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#i feel like this permanent freak open secret but i can't push it too far by asking for love or having feelings or else ppl will like.
operahousebookworm · 1 year
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I am still hopelessly behind on most of my fandoms, but as I am now fully caught up on Miraculous I feel more comfortable venturing back into Tumblr. Especially because after seeing "Elation" I feel like I can see how the entire rest of the season is going to go, and I have to share this SOMEwhere or i will explode.
Spoilers for up to this point behind the cut. (Also this got really long.) My predictions are not actually spoilers because I am not involved with the show, I am just a writer and know my pulp. So I guess if you would be mad if I'm right, come back later.
Good? Good. First of all, can I say how much I love this season so far? Managing to reverse the polarity of the love quadrangle? Marvelous. Adding the "openly and mutually love each other but cannot be together because Reasons" flavor of Yearning to the mix? Perfection. Nathalie dumping Gabriel's ass and getting some backstory? Chef's kiss. Having an explicitly redpilled dude without referencing the real world? Masterful.
Okay okay. I am not writing this all as a fic because I still haven't finished the fic I started well before I got long covid, so what you get are the highlights, roughly in chronological order. (I was gonna do bullet points but Tumblr didn't like that.)
THE WHOLE STORY (starting from after "Elation")
Marinette gets gently teased at school for the pictures of The Ice Cream Incident. She deflects, says she's just a really big fan of Cat Noir and they don't actually know each other very well. Adrien and Marinette both has a sad.
Monarch sends a Villain of the Week to kidnap Marinette. Adrien loses his entire shit. Marinette gets free and sneaks away, intercepts Cat Noir before he can run headlong into the trap with the ol' "Oh yeah I totally already rescued Marinette, we are very good friends" chestnut.
VotW defeated. Cat Noir rushes to check on Marinette (after Ladybug delays him with a "Shouldn't you feed your kwami first?"). He feels extremely guilty about making her a target. She tries to reassure him, unsuccessfully. Again the whole parasocial angle comes up, with Marinette getting frustrated that he's stuck on the theoretical ethics and ignoring that she was a willing and active participant in The Incident. He takes her home where her parents are panicking about their daughter being taken hostage. Tom approvingly reminds Cat Noir of his vow to protect Marinette in "Weredad." Cat Noir smiles but leaves immediately (guilt guilt guilt)
The possibility of the heroes sharing their identities gets raised. Cat Noir is again "haha can't trick me" but Ladybug is starting to consider it. When she talks it through with Alya (who is apparently on a permanent sleepover now?), Alya teases that this is just so she can date Cat Noir, which is true. Marinette deflects, counters that they've gained some serious tactical advantage from Alya being in on the secret, which is also true. (Alya declares herself a Secret Keeper (tm).) But the danger is still Monarch finding out.
Alya realizes that Tikki must know who Cat Noir is. But Tikki can't tell her even if she wants to, because of the spell that prevents kwamis from speaking the identity of a holder. Lightbulb! Could they cast the same spell on a human? Hijinx, VotW. Spell doesn't work.
Dejected, Ladybug talks about it with Cat Noir, because she is trying to be more open within the constraints of the things she has to hide. Growth! Cat Noir points out that the real danger is one of them being akumatized, and Ladybug's been able to block that before. Maybe she could power up that charm to counter the megakumas? Ladybug is optimistic, if more cautiously so than before.
The heroes meet up to try out the megacharm. Ladybug pushes too hard. The charm comes out all crackly and broken, and she passes out. Cat Noir freaks, takes her to a vacant room at the hotel to recover, hiding in the bathroom so she can detransform. A VotW appears. Plagg comes in to get the earrings so Adrien can be Mister Bug again, but Marinette has revived a bit and knows he's too upset to do this on his own. She sends Tikki with the earrings to find Scarabella.
Scarabella and Cat Noir handle VotW. Cat Noir is still super worried, tells Scarabella that he's having a really hard time because there's no one he can talk about his whole life with. Ladybug (after some guilting by Alya) later admits to him that she went through something similar and had to tell her best friend her secret. Suggests that Cat Noir find someone he can tell, but to choose that person very carefully. She also proposes attempting the charm again, which Cat Noir shoots down hard.
