#mlb:ar misc

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Adrien is demiromantic. 

Well, not like canonically, but I think it makes sense if he is in the show. And also because I’m doing my own rewrite and have fully creative freedom he is going to be on the aromantic spectrum and NOT JUST BECAUSE I AM OKAY I swear but because it makes sense for who he is.

In the show, Adrien is almost entirely oblivious to people who have crushes on him. He doesn't really think about romantic situations unless others prompt him to or he gets close to someone. In my rewrite, it is very similar. I don't think it's ever gonna be explicitly said or anything but if you wanted to label him it would be as demiromantic.

(Demiromantic is an identity on the aromanic spectrum which basically describes people who don’t experience romantic attraction towards others unless they are close with them.)

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Chat Noir is Adrien

That seems pretty obvious, they are literally the same person. Honestly, I don’t know if this was ever a point of contention in the fandom because I’ve never been, like, properly in the fandom but I remembered hearing about this a while ago and thought I talk about it in regard to my Rewrite :)

Adrien and Chat Noir are the same person, again, obviously, but they act very differently from one another, particularly in the show. Adrien is always polite and carefully spoken while Chat Noir says anything and everything. They act like different people, but they aren’t.

I think every person goes through an identity crisis in their life. Mine has been ongoing but it was pretty bad a few years ago. I felt very lonely because I didn’t have anyone who knew me, but that begged the question, Who am I?

Depending on the situation I act differently. I make different jokes around family than I do around friends. I speak and act differently at work than I do in my house and at school I behave entirely differently, but all of these are me.

At school, I am naturally quieter and more withdrawn. It would be unnatural, not authentic if I were to be super outgoing and sociable. That is me.

But with friends, I make crass jokes and laugh about dumb shit. I instigate conversations and go out of my way to spend time with them. That is also me.

Neither of these versions of me are facades, they are all me, but reacting to different situations. I don’t particularly enjoy school so I go into low power mode, but when I do happen to enjoy a topic or have a friend in the same class then I am more invested. I am fluid and changing and all different “versions” of me are still me.

To apply this to a fictional teenage superhero, Adrien acts a certain way at school, and as time progresses he gets more comfortable in the “version” of him he is at school and settles into it. When he transforms and becomes Chat Noir, another “version” of him surfaces. One isn’t more valid or authentic than another; Adrien is simply adapting to his circumstances.

One minor issue (yes it’s only minor this time around) I have with the show is that they never show bleedover between the different “versions” of Adrien. I may be wrong, but I believe they do with Marinette early on where they show her gain confidence as Ladybug and that transfers over to her as Marinette, but they never do anything like that with Adrien.

Going back to my example from before, in class, I am typically quieter and more withdrawn, but if I have a friend in that class or was just talking to my friends before I went to class, that may change and I end up being more talkative and involved. If something bad happens in my personal life, I will be unfocused and tired in class. These different “versions” of myself are all connected and they bleed together, they impact one another.

As a whole, I think the show should look into this more. Or, if they don’t want to dive into that, they just ignore it entirely, but a lot of the show’s main struggles are with the heroes, Marinette in particular, dealing with having “two lives” that are at odds with each other. It would make that struggle more interesting if they dove into how they personally struggle with this outside of just being stressed, you know?

In my rewrite, I’m not planning on diving into this in great detail, but I want to make sure that the connection is present. I see how changes in one “version” of a character impact the others. 

When Adrien gets his miraculous and becomes Chat Noir, he suddenly has unlimited freedom and gets to experience something new. As a result, he starts to discover himself more in this newfound freedom and realizes he likes making jokes and goofing off but that he likes to do so because it makes the people around him smile. 

As Adrien, he makes the people around him smile not primarily through jokes, but by acts of service. He spends time with them and connects with them on an emotional level to support them. Adrien still makes jokes, but they aren’t his go-to as it is for Chat. Chat likes to connect emotionally with Ladybug, but can’t fully because of their secret identities.

Adrien and Chat Noir are the same person but just put names to that same person in different circumstances.

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Master Fu and Adrien

In this rewrite I make Fu a much more flawed character and we see that immediately in his relationship with Adrien.

Fu already has relationships with Adrien and Marinette prior to distributing the ladybug and black cat miraculous. He tutors Marinette and teaches Adrien Mandarin. He's been Adrien's teacher for a few years now.

Fu is preparing to give Adrien the black cat miraculous when the first ever akumatized villain attacks. Before Fu can speak to Adrien about what is happening, Adrien is grabbed by Gorilla and rushed out of Fu's store where the lessons take place but Fu manages to slip the miraculous into Adrien's bag before he leaves.

Adrien later finds the miraculous, transforming into Chat Noir and etcetera etcetera. Fu never tries to talk to Adrien about the miraculous despite still teaching the kid Mandarin. Adrien/Chat Noir doesn't even know that a guardian exists.

Eventually the Mandarin lessons stop and Adrien stops seeing Fu entirely. Hawkmoth starts akumatizing people at increasing rates, leaving Chat Noir and Ladybug completely swamped with responsibilities. In this time, Chat Noir/Adrien finds out that Marinette is training with someone called "The Guardian". Through context clues, Adrien realizes that The Guardian is basically a wise old man training Ladybug in the ways of the miraculous.

Chat Noir asks Ladybug about this, about how often she meets him and what she is learning. You can tell he is feeling left out. Eventually he asks Ladybug is he can train to become a guardian too, but when she returns after asking the guardian she informs him that Chat Noir is not welcome. He asks why and she says the guardian never gave a reason.

But I know the reason because I am writing the story.

Fu is a man who is set in tradition. He was basically indoctrinated into a cult when he was child, the cult being The Guardians, and had ideas ingrained into him that cannot be erased. When Fu sees Adrien/Chat Noir, he sees someone who is immature and reckless. Adrien doesn't exhibit traditional leadership skills and so Fu doesn't want to train him to be a guardian.

Fu never has a chance to reveal his identity as guardian to Chat/Adrien until Fu is forced to help in battle and Chat is like who da fuc is dis guy and then Fu dies.

After Fu's death, Adrien realizes just how much of a douche bag the guy was. While he was alive, he was placing forcing Ladybug to live up to insane expectations that made her question everything. This pressure was only furthered after his death. Adrien watched as Ladybug blamed herself for everything that went wrong in the wake of Fu's death. He watched as she tore herself apart over this crochety old man.

It was in watching Ladybug that Adrien was grateful he was never trained by the man. He never views Master Fu with the same respect Ladybug does and this disrespect is ultimately what saves Ladybug from herself.

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Fixing Lila Rossi

Oh boy, do I hate Lila. Not only is she a bad character, but she's a badly written character too which is a far worse crime imo.

At first, I was tempted to just write her out entirely but then I thought, "What the hell, might as well see if I could make her work" and I'm glad I did.

In the show, Lila is a conniving manipulator. She is constantly scheming, but why? Her reasons for what she does are never made very clear, but that's not her biggest crime.

Lila joins the class randomly and immediately begins lying and deceiving. When Marinette discovers this, Lila begins attacking her and when Marinette speaks up about this, everyone sides with Lila, including Marinette's best friend. For so many episodes, for so many seasons, Lila is a cruel manipulator, and that entire time Marinette and Adrien, two of the most well-liked people in the entire class, are ignored when they speak up against Lila.

I think this is all incredibly dumb and it makes me very angry to think about it so I reworked her character entirely.

The first thing I figured out was Lila's motivations. Why is she the way she is? What are her goals? How far is she willing to go to get what she wants?

The easy conclusion I came to was that Lila wants the luxurious glory of wealth. She comes from a poor family where she's been neglected and pushed to the side her whole life. She wants the power that comes from money. She wants people to look at her and envy her like she has done to others her whole life.

But the more I thought about Lila the more I realized her motivations are more than that.

Her whole life has been lived in uncertainty. She never knew if she would be getting dinner that day or if she'd be able to stay in her home. She never knew if her parents were in a caring mood or a cruel one. She never had any control over her life, and she is tired of it.

Lila wants money because it gives her control, but she also wants to control people. She befriends people to get what she wants or to gather information to force them to do what she wants. She never lets anyone have a leg up on her, because that is surrendering control.

Even if the person she is interacting with doesn't play a role in her master plan, she doesn't want to risk the chance that they might. Vulnerability and authenticity give people access to Lila, to the things that anger her and make her sad, and so she never lets anyone in.

Yes, Lila is driven by a desire to accumulate wealth and fame, but those are just pieces of the larger puzzle. Ultimately, Lila has lived a life where she is powerless and she decided years ago that she would rather be dead than continue to live at the whim of others.

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Chloé Bourgeois Was WRONGED

so I'm trying to do her justice.

