Plagg: In The End, It Doesn’t Matter Since They’re The Same Girl!

@storyseekers event 01 : get to know the story seekers — eleanor   — the renegades trilogy by marissa meyer

ahem

i miss girl meets world

thank you for attending my tedtalk

Watching the second season of XO kitty left me confused about what they did with Yuri’s character, a lot of it felt out of character to me, what do you think?

From my interpretation, Yuri’s character has always been super devoted and invested in her relationship with Juliana, a lot of her motivation and behaviour in the first season is working towards being with Juliana (e.g. fake dating Dae, trying to comply with her mom so she can go to Iceland, etc). During this time she also sheds the “mean popular rich girl” image as she slowly becomes friends with Kitty and helps her learn about her mom, and also with Dae as she helps him navigate his relationship with Kitty.

This character development of wanting to be a good friend and show up is continued in the beginning of season 2, with Yuri telling Kitty she wants them to be there for each other, and even making that speech about how she found her own family at school the past semester. She’s still very invested with Juliana and clearly happy with her. To me, the only friction in their relationship is navigating the change of Yuri having a really close new friend (Kitty) that Juliana is a bit suspicious of, but Yuri consistently reassures Juliana, and Juliana takes the time to acknowledge her insecurities and also trust Yuri.

And then Yuri just cheats on her?? And kisses Kitty “on a whim”? This is where I felt like she was behaving out of character? She then goes into a spiral trying to get Juliana back, completely ditching her friendships and expecting her Juliana to take her back after she cheated. I understand the heartbreak and desperation to fix things but her cheating in the first place and then ditching her friendship with Kitty feels out of character to me, when her whole development in season 1 was wanting to be with Juliana and becoming a good friend to Kitty and Dae.

I’m mainly wondering if Yuri has/had feelings for Kitty ever. To me, Yuri’s feelings have always been the hardest to read out of all the characters. When other characters start having feelings, it’s pretty explicitly shown (e.g. Kitty starts falling for Yuri watching her DJ, has that dream, starts getting nervous when Yuri is close when returning the necklace, fixing her hair, rehearsing the fan dance. Even Minho showed signs of starting to like Kitty, like that moment when they were cooking together at chuseok, also having a dream, longing glances, etc.).

In your interpretation, do you think Yuri ever started showing signs of liking Kitty early on? Personally I interpreted most of their interactions in season 1 as her becoming sus that Kitty might like her (e.g. assuring Kitty in the tent that she’s not making a move on her, asking her what she was doing when Kitty was getting close to her at fan dance rehearsal, again asking her what happened at rehearsal before they went on stage). It wasn’t until season 2 that she started showing some signs that she might be into Kitty, like when she awkwardly reacted to Kitty sharing she had a date with Praveena, that moment outside the VHS shop before she calls the cab, and of course right before and leading up to their kiss. Even then, it felt hard to read and out of character because they never show her falling out of love with Juliana, so it was confusing to me that they started putting those little moments in while she was still with Juliana.

Only towards the end of season 2 I felt like Yuri was returning back to the person she developed into in season 1, telling Juliana she would leave her alone and reflect on her mistakes, helping Dae with his outfit, talking to Kitty’s cousin for her. I also felt like we lacked a discussion or confrontation about Kitty’s feelings towards Yuri. They never really discuss the letter, and the kiss is called a “mistake” and they never discuss why it happened.

Would love to hear your take on this :)

TLDR: Yuri this season felt out of character to me, did she ever have feelings for Kitty, why was the kiss never explained, what do you think?

P.S. really enjoyed reading all of your posts so far about the new season, thank you for sharing, I appreciate it, and I am still on this ship with you 🫡

thank you for your kind words and thoughtful ask!!

to be honest, I don’t think Yuri cheating was ooc. I love her so much and will always support a lesbian’s wrongs, but I’d say she was 100% emotionally cheating even as early as Season 1. Her feelings may not be as obvious as Kitty, who openly states them, but they are absolutely there. Here’s what I remember from Season 1 off the top of my head:

Episode 8: Before coming out to Kitty, Yuri tells her, “you’re so likable and sincere… it’s annoying.” I see this as a parallel to Kitty saying in Episode 6: “I can say with confidence that her nose is annoyingly perfect.” Both girls have, without realizing, started to feel affection for the other, but chalk it up to their feelings of animosity. (Cue “Loathing” from Wicked…)

Episode 9: Juliana, who knows Yuri and Yuri’s romantic habits very well, has started to pick up on the fact that Yuri likes Kitty. She says that Yuri talks about her a lot, and even made Kitty a mixtape — signs that Juliana recognizes from when Yuri was interested in her. From what we’ve seen, Juliana seems to be a very level-headed and gracious person. I don’t think she would have said these things unless she felt she had real reason to be concerned. 

