#mlb characterization

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MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Kuro Neko"

Introduction

After a long break, I'm finally back to making these posts and I'm glad. In case you are new to this series, here I look at the perspectives of different characters in every individual episode of season 4 in order to show people that why these characters act the way they do and today it's episode 23.

Finally we are at this episode. I been waiting to do this ever since I first started this series. It was the entire reason I wanted to do this series in the first place. 99 % of people who watch this episode either ignore Ladybug's POV, ignore Cat Noir's POV or just look at the episode at surface level and it broke my heart to see the hate on these characters. Then the remaining 1 % of people such as gentil-minou here on Tumblr and u/Faulan1 on r/miraculousladybug inspired me to start my own series of posts explaining why the characters behaviours are only humane when I saw they're takes on this episode. So let's get started with explaining why Marinette and Adrien's behaviours are humane in this episode as well.

Character POVs

Adrien/Cat Noir

"But does that mean Cat Noir is who I really am? Deep down inside?"

Well since this episode is mainly about Cat Noir feeling left out of battles, we're going to start with him. From the starting of the episode we know that he has been skipping out on battles and a lot of people have given him hate for this but I believe that they have forgotten about the continuity. For the entire second half of the season, we've been building towards this about how Cat Noir has been feeling useless and "Ephemeral" was the last blow when Ladybug called upon a team of superheroes when he didn't show up. This is what happens to someone who suffers from clinical depression.

As he was suffering from clinical depression he assumed that Ladybug didn't need him, focusing on the fact that he was being left out than focusing on why more heroes would be useful and believing that he is useless whenever Ladybug and her team win a fight without him. So when Plagg encouraged him to go out there and talk to Ladybug, he assumed that she would know his problem without him telling her and tried to get the answer he wants to hear out of her but since Ladybug isn't a mindreader and Cat Noir is an expert at masking his emotions it doesn't go so well and ended in Cat Noir giving up his miraculous when Ladybug told him that he was wasting her time because according to him all his beliefs about what Ladybug thought of him was confirmed and she didn't need him at all.

After this he goes into a depressive episode but when Plagg returns he gives him the idea that if he acts like the person he believes Ladybug wants as a partner, then Ladybug will like him but when that epicly fails his distorted thoughts about what Ladybug wants of him was proven wrong and he learns that Ladybug doesn't want the perfect Cat Miraculous holder, she just wants Cat Noir and we're going to get to her in a minute.

The reason Cat Noir never told Ladybug about how useless he feels is due to his abusive father who never listened to what his problems to her so Adrien only knows what it's like to listen but not to be heard and also feels that his emotions are invalid due to Gabriel always making him feel that way. Now let's move on to Ladybug's side of the problem.

2. Marinette/Ladybug

"It's useless. The problem is that Cat Noir is in love with me and since I can't do anything about that I'll keep on breaking his heart over and over again. Maybe Cat Noir is right. We should split."

I've seen a lot of hate on Ladybug for being "unnecessarily mean" to Cat Noir this episode and "not caring" about him and I want to end that now. We see that Ladybug has been fighting akumatized villains with a team of superheroes rather than Cat Noir and this is due to her need for control. When Cat Noir is with her, he's always whatever Ladybug needs him to be and makes her feel confident in her abilities and in control but when you remove Cat Noir from the equation she no longer has him to fall back to so she needs another way to feel in control and that's by getting a team of Miraculous holders so that she can feel that she can do it now that she has a team of superheroes under her command.

Her behaviour this episode towards Cat Noir was not due to her not understanding his problem, it was about her not being aware of his problem due to Cat Noir never telling her about it. She even asked Cat Noir in "Rocketear" if everything was fine and he said that it was so when he was not showing up for battles she projected her need for a break onto him and decided to get a team of heroes to make up for his absence because Cat Noir is just means that much to her. She also has to put up a confident front to the public so that Shadow Moth can't see that she is afraid and use that to his advantage but didn't mention this to Cat Noir due to her believing that leaving him in the dark would avoid another Cat Blanc scenario.

When Cat Noir shows up to talk to her, she had no idea what was wrong with him and was just doing her job. She tried to be nice to him by telling him that he could leave now and that she had to urgently go and collect the Miraculous back from their respective holders but when Cat Noir kept insisting that he help even when she told her that it would take up too much time to tell him about all the rendezvous points she lost her temper which was understandable because I could feel her urgency when she said that she was in a hurry. When she realized that Cat Noir was actually going to give up his Miraculous it was already too late and she broke down and being overwhelmed by all the holders urging her to get their Miraculous and since Marinette is a logical person, she pushes aside her feelings to do her job.

Instead of looking at what she's afraid of she blames it on Cat Noir's feelings for him due to her trauma when Cat Blanc said that it was their love that got him akumatized. She tries to find a new Cat Miraculous holder who is not in love with her because that's what she believes is the problem. When Cat Walker is going to show up, she tries to do everything in her power to make sure it's doesn't go wrong like with Cat Noir and when she sees Kuro Neko her trauma comes back into play again when she believes that it was Cat Noir who got akumatized because of her and when she tries to fight Kuro Neko with Cat Walker she realizes how much she misses him and how much she wants him back and by the end of the episode Cat Noir returns and they finally communicate to some degree with partly solved the problem and Ladybug came to the conclusion that she needs to make Cat Noir feel like he's needed and we'll see her apply that in the remainder of season 4.

