Re:The Alya believing Lila thing

Yeah S5 definitely started with a checklist of 'Cool things to have happen' and then they were all force fed into episodes no matter the logic or sense of it.

YMMV on 'cool'.

I found it ironic that after watching Derision, the writers would expect me to blame Chloe for 'traumatizing Marinette which made her a stalker' and that 'Chloe's trauma doesn't excuse her mistreating pelple'.

It's laughable at best, what lesson am I suppose to learn exactly? That I can excuse Marinette's behavior but not Chloe's?

Not to mention, Marinette has 0 problems teaming up with Chloe to sabotage Kagami's date with Adrien. Ironically making the beloved protagonist a hypocrite in the process, heck, in the end of Animaestro, Marintte didn't learn her lesson that she is in the wrong, and it's just a lesson of not having to believe that Chloe could pull off a plan. Classy.

I just can't see Chloe going to a public school willingly. She's too... Is pompous the word?

Sort of not TA Related, but how do you feel about the argument against using gabriel's actions during Chat Blanc and Ephemeral as proof of him being a Abusive father since they were reset at the end of the episode?

Personally, I think they should be accounted for since the fact he willingly chose the abuse/trauma out route twice speaks volumes, especially with Chat Blanc now occurring only a handful of months after origins due to the one year retcon.

The peacock miraculous can only sense the amok, not the senti itself. However, there is some debate on whether it is a retcon due to Natalie's dialogue during feast where she immediately jumps to the conclusion that the statue is a dormant sentimonster

"I felt an amok within. This isn't a statue, it's a dormant sentimonster. Very old and very powerful."

Personally I don't consider it to be one since the wording does leave some room for interpretation and there are a good amount of nonverbal stuff in the episode that dose somewhat help explain why Natalia immediately assumption, though I do understand why some people consider it to be a retcon as again.

Though speaking of the peacock sensing only the amok, fun fact it's brought back up during season five specifically during Emotions where Felix look completely shocked upon making eye contact with Kagami's ring which we know due to perfection's epilogue scene and Pretention is her amok.

Of course Kagami's ring being her amok is an absolute retcon courtesy of her debut episode, but that's an entirely different conversation lol.

With how contradictory Hawk Moth's goals are at times (for example, sometimes wanting to protect Adrian and sometimes being willing to hurt him, or occasionally talking about taking over the world), do you think it would have been better if he had been two seperate villians with similar powers, but different intentions?

For an example of what I mean: The 1994 show ReBoot has two main villians; Megabyte, who wants control and dominance, and Hexadecimal, who seeks to cause chaos and mayhem. If they had been the same character who wants control in one episode but chaos in the next, that would have made for an inconsistent character.

https://www.tumblr.com/immaturityofthomasastruc/751719384168480768/so-i-was-reading-through-the-ml-scripts-that-were?source=share

To clarify what I mean is that what ladybug says is the same but the order of events in which she says it was reverse.

The script had Chloe handed the miraculous back first before ladybug announced she was being taken off the team, while final version that made it into the episode had ladybug tell her before chloe even took off the miraculous.

In regards to what you mentioned in your Kwami's Choice Part 2 Plagg wanting to cataclysm Chloe post, that's the trope we call "Jerks Are Worse Than Villains", in which the jerks are hated more than the actual villains. Now granted, this is an out-of-universe reaction, but it feels like Thomas genuinely believes this in-universe with how he treats most of anyone who's against the heroes, mainly Marinette.

Funnily enough, Gabriel himself is on the list. As stated by TV Tropes, "Hawk Moth/Shadow Moth/Monarch is the subject of an odd variant of this with himself — in large parts of the fandom, his actions as Gabriel Agreste are seen as more detestable than those he takes as Hawk Moth. While Hawk Moth may akumatize civilians into fighting the heroes, he's spared due to a measure of Evil Is Cool and the impersonal scale of his supervillainy. Gabriel, on the other hand, is a chillingly accurate abusive parent to his son Adrien, micromanaging and isolating him since before the show began — and it doesn't help that he's willing to enable Lila in tormenting Adrien's friends (especially Marinette) for his own gain. It's telling that "Cat Blanc" is widely regarded as Gabriel's Moral Event Horizon crossing based on his treatment of Adrien and Marinette, and not for any of his usual supervillainy."

