Fanfic / Hawkmoth Gets A Reference

Hawkmoth Gets a Reference is a Miraculous Ladybug fanfic, in which Hawk Moth revaluates his style and becomes noticeably more dangerous...

There is also a chat-fic taking place in the same continuity, called HMGAR Gets a Chatfic?

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This fanfic provides examples of:

• Adaptational Sexuality: Chlóe in canon is Ambiguously Bi at best, showing little attraction to anyone than Adrien, yet here she's a lesbian, and admits that her crush on Adrien was just for show, not that she herself fully realized it until Shipmaster's powers affected her.
• Adaptational Villainy: Audrey, full stop. You thought she was bad in canon? In the first chapter she gets, she insults Sabrina's dressware and demands to have her thrown out of the party being hosted, reacts with open disgust at Chloe calling the girl her girlfriend and trying to defend her, strikes her hard enough to draw blood when she tries defending herself, and when André finally realizes how much of a monster she is and annuls the marriage, he reveals that she tried to smother Chloe as an infant for crying too loud. Oh, and she to decides fight for custody of Chloe specifically so André can't keep her, purely out of spite. And things just get worse from there.
• Alternate Identity Amnesia: Unlike past akumas, the new akumas created by Hawkmoth Subvert this and keep full memories of what they have done, often to devastating effect. This shows that he's actually using the Butterfly more effectively now.
• Antagonist Abilities:
  • Shipmaster’s abilities are designed to take advantage of Chat Noir's tendency to end up Taking the Bullet for Ladybug, as her blasts cause the person who provides the first part of the relevant ship name of the pairing to fall under the effect first regardless of which one of them is hit, and since their ship name is "Ladynoir", all Shipmaster has to do is hit Chat to take Ladybug out of the fight. Marinette directly refers to her as their "counter".
  • Dutch's powers cause anyone he touches, anyone they touch, and so on to immediately transform into their fursonas with no ability to counter or resist. This is to try and bypass the Glamour that protects Miraculous users, since it can't hide their species like it can identifying features. The heroes only get around it by recruiting temporary heroes to use their Miraculouses.
• Bullying a Dragon:
  • Upon debuting his new look, Hawk Moth lampshades that the people of Paris were mocking a man who creates supervillains with their list of Akumas that look like they were designed on drugs, and now that he's been made aware of his failings he's a much more dangerous threat.
  • Alec has a case of this that borders on Too Dumb to Live, showcasing the list on live TV again despite Hawk Moth explicitly stating, to all of Paris, that's what caused him to reevaluate his style and Take a Level in Badass in the first place. This is an especially egregious case since it, albeit very indirectly, leads to the creation of Reality Check, the first of Hawk Moth's creations to straight up beat the heroes, if in a way that doesn't allow him to get the Miraculous.
• Entertainingly Wrong: After the Sentimonster Reality Check completes his mission of helping Marinette and Adrien communicate, his creator Azur Royal decides to let him live as the the Agreste's family's newest son, a stark contrast from Hawkmoth or Mayura who dispelled their sentimonsters like Sentibug when they are no longer needed or turn against them. This leads to Alya to conclude that Azur Royal is an Anti-Hero that stole the Peacock Miraculous from Hawkmoth and is skirting around the law. She's unaware that Azur Royal is Gabriel Agreste AKA Hawkmoth, his decision to spar and adopt Reality Check the result of noticeable character growth as he improves his connection with the Miraculous.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Played for Laughs when Gabriel and Adrien are watching Kill la Kill, with Gabriel horrified when he sees the flashback of Ragyo throwing away an infant Ryuko in the trash. Doubles as Foreshadowing.
  • Played much more seriously in "Domestichaos", where Hawkmoth tells Audrey he has no interest akumatizing someone that attempted to murder their own child. Unfortunately, she doesn't take no for an answer.
  • Hawkmoth and Revelation are both disturbed finding out that Chat Noir was an Empty Shell before getting the Black Cat Miraculous and meeting his civilian friends, with Hawkmoth wondering how has he never akumatized him before.
• Exact Words: After finding out that Felix attempted to sabotage Adrien's relationship with his friends and girlfriend, Gabriel creates an akuma and orders it to find the person with the strongest negative emotion to hunt down Felix... and it flies straight to him first.
• Fashion-Victim Villain: In-Universe, there's a list of "Akumas that must’ve been designed on drugs!". Incubus, whose defeat starts the story, is the tenth entry. While Gabriel mentally argues against Antibug's inclusion to the list, and Bubbler looking garish was deliberate because he was still mad at Nino, he only gets as far as Mr Pigeon at #5 before he slams down and breaks his tablet. This causes him to realize that he was slacking in the design department for his Akumas, and after Nooroo tells him both that the outfits that they wear is only minorly influenced by their subconscious and that his own outfit has been compared to a gimp suit, he becomes determined to improve.
• I Always Wanted to Say That: Chlóe as Beetelle says this when using Ladybug's usual lines after defeating a villain.
• I'm Taking Her Home with Me!: When Emilie sees Marinette in person, she finds the younger girl adorable and wants to adopt her. Her husband shut this decision down, reminding her that Marinette already has a pair of loving parents. Any decision doing so would piss off Sabine and cost Emilie a Best Friends-in-Law. Gabriel also mentions how his wife also tried the same thing with Chlóe, which almost cost their relationship with the Bourgeois.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: After Adrien and Marinette start dating and he lets Kagami down gently, the fencer decides to take her own advice of changing targets and move on from her feelings for him. The problem? The other person she finds herself falling for is Marinette.
• Humanoid Abomination: Dark Tyrant is this. An emaciated black figure with all the flesh of her fingers melted off her body and her face a porcelain mask showing a Slasher Smile full of teeth.
• Hijacking Cthulhu: Despite Hawkmoth's refusal to grant Audrey akuma powers, her own spiteful and vindictive attitude let's her steal some of his power, with Hawkmoth barely able to break the connection before she could drain him completely.
• Logical Weakness:
  • Incubus, the Akuma at the start of the story, has Charm Person powers over women... but only women. Once the heroes figure that out, they just have Chat Noir use himself as a Human Shield to keep Ladybug from being affected.
  • Shipmaster's powers cease to affect Ladybug when she de-transforms and changes back, since her civilian self's ship names are different from her hero self's. That said, they are still some lingering after effects even after Shipmaster is defeated, with Marinette stuck with lustful thoughts to both Chat and Adrien.
  • While the Glamour on the Miraculouses keeps anyone from connecting the dots on the user's identities from their features, the effect was never designed to hide their species, since they've only ever been used by humans. Thus, Dutch's power to make anyone their inner fursona forces Chat and Ladybug to use temporary heroes in order to keep anyone (like their classmates) from potentially connecting the dots about the heroes being the same species as someone else they know.
• Not-So-Imaginary Friend: What Gabriel thought was his consciousness taking on Emilie's voice and mannerism after improving his compatability with the Butterfly Miraculous is revealed to be a manifestation of Emilie's emotions while she's still in a coma.
• Oblivious to Love:
  • During the anime binge, Gabriel expresses his frustration at how a male protagonist is missing the obvious signs that his female friend likes him. This rant helps Adrien realize his mutual feelings between him and Marinette.
  • In the Dutch arc epilogue, Adrien reveals to Nino that he suspects both of his parents were this to Nathalie, not only unaware of her rather blatant crush on both of them but that they cared for her more as a friend. Adrien also thinks that he was pretty dumb back then not to notice the signs.
  • It's revealed that Juleka not only wasn't aware that Rose liked her back before Shipmaster got to them, but that they were dating the whole time and she didn't realize, not even when trying out swimsuits together or even kissing. In the chatfic, Rose is very much peeved about the whole thing, at least until Juleka offers her a trip to the pool and promises to wear the bikini she bought for her on her birthday.
• Seen It All: In the chatfic, Alya isn't too fazed finding out that Kagami likes Marinette romantically, given that several girls (herself and Chlóe included) all had a crush on Marinette at one point or another.
• Secret Secret-Keeper:
  • Luka finds out that Marinette is Ladybug when he sees her transform without checking if anyone is around. He lampshades that she needs to work on her spatial awareness.
  • In the chatfic, thanks to a few statements from Marinette after she shared her Secret Identity, Alya figures out that Adrien is Chat Noir.
  • Emilie knew that her son is a superhero since the first day, though he isn't aware that an emotional construct of her has been watching over her family.
• Shipper with an Agenda: Besides the whole "give the Miraculous to Hawk Moth" part, Alya as Shipmaster also makes Lila go obsessed over Chloé with her "LiBee" ship as payback for Lila claiming to ship Ladybee after getting annoyed by Alya's Shipper on Deck behavior.
• Shout-Out:
  • The anime that Gabriel and Adrien were watching in the first chapter included Kill la Kill, My Hero Academia, and Dragon Ball.
  • Shipmaster's naval theme and abilities are apparently based on KanColle.
  • The real identity akuma Dutch is all but said to be the Spy from Team Fortress 2.
  • When Chlóe temporarily uses the Ladybug Earrings, she dons the name "Beetelle". Sabrina, however, says that she always imagined that Chlóe would pick "Scarlet Lady" as her superhero name if she ever became the Ladybug hero, with Chlóe agreeing that it's a good name, but feels that she shouldn't use it for some reason.
  • They are a few JoJo's Bizarre Adventure references, namely Ladybug creating her own "Stand" in chapter 20 and the Sentimonster Reality Check referring to himself as Gabriel's Stand.
  • In chapter 43, they are a trio of hotel staff named Arthur, Lewis, and Vivi.
• Strange Minds Think Alike: What do Luka, Anarka, Gabriel, and Emilie all agree on? That Rose is the top between her and Juleka: Luka outright catches that there is an amok afoot when Juleka is radiating too much 'top' energy and Gabriel outright agrees with Emilie that Juleka being the bottom is 'obvious'.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • Hawk Moth doing this is what starts the story. After realizing how much of a Fashion-Victim Villain he and his akumas are, he decides to start putting serious thought into how they look from now on, even spending time with Adrien for a few days to get new ideas. And due to how the Butterfly Miraculous requires focus on the design and the recipient's emotion for maximum effect, every Monster of the Week gets stronger and smarter as a result. And then he finds a way to fix the Peacock Miraculous on his own...
  • Ladybug and Chat Noir get this too. Master Fu tells them that in addition to the built-in powers each miraculous has, they can create their own powers based on their personalities.
• Trauma Conga Line: Domestichaos has Audrey hand deliver one to...well, everyone, but Chloe deserves special mention. In the span of what couldn't have been more than a few minutes, Audrey insults her girlfriend, slaps her hard enough to draw blood, and is outed for trying to kill her as an infant by her father. Audrey then declares her intention to fight for custody for her and force into a carbon copy of herself just to spite André, prompting him to willingly Akumatize himself to stop her. Then, Audrey tries to take the Akumatization for herself, and when Hawkmoth tells her no, hijacks the Akuma to get powers anyway. And when Marinette pulls her ass out of the fire, Chloe realizes that Sabrina's still in there and she can't do anything about it. She nearly hits the Despair Event Horizon before Hawkmoth of all people shows up with Sabrina in tow.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom:
  • Nadja mentioning the list of Akumas that are considered In-Universe to fall into Fashion-Victim Villain territory, and the people who mentioned that Hawk Moth's outfit looks like a gimp suit, cause