Adrien contemplates who he can tell. Tries Nino, but Nino does his oblivious Nino thing and he thinks better of it. Tries his dad, but Gabriel is really busy with something and blows him off. Adrien fumes that everyone does this to him. The only person who really seems to listen is... of course! Marinette! Plagg makes lame excuses but Adrien is set on it.
It does not go well. "I didn't mean tell me!!" So now they both know. (Plagg was entirely correct, is insufferable about it.) Once they get past the "once again redefining who I'm in love with" thing, they realize they both have to give up their Miraculous, right? But no, Adrien decides that only one of them has to, and insists that it be him. He starts to renounce Plagg, but Marinette stops him, promises this will only be temporary and they'll find a way to protect themselves from Monarch.
Also Gabriel can feel The Angst from across town, but by the time he can get away from his important business thing they've sorted it out and the akuma lands on someone else.
Marinette deputizes Alya to find a new holder, but warns that it can't be someone who knows who Ladybug is. Alya starts with Luka, but oops, he can't wear the ring for the same reason Alya can't. He insists that it wasn't a problem because he loves both Marinette and Adrien like family, so even Monarch can't get him to betray them. Alya is pissed but also delighted to have another Secret Keeper.
Luka passes on the ring to either Juleka (because she is actual family) or Kagami (because she is badass and also they would make an excellent Pair the Spares). The new hero is Panthress, shows up just in time to help Ladybug with VotW.
Next episode starts with Alya leading a Secret Keeper training session for Adrien and Luka. There is a Powerpoint and branding. Main thing she preaches is that they cannot use nicknames or inside jokes or anything when any of them are not in costume, and to assume that anywhere outside of Marinette's bedroom could be heard by Monarch. CONSTANT VIGILENCE! No Ephemeral bullshit on her watch! It is very intense.
Also, Marinette and Adrien are dating. Gabriel insists that Adrien is too young to have a girlfriend, so they keep it on the DL. Of course all the girls know and are delighted. Lila also figures it out and does some Lilaing to try and prove it, though they're able to keep her from getting any real evidence. Marinette struggles to balance paying attention to her boyfriend and school with superheroing. Adrien takes it better than Luka/Kagami since he knows what's up, but not by much. After a balance-themed VotW shows up and gives Ladybug and Panthress a tough fight, he laments to Alya about being left on the sidelines. "Who said anything about sidelines?" Alya scoffs. "Being a Secret Keeper means you are your hero's secret weapon." They pull off some kind of Sentibubbler/Hack-San trickery that leads to victory.
Alya picks up on the unsubtle balance imagery and realizes that's what why the megacharm failed: something that powerful needs to balance creation and destruction. Panthress gives back her ring. Ladybug and Cat Noir reconvene again and together successfully create a pair of charms, one for each of them. It leaves them both extremely drained, though, and Tikki warns they probably shouldn't attempt it again.
But did it work? There's no way to know without Monarch attempting to akumatize one of them. Not great! They reassure each other that they'll all band together to handle it if that happens. Still, Marinette gets in her head and paranoid about it and tries to keep her distance, reasoning that gives her friends a better chance at stopping her if it becomes necessary (and frankly it's been too long since Marinette made a bad decision).
Meanwhile, wouldntchaknow, Monarch decides this is the perfect time to make another attempt at using Marinette as bait. Nathalie, who has picked up on The Vibe, warns him that he should knock it off for Adrien's sake. Gabriel blows her off, starts plotting to get Marinette good and pissed.
And it works! That big black butterfly heads straight for her. It takes a great effort for Adrien to hang back and watch. The akuma hits the charm and doesn't just get rebuffed--it disintegrates. Marinette and Adrien celebrate. Nathalie, who has taken it upon herself to bodyguard Marinette, is stunned. Monarch is enraged, sends out another akuma to grab a random retread VotW. (Who hasn't been akumatized at this point? I think it's just the art teacher, Mr. Banane, and, like, that one bus driver. That's what happens when there are only about 30 people living in all of Paris.) Marinette and Adrien do a joint transformation, and are positively giddy while they fight VotW. They agree afterwards that Ladybug and Cat Noir probably shouldn't seem to be a couple, because the attention would only get worse.