Episode 9: During fan-dancing practice, Juliana tries to call Yuri, but Yuri hangs up the phone because she’s busy helping Kitty. When Kitty tells her to go answer Juliana, Yuri says “you’re more important to me right now.” This is a clear example of Yuri prioritizing Kitty over Juliana. She also looks at Kitty's lips when they almost kiss, and doesn't move back when Kitty starts to lean towards her.

Episode 10: When Kitty is about to confess her love to Kitty at the airport, Yuri smiles and waits for her to finish. She already must have an inkling of what this is going to be about, as she was planning to confront Kitty about their almost-kiss while they were waiting in the wings before their performance in Episode 9. 

Episode 10: At the airport, Yuri cuts off her reunion with Juliana in order to find Kitty. When she doesn’t, she tells Juliana to wait so that she can convince her mom to bring Kitty back to KISS. This is the first time she’s seen Juliana seen each other in months, after they thought they might never see each other again, and she is thinking of Kitty instead. Even Juliana subtly points this out. This is the second example of Yuri prioritizing Kitty over Juliana.

Episodes 8-10: Yuri is very physically affectionate with Kitty: playing with her hair and clothes, hugging her from behind, leaning on her, etc. While this is not a universal sign of romantic interest, Yuri doesn’t do this with her other female friends.

This isn’t to say Yuri didn’t love Juliana. I think it’s quite clear that she did — as you mentioned, getting Juliana back is her main motivation for the first half of Season 1! But I think the connection Yuri shares with Kitty is quite different, a one-in-a-million friendship and romantic relationship, and Yuri really struggles to come to terms with it because she already has what she has wanted all her life.

We also have a hint that Juliana and Yuri’s relationship has some cracks in it even before Jina sends her away. Yuri tells Kitty in the car in Episode 1 that the person she’s seeing “isn’t serious, because it can’t be.” While they had at this point already made plans to go to Iceland together, they were likely apprehensive about their relationship working out long-term due to both of their homophobic families. I still believe that they loved each other deeply, but their relationship wasn’t perfect even before Kitty came into the picture.

Yuri is intentionally hard to read: she is guarded, keeps her cards close to her chest, and frequently lies — to everyone, to the people closest to her, to herself. In all fairness, the environment she was raised in demanded this of her in order to survive. Yuri also has abandonment issues, lashing out when she feels her relationships with others are threatened — stealing the necklace from Dae in Season 1 to prevent him from leaving her, and pushing Kitty away after their kiss. Alex points out (very gently) that she can be selfish, and her immature decisions cost her a lot this season. 

So, in truth, I don’t think Yuri’s decisions were ooc, but I still didn’t approve of how her character was treated this season. I think there were ways in which to handle her realizing her feelings for Kitty without the cheating plot, just as Kitty realized her feelings for Yuri but didn’t cheat on Dae. I think Juliana should have had the chance to break up with Yuri on her own terms after Yuri failed to show up at the art show, to give her character agency rather than just being a victim of other people’s choices. I think we should have seen more about Yuri struggling over her feelings for Kitty as well, both before and after the kiss. (I would have loved a reverse of the Episode 6 dream, with Yuri having a dream about Kitty instead… TT_TT)

thanks again for the ask! I feel a bit self-conscious spending so much time thinking and writing about XO, Kitty, but putting my thoughts into words has helped me quiet some of the chaos I’ve felt since watching the season. 

imagine the “are you doing anything later?” “i have a previous engagement” scene from the beginning of the incredibles but with ladynoir 

❝I just don’t wanna feel so bad anymore.❞ Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck / Joker in Joker (2019)

After defeating Hawkmoth, Ladybug and Chat Noir decide to meet at a specific table at a specific café as civilians and finally get to know each other behind the masks. They both try to get there anxiously early but Marinette, being the disaster she is, arrives with a box of personalized sweets after Adrien has already taken the table. Now, as excited as she is to run into the love of her life like this, she needs the table and she’s going to get it. She goes over and they exchange friendly greetings but as soon as she asks for the table Adrien gets serious and gives her a stern “No”. Marinette continues trying to convince him to leave but he insists that he needs the table because he has a date with the love of his life and he ain’t budging (that explains the bouquet he has with him) and it hurts to hear that but not as much as its going to hurt him when she removes him from the goshdang table by force.

They both wind up getting kicked out of the café btw

alya: (doing an interview) do you have anything left to say to your fans

chat noir: yeah

chat noir: gabriel agreste is a little bitch

anyone have some good Ladynoir centric fic recs? whenever I try to look for them they’re kind of drowned out by the other sides of the lovesquare, even in the “ladynoir” search

#PURE

Larry your waiter: *dies*

Me: