and robert’s relationship does get a decent amount of care put into it, on the whole, and sometimes that’s visible in the storytelling - like sometimes, a scene will happen that just sort of… slots a lot of things into place and calls back to meta we’ve been writing the whole time and… idk. like, you really do just need to look at rebecca as a character and compare the writing for her over the past year with the writing for aaron and robert, who have much more consistent traits and motivations.

i think this is why i like writing meta for this show. because sometimes there’s a pay off, where the show will specifically highlight things we’ve been talking about and examining and make them explicitly canon. it’s super satisfying. the heavy handedness works (for me) for this purpose. it’s like taking our meta and saying to everyone ‘oh hey, that thing you were reading into is exactly what we were going for’. and the general audience will do this as well - everyone will have an opinion on what’s happening beneath the surface of some stuff, it’s just that they might mention it off-hand to someone they’re watching the show with whereas we sit down and spend three hours typing up an argument to support it based entirely on how we’ve interpreted that last three years of canon and then use it to try and convince people to feel the same way lmaoooo. it’s awesome. but those bigger picture ideas that maybe aren’t called out specifically

like… don’t get me wrong, i don’t believe in the idea that they’re going to call back specifically to the january argument and take a big, in-depth delve into why that specifically happened and why it was some sort of turning point that they ignored in favour of being together and how that ultimately went wrong… i can’t imagine that’s happening lmao, that’s absolutely what our meta is for (which is fine). like… i don’t see them calling back to the specifics in any meaningful way (at most we might get some dialogue parallels bc the show loves those, as we know lmao)

but like… ok, some of this is going to come back to how early on did the show know they were going to break aaron and robert up, in all honesty. we know that iain has been intending to get rid of the whites… probably since the time he started? going by the interviews he was giving at that time? we know rebecca was brought on with some sort of plan in place for her character (to get in between robron lmao). obviously we can sort of… like, chicken or the egg, what came first - lucy announcing she was pregnant and them realising that rob and aaron would have to get married quickly, or iain deciding to go max feeling exploitation and get two weddings out of robron? this is all random extrapolation on events we know, because we can’t pinpoint when it became clear to them that they were going to do a wedding, followed by a big break up, followed by a big reunion and culminating in another, ~~~~real (so to speak)~~ wedding. but at some point, that would have been firmly in their plans.

the january argument -

ok. ok fuck it let’s meta the january argument even though i literally said i wasn’t going to and that i wanted to wait until they got back together idc i don’t listen to me she doesn’t know what’s up

the reason i love the january argument so much as a turning point within the larger overarching story they’ve been telling is because it works so well as this big flashing harbinger of doom that the boys both ignore - it’s built up specifically from problems they have been having since right before they got engaged

and look, i wanna write meta about all the arguments they have firstly from the reunion until ssw and then from in between ssw to the january argument, because i think the stuff that takes place when rebecca is in the village is very pointedly building towards what ultimately happens in january

and i think it’s clever because when you watch it for the first time, the fact that aaron is ultimately driven to violence and puts kasim in hospital and then ultimately gets arrested is what you’re left thinking about - it totally draws attention away from the things aaron and robert are saying to one another and the way that their argument(s) echo previous fights they have had around rebecca and aaron not understanding rob’s bisexuality and rob’s tendency to lie and scheme and rob’s defensiveness around his schemes and how much he has changed and is trying to change vs how much aaron needs from him and just… the ways in which they’ve been slowly falling apart.

(and ok at some point i will write my actual meta where i actually quote the dialogue instead of making vague references to it, although i usually feel like it’s a safe assumption to think that you guys know where i’m sort of pulling these ideas from when i talk about this shit - specifically, stuff i want to talk about includes the things aaron has said about rebecca and robert’s interactions with her, the moment robert talks about his scheme as something that is no longer about andy and absolutely about the money, aaron’s understanding of the robecca kiss, rob talking about how aaron can’t be happy and that he screws things up (which is horrible foreshadowing for kasim), rob yelling about aaron walking away from arguments and not recognising the change rob has made and the way that rob literally brushes his kiss with rebecca under the table, aaron literally saying that he doesn’t like the person he is around robert because of how things have played out with rebecca ec. etc.)

anyway, they just… i’ve fully written about this before, but the kasim stuff acts as a distraction both for robert and aaron - who, before aaron’s arrest, are having a tentative conversation where rob is gently pushing for them to still go to vegas to try and work things out and aaron is absolutely not convinced. after aaron gets arrested and then gets released, the next scene they have is aaron trying to give robert an easy out and robert point blank refusing - over the course of the three episodes, from aaron getting arrested to aaron giving the police a new statement, rob makes multiple references to fighting for their relationship even if aaron doesn’t think it’s a good idea - literally says that he’s not going to stop fighting for them, which is important but also sort of conveniently skims past the point that this argument didn’t occur in a vacuum and at no point have they faced up to what happened to bring them there between the two of them.

when, during the reveal, aaron says that rob was the one who pushed for this, you can sort of see where he’s coming from in a sense. i think aaron’s impending sentencing also made it harder for them to focus on what the real issue was (or rather, made it way easier to ignore, because they were too busy being terrified of losing one another) - but even then, rob decides to throw a surprise wedding because in canon we know that aaron is panicking about leaving robert and losing him completely - which is ultimately what happens, both exactly in the way aaron feared, but also not at all because rob’s motivation to cheat is, as we all know, entirely about aaron (or rather, about both rob’s feelings for aaron and rob’s horrible decision making/tendency towards lashing out impulsively when confronted with things he doesn’t know how to deal with like a normal human and fucking up his and other people’s lives in the process). aaron’s fears that rob would want someone else were unfounded but those fears also sort of led him to underestimate how much of a toll his getting sent to prison would have on robert and so, in the most perverse and unexpected way, his fears about what robert would do given rob’s behaviour up until that point, ended up being spot on.

all this is to make a point that the january argument played a massive role in robert and aaron getting married the first time round and also led them both down a road where they were distracted from what should have been the ultimate sign that things weren’t working and thus didn’t take the opportunity to fix it, rather let things get dangerously and disastrously out of control. i remember a lot of the meta around the time of the jan argument pointing out that things hadn’t been resolved and that they would be resolved at some point - i saw a lot of people talk about an immediate resolution. i think my instinct was that it would take them a little longer - maybe a month max, but that things would be worked out before the wedding. the fact that the wedding wasn’t legal was like this big red herring - it made us all believe that the only reason they’d have a second wedding would be to legalise things. but oh, oh no, no - little did we realise at that point that the whole first wedding was just another distraction (a very beautiful and romantic distraction, but a distraction nonetheless). the first wedding wasn’t a random break from the misery they’d had between that point and ssw, it was a symptom. once again, robert finding a way to push through their issues, to make it more about their love and the fact that they want to be together, and aaron following because that’s what he wanted too - neither of them wanted to deal head on with any of their shit.

uh, taking things right back to my original point of ‘how much of this will we actually see resolved when they get back together’ - i mean, it’s difficult to say? because on the one hand, it depends on what story the show wants to tell with them next and on the other, it depends whether they want to sort of just brush their issues under the carpet and pretend they never happened (worst case lmao). i think, though… i mean, i don’t know, i actually genuinely don’t want to speculate at all on what we’ll ultimately see because down that road leads madness and also an inevitability that we’ll all get it wrong, as we did before with both the jan argument and the purpose of the first wedding, for instance. i think, particularly because it is something i’m looking forward to, i also don’t want to put any expectations on it, really? i’d rather just watch it as open-mindedly as possible. which is also why i want to wait until after i watch it until i really write my meta around this break up, because then i can sort of shape my opinions about what we’ve been shown and where they’ve taken things. i don’t want to try and assume they’ll deal with x or they won’t deal with y or they’ll have them do this or whatever.

having said that!!! that doesn’t stop us from looking at what’s been done so far - the wedding, prison and the ons happened over six months ago now, so we’ve got enough distance from it to say that… look, rob and aaron had so much misery and so many problems from ssw onwards and they ended up going through a massive break up. so big-picture wise, it’s logical that all that misery was intentional. it wasn’t just fuelling the andy plot or whatever, it was there as a build up to ultimately splitting aaron and rob up and making it last a while (even if they hadn’t decided at that point to actually break them up - it’s chicken and egg, they would have known what they’d put them through up until that point and understood that this could realistically ultimately lead to a break up). the january argument wasn’t resolved because it couldn’t be, because that would be counter-productive to the eventual plan of separating them. the first wedding was rushed and not legal and the reason for it being held was literally LITERALLY bc aaron was afraid rob would cheat - because again, that wedding wasn’t going to be the one that lasted. there had to be problems there.

basically - yes we absolutely put more thought into this shit than the show does but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the thought we put into it is… wrong? or will lead to us not feeling satisfied? because the way that things have gone wrong with robron so far have led to a break up. it feels like a safe assumption that they’re not going to go through a massive break up again after they get back together at the beginning of 2018, so on some level somewhere, it seems like a safe assumption that we’re not going to have rob kissing his ex to get money, or aaron doing a miserable 6 week prison stint, or robert knocking someone up etc. basically, i guess what i’m saying is… the pain wasn’t for nothing? it was there to play a function in the story and while i doubt that aaron and rob are gonna get back together and the show is gonna be like ‘ok well their problems are fixed now so that’s nice’, they’re going to be writing with a different eventual goal to the one they’ve had this year?

this wasn’t even ur original question i just took this to an entirely different place lmao. sorry. i guess what i’m trying to say is i’m not particularly concerned about getting a final resolution on rob and aaron’s issues, but the writing for them will change as the direction of their story changes, so. the reason i’m waiting is more because i’m waiting for that direction to stop being “keep them apart” and start being “get them back on track and prove they can be together”. which is sort of… the next step? i guess? regardless of whether or not they have problems (and it’s a soap so u know they will), the story needs to shift from a break up to a big second wedding - the one that you assume will last more than a month (because they’re not stupid - they know there’s only so much you can wring out of a thing and they’re already pushing it). so… yeah. that’s what i mean when i talk about this particular storyline wrapping up.

i could just keep that last paragraph and delete the rest and you would still have your answer but im obviously not going to do that.

#answering anons #....im on my mobile so this isn’t going under a cut im so sorry #i’ll fix it later #long post #meta #god damn @ myself pls shut up for once

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