I am not a Chloe hater but I don't, like, stan her either or anything. I just think the show really messed her character up hard. Chloe was totally going to be "redeemed" or "fixed" or whatever you want to call it but then someone decided he didn't like Chloe and forced her to be a boring, one-dimensional bully.

Chloe was going to be interesting, maybe not good, but interesting, but she was robbed of the opportunity so I'm giving her a second chance.

Chloe is still a bully and a major one at that. She is the reason Marinette is shy and timid, the reason Marinette lacks confidence. Chloe is a bully to everyone and everything, constantly lashing out when she doesn't get her way. This is not good and Chloe's story in the show focuses on her struggling with changing that.

For the first season, Chloe is just a villain. There is one episode where it is vaguely implied that she is in fact a human being who feels things like sadness and guilt, but it's brief and easily forgotten. In this brief moment of humanity, we learn one crucial detail about Chloe's life: her mom is back in Paris and this isn't a good thing.

In season two we understand why her mom living in Paris is bad. Throughout the season we slowly watch as Chloe's cruelty escalates. The bullying becomes so bad that the entire class calls out Chloe and her best friend who has put up with so much of Chloe's shit for so many years finally ends their friendship. For the first time ever, Chloe is forced to face the consequences of her actions.

And this breaks her. She is completely lost and desperately trying to hold onto the life she had, but in the season finale it all finally crumbles. In the season finale (which is two episodes), we see Chloe's mom for the first time and why Chloe behaves the way she does becomes clear.

Her parents are divorced. The two were happy together for a few years after Chloe was born but when she turned 6 things got messy. They were constantly arguing with one another, getting into heated arguments anytime they were in the same room. This went on for years before they finally got divorced, but in this time Chloe had been neglected a great deal. Her parents were so wrapped up in one another that they forgot their daughter. The only times Chloe was given any kind of attention was if she got in trouble. If she acted up in class than the principal would call her parents and they would be forced to show up and pay attention to her. If she refused to listen to her ice skating coach than her parents would have to go to her practice and pick her up. If she caused problems, she got attention. Maybe it wasn't good attention, but having her parents see her and dislike her was better than not being seen at all.

This eventually translated into Chloe's personal life too. She learned from a young age if she wanted attention she would only get it if she was an absolute bitch. So she bullied her classmates, and ruthlessly judged her friends, because if she did then they would pay attention, they would have opinions, and be invested.

But during season 2 this stopped working. Her friends left her and her classmates ignored her. Chloe's only method for connecting with other people was failing and she didn't know what to do.

So she lashed out.

In the season 2 finale Chloe's mother attends a fashion show in which she collaborated with Gabriel Agreste to release a new line of clothes. Chloe and both her parents attended the show and the entire time Chloe was causing problems. She complained about nothing, made rude comments, all in hopes that her parents would pay attention to her, but that never happened.

Chloe was ignored.

And even worse, Chloe was ignored in favor of her half-sister. During the fashion show, Chloe's mom's phone was continuously ringing but was being dutifully ignored until Chloe made a particularly snide remark and her mother stood up and left. When Chloe tracked down her mother, she was standing backstage, arguing with her dad and shouting about Zoe on the phone.

After everything, after all the friends she lost relationships she destroyed before they could've even formed, after all the time and happiness she sacrificed, she still didn't get it. Chloe realized she would never get her mother's attention, would never get her mother's validation or appreciation.

This is a turning point for Chloe's character where she starts to change. She tries to be nicer, kinder. She befriends Lila and earns back her friendship with Sabrina. Chloe is finally making positive changes,

Until she starts being mean again.

At this point, it's important to note that Chloe's character drifts into the background more after season 2. The season 2 finale is kinda the big climactic end of Chloe being an imposing antagonist and Lila steps into that role. When Chloe is at her most vulnerable at the literal end of season 2, Lila appears and comforts her. Lila becomes her friend and helps her "change". Lila teaches Chloe how to be kind, how to earn back the respect of her classmates and her friendship with Sabrina. Lila quickly cements herself as someone Chloe relies on and blindly trusts.

So Lila is in the perfect spot to start pushing Chloe to be a bully again. I haven't entirely worked out the details as to why this happens, that can only be decided when I actually outline the plot later seasons of the show, but I know that it happens. Lila slowly pushes Chloe to be mean and cruel all while convincing her that she isn't.

Chloe realizes at the end of the show that she is really fucked up mentally. She takes a good, long look at herself and sees that she has a lot of problems and needs to take time to fix herself. The show ends with Chloe still being a villain, still a bad person who has said and done bad things and hasn't been able to make up for them, but she is optimistic that she will be able to change.

Chloe is a villain but she has the potential to become better.

(There's a lot more I have to say about Chloe and Zoe and Lila and how all of them connect with one another but this is long enough as it is so I'll save it for a later day.)

[mlb-a-rewrite]

WHAT ABOUT GABRIEL?!?@?!?!?!?!?!?!

Oh, there is so much about Gabriel.

The best place to start is with his backstory.

Gabriel is a good man. He came from a run-of-the-mill family in rural France and moved to Paris with dreams of becoming a fashion designer. While working at a department store, he met Emilie, the daughter of a wealthy business owner who acted part-time and traveled full-time. They fell in love suddenly and fully.

It was then that Emilie introduced him to miraculous.

She told him she was being mentored by a man in possession of magic jewelry pieces and that she spent time as a vigilante. The man had multiple magic jewels called miraculous and she wanted Gabriel to work with her.

“They had to remain in the shadows”, she insisted, “because the old man was paranoid. They couldn’t gain a reputation or image so people wouldn’t track them down.”

Gabriel was initially disbelieving, as any sane person would be when the love of your life says they are a magic superhero in their free time. Still, he humored her and found out that she wasn’t crazy but that magic actually did exist. She gave him the butterfly miraculous while she wore the peacock.

For years they operated covertly, alleviating petty crime from the shadows. Eventually, Gabriel made it in the world of fashion and Emilie starred in a few big movies. When they had their son, vigilante work became a hobby. They still went out, but rarely together. They knew they couldn’t afford something to happen to them and leave their son behind.

But their precaution didn’t pay off and they were eventually, when Emilie was out one day alone, she was tracked down by other miraculous holders who insisted she give up her miraculous at once. When she refused, a fight broke out, and when Gabriel saw this he quickly transformed and rushed to his wife’s aid, but he got there too late.

Just as he arrived on the scene, he watched as she was overwhelmed by the miraculous holders and was powerless to stop as they struck her miraculous at once, causing it to shatter.

She collapsed quickly and Gabriel rushed to her side. The attackers fled once they realized what they had done, leaving Gabriel with his dying wife.

She retained consciousness for a week in the best hospital in England. Her parents heard of her sudden and mysterious illness and insisted she return home. Gabriel and Adrien remained by her side as they watched her slowly slip away.

Emilie was brain-dead at the start of her second week in the hospital. She remained there, kept alive by machines, for a week before her parents demanded Gabriel pull the plug. The doctors said she wasn’t coming back and at this point, it was sadistic to keep her in this limbo.

Gabriel refused and spent a fortune having her transported back to Paris. She remained comatose for 2 more weeks, Gabriel never leaving her side the entire time.

After those 2 weeks, Gabriel sent announcements that she had died. He had decided to end her suffering, but it had been a lie. In secret, Gabriel had organized for her to be placed in a specially designed chamber (that looked eerily like a coffin) and the chamber was placed in his basement. He knew that he would be judged if people knew what he was doing, so he didn’t tell anyone apart from his most loyal employee and friend, Natalie.

He knew of miraculous, but not much, so he devoted himself to research. For months he did nothing but find anything he could about the jewels and eventually, he learned that 2 first-rings could be used to make anything a reality. In that moment, he remembered the mentor, the one who had given Emilie her miraculous, who had trained her inadequately and let her die, who also possessed multiple other miraculous.

The best chance Gabriel had at saving his wife was to steal the miraculous from her killer.

There’s a lot more that happens to and with him throughout the show, but I’ll save that for another post. He is a very interesting character that, like every character in this show was done dirt (except Luka 😭😭 somehow my boy escaped character assassination and I’m so grateful). I will definitely talk about Gabriel more in the future, but this seems like a good place to start.

Thank you for the question! I kinda forgot I haven't really talked about Gabriel yet lmao.

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Tell me, why did you decide to make Master Fu more flawed instead of having him treat Ladybug and Chat Noir equally?

Honestly, there wasn't a specific moment where I decided that I was going to make Fu flawed or discriminatory to Adrien. The first thing I did in this rewrite with regard to the plot was decide on Fu's backstory. He is the reason the plot happens (in both the show and the rewrite) and so I wanted to make sure his backstory was interesting.

I settled on making The Guardians something adjacent to a small, intense religious order and quickly came up with this concept was realized that The Guardians as a format and structure and are inherently flawed and that any people to come out of their organization will be a result. It also made sense in my head to make Fu intensely traditional and paranoid.

He feels responsible for the attack on the Vihara and later, he is directly responsible for losing the butterfly and peacock miraculous in addition to the peacock holder dying. When he got sloppy he stopped following the practices of The Guardians to a t, people started dying and chaos ensued.

All of this considered it made sense when I started writing out the actual story that Fu would be a stubborn, traditional old man. He tried to do things his way before, the way Adrien/Chat Noir wants to do things, but that resulted in a catastrophe so he is sticking with tradition, even if it kills him (which it does lmao).

Thank you for your ask! I always love bitching about old men :)

[mlb-a-rewrite]

Lila’s Story

Season 1:

She is introduced with the rest of the class, she blends in, she is no one special.

A few episodes in, she gets her "solo" episode. Basically a lot of the more background characters (like Juleka, Milene, whoever you know) have episodes "about" them where they get akumatized because of some minor conflict. Lila talks about how she was bullied at her previous school and now by Chloe and doesn't have any friends, gets akumatized, is saved and everyone tries to make her feel included. She fades into the background and isn't mentioned again for the season.

The bedroom scene also happens here (more on that later).

Season 2:

She doesn't really appear at all, just living in the background

There is one episode where it opens with the bathroom scene (again, more on that later), I think kinda partially during the mid-season finale idk idc and then during the big mid season finale a new miraculous holder appears. This is Lila as Volpina, except she doesn't actually have the fox miraculous and is just akumatized to appear that way. We also can't really tell it's Lila, like looks wise anyways. She's got a big mask on that kinda like covers the top half of her face but like context clues make it so its kinda obvious its her. She is basically the akumatized villain for those episodes and flees before anyone can ID her/deakumatize her so the characters don't know it was her.

The Chloe episodes happen where we learn abt Chloe's mom and everything, People are conflicted about Chloe, not sure whether they should try and help her and give her the benefit of the doubt or put her down and like reject her. Lila insists they help Chloe, that everyone deserves a chance to be included, and thus, she starts to befriend Chloe (This is the very end of season 2)

Season 3:

Starts off by establishing Lila is friends with Chloe. At some point maybe she and Chloe go on a trip together (like during the Shang Hai special they were traveling to American or some shit) and are besties. (Lila spent this time tracking down info about the miraculous but was actually traveling with Chloe)

Lila has a solo moment where she is trying to get hawkmoth's attention, hoping to get akumatized. Her wishes are not granted. Maybe this is the bathroom scene take 2 but that feels off to me might revamp the timing of all this later.

Eventually, Lila slips up and reveals too much to Chloe about her intentions to do evil things. It really isn't a big deal and Chloe doesn't even realize that she said something out of place. But Lila can't take chances so she

Turns on Chloe. This is near the end of the season. She talks about how awful Chloe is/was to her while she was just trying to do good but it is hopeless she is just too mean and the class turns on Chloe again, thus having Chloe revert back to how she was at the begining of the show

Season ends with Lila betraying LB and stealing the miraculous to give to hawkmoth. (This could be why marinette/adrien dont trust her because they knew she lied this whol time as a hero so maybe she is lieing irl too. Lila doesn't know LB/Chat's secret identities of course)

Might shift Lila's betrayal of Chloe to much later.

Season 4:

Lila has earned the trust of most of the class (minus chloe/sabrina and mari/adrien and Alya/Nino bc they trust their besties). It isn't full on civil war within the class but there is tension. Lila doesn't do much to instigate conflict.

She continues to work with Hawkmoth, slowly gathering more information. Maybe she refuses to give him the miracle box unless he reveals his identity to her or something like that so she can continue to have leverage over him.

By the big final conflict, she has a lot of information on everything and desperately wants a miraculous to make everything better. She wants to make herself special and rich and perfect and powerful and in control, but she gets sloppy, and thus, is killed when she tries to go against hawkmoth

I think there should also be scene before her final conflict with hawkmoth where she is getting desperate and frantic and ends up trying to turn the class against Mari and co. Maybe Marinette is trying to get the class to help stop her because she found out Lila is a supervillain and Lila tries to get the classmates to back her but she slips up in how she talks/acts and they all start to see through her facade.