Episode 4 - Meduma

This might be surprising to some people, but Anti-Hero is the only song by Taylor Swift I’ve ever heard all the way through. The chorus kinda applies to both Chloé and Marinette in this case – and I suppose to me as well, considering how exhausting it is defending Chloé against the direction they took her in the show.

Marinette/Meduma

A moment like this is big and dramatic. It was genuinely scary when Marinette nearly got Akumatised into Lady Justice and took off her Earrings. In a way I chickened out, by finding a way for her not to have the Earrings on (although, obviously that was necessary for another part of the plot).

Given Chloé is able to resist Akumatisations, I didn’t want to make it look like Marinette was less powerful than Chloé. The main two reasons that Papillon was able to get her without a Forced Akumatisation are a) that Chloé had been Akumatised many times before, so it didn’t come as a surprise and b) because Papillon managed to find a way through her defences, which is a technique I’ve treated as canon in Miraculous: Contingency. There was something similar in The Reprise; because Tangle was bracing herself to resist whatever Papillon offered, she wasn’t prepared for silence and that was a way in for the Scarlet Akuma. One thing I wanted though was for Marinette to force the Akuma out by herself, not just one of her allies breaking the object.

As to the design of Meduma, it’s very heavily based off what I vaguely remember about the gorgons from Greek mythology. Instead of turning people to stone, she paralyses them with doubt. It’s not 100% accurate, but when is anything Papillon does?

Queen Bug

This was something I’d wanted to happen since I wrote the first draft of Season 1. Chloé getting the chance to be the Ladybug Miraculous, even if only for one day, was a specific goal for Miraculous: Contingency almost from the very beginning. That being said, I didn’t want to just give her Tikki and let her run with it, Chloé needed to earn that chance.

In my mind, Chloé’s redemption arc, which started in season 2 of the show, ended in Chlophidian when she and Marinette finally accept each other fully as friends and allies. Queen Bug isn’t really part of the redemption arc, although I suppose it could be considered a reward for completing it. My cousin drew me a picture of what Queen Bug might look like, with very little direction from me (all I said was the same mask, and she wears her hair down) and I used that for the description in the narrative.

Originally, this episode was titled “Queen Bug”, then I downgraded it to a subtitle, then I decided to leave it out. I wanted that moment where Tikki takes the plunge and Chloé gets to say “Tikki. Spots. On!” to be more of a surprise. It’s also good that I decided to change The Unstoppable Monsieur Pichon to include Scarabella – it feels better seeing that Marinette has given permission for this before Tikki took it upon herself.

Queen Bug and Ryuko’s antagonism was a surprise, given how tolerant Kagami has become of Chloé, but I wanted to highlight the stress Kagami was under, knowing her girlfriend had been Akumatised. Poor Chat Noir had to hide it all, because Korvid and Queen Bug didn’t know that he is also dating Marinette. I think everyone else who arrived knew though.

The moment where Chloé manages to fight down Meduma’s Inferiority Beam through sheer force of ego was a nod to the fact that, even if she has improved immensely, Chloé is still Chloé. On the other hand, she’s able to talk Max back to function as well.

The moment where Marinette and Tikki visit Chloé and Pollen at the end of the episode, not in costume, felt significant. This was Marinette finally letting her guard down around someone she’s learned to think of as a friend, but acknowledges she’s got a lot of instinctive behaviour about. There’s only the Rogues to go to talk about the mysterious plan now, though.

Vesperia

You’re probably tired of me saying this, but as Zoé wasn’t in the first draft of Miraculous: Contingency there was obviously no Vesperia in the first draft either. Deciding to add her into the narrative wasn’t something I’d completely planned on but, when I had her in the first part of the episode I figured that this version of Chloé would definitely want to bring her sister along.

I feel a bit bad for her; because it’s an ensemble episode, we don’t get much time to see Vesperia in action, although she is instrumental in defeating Meduma. It is a side-effect of my only deciding to include her at the last minute. In a later phase of the story, I am planning to feature more of Zoé (both as Vesperia and as Blaqueminette, and maybe as another Miraculous too)

Teamwork (Again)

The whole point of the Core Miraculous Team getting their Kwamis permanently was precisely for this eventuality, and they rose to the challenge. At this point, every Miraculous in the team except Chloé have their Kwamis, so they couldn’t stay away when Chloé warned everyone that Marinette had been Akumatised.

This episode really gets across how well the team have learned to work together. Even with two new members (sort of) they did a good job at keeping Meduma contained once they caught up with her. Once Queen Bug, Ryuko, and Pegasus return to the team, everyone moves like clockwork, perfectly carrying out the Ladybug Miraculous’ plan and managing not to laugh at the irony of Queen Bug promising Marinette that one day she can be a Miraculous too.

As I mentioned in the commentary for Blurgeois, a large part of the narrative for season 4 is acknowledging how the team works together – Ladybug has learned to trust her teammates (certainly more in the show – to be fair to the show’s version of Marinette, she’s three years younger than this version of her)

Mathilda/Lila

This was the only Lila cameo I included in the first draft of the story, it was only here that I worked out I could be leaving breadcrumbs to explain what’s happening with Lila. Fixing that oversight was one of the things I always planned to correct when I got the second draft done, and I spent a long time working out exactly what Lila was doing.

Her first draft appearance in this episode was very similar to how it appears in the second draft, I just added the name, and a little more attention from Adrien.