After the fight, Nathalie drives them home. Marinette and Adrien snuggle in the back seat, talking quietly and vaguely about how things can go back to normal. Nathalie sneaks a pic. Later, she confronts Gabriel with it, says he's refusing to see how he's hurting his son. She lays it all out: as his loyal aide for years, she has everything she needs to destroy him. She's refrained for Adrien's sake, but if Monarch continues threatening the girl Adrien loves, it's war. Gabriel quips that he's proud she's almost as ruthless as he is; she retorts that she's much more ruthless, and always has been. Later, Gabriel gives Adrien his blessing to date Marinette.
And then... plot stuff? There's still all the business with Felix and the resistance and getting set up for the final showdown and "smart devices are evil, metaphorically but also literally", but it isn't the Romance Arc so I haven't been obsessing over it. Somewhere in there, they specify that the grimoire describes the ability to make the wish as "two great powers contained in one heart." Also Master Su-Han arrives at a point before the final battle when all seems lost, with all the Guardians in tow to kick all the ass. They arrive either by hopping across the rooftops, or by bus because Su-Han hopped across rooftops all the way to Tibet and fuck that. (I can't decide which is funnier.) Also also they are all obsessed with cat videos.
Anyway, somehow it gets to the final throwdown, Ladybug and Cat Noir vs. Monarch. The battle reveals that Monarch has seriously rotted from the cataclysm. Ladybug frets that they could heal him if they had the lucky charm from that night. Nathalie goes "Oh, you mean this thing?" and produces it. (She finds it earlier and recognizes it as a lucky charm but doesn't know where it came from, so keeps it handy.) One "Miraculous Ladybug" later and Gabriel is healed.
He's stunned that Ladybug would help him after all this. But he's also the kwami of Sunk Cost Fallacy, so he still insists he needs the two great powers in one heart to make his wish. Lightbulb! What can make two hearts into one? Why, love, of course! Marinette thinks a Ladybug and Cat Noir in love might be able to accomplish the same thing.
They go down to Emilie's chamber for the attempt. Ladybug confirms that Emilie's condition is from the broken peacock Miraculous going parasitic and sucking away all of Emilie's life force instead of just what it needed to recharge. They might be able to give her back enough energy to be healed.
Ladybug and Cat Noir succeed in creating a megacharm, but the impact is closer to Ladybug's first attempt. They both detransform and are barely conscious. Marinette weakly tells Gabriel to give the charm to his wife and call her to wake up. He does, while Nathalie tends to Adrien and Marinette.
Emilie awakens. But she's weak after her long sleep and still coughing, and it's a struggle for Gabriel to help her out of her life support tube. Enraged, he accuses Ladybug of tricking him. Emilie sadly pats her husband's cheek. "This is what I feared would happen, my love. What have you become?" Gabriel is gutted.
Emilie explains that the charm is healing her, but cannot do so fast enough to combat the severe damage to her body. It would take a steady supply of such charms to fully restore her. "And the cost," she says, looking at her son, who is beginning to recover and clutching Marinette, "is too great."
"But I promised," Gabriel insists. "I swore I would bring you back."
"And you did. You gave me more time. Even one more minute with you, one more chat with my dearest Nathalie, one more chance to see my son and meet the girl he loves, all of that is a gift I never deserved. But you must promise me something else now. When this gift of time runs out, you must let me go. You must let me rest."
Gabriel agrees. Various tearful reunions. Emilie gives the charm to Nathalie, who might still be healed. Marinette awkwardly tries to excuse herself, but Emilie insists she stay. "You are family, are you not? And you will all need to take care of each other."
Gabriel puts a hand on Marinette's shoulder. "We will."
And then they all have dinner at one end of that ridiculously long table, with Adrien and Marinette being cute together and probably some voiceover.
END OF SEASON and probably a cliffhanger about a new Big Bad
Other things I think are likely/possible but didn't fit in my Grand Unified Theory:
Adrien asks Luka for advice on how to handle things with Marinette. Luka explains that he got his zen outlook through a lot of therapy and practice (because come on, he's too perfect, he needs some explanation) and offers to teach Adrien a bit
Alternatively, Adrien finds out that Luka knows that he's Cat Noir, and is able to confide in Luka the way Marinette confides in Alya
Or Luka advises Marinette (because at this point he's pretty much Hot Agony Aunt, it's going to happen in some flavor) that her bad decisions don't come from the way she feels, but the way she tries to hide her feelings. They broke up not because of her secret, but because she wouldn't be honest that she wasn't that into him.