To a lesser degree, Chloe also made the list: "Chloé Bourgeois is a highly divisive character in the fandom, but she at least has a subset of fans who either Love to Hate or just straight-up love her. On the other hand, her parents André and Audrey are widely hated — the former for his constant abuse of his mayoral status, the latter for being an abusive parent and adult version of Chloé without any of her redeeming qualities, and both for pretty much enabling all of Chloé's worst behavior yet never getting called out or punished for it (by contrast, their daughter not only at least gets called out on her behavior, but is usually portrayed as being the sole one at fault for how nasty she's become). This applies more to Audrey, as André does show some sympathetic qualities in later seasons, and eventually faces Laser-Guided Karma after he's forced to resign due to the stress of his corruption and his "friend" Gabriel double-crossing him."

The last point with André is contentious, I know, but going back to my first paragraph, the show really does love treating Chloe, Lila, or anyone who is still less of a threat than Gabriel as WORSE than his supervillain identity because they weren't nice to Marinette, and some of the ones who see the light STILL AREN'T GOOD PEOPLE (Felix, Sabrina, Nathalie) or took way too long to get a Freudian Excuse as to WHY they're a jerk (Again, Felix, but also Alec Scataldi, pretty sure there's some others that can be listed here...), or retroactively aren't good (Jagged leaving Anarka (is Jagged really his birth name, or did they reveal it in supplementary like Placide or offhand like Armand?), Kim unintentionally traumatizing Marinette with his prank and then not feeling remorseful in the present day until after he's de-akumatized (which is actually just "be more empathetic to how people feel about your jokes" than any actual regret last I checked), some others I can't think of right now...). It's pretty bad...

So I watch the Total Drama fanmade series, Disventure Camp, and I think this line from the character Fiore summed up how Thomas was trying to write Chloe, but failed big time:

"I know from experience. We all have problems, Grett. My mother never loved me, and I know her life would be much better if I never existed. She's told me she thinks I'm a monster. I know she's right, but it still hurts to hear. But you know what? After a while, the hurt starts to hurt less. You start taking ownership of who you are."

Basically, it sounds like Thomas was trying to say "Yes, Chloe is obviously an abused victim, but she needs to learn to take ownership for her own fuck ups and get over it." Which would be an understandable and even a good lesson and redemption arc for Chloe to help her understand that her actions don't excuse her behavior and she can't use her abuse as a clutch to be an asshole. Of course, it would work if he didn't spend time bashing her 24/7.

I hope this isn't me coming off as victim blaming, and if so, I do apologize and wouldn't mind being corrected for my mistake.

P.S. Find the Avatar: The Last Airbender reference

Are you going to cover other/potential future Astruc projects, and to what extent?

Mr. IOTA, what is your favorite Lucky Charm object?

After casually recalling a couple of fanfics I discovered that there was a believable way to involve Adrien in the season finale without compromising his identity in front of Monarch or Ladybug.

Okay, so in my version of the story Felix infiltrates Adrien and Kagami's cage and tries to rescue them, but Adrien doesn't know if he can face his father under these conditions, so Felix and Kagami convince him that he has to take more initiative in his life or he'll never get his freedom. Finally Adrien comes up with an idea.

With the help of the sentimonster camera, Adrien projects a video around the world where he reveals that he doesn't want to be a model and that he only does it to please his father. The message will set many of the akumatized free.

Monarch realizes that he is losing akumatized and Adrien's message reaches him in his alliance. Instead of Emilio's message, it is Adrien's message that tells him that he just wanted his family to be happy again and that although things are not perfect, he would like his father to accept him as he is.

Gabriel goes into a mental breakdown, knowing that the repercussions to the company for his son's confession will be very serious and he is no longer sure of fulfilling his wish.

Y... Instead of making the wish Gabriel falls agonizing in his last moments of life and talks to Marinette about the great mistakes he made in vain, he begs her to please make the wish to revive Nathalie by using himself as a sacrifice and although Marinette does not want to do it, in tears she resigns herself and makes the wish.

Either that or they both pay the consequences of their actions and Amelie moves permanently to Agreste Manor and dissolves the company.

If the show refuses a flashback episode for Gabriel, do an amnesia plot. Due to some akuma hijinks, Gabriel forgets all about being Hawkmoth and, without the possibility of the wish or guilt for the broken peacock, we see an improved attitude and signs of healing. Only for him to be tragically forced to bring his memory back to stop the out-of-control akuma, ending the episode with him mourning what could have been while convincing himself that he can't afford to be anything else.