3. Plagg

"You're not Cat Noir but you're not Adrien either. You're both. You're the perfect son who's extremely successful in everything he does but you're also Cat Noir who just wants to enjoy life and have fun. One can't exist without the other and I sure am glad to have both of you back."

And Finally we end off with Plagg, the hero of this episode who got back Cat Noir by convincing Ladybug that he knows another holder who is not in love with her. When Plagg came back to Adrien, he used a real life therapeutic technique called behavioural activation to make Adrien start participating in life by giving him the idea that if he acts like someone he's not, Ladybug will like her when in reality that's not the case.

When the plan didn't go as well as Adrien thought it would, Plagg revealed that the plan actually worked better than he thought and by this he means that Adrien's distorted thoughts about what Ladybug wants from him were proven wrong when he put them to the test and it made Adrien realize that Ladybug doesn't want the perfect Cat Miraculous holder, she just wants him as Cat Noir. Plagg also made him realize that both his Adrien side and Cat Noir side are a part of him and helped him progress in his arc of figuring out who is.

Conclusion

Well, that's about it for "Kuro Neko". It's glad to be back making these posts. About "Qilin", I'm going to be reposting that right before the finale so that we can have the full picture before we get into the biggest finale the series has had yet. So with that out of the way, I hope you enjoyed reading this and I'll see you next time.

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Hack-San"

Introduction

Hey everyone, I'm back again and today we're gonna be doing episode 16, "Hack-San". If you missed my last post, you can find it here. If your new to these posts then here's the basic explanation: here I take a look at every individual character in every individual episode of season 4 to give an overall outline of the entire journey of these characters.

So "Hack-San", this episode revolves around Alya temporarily becoming the new Ladybug Miraculous holder while Marinette is off to visit her aunt in London with her parents as there is nothing she can do to convince them not to have her go and there needs to be a Ladybug Miraculous holder in Paris while she's gone to capture the akumas and we all know what happened the last time she trusted Cat Noir to call her when there was something wrong in Paris back in the New York Special. This also causes some collateral damage to certain other relationships Ladybug has (cough Cat Noir cough) so without further ado, let's get into these characters.

Character POVs

Alya

"You're right, I'm not Ladybug."

So obviously the main focus of this episode is Alya's hero arc just like "Mr. Pigeon 72", "Optigami" and "Sentibubbler" and here Alya learns what it's like to be in Marinette's shoes and got a taste of how much pressure she goes through everyday. We see from the scene of her doing everything she can to prevent akumatizations that she seems to developed the same quirky, panicky behaviour as Marinette so now we know where that comes from.

When she first got the Ladybug Miraculous from Marinette she was taken aback but then thought she would be a great Ladybug and that nothing would ever go wrong. But being the new Marinette proved to be harder than it looked as she tried her best to stop anyone from getting akumatized and when she became Scarabella she had to deal with angry Cat Noir who suspects that she is either an akumatized villain or a sentimonster despite her telling him otherwise and when he did believe her, he took his anger out on her until she tells him that if he has any problems, he should talk about it with Ladybug.

At the end of the day when they defeated Robustus, Alya came out learning that it's not easy being Marinette and she taught us the same as well.

2. Adrien/Cat Noir

"You didn't hurt my feelings. You did everything right. Paris will always need a ladybug superhero to watch over her. It's just, I realized that if one day that hero wasn't you, M'Lady, since we don't know each other's identities, that means.... I'd never see you again. Ever. You know, I just don't know if I could bear it."

This episode hits hard for Cat Noir and creates yet another crack in their relationship progressing the Ladynoir miscommunication arc but luckily they communicated at the end of the episode and that crack was sealed.... sort of.

When Cat Noir first saw that there was a new Ladybug Miraculous holder his emotions took over like they did in "Sentibubbler" when he found out that Ladybug and Rena Rouge were part of a two-person plan because unlike Ladybug he isn't good at regulating his emotions and dealing with a situation logically. Because of this it didn't occur to him that if the apparent new Ladybug Miraculous holder was an akumatized villain he would have murdered an innocent victim who was just under the control of Shadow Moth and if it was sentimonster it would've gone berserk.

When he finally accepted that Ladybug did reveal her identity to someone and gave her her Miraculous to temporarily use she took his anger out on Scarabella because of what Ladybug did and when Scarabella finally made him realize that if he has any problems he has to talk about it with Ladybug since she was the one who made the decision, he treated her fairly and played his part as being the loyal protector of the Ladybug Miraculous holder.

At the end of the episode, when Ladybug apologized to Cat Noir for what she did, Cat Noir denied that he was hurt but due to him being raised to believe his emotions are invalid but did tell her that he couldn't bare it if he would never see her again and since Cat Noir communicated Ladybug made him feel better.

3. Marinette/Ladybug

"You.... must have been pretty surprised to discover there was another holder. I'm really sorry Cat Noir. I should've told you. I mean if I found out you told someone your secret identity, I'd... probably get upset too. I'm really sorry I hurt your feelings."

