After Moving To Gotham And Having To Deal With A Stressful Job, Danny Has Started Taking Walks Around

Temples are built for gods. Knowing this a farmer builds a small temple to see what kind of god turns up.

I HATE GEN AI I HATE GEN AI I HATE IT I HATE ITTTTTTT

ITS SO PAINFULLY OBVIOUS WHEN YOU USE IT. ITS HORRIBLE. ITS DESTRUCTIVE TOWARDS THE EARTH. ITS LITERALLY DESTROYING YOUNGER KID’S MIND I HATE IT IGHHHHHH!!

this rant came by because I use em-dashes and PROPER PUNCTUATION and apparently i’m using AI. I AM NOT.

What is a character's core?

I've used this term and variants of it in a few of my posts and I wanted to take a quick moment to define it because I'm not sure how commonly discussed this topic is, but it's an important one to keep in mind when evaluating and writing certain types of media.

Most genres of fiction make use of standard character roles/tropes. The plucky sidekick, the dastardly villain, the last girl, and so on. This isn't a bad thing. The existence of this stuff is a big part of how we define genres and how we evaluate writing quality. For example, if you're writing a romance, you're going to have romantic leads. Two (or more) individuals who will be together by the end of the story. If these roles don't exist, then you don't have a romance. And if their relationship feels toxic and unhealthy? You may not have a romance. Or, at least, not a classic romance. The worse the relationship is, the more you wander into the genre of "dark romance," which is all about enjoying deeply unhealthy fictional relationships.

This brings us to Miraculous and why I feel comfortable defending Adrien and Marinette as victims of bad writing.

Unless the writers are doing something truly insane, the love square is our end game couple. The ones destined for a happily ever after. That means that everything the writers do with these two and their relationship can be evaluated through the lens of, "are you honoring the characters' roles as the romantic leads?" And if the answer is, "No?" Then the writers are failing because "romantic lead" is a defining aspect of these characters. It isn't what they should be, it's what they are. Anything that goes against them being a good couple is bad writing.

This doesn't mean that they must be perfect. They're allowed to make mistakes and have flaws. Those are the sorts of things that drive a story! But the mistakes and flaws have to be treated as such by the narrative, they have to have some sort of resolution, and they have to be maintained in balance with the whole "love interest" thing. Too many mistakes and flaws and we've gone from "romance" to "tragedy," which is what I'd currently define Miraculous as.

This role evaluation thing isn't limited to romantic leads. Any character that has a clear role in the story can be evaluated via this criteria. For example, Alya is clearly meant to be a good best friend and reliable confidant for Marinette. You can tell this because of things like her learning Marinette's identity and her helping Marinette discover the secrets of the miraculous, big story moment that are treated as positives by the narrative. So anything Alya does that makes her feel like a bad friend is bad writing. It's why I get the Alya salt, but don't participate because I can't view her as the awful person the Lila stuff makes her out to be. That's not who Alya is narratively speaking.

Generally speaking, this core/role thing is my main way of evaluating characters in genre content like Miraculous. It's the driving force behind most of the character discussion on this blog and something I strongly encourage people to think about if they enjoy reading/writing genre content as it's a great guideline! Figure out the role a character is supposed to be in, generally honor that role, and you're golden! You have room for flaws and conflicts while still having something to keep you in check from straying too far off course.

Marinette has great friends but they often encourage her stalker behavior and are too willing to be apart of or even come up with plans, like in Gigantitan and Backwarder. Though in Backwader they didn't go through with it, their first thought when hearing Adrien and Kagami going on a trip was to come up with plans to stop them. They obviously mean well and want to support her but take things a bit far. So, i wrote this in the context of them meaning well and wanting to support her but unknowingly took things too far

Line Divider

Rachel and Adrien have been friends for a long time and sometimes modeled together. When she had called telling him that she would be going to his school he was excited. For the first week she stuck close by him since she didn't know anyone else. She got along great with the class and the girls were fun to hang out with

The second week she branched out a bit more and made friends with people outside of the class. She still stuck by Adrien because she was still a little shy but he was glad that she was making new friends. At the same time Marinette was not having a great time. When Rachel first came she didn't think anything of it until she saw how close her and Adrien were. The girls reassured her that it was fine and that she was a sweet person. Still, Marinette couldn't help but spiral, they modeled together and she was also famous. She thought of this leading to her getting Gabriel's approval and them getting married

Then a picture came out of Adrien and Rachel together at a cafe. Marinette immediately called the girls over to her house to show them. The girls saw that Marinette was miserable over the picture. They felt bad for telling her that she had nothing to worry about now seeing the picture, but at the time they really didn't think Rachel had a crush on Adrien. The girls wanted to comfort her and fix this so they came up with a plan. What the girls didn't know was that the picture attached to the article said nothing about them being a couple. In fact it was about the cafe they frequently visited stating that it was the new popular place to go

When school came the next day Rachel was surprised to find her classmates ignoring her. Even Rose and Juleka ignored her when she greeted them. The guys also ignored her when she tried to talk to them. Adrien was just as confused as she was. He tried talking to Nino but he never got a straight answer before he made an excuse to leave. Through out the entire week the class ignored her and stopped inviting her to things. Thankfully, she wasn't alone since she made friends outside of the class but it still hurt because she didn't know what she did wrong. Rachel had told Adrien that she was going to transfer classes. He was upset but he understood, he was distancing himself from the class and hung out with other friends. He no longer went out when they invited him, the one time he did he saw that Rachel wasn't there and they gave an excuse that she couldn't make it. He may be oblivious sometimes but he knew that they didn't invite her

It wasn't until one of the girls overheard Adrien teasing Rachel about her and her boyfriend that they realized they made a mistake. The girls met up talking about what they overheard. They were confused since the article pictured them together on a date, but looking up and reading the article they realized that it had nothing to do with them as a couple. Looking up Rachel, they see that she's been in a relationship for years with her actor boyfriend. After talking with the rest of the class they decided they needed to apologize. Meeting up with Adrien and Rachel they apologized and confessed they misunderstood and thought she and Adrien were dating. Adrien and Rachel were baffled, why did them thinking they were dating make them ignore her. Adrien was confused, they did this because they thought they were dating and now he can't help but think that the same thing will happen when he does get a girlfriend. Rachel didn't want anything to do with this anymore. She was hurt and confused but more importantly she just wanted to move on

In the end, Rachel had thanked them for apologizing but she wasn't comfortable being friends with them anymore. Word spread quickly around school about the reason why they were ignoring Rachel, and because Marinette's crush on Adrien was well known in school it wasn't hard to figure out why they did this. A lot of people looked at them weirdly, it was one thing to want to support your friend but instead of comforting Marinette and helping her move on, the first thing they came up with was to stop being friends with Rachel. Even if they were dating what were they hoping to accomplish by excluding her, for her and Adrien to suddenly to break up so they can all go back to being friends. The whole situation was confusing, they meant well and were trying to support their friend but went about it the wrong way

It is a haunting image.

A boy; a teen, puppy fat still prevalent, kneeling— wailing over the corpse of an elderly.

It is a haunting image. Not because this is his mother, or grandmother or aunt. His skin is tinged green, tears streaming down his face. He is sobbing—great, heaving sobs that show how inhuman he is if only because he doesn’t stop for breath.

It is a haunting image to spectators—but especially haunting to those who know the child.

Well.

He can hardly be called a child, now can he?

This is not his mother. Not his grandmother, not an aunt. This is someone else, someone who he held dear to his heart, if only because she was his sister.

His brave, fearless older sister. Not older by much—barely 2 years, and yet. And yet.

There is grey streaked in her hair.

He sobs. He wails. He keens.

King Phantom grieves because his last remaining family member has not risen. She will never rise again.

It is a haunting image.

A prompt

Imagine this guys. Ghost King Danny has been the King for many years now, ever since he was 14 and put Pariah Dark back in his timeout napping corner, and he held an elderly Jazz closely to his chest as she breathes her final breath. As she goes limp and her eyes go distant and unfocused, nothing rises from her corpse. Not a single hint of a ghost forming, or even a simple shade.

The last of his family has left him, and all he can do is scream in anguish.

A ghost who still looks like a 14 year old holds his 2 year older sisters elderly corpse, and all he can do is wail.

Dp x Dc fic idea that wouldn't let me sleep:

"No, you don't understand! I need my powers. I'll die without them!" Danny pleaded with the officer in front of him.

"Sure, kid, and I need a burger. You'll be just fine without your flight or superstrength or whatever. Look, I see kids like you all the time nowadays. You think just because you have a few powers, you can become some kind of hero. You run away from home, cause trouble in the name of 'justice' or whatever. Then reality hits. You start stealing. What's a few stolen bucks or candy bars in the name of the greater good, right? It's a downward spiral from there. Seems you were pretty far down the spiral. Beating up government agents? Kid, there is no way in hell I'm letting you out of here without the meta power suppressant collar. You're lucky Mr. Wayne was so generous and decided to foster you until we find your parents. I would've sent your troublesome ass back to juvie."

I was thinking this was a bad timeline where the Fenton parents died and Danny ran away. The power suppressing collar does work on him somehow, and cuts him off from his ghost half, which stops the ectoplasm that was keeping him alive since the accident.

I pictured Bruce as the foster parent that decided to help the troubled teen, but it could be anyone. Imagine if Lex Luthor decided he wanted to "help" (read: manipulate the young meta into doing his bidding) Danny instead. Extra angst.

Master Post

DPXDC Fics:

Prepared For Anything: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

Ambassador Danny: Part 1

The King and the Assassin: Part 1

hey,

i follow you and a few others for your round-robin style dpxdc stories. Which!!! I love so much!! Who else is there that you do that with regularly? Are there any blogs you recommend if i want to read more round-robin fic?

thx

There are quite a few people. Sorry it took so long to answer. Kept forgetting my inbox existed. This is by no means and exhaustive list. Just people I know pop up often!

@radiance1 @bluerosefox @zylev-blog @puppetmaster13u

@ailithnight @regonold @angryraptor13 @angryricepudding

@thenightwolf51 @evilminji @nerdpoe @lolottes

@babbling-babull @soniclozdplove @ryoalouette @hypewinter

@charlietheepicwriter7 @freshmiraclecheesecake

@ashoutinthedarkness @bianca-hooks123

@britcision @gaddaboutgriffon @thatrandomsarahchick

@ourrechte-blog @kyrianclawraith

"I'll pay you 10 times the amount you were given to take me out." Bruce Wayne is, very out of character, super serious and looking at him so intense.

Danny isn't paid enough to figure out why the supposed himbo isn't acting like it.

"You know what? Yeah. Deal." He fishes his phone out, accepting the money transfer and calls his boss for the day.

"Heyyy big guy– yeah‐ I know... anyway! I'm not killing Bruce Wayne, you should find someone different to do it— bye!" And he hangs up, cutting the shouting with a grin.

"If you ever, and I mean, ever need someone out of the way, call me."

He happily hands his contact information to the billionaire and swoops out of the window.

He is rich! So mega rich!

("Did you just buy the mercenary?"

"He's a kid! I panicked!"

"At least you got a phone number??")