Gabriel and Lila scheme to get between Adrien and Marinette, who finally make the time to hang out together.
Tropes:
- Arranged Marriage: Gabriel and Tomoe planned for Adrien and Kagami to be together, and they are both furious when they find out that Adrien is dating someone else.
- Art Shift: There's an extended sequence showing Marc and Nathaniel's comic as they explain their Ferris Wheel Date Moment to Adrien and Marinette.
- Babies Ever After: The comic includes a picture of adult Adrien and Marinette with their three kids (no hamster, though) and ends with an elderly but still very happy version of the couple.
- Badass Normal: Adrien's bodyguard attacks Riposte Prime, giving Adrien and Marinette an opportunity to run away. Shortly after, Adrien protects Marinette without transforming, using only his fencing sword, giving her a chance to run away before Riposte eventually gets the better of him.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Gabriel gets the result he wanted by ruining Adrien and Marinette's date, confident in his belief that it's the first crack in their relationship. Whether he's right is another matter.
- Barrier Warrior: Riposte Prime's sword is upgraded with the power of protection, allowing it to trap anyone she directly strikes in a Shellter bubble. Unfortunately for her, she can only maintain one bubble at a time.
- Bittersweet Ending: Gabriel and Lila's machinations force Marinette and Adrien to end their date early, to their dismay. On the bright side, the two help Kagami learn not to suppress her own emotions and act upon them and while she unwisely chooses to keep Lila as a friend, she at least knows her new pal isn't that perfect after all.
- Blatant Lies: Gabriel tries to blame moving up the Diamonds' Dance as a scheduling issue, but Tomoe can tell he's lying by his heartbeat.
- Break Them by Talking: Lila uses her manipulation gift to trick Kagami into thinking that Marinette was deceiving her, to make her susceptible to Akumatization.
- But I Read a Book About It: Nathaniel and Marc try to create the perfect romantic moment for Adrien and Marinette based on romance books and movies. Naturally, Adrien and Marinette just end up feeling awkward.
- Call-Back: Adrien and Marinette have their date with a picnic in front of the Agreste Mansion, like Emilie and Gabriel did in their youth.
- Character Development: When Adrien texts Marinette telling her that he can't spend time with her, she doesn't panic or catastrophize, and instead correctly deduces that his father made him do it.
- Continuity Nod:
- Kagami's anti-Akuma charm is worthless against Monarch's Megakuma, as first demonstrated in "Dearest Family".
- Learning his lesson from "Perfection", Monarch targets the picture frame Marinette gave Kagami at the end of that episode, instead of her ring.
- Gabriel has to move up the date of the Diamonds Dance because he burned through a fair portion of his remaining time through his use of Second Chance in the previous few episodes, as shown in "Intuition".
- Control Freak: In a move completely in character for both of them, Gabriel and Tomoe freak out and start pointing fingers when they realize that Adrien and Kagami are no longer the "perfect couple", Adrien instead going out with "mediocre" Marinette. Gabriel even has Kagami akumatized just to ruin their date.
- Curse Cut Short: Nathaniel declares that Adrien and Marinette need a "little kick in the a— uh, a little help" confessing their love for each other.
- Date Peepers: Marinette and Adrien's friends prepare a romantic evening for the two of them and hang around to provide background music and witness the couple's First Kiss, even counting down to the perfect moment for it. The fact that they have an eager audience makes Marinette and Adrien even more awkward around each other and utterly ruins the mood.
- Didn't Think This Through:
- Nino volunteers to cover for Luka in the band, but no one thought to ask him if he can play guitar and Nino didn't feel it necessary to tell them otherwise until they're in the middle of the song.
- Marinette and Adrien's friends make an overly elaborate planned date for the couple that involves them giving music and watching. None of them seem to realize how awkward this would be for the two who have already struggled with their feelings.
- Double Meaning: During Lila's call with Gabriel, she says that Kagami is vulnerable to being akumatized by Monarch, but she doesn't explicitly suggest that Gabriel should do anything.
- Double-Meaning Title: Riposte Prime receives the power of Protection, but it also refers to her desire to "protect" Adrien from Marinette's supposed toxic influence, and Kagami's harmful attempts to protect her image by suppressing her emotions.
- Embarrassing Pyjamas: Marinette goes to Adrien's house to hang out but does so without changing out of her pajamas, the result of her confidence getting ahead of her. She reasons that Adrien won't care if he really does love her, and refuses to second-guess herself even when she has to briefly go back home. It only dawns on her that it may have been a bad idea when she's standing in front of Adrien. Adrien helps her feel better by switching to his own pajamas, proving her right.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Gabriel thinks the only reason why Adrien is dating Marinette is because her “mediocrity” allows him to shine with less effort, failing to understand that Adrien simply loves Marinette for who she is.
- Evil Is Petty: Gabriel's main motivation for akumatizing Kagami is to drive a wedge between Adrien and Marinette when he can't simply force Adrien to not see her. He magically possessed his partner's daughter just to screw with his own son's love life.
- False Friend: Lila once again convinces Kagami that Marinette is one, while actually being one herself. This time, Lila claims that Marinette is a liar who manipulates everyone around her to get whatever she wants. An excellent description if Lila were talking about herself.
- Ferris Wheel Date Moment: Adrien and Marinette's friends arrange this for them, though things don't go quite as planned because it feels too forced for either to get into the moment.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Riposte Prime attacks Marinette out of jealousy of her relationship with Adrien. Once she's back to normal, Kagami feels extremely guilty over feeling this way.
- Horrible Judge of Character: While this time Kagami at least realizes that Lila has an unreasonable grudge on Marinette, she believes she's just misguided instead of an actual malicious person.
- Hypocrite: Gabriel doesn't approve of Adrien dating Marinette because she's not upper class. The only reason he was able to marry Emelie is because she did the same with him, though it's not precisely clear how far apart in station the two were at the time. Adrien even calls him out on it, not that Gabriel listens.
- I Just Want to Have Friends: Lila is easily able to manipulate Kagami by calling her her best friend.
- "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: Cat Noir tries to talk Riposte Prime into rejecting the akuma by reminding her that she fought alongside him and Ladybug as Ryuko. It almost works, but Monarch is able to reestablish his hold on her.
- Internal Reveal:
- Gabriel reveals to Tomoe that he’s Secretly Dying.
- Gabriel and Tomoe discover that Adrien and Kagami broke up. Since they've been broken up for months, this shows how little they pay attention to them.
- Interrupted Declaration of Love: Marinette once again tries to tell Adrien "I love you", but Riposte Prime interrupts them before she can finish.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Kagami admits that she has fallen back in love with Adrien due to his newfound confidence and assertiveness (or perhaps never fell out of love with him in the first place). Nevertheless, she's one of the most fervent Marinette/Adrien shippers because she wants her two friends to be happy together, and feels awful about being jealous of Marinette for having Adrien's love.
- Karma Houdini: Lila manipulates Kagami to turn against Marinette and gets her akumatized. While Kagami calls out Lila and says she doesn't want to be involved in the spat between her and Marinette, she still chooses to remain close friends with Lila, not realizing that Lila deliberately wanted her akumatized.
- Last-Second Word Swap: Tomoe tells Gabriel that he needs to resolve the situation before he... leaves. Between the pause and the fact that he just admitted he was Secretly Dying, it seems clear she was originally going for a word that kids' shows typically prefer to avoid.
- Moment Killer: Invoked. Gabriel akumatizes Kagami hoping that she'll ruin Adrien and Marinette's date. She attacks them just as they were probably about to kiss.
- Murder the Hypotenuse: Imprison the hypotenuse at least. Riposte Prime thinks that getting Marinette out of the way will let her be with Adrien.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Kagami reacts this way after learning that she was smeckledorfed by Lila.
- Never My Fault: Gabriel and Tomoe each blame the other for Adrien and Kagami not working out, for pretty much the same reasons. Gabriel believes Tomoe isn't controlling Kagami well enough because she's encouraging Adrien to see someone else, and Tomoe blames Gabriel for allowing Adrien's gaze to wander elsewhere when Kagami still clearly loves Adrien.
- Never Say "Die": After learning that Gabriel is Secretly Dying, Tomoe tells him he needs to resolve things "before you... leave". While the subject comes up repeatedly throughout the episode, his impending death is never directly described as such, only heavily gestured at as an urgent time limit.
- Out-of-Context Eavesdropping: Gabriel and Tomoe eavesdrop while Adrien talks to Kagami about his relationship with Marinette. They initially think he's talking about his relationship with Kagami, and then are furious when Adrien mentions Marinette's name.
- Parental Marriage Veto: Gabriel attempts this when telling Adrien not to see Marinette, but Nathalie countermands him and he decides not to challenge her on it, instead choosing to ruin their date and hopefully drive them apart indirectly.
- Pet the Dog: Nathalie countermands Gabriel's order that Adrien not see Marinette, seeing it as a bridge too far to control his love life.
- Psychological Projection: Lila tells Kagami that Marinette is a liar, manipulator, and toxic person who should be avoided, all of which describes Lila to a T.
- Shipper on Deck:
- The entire friend group (basically everyone except Lila, Chloé, and Sabrina) is actively trying to get Marinette and Adrien together, and have even come up with an elaborate plan to help the two of them have their first kiss together. Unfortunately, this works against them because the overly staged event feels anything but romantic to Marinette and Adrien.
- Nathalie countermands Gabriel's Parental Marriage Veto and encourages Adrien to be happy with Marinette. And while the Gorilla doesn't go against Gabriel's orders, he helps Adrien prepare a romantic picnic for Marinette and sneaks her into the mansion without his boss noticing.
- Take Up My Sword: Tomoe implies that, should Gabriel not retrieve the Ladybug and Cat Miraculouses before dying, Adrien and Kagami would be expected to continue that quest.
- That Cloud Looks Like...: While on their date, Marinette and Adrien look at clouds. Adrien points out one that looks like a horse, and then asks Marinette what she thinks about another one — which looks exactly like the two of them kissing, getting Marinette flustered.
- Two Scenes, One Dialogue: Marc and Nathaniel separately go over their plan with Adrien and Marinette, seamlessly giving the exact same pitch between cuts.
- Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Discussed. Lila convinces Kagami that Marinette acts awkward and helpless in order to manipulate others into liking and helping her.
