Always Bring a Phoenix Down

Thaedus makes mistakes because despite being more moral than most Viltrumites, he's still arrogant about his own power and causes problems because his assumption that he's always in control in the moment made him ignore potential backfire

Cecil's flaws are born from the paranoia of things he cannot control

Robin & Cyborg: Best friends, but also kinda rivals. They support each other and push the other to always improve

Robin & Starfire: Dating, but also they reassure the other when they feel alone. Reminding them that they are never alone

Robin & Raven: Inspiring hope in each other without realizing it

Robin & Beast Boy: Robin grounds Beast Boy, but weirdly, Beast Boy grounds Robin too

Cyborg & Starfire: Take turns as the other's confidante and comfort

Cyborg & Raven: Raven is often at her kindest when with Cyborg and Cyborg is often the most respectful about her boundaries

Cyborg & Beast Boy: Shares one brain cell

Starfire & Raven: Unironically the closest pair of friends. Not even in an opposites attract kind of way. They really bonded after the switching episode

Starfire & Beast Boy: Big sis and little bro energy. Also, youngest siblings in a family energy

When it comes to Miraculous, a lot of things feel Western with a Chinese aesthetic. It feels like they stick with their own culture, but slap on Chinese stuff to make it look more mystical and foreign rather than teach things people may not know. What makes this unfortunate is that there are a lot of easy ways they could've done this

Marinette's family owns a bakery, but I can't recall them ever making Chinese pastries. I grew up on baked pork buns and I will straight up devour a box of red bean buns if you're foolish enough to leave them around me unattended. That's a very real thing many immigrant families do. Many want to keep their heritage alive as much as they can in a foreign country and build a business around it. There is no rule against Tom and Sabine having French and Chinese baked goods for sale in one bakery

Another thing is the writers tend to take the most Western interpretation of Chinese folklore. In the season 4 finale, there's a comment made of cats vs. dogs with Adrien and Felix using those Miraculous. However, in Chinese folklore, there's a bigger emphasis on cat vs. rat

The cat is typically known as an unofficial 13th member of the zodiac. The reason for this is because in the various tales of how the zodiac animals were chosen, there is one thing that remains consistent. The rat sabotaged the cat to make sure they can't have one of the positions. In some cases, the rat just lied so they never showed up to a divine banquet. Some stories has the rat straight-up drown the cat in the river while they were crossing it

So if Felix used the mouse Miraculous to swarm all the heroes and snag the Miraculous off everyone, that would be a really unique way to reference that folklore in a modern setting

If we're being completely honest, I don't know why they wouldn't try to incorporate the Lunar New Year as a big day for the Kwami. If Miraculous were made in China, why not link them to an actual holiday with the implication being that the festivals began to celebrate the good created by previous wielders

The saddest missed opportunity is not making use of the Qixi festival. The Qixi festival is a holiday that celebrates a tale of two lovers who are separated because of their forbidden love, but once a year, they can cross the heavens and be together for just one night. With Miraculous's whole thing of "The power of love always so strong" why not reference a Chinese love story?

The kicker here?

The story is called "The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl"

Weaver girl Fashion designer

Hello? Golden opportunity dangling right here in front of everyone's faces. They could've been a pair of past ladybug and cat wielders who comment on Marinette and Adrien's budding romance and compare it to their own story. Talking about how their own duties prevented them from being together long-term and encouraging their successors to fight for the love they have

This wasn't directed at me. I just happened to see it

It's normal to like two things that are complete opposites simultaneously

Game that is classic jrpg shonen shenanigans with power of friendship beam? Yay!

Game that delves into the dark reality of a world of death where every child is an orphan by default? Also yay!

People have a wide range of interests

People also have different moods

It would be cool if Digimon TCG BT-26 cards had reveals for the digimon they're adding in the upcoming Time Stranger expansion

I would totally try to do that if I was in charge of anything in the production

LET NERDS HAVE NICE THINGS

Good news for Rafflesimon and TyrantKabuterimon, I guess. Their cards were originally 6s too, but they make more sense as 7s because they are jogresses between two megas

Is it stupid for minors to pursue adults romantically? Yes

Are the adults more culpable than the minors if they reciprocate? Also yes

Is the adult even more culpable if he meets the minor in a context where he objectively cannot claim that he wasn't aware of her age as a minor because she is, not was, is his student in a high school class?

Some women act kinda entitled to gay male spaces and media. If it's something specifically about gay men, I'm sorry but there's not gonna be many prominent female characters beyond supportive family members and friends

And let's keep if fair

If a man complained about a lesbian show not focusing on male characters, I'd call him an idiot, because why on earth would a show labeled with LESBIAN focus on male characters? Obviously, the women should be the primary focus

Yaoi focuses on male characters. Yuri focuses on female ones. That's how that works and that should be okay, but sometimes I see women look at something labeled GAY MEN, and throw sexist accusations for not having female characters in prominent roles

I don't like the defense some people use that is "They're supposed to be flawed" and that's it. Every character is supposed to be flawed in some way. That's the whole point of character arcs. There's a difference between having a flaw for the sake of a journey or comedy in a less serious show and a character with flawed writing

One of Zuko's biggest flaws is his desperation for validation and he doubles-down a lot of bad behavior in hopes of winning his father's approval. The show makes a whole point about how he wasted so much of his potential chasing a goal that wasn't necessary or worth it

There's also Alma Madrigal who is a massive control freak because she's already lost her home once and is terrified that losing even the tiniest bit of control would mean losing it all a second time. The movie makes a point to show that while everything she does is for her family, she is in fact harming her family and needs to let go a little for everyone's sake including her own

Even recently, there's Raito Souda from Digimon Beatbreak. His superior complex has convinced him that he is a genius who stands above everyone else and has no empathy for those he considers beneath him. When his superiority is threatened, he becomes irrational and after a series of failures, his entire sense of identity collapses in on itself and he has to reconstruct who he is from the ground up

One of my favorite characters is Della Duck and her impulsiveness led to the biggest mistake of her life. Different family members have realistic, but fair reactions to the aftermath of her decisions and we're shown Della's remorse and her resolve to make up for lost time. Notably, she still makes mistakes, but that very first one is one mistake she always tries to avoid repeating

These flaws all exist for the sake of building character. They have to confront these flaws and change and no one around them sugarcoats how they need to grow past these flaws

A character with bad flaws is Marinette in my opinion. I understand the whole point is that she's supposed to be making mistakes, but it feels like the show won't commit to making them real flaws. Part of a real flaw is having real consequences as a result of said flaw. Not saying she needs to be raked over the coals, but Alya had good reason to be upset about the lies. Why erase her memory to just repeat the same reveal twice? Mari and Alya would've had better character growth if this is an ongoing discussion that wasn't delayed by the mind erasure

I think a good comparison here are two characters who both have the flaw of "well-intentioned goal to save the world led to them being a shitty parent and doesn't realize it until it's too late." Celine and King Rhoam both meant well and just wanted to help their child become the hero they're meant to be

However, I have an easier time understanding Celine's mistakes than Rhoam's. Celine's motto of hiding every flaw no matter what is something she forces on Huntr/x because it was something forced on her. As another foil to Rumi, Celine's inability to accept the flaws in herself and others highlights Rumi's ultimate choice to accept herself. There's more of a narrative purpose here

In contrast, Rhoam's role in Zelda's story is less understandable. I know the point is that he's too much of a king than a parent and comes to regret this, but his overall role ends up being designated asshole. Forcing Zelda to sacrifice everything else for to focus on magic training that already wasn't working doesn't make sense even in context

Celine enforces the hunters' creed because from her perspective, it "worked" for Celine during her time and appears to work for Rumi on a surface level

Rhoam enforcing the constant prayer when he has no experience to justify that it's capable of any positive outcome and Zelda is blatantly more miserable trying to make it work that way just makes him look stupid for not trying something else sooner

Celine's flaws come full circle in the narrative. Rhoam feels like "designated obstacle" for Zelda

What about how many supposed empowering girlboss media are often still complacent in tokenization?

And how having the acceptable marginalized representation means something is beyond critique because it has the right kind of rep ignoring all valid red flags brought up by another group

All forms of media rely on having the audience's good will to some extent. For all the ups and downs in the series, they have to be willing to continue the journey with you until the end

Honestly, Miraculous does kinda push the limit here. It's one thing to stand by Chloé not getting a redemption arc, but bringing her back just to double-down again and insist she's the worst of the worst kinda just feels spiteful and it invites unnecessary drama into your life

There's even a Marvel writer that admitted to ragebaiting Spider-Man fans, because he'd rather make fans angry than have them not care, but anger doesn't automatically make readers invested. If readers feel like a product is never gonna be satisfying, they give up on it

A bit of good will can go a long way. For example, in Heroes of Olympus, everyone was panicking after the Mark of Athena. Everyone spent the year before House of Hades freaking out and when the book finally dropped, Rick had a little excerpt for the fans

To my wonderful readers: Sorry about that last cliff-hanger. Well, no, not really. HAHAHAHA. But seriously, I love you guys.

No one got mad, because Rick Riordan had everyone's good will. Audiences are fine with having their emotions toyed with, but not if they feel like there will be no payout

Everyone has their own limit, but that is something to be considered at all times. I'm not saying you should always cater to fans every single time. Doing that is a whole other can of problems

The show always made it clear that he's the pathetic one for never letting go

Maddie never reciprocated his feelings. Jack was never in his way. She just chose Jack and Vlad should've respected that

He's never treated as tragic or sympathetic because the woman he loved didn't want him back. He's sad and pathetic for pining after a married woman that's already told him no multiple times

Even in the alternate timeline episode, we see that version of Vlad try to control Maddie's interest in ghosts and are told that he lied to her and told her Jack wanted to hurt her after the accident when he didn't

It's also telling that Jack never abandoned Vlad after the accident and tried everything to maintain their friendship, while Vlad immediately screwed Jack over when the reverse happened

There is one specific thing I like doing that makes it so nice to be more of a Digimon fan than a Pokemon fan. I'm not saying this to be hateful. If anything, I empathize with Pokemon fans because y'all are in the trenches when it comes to this