Finally, we end off with Marinette who made the good call of giving her Miraculous to Alya after failing to convince her parents to not have her go to London as not only would there have been no Ladybug Miraculous holder to capture the akuma after defeating Robustus but Shadow Moth would have already unknowingly gotten the Ladybug Miraculous since Marinette gets captured by Robustus due to being the prized possession of her parents. It also really shows how much she trusts Alya with such a responsibility.

Even so, we see her trying to control everything by giving Alya tips on being Ladybug and how to care for her kitty which I personally though was really cute and it's also a symptom of her PTSD coming back, that is her need to control everything in order to prevent the traumatic event.

At the end of the episode, when Alya tells her that she needs to talk to Cat Noir she did so because she felt bad about not telling Cat Noir that there was going to be another holder and felt guilty for hurting his feelings and when Cat Noir told her that he was afraid of one day losing her forever, she reassured him by telling him that she would never leave him further reinforcing the fact that she would never ignore Cat Noir's feelings given that she is aware that he feels that way.

Conclusion

And so with that we end of the character analysis for "Hack-San". Hope you enjoyed reading cause this was another fun one to do and "Rocketear" probably will be as well because I'm excited to look into Nino's jealousy and Alya having a hard time keeping secrets from him. As always let me know your thoughts on this analysis and feel free to let me know if I missed something for any of the characters this episode. With that being said, see you guys next time!

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Ephemeral"

Introduction

Hello everyone, I'm back again with a new character analysis post and this time it's the all-mighty 100th episode of Miraculous, "Ephemeral". Here, I look at the individual journeys of every relevant character in every individual episode of season 4 and this time it's the 22nd.

Ah, the 100th episode, a.k.a. the fake reveal episode of season 4. Really enjoyed this one. It was interesting to see how the reveal would have played out if Marinette was the one to figure out Adrien's identity first but just like "Cat Blanc" it resulted in the end of the world and hence the timeline had to be erased. These what-if episodes show us that no matter how the reveal plays out, Marinette and Adrien will always find a way to fall in love with each other. There's a lot of characterization to cover for this 100th episode, especially for Marinette and Adrien so let's get started.

Character POVs

Marinette/Ladybug

"It's not that simple, Tikki. I'm in love with Adrien, but I've never been in love with Cat Noir. It's like they're two completely different people. Is the Adrien I'm in love with the fake Adrien? Is Cat Noir the real Adrien? Who's the real Adrien behind Adrien?"

So since this episode focused on how Marinette would react if she found out Adrien's identity first we're going to start with her. First things first, Marinette does not hate Cat Noir. We've seen in "Truth" that she actually likes the his Cat Noir qualities like his courage, his self-confidence and most importantly (at least to the fandom) his puns. She's always loved Cat Noir but just as a really good friend.

At the beginning of the episode, when Cat Noir didn't show up to deal with Moolak she was forced to improvise and had to get out nine Miraculous in order to make up for Cat Noir's absence which really shows how important he is to her.

After defeating the villain, she was confronted by Su-Han, the guy who has been breathing down her neck since "Furious Fu" and was pressured by him to find out who Cat Noir is so that she may have better control over him but Marinette, knowing the consequences of knowing each others' identities, tries to convince him otherwise and made a compromise to have him know his identity which he agreed to. Knowing that she is the only person Cat Noir would ever reveal his identity to, she was forced to make a plan with Viperion to find out who Cat Noir is without him knowing.

When Cat Noir revealed his identity to her, she was in shock because Adrien and Cat Noir are practically two different people due to how different their personalities are. Part of the reason also that she didn't reveal her identity to him was because when he revealed his identity she thought "Oh no, this I why I fell in love with Cat Noir, it all makes sense now". Her reaction to Adrien being Cat Noir wasn't "Ew, Adrien is Cat Noir, I don't love him anymore", it was "How can I claim to love Adrien when I never knew him as well as I thought?" And it totally makes sense because Adrien and Cat Noir are completely different and Adrien hasn't found the balance between his Adrien self and his Cat Noir self yet. She felt like she didn't even know him anymore and that made her feel awkward around him. When she learned from Luka that when he found out that someone wasn't how he thought she was, after the initial shock, she got to know them better and learned to love them even more so Marinette took his advice started spending more time with him getting to know him and finally learning to love both sides of Adricat which wasn't that hard because she already loves his Cat Noir qualities as a friend.

When Sass had to reverse time to prevent the end of the world, and Ladybug saw the effect his powers had on doing so, she didn't know why Sass had to reverse time but she did know that something happened due to them revealing their identities that was so bad that he had to reverse time further reinforcing her belief that they must never know each other's identities.

2. Adrien/Cat Noir

"I understand. It's never easy to show your true self to someone and wonder what the other person will think of you, if they like you. It's hard for me too you know. My heart's beating so fast. I've been waiting for this moment for so long. Imagine the stories I had to come up with when you saved my life as Adrien or when you wanted to give me another Miraculous. It was awful having to hide Cat Noir from you, I'm so glad I don't have to do that anymore. I hope you're not too disappointed, but whoever you are behind that mask, you'll always be the most amazing person in the world."

Now let's look at Adrien's side of things. When his father asked him to substitute him because he wasn't feeling well, Adrien tried to object but was unable to resist his father's will which made their already-shaky relationship shakier from "Mega Leech" and when he discovered that he was Shadow Moth, it completely shattered and he was forced to obey his father possibly due to him being a sentimonster.

Due to him having to cover for his father in an interview he wasn't able to get away in order to help Ladybug fight Moolak as Cat Noir and when he found that she had asked him to come to the Eiffel tower to talk he was afraid that Ladybug would be mad at him. But in reality, she just wanted to them to reveal their identities to each other so that Ladybug will know where to find him when another situation like Moolak happens which relieved him and once he revealed his identity he lamented on how hard it has been to keep his true self from her and now he doesn't have to hide it anymore.

When Ladybug finally decides to reveal herself and reveals herself to be Marinette, he immediately accepts her because the person he loves most in the world turned out to be one of his closest friends. Some people would say that this shows that Adrien only likes Marinette because of Ladybug but a beg to differ because he did say in this episode itself that whoever she was behind the mask he would always love her and he stuck to his word and we've seen in the past how he seems to be the only one to acknowledge that Marinette is always helping others just like Ladybug so it makes total sense to him that Marinette is Ladybug because their so similar unlike for Marinette, Adrien and Cat Noir are basically like to different people.

3. Luka

"Quite the opposite actually. Once I got over the shock, it helped me to get to know them better and like them even more."

Now we have Luka, the guy who found out both Ladybug and Cat Noir's identities back in "Wishmaker" and in this episode, we finally get to see how he felt about it. When Marinette asked him if he ever found that someone had a secret side to them that he couldn't possibly imagine and whether it completely changed his perspective of them. Luka revealed that while he was initially shocked, he later got to know them better and that allowed him to love that person even more. Classic Luka.

As for why he didn't reveal to Ladybug that he actually knew their identities, like I said is "Wishmaker", he didn't want to put more stress on Marinette than she already has and make her have to factor in him knowing her and Cat Noir's identities into her plans as well. He also listened to Ladybug and didn't reverse time or even pretend to reverse time because Luka as a character is submissive and doesn't usually take the lead. He's intuitive and wise just like his kwami but he isn't one to take initiative.

4. Plagg

"Cataclysm!"

I wasn't originally going to add him but after reading about him in the trivia section of this episode, I was intrigued and wanted to point this out. It's a small moment but it has a lot going for it.

When Plagg found out that Adrien's father was Shadow Moth he acted out of both anger and guilt. He was angry at Shadow Moth for the way he has treated Adrien, for the way he treated his kwami brethren Nooroo and Duusuu (and we know that he cares a lot about Nooroo from "Sandboy"), for the way he took advantage of the emotions of everyone in Paris and guilty because he felt responsible because he never realized that all this time, he along with Nooroo and Duusuu have been living in the same household and he never even bothered to notice it. Says a lot about his character.

Conclusion

That's the end for the 100th episode. Pretty crazy one. As always, let me know your thoughts on the episode and let me know if I missed anything for any of the characters. I might not be posting for a while. See you when I do.

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Furious Fu"

Introduction

Hey guys, I'm back with another MLB Season 4 character analysis and now we're onto episode 6. If you missed my last post you can find it here. This is the series where I look into the emotions, motivations and thought processes of all the characters in every individual episode of season 4.

So this episode was a big one. We got to see the return of good old Master Fu with his girlfriend Marianne and we also have Marinette meet the Celestial Guardian of the Miraculous, Su-Han who has come all the way to Paris on foot after the events of "Feast" to reclaim the Mother Box and he was also a very interesting character I am going to analyze in the analysis so let's get started.

Character POVs

Marinette/Ladybug

"You know why you can't come. When he made me the new Guardian his memory was magically erased. Now Master Fu is just like everyone else: he can't know about the Miraculous, my secret identity or you kwamis"

Starting off with the main focus of this episode as always, Marinette had to deal with the immaturity of the kwamis wanting to see their old Guardian and the wrath of a fully-fledged Guardian of the Miraculous who wants to reclaim the Miracle Box from her and is forced to have to show him that she is a worthy Guardian which she did by dealing with the titular villain when Su-Han couldn't showing that she can be a good Guardian in her own way. Overall, she handled the situation very well.

Also from the end of the episode, Su-Han is now watching her every move, ready to the Miracle Box away from her the moment she does something wrong and that adds yet another layer of pressure onto Marinette (as if she needed another reason to be afraid of failure).

Not much to say about her this episode, but for our next character, I might have more to talk about.

2. Su-Han

"Involving Marianne in the fight, a human without powers, was against the precepts too. This has proven two things: the first thing is that you have the audacity to invent your own rules and as crazy as it may seem, somehow they all work. The second thing is that your natural instincts tell you who you can trust, an essential quality for a Guardian."

Moving on to the introduction of Su-Han, He was a pretty interesting character and while many people hated him, you can kinda see where he's coming from. When he woke up suddenly after the events of "Feast", he found the Miracle Box he was supposed to protect missing along with his slacker student, Fu and this infuriated him and when he found out that not only did Master Fu take away the Miracle Box but also left it with an not-properly-trained teenage girl he was furious and wanted to take away the Miracle Box immediately.

