MLB S5: Kagami Sentimonster Theory
[Context needed: S5:E18 Emotion, S5:E19 Pretension]
Hello! I’ve been away from this blog for ages but I’ve been super active in other fandoms and I really want to start uploading theories fast enough for them to not be common knowledge by the time they’re up SO in that spirit, here’s a super rushed Miraculous theory being posted right after today’s release of Pretension and Revelation on Gloob. (Will clarify though, as of writing this I have only seen up to Pretension.)
Thesis: Kagami is a sentimonster (as well as Adrien duh, and potentially also Felix) and her object is the tsurugi family ring.
Evidence #1: Felix’s reaction to her ring.
When they first meet in Emotion, Felix has been a holder of the peacock miraculous for some time, and he is also currently wearing it as he approaches her. We know from Hawkmoth that holders with this sort of power can sense strong emotions and can also still have / control their amuks/akumas while detransformed, so it’s reasonable to believe they can also recognise when someone else has used the miraculous in the same purpose. (Like if someone made a sentimonster, the peacock holder would be able to recognise that it was their same power in effect.)
Felix goes to kiss Kagami’s hand when they first meet, and he reacts with shock and a hint of disbelief when he sees her hand. (time: 7:26, 7:27)
Furthermore, when he looks back up at Kagami, he’s mistified (and potentially sympathetic?). If we take the Adrien Sentimonster theory as fact, Felix knows about his plight, and this expression would match up if he were discovering there were more “diamonds” like Adrien, a phrase used in that episode which I found quite interesting based on these two theories. If I continue to build on these ideas, I’ll likely be calling them the diamond theories based on the Diamond Ball and all that happened in that episode. (time: 7:29)
Evidence #2: “We aren’t puppets” scene
Once alone at the Diamond Ball, Kagami and “Adrien” (Felix in disguise), have a discussion about their parental control.
“We don’t need to play puppets for our parents.”
“But they’re still the ones pulling the strings, aren’t they.”
Here, Felix is once again implying that he knows about sentimonsters amongst the Diamonds, and furthermore he’s hinting at Kagami maybe being one of them. After he makes this comment though, Kagami looks down at her family ring. She knows it’s tied to this control she feels, even if she doesn’t know its direct connection yet.
She replies telling him that “In my family, you obey orders because you choose to.” This ties in to Evidence #4: “You are your own master”, with the idea in her family that the control is it’s own form of free will, though it’s really just their trust in her engrained obedience.
Their next interaction is going to also be grouped under this evidence point because it’s in the same scene, and I view it as Felix’s test for her.
“Let’s leave, I dare you.”
“Are you insane? We can’t do that.”
“Of course we can; I can.”
In his “of course we can” line, I got the feeling that he meant it as “Of course we can, why couldn’t we? Are you going to acknowledge the limit that we’re both bound by, yet cannot seem to address? I dare you to, I doubt you can.” It’s a test of both her knowledge of her walls and also her admittance to it. Her response would show how aware she was of her situation; it’d prove his theory of her unknowing-victim state.
(her face falls,) “No, we can’t.”
“See? You’re not as free as you claim.”
Just like that, he’s found someone like him. This is why he saves her when he entraps everyone else who’d attended the ball. His ‘perfect world’ is meant to be freedom for all those who are under unfair control.
Evidence #3: Tsurugi-San’s Phrasing
In Pretension, Ms. Tsurugi says the phrase “We are connected, as are our children. They were made for each other.” (1:57)
They were made for each other? Interesting.
This is not the first time Adrien has been implied to have been made, designed, programmed, etc. to be a specific way, but adding Kagami to the equation by the idea that she is the same as Adrien (both being “made”) leads me to connect all of the Adrien Sentimonster evidence to her as well.
Evidence #4: “You are your own master.”
This one needs a bit more explaining, but in Pretension, Tsurugi-San strikes Kagami’s ring and tells her, “If you are not your own master, then you’re already your own slave.” (Here is the full interaction for context)
“What do you see here, Kagami?”
“And that crest dictates your behaviour. A duty. If you’re not your own master, then you are already your own slave.”
My theory here is that this is alluding to how Tsurugi believes that Kagami earned having the ring herself since she obeyed so well anyway before, but now her emotional responses have her “self control” in question, and Tsurugi is considering taking the ring back (something we will come back to later).
The line about her being her own master, I feel, was a direct reference to her literally being in possession of the object which controls her. Which brings us to the next point.
Evidence #5: Revoking the Ring / Fake Ring
It’s taking forever to write this all out and this one doesn’t need too much context, so this will be a bit less explained.
Skipping forward in Pretension, Tsurugi-San decides that Kagami is no longer in control of her emotions and can’t be trusted to obey properly. (This is after Gabriel also alludes to this idea that her daughter is ‘out of control’.) She says this line:
“If I have to force you into obedience [...], then I will.”
And then has Kagami hand her back the family crest, aka the object which controls her, essentially having Kagami hand over her free will (unknowingly).
HOWEVER, plot twist, Felix meets up with Kagami towards the end of the episode and hands her the real ring.
“The ring you gave your mother was a fake. This is the real one.”
Why would Felix have taken the ring unless A) he knew it was EXTREMELY important/significant, and B) he saw that Kagami was in serious danger of her mother taking it back, and knowing the power it contained (and seeing as his mission is for all of them to be free,) he swapped it with a fake as a precaution and ended up surely saving Kagami’s literal free will.
Bonus small sentimonster things:
In the ball scene (Emotion), when he snaps away Gabriel, he says “Adrien, My mother, Me, [...] I’m freeing us from you! [snap]” which is a lovely parallel to how sentimonsters are “Freed from existence [snap].”
In Pretension when he has that small insight on his view of sentimonsters, he says “Don’t call them that (”sentimonster’)”, and though he never corrects her on what to call them, I believe the subtext here is that they’re victims in his eyes (like him, his cousin, and supposedly Kagami). He sees any sentimonster as a victim of irresponsible use of his miraculous by someone who carelessly brought something into the world "only to manipulate them, control them, abuse them, and end up destroying them. [...] You have a responsibility for them.”