Adrien figures out how to view the footage from Felix's monocle. Learns the truth about both his parents, freaks out and runs to Marinette's house. (This works even if he doesn't know she's Ladybug, because he's panicked and she's the one person who feels like sanity and safety.)
Nathalie sabotages the kwami containment system or otherwise fucks with Monarch's stuff
Nathalie (or another quasi-villain, possibly Felix or Chloe) gets the Snake from Monarch but uses its power to help the heroes
Amelie knows about the peacock Miraculous, and maybe even wielded it. That's why Felix wanted it back.
Adrien is the one put in serious danger at some point (before identities are revealed), forcing Marinette to realize that she does still love him, oops. Also forces Monarch to wonder if maybe he's going too far? (Nah.)
Monarch makes his wish, and Emilie is fully healed, but the life exchanged is Adrien's, oops. Ladybug figures out how to reverse this.
Sorry, Gabriel and/or Nathalie, but redemption = death
Whatever happens, Emilie IS NOT FULLY REVIVED. It's just not gonna happen. Not only does that teach the lesson that all the horrible stuff Gabriel did was rewarded in the end, but the show has heavily focused on themes of dealing with guilt, accepting loss, and facing the consequences of your actions, so wiping out the core concept with a magic reset button undermines all that. (Are there two Miraculous that grant their holders a literal magic reset button? Yes. Shh.) The only way it would work for Emilie to live is if Gabriel trades his life for hers (see above point)
Vaguer predictions for later seasons:
Someone else takes over as Hawkmoth. Predicted candidates: - Nathalie (adults are a more convincing threat than children, has her own interest in the Miraculous) - Amelie (didn't see that one coming, evil twin = operatic af) - Felix (shady bastard, would use the wish to bring back his father) - Lila (heavily foreshadowed, whole deal is being a dick)
Gabriel uses his extensive knowledge of the Miraculous to become a Guardian, or at the very least restores the Miraculous to their previous forms. With at least two more seasons, there's time for him to have a proper redemption arc, a la Zuko or Scarlemagne. That doesn't mean he's dodged redemption = death, though.
Adrien is dealing with serious anger and grief about his father's betrayal. Forgiveness will be a long, hard road if it comes at all. Marinette pushes reconciliation because her loving and supportive family makes it hard for her to understand that Adrien might be better off without a parent.
Another point of contention with them: Marinette's control freak tendencies vs. Adrien's growing desire to assert himself
They stay together despite difficulties, but continue to insist that Ladybug and Cat Noir are not a couple. Paris continues to not remotely believe them. High chance of fake dating, alter egos that are still them, other silly romance tropes (because we still haven't run out, no sir)
Something breaks one/both megacharms to bring back some "it's not you it's my enemies" stakes
There's at least one more Miracle Box in play in NYC, and who knows how many others. So many superheroes!
But Marinette's box is the main one, and there's only one Ladybug. So instead of being the de facto leader of a dozen superheroes, she's the de facto leader of hundreds. Yay?
Marinette will want to retire as a Guardian but there's that pesky mindwipe to deal with
Another Guardian (maybe even Gabriel) suggests that maybe there's a better way of vetting holders for these ancient, powerful jewels than just giving them to her classmates? (jk there's not, they go through a bunch of auditions and stuff and the original holders are still the best)
A bunch of new characters introduced as the cast disperse to vocational schools. There will now be 50 people living in Paris instead of 30! (We will still run out of people to akumatize.) This will include a new shippable couple to troll us endlessly with, as well as a new antagonist because Chloe and Lila are honestly played out.
Alya hands over control of the Ladyblog, feeds her successor endless plausible bullshit about hero identities
As mentioned above, Luka and Kagami date for a bit and then amicably break up. Everyone tries to project drama into it, but their whole deal is that they're levelheaded to a fault
Rose/Juleka and Marc/Nathaniel are explicitly confirmed as couples (instead of just being shown in parallel with other couples as they have been). Because this show makes "fuck you" money and can do what they want
So how much of this will be right? I don't know! I was sure they couldn't milk much more distance out of the "will they/won't they" romance and hoo boy they surprised me. I am equally certain that I will be more or less correct with my outline and that something will happen in the very next episode that completely fucks my bracket. I will be delighted to be right, delighted for them to pull something I never saw coming, and generally just delighted to have more episodes.
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