It didn't help matters when he also found out that his slacker student lost two Miraculous just because he was hungry and that the whereabouts of the most dangerous kwami is now unknown. It also made sense when he tried to take away Master Fu's staff because that was apparently the disguised staff of a Guardian which led to Master Fu's akumatization into Furious Fu, a supervillain with the ability to use whatever power he makes a symbol of with his paintbrush on a piece of paper and wants revenge on him for trying to steal his staff. Since he was not trained to fight people created from the magic of the Miraculous, the only thing he could do was hide and when Ladybug made him realize he was being a coward and when he saw her in action, she deemed her worthy of being the Guardian of the Miracle Box but was still going to keep an eye on her considering this was still a teenage girl she was dealing with.

3. Adrien/Cat Noir

"Does that mean you won't remember me?............ You want my ring? Then come and get it!"

Finally, we're going to end off with Cat Noir who had one moment this episode where he realizes that if Ladybug gives up the Miracle Box, she would lose her memories and therefore Ladybug would not remember him and since he doesn't know her true identity, he would probably never see her again. This is where his dependency on his relationship with Ladybug for his happiness comes up again back from the episode "Truth" and that dependency is causing problems here but it was also a good thing that Cat Noir did that because otherwise in the end Su-Han would never have let Marinette keep the Miracle Box.

Conclusion

Well, that's the end of episode 6 and I really felt this was more of a plot episode rather than a characterization episode so I didn't really have much to say on any of the characters other than maybe Su-Han. So let me know your thoughts on my analysis of this episode and as always let me know if I missed anything about any of the characters.

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Crocoduel"

Introduction

Hey there everyone, I'm back with another season 4 character analysis post and this time it's episode 12. If you missed my last post, you can find ithere. For the new people who want to read this first anyway, in this series I look at the emotions, behaviours and thought processes of the individual characters in every individual episode of the characterization-rich season that is season 4 to outline the progress these characters have made in this season as a whole.

So "Crocoduel", we not only get another new hero in the form of Purple Tigress who seems to be really popular in the fandom, but we also get a follow up from "Truth" on Marinette and Luka's break-up and how it has affected both of them. It also tackles the relationship between Anarka and Jagged. So yeah, this analysis is going to be interesting so let's get started.

Character POVs

Juleka

"Mom, Dad, I'm sorry but TALK IT OVER INSTEAD OF ARGUING!"

Obviously since this is Juleka's episode, we're going to start with her. LikeMyleneandRose, she also had a character arc in getting her Miraculous and for her it was learning to raise her voice and speak up about her feelings, something Luka can learn from his twin sister. Hey, I found something they have in common as siblings! Anyway, back to Juleka's character arc.

At the starting episode, we see Juleka afraid of speaking up and letting people know how she feels, being pretty submissive when Alya and the rest of Marinette's friends begged Juleka to let them have her birthday on her family's houseboat instead of going to the movies like they planned to get Marinette to confront Luka and being asked by Marinette to try to get Luka not to be at his house during their birthday party so that she won't have to confront him and due to being to submissive Juleka accepted Marinette's request as well and felt overwhelmed. Her submissiveness was also the reason she didn't stand up to her father when she heard that he was giving her brother a guitar and nothing to her and if it hadn't been for Marinette, she wouldn't have talked to him at all.

But her learning to speak up about her feelings actually happens when she meets her kwami, Roarr. Kwamis truly are the perfect therapists for their respective holders. Roarr encouraging Juleka to speak up is what gave her the strength to be vocal about her feelings when she became a superhero and after she helped Ladybug defeat her parents when she kinda settled their feud by raising her voice.

2.Marinette/Ladybug

"But it will be so awkward. You know that Luka's in love with me but I'm in love with Adrien and every time we see each other he just ends up getting hurt all over again 'cause he knows I'll never feel the same."

Moving on to the Marinette-Luka breakup aftermath, starting with Marinette's side of things. After breaking up with Luka in "Truth", Marinette became very awkward with Luka which led to her wanting to avoid him because she is ashamed of having to break up with him and doesn't want to have him getting hurt all over again just because she can't return his feelings towards her.

When she realizes that she has to come to Luka and Juleka's houseboat for their birthday party, she panics due to this fear which leads to her to asking Juleka to make sure Luka isn't at the party when she's coming there, unaware that this was overwhelming poor Juleka. When she did realize what she did hurt her and could have by extension hurt Luka, she felt remorse for her actions and apologized like she doesn't whenever she realizes that what she what she is doing is hurting someone and even stands up for her when it appears as though Jagged was showing favoritism towards Luka by giving him and guitar and nothing to Juleka.

By the end of the episode she admits her mistake and settles things with Luka, officially becoming buddies.

3.Luka

"You know, it hurts a lot more not seeing you that seeing you"

Now let's look at Luka's side of the conflict which people seem to understand more. After their breakup, when Marinette started avoiding him, Luka felt as if Marinette hated her when in reality she was only just afraid to hurt him. He knew she had a secret that she didn't want to share and was completely OK with that. When Marinette showed up and they settled things between them by finally communicating which honestly seems to be the theme of this season.

Luka also finally communicates his feelings to her by saying that it hurts a lot more for not seeing her than seeing her which is great development for him. Hey, what do you know? Both the Couffaine twins spoke up this episode: Juleka with the argument between their parents and Luka with how feels about Marinette avoiding her so good job on both of them.

4.Anarka

"Jagged Stone, you really are a shipwrecker. How dare you come here and give my son the album that caused our breakup!"

Now we're going to look at the Anaka-Jagged conflict which seems to be based on an album they made which supposedly caused their breakup. From what I'm gathering, from Anarka's POV it seems as though Jagged left their family when he realized they were having kids because he didn't think he would be a good enough dad and to Anarka it seems as though he left her for his music career to raise the kids all on her own and that has to be pretty rough, hence why she never wanted to talk about it with Luka or Juleka.

When Juleka raised her voice and told them to talk out their problems peacefully, they both agreed to do so for the sake of their kids.

5.Jagged

"Caused our breakup? You mean the album that helped me get my life back after you left me!"

From Jagged's side of the conflict we can see that he was concerned about not being a good-enough dad to their kids and Anarka, not understanding these concerns, left him with nothing but their album which was the one thing that managed to help him get his life back after he became all alone. His way of coping with a problem was to channel the emotions into a song similar to his son and when he found out how much he had in common with him, it gave him hope that he might be able to be a good dad after all.

He shows how much he cares about both his kids, although it didn't seem like he cared about Juleka at first, by giving Juleka the first guitar he ever owned and giving his son Luka the album that help him rise up again after he was left in the dumps by Anarka. By the end of the episode both Anarka and Jagged admitted their faults and apologized to each other when Juleka told them settle things peacefully.

Conclusion

Well, that's the end of the analysis. Gotta say it was a pretty fun one since we had two conflicts and one Miraculous hero introduction. Both the Couffaine twins learn to speak up about how they feel and Jagged and Anarka settle their long-time feud. So if I missed anything about any of the characters in this episode, let me know in the comments and also let me know your thoughts on this analysis. Feel free to try to dig deeper than I have for these characters.

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MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Glaciator 2"

Introduction

Hey everyone, I'm back with a new MLB Season 4 Character Analysis and this time it's episode 15. If you've missed my previous post you can find it here. If this is you first time seeing one of these posts then here I look at the journeys of all our favourite MLB characters in every individual episode of season 4 in order to give an overall feel as to how far they have come.

So this episode focuses on the relationship between Ladybug and Cat Noir and Cat Noir learning more about how to express his feelings towards Ladybug in a more healthy manner. We also have a bit of Marinette with her feelings for Adrien but this episode more so focuses on the Adricat side of things. While this episode may seem filler-esque in nature, it's actually not as it gives us some relationship development for both Marinette and Adrien. The number of Character POVs here started with just Adrien and Marinette but then it became three and then four with the addition of Andre the ice cream maker and Kagami as well. So let's get started!

Character POVs

Adrien/Cat Noir

"Marinette opened my eyes. The thing is I'm always doing my Cat Noir act with her. Maybe if I were my true self with Ladybug, she'd fall in love with me."

So obviously we're going to start with Adrien since he's the main focus here. The episode starts with both Ladybug and Cat Noir fighting Glaciator again and Ladybug and Cat Noir apparently being elected "couple of the year" much to Cat Noir's amusement and Ladybug's disapproval. Cat Noir uses this opportunity to try and seduce Ladybug only for him to get thrown in the trash because he wouldn't stop. Cat Noir realizes his wrong after the fight is over but comes to the wrong conclusion: that he isn't allowed to be in love with Ladybug.

This causes him to try to suppress his feelings by seemingly deleting all his photos of Ladybug on his computer and Cataclysm-ing every billboard of them being couple of the year in order to erase any trace of his feelings for Ladybug and this suppression of his feelings even makes him vulnerable enough for akumatization. When Marinette called her over and they started practising for Marinette to confess to her crush they hung out together and it made Cat Noir realize that it's OK for him to be in love with Ladybug, he just has to be more respectful towards her feelings like how he asked her while they were fighting Glaciator for the second time in the episode if it was OK if he called her "M'Lady". And if you look at all the episodes that come after this you can notice that Cat Noir is less flirty towards Ladybug and simply just her loyal partner which is good development on his part.

2. Marinette/Ladybug

"What's wrong is that this isn't really me... The first time I saw you, I misjudged you. I thought you were conceited and superficial. But then I got to know you, I saw who you really were deep down, someone sweet, sincere and generous. Since then there's been something I've wanted to tell you but every time I try it's like my brain suddenly freezes and now, I think I'm ready. I love you."

A lot of people seem to blame Ladybug for what happened in this episode but the thing is, it wasn't really her fault. At the beginning of the episode, when Cat Noir was trying to seduce Ladybug, she told him to stop but he didn't which caused her to get angry and throw him in the trash. Could she have handled it better? Yes, definitely. Was it wrong of her to throw Cat Noir in the trash? Completely unnecessary. But was it understandable for her to do considering the history of Cat Noir's constant confessions? Yes, yes it was. Just look at the history of his confessions and how Ladybug progressively more annoyed:

In the first "Glaciator", when Cat Noir confessed to her for the first time, she tried to be sensitive about his feelings and tried to let him down as gently as she could by telling him that he was her friend and she doesn't want to play with his feelings.

Then in "Frozer", when he confessed to her again, she was still patient and maintained a gentle tone when she reminded him that she was in love with another boy and was not in love with him.

Then again in "Oblivio", when he tried seducing her again, we can see that she is started to lose her patience with him as her tone is much more exasperated when she repeated to him that she was in love with another boy.

And now in "Glaciator 2", she has reached her breaking point and is done trying to be gentle with him and loses her patience completely.

Of course she doesn't want to hurt his feelings, but there is only so many times you can tell someone something until you lose your patience with them.

But Meanwhile, she tries to plan on confessing to Adrien and when she sees Cat Noir she sees the perfect person to practice confessing to (keep in mind that she was not aware of how hurt Cat Noir was and would never have asked him to do this if she knew). She spends so much time being obssessed with creating the perfect confession for Adrien that she doesn't realize that the confession was nothing like her until the end of the episode and when she does, this progresses her character.

3. Kagami

"I'm worried about Adrien. His sword has lost it's edge. (Marinette: His what?) Since you're both so weak, I mean sensitive you understand him best and can help him be happy again."

From this episode, we can see that Kagami seems to have moved on from Adrien lying to her and their breakup as she is able to talk to him normally this episode and is worried about him losing his edge in fencing as she tells Marinette in her car.

She also seems to have become an official Adrienette shipper from "Mr. Pigeon 72" as she actively tries to help them get together and believes that they are perfect for each other since they're both so "weak". She helps Marinette by giving her an idea for a way to help her confess to Adrien which is to practice by confessing to someone who she has no feelings for so that they're emotions won't get in the way although by the end of the episode it turns out that this was just something she read from a manga. This shows us some good development for her and Marinette's friendship as now along with Marinette's usual friend group, Kagami is also helping her get with Adrien.

4. Andre

"But it can't be! Ladybug and Cat Noir are supposed to be made for each other. I've lost my connection with my ice cream."

Finally, we're going to end off with Andre the sweetheart's ice-cream maker. He was mostly in the background of this episode but his character has just enough depth for him to have a section in this post.

On the surface it may seem like he's just sad because the two teenagers he ships aren't together (unbeknownst to him that they actually are) but when you ponder on things as long as I do, you begin to realize: He's had a reputation of getting couples together with the magic of his ice cream and having a sixth sense for which two people are made for each other and when you have that kind of reputation you start to pride yourself on that sixth sense and when you're proven wrong for once, you begin to doubt yourself and your abilities and that takes a hit to your pride.

Conclusion

That's the end of my "Glaciator 2" character analysis and to be honest, it was really fun just like the last episode. I can't wait to get into future episodes and look more into things like Marinette's Cat Blanc trauma and Adrien's identity crisis but until then let me know your thoughts on this analysis and feel free to give me your own analysis on the characters this episode and as always let me know if I missed anything for any of the characters. Until next time!

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Guiltrip"

Introduction

Hey, guys and welcome to another season 4 character analysis post. If you missed my last post, you can find ithere. For those of you who are new to this series, here I basically look that journeys of all the characters of MLB in every individual episode of season 4 in order to help people attain a better understanding of these characters and learn to appreciate them more.

This episode was another one where we were introduced to a new Miraculous: the pig which grants the power to show a person their greatest desire. According to the release of the episodes, this was the first episode we saw where someone new gets a Miraculous. I really enjoyed this episode for the focus it had on Rose and Juleka and the way it shows the different ways Marinette and Adrien approach a problem, speaking of which let's get into the character POVs.

Character POVs

Rose

"No, I must not think like that. Yes, I'm glad I did 'cause that's what made us closer and stronger."

Of course we're gonna start with her since this episode was basically Rose's chance to shine. Like "Mega Leech", this episode also gave us a great message about thinking positive which is honestly something the fandom could learn from Rose. It was her positive mental attitude that saved the day for this episode and that compliments well with Miraculous Ladybug being a show about emotions.

We see here that Rose trusts Juleka more than anyone and is very forgiving of her when Juleka revealed that she told everyone about her illness. She even when after her when she got akumatized, putting her life in danger just for her friend (girlfriend?) despite Ladybug and Cat Noir telling her it was too dangerous and her positive mental attitude allows her to not be affected by Guiltrip which is what Ladybug sees in her to make her worthy of the Miraculous of the pig. Overall, great show of positivity from Rose, Juleka is lucky to have her and she truly is worthy of her Miraculous.

2.Juleka

"The first to plead guilty is me."

On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have Juleka, whose negativity and guilt of her wrongdoing allowed her to be vulnerable to akumatization and turned her into a version of Reflekta with a sentimonster named Guiltrip which sucks people in and makes them feel guilty of all the things they feel guilty about deep down or of anything bad that happened in general once you lose your positive attitude.

When she found out that her closest friend (girlfriend?) was actually discovered to have an illness which gives her headaches and bouts of vomiting which can come back at any time and got her hospitalized temporarily, she was devastated and when everyone surrounded her and asked about what was wrong in worry of her, she felt overwhelmed and forced to tell. When everyone started giving Rose special treatment when she returned to school, she felt extremely guilty of what she did and confessed to Rose.

And when people continued to give her special treatment after that, Juleka still felt guilty which caused her to get akumatized and send herself into her own sentimonster which was meant for her victims which really shows how guilty she really feels. In the end, she got what she wanted and got a happy ending.

3.Marinette/Ladybug

"Cat Noir, you can do this! You have to think positive. You're the greatest partner anyone could have! (Ladybug, do you really mean that?) Yes, I probably don't tell you this enough but I couldn't do this without you."

Another show of how much Cat Noir means to Ladybug, her telling Cat Noir that he's the greatest partner anyone could have and that he couldn't do it without him similar to what she said in the New York Special except with a much more sadder tone and we also see how the absence of Cat Noir affects her detrimentally in future episodes.

Besides that we also have the contrast between her and Adrien on solving a problem, sympathy vs empathy. Sympathy means that you can put yourself in a person's position and think about how you would feel in their situation and what you would want and behaving with them accordingly. When Marinette sees that Juleka is sad, she immediately jumps into problem-solver mode and tries to brainstorm an idea to cheer her up because she would never want to be sad and she thought of messaging everyone in her class to help her because as we've see in "Gang of Secrets" that's what she would want if she had a secret that was a huge burden on her since telling Alya helped with her problems a lot.

4.Adrien/Cat Noir

"Juleka, is everything OK?"

Now let's look at Adrien's approach to solving a problem which is what seemed to be working in this situation, the empathy side. Empathy means understanding how another person might feel based on their personality and what they as an individual would want to make them feel better and Adrien as a really nice guy is good at that.

When he saw that Juleka was sad, she took the time to listen to what she had to say and try to figure out what she wants rather than apply what he would want in the situation. He knew that Marinette would never say anything to hurt Juleka and he knew that something else might have made Juleka feel sad. This is yet another way Marinette and Adrien are yin and yang for each other and in this case it's sympathy vs empathy, being able to regulate one's own emotions vs being able to regulate others' emotions, logical vs emotional, etc.

Conclusion

That's the end of this episode's character analysis and this was a really interesting one since we had more character to analyze this time: the hero of the episode, the villain of the episode and the main two. So let me know your thoughts on my analysis and also let me know if I missed anything for any of the characters this episode. Feel free to give your own input into their characters as well.

[character-fan19]

MLB Season 4 Character Analysis: "Mega Leech"

Introduction

Hey guys, I'm back with another MLB Season 4 Character Analysis post and this time it's episode 10. If you missed my previous post, you can find it here. For those of you who are new to this series, in this series I look at every individual character in every individual episode of season 4 and analyze what they're going through and today we're starting to hand out more Miraculous.

Mega Leech was the first episode, at least chronologically, where we see a new Miraculous being handed out which is not exactly new since we've seen it used before by Marinette but this time with Mylene who got some character development this episode meaning not only will she get a Miraculous but also a section in this post.

Character POVs

Mylene

"There's no shame in being afraid, Marinette. I'm scared too. Of the dark, of humidity, of germs, and even mice. I was really frightened about protesting this morning so I plucked up my courage and managed to do it anyway"

This episode was mostly about Mylene facing her fears and learning to not be afraid. It was a really good message that being a hero doesn't mean your not afraid, it means that you are willing to do the right thing even if you are afraid.

At the start of this episode, it showed us how she is giving herself the courage to protest to the mayor about the Project Oxygen by telling herself she's not afraid and that she can do it. Already she is showing the qualities of being a hero. When the mayor gets akumatized into Malediktator again with a sentimonster Mega Leech with the ability to shrink and clone him so that he can go into people's ears and control them she and Marinette both went into the sewers after Mylene told her of how she faces her fears everyday which factors into Marinette's decision to give her the Mouse Miraculous.

When she about to be offered the Mouse Miraculous, Mylene stops Ladybug due to her many fears and lack of confidence in herself similar to Marinette when she first received her Miraculous but learned to overcome her fears after being motivated by Ladybug to become a hero. Great character development for Mylene indeed, going from a scaredy-cat in season 1 to a brave hero in season 4.

2. Adrien/Cat Noir

"I didn't take a stand against you father, I took a stand against a project my friend showed me was bad for Paris and for the planet."

Relationships continue to crumble to dust for Adrien but this time with his father, although it was already very fragile when we were first introduced to it in season 1. Now it's even more messed up what with Gabriel starting to control Adrien with a ring that is possibly his amokitized object if he is a sentimonster. I'm not saying that this confirms the senti-Adrien theory or anything, just that the writers really seem to be emphasizing that that's the case this season and this could be good for his character if it turns out that he really is a sentimonster.

To all Adrien stans, it will look like Adrien has made so much progress in becoming free of his father only to find out that he was never free at all. The thoughts of Adrien stans on the senti-Adrien theory reflect Adrien's reaction if he finds out he is a sentimonster (if he is a sentimonster, that is) and him being a sentimonster will also be a great metaphor for abuse as Miraculous creates metaphors for a lot of psychological stuff such as akumatization representing emotional dysregulation.

Conclusion

That's the end of this season 4 character analysis which had good development for Mylene and hinted of a possibility (if it turns out to be true) of Adrien being a sentimonster which would be good development for him. Let me know your thoughts on my analysis and let me know if I missed anything for any of the characters this episode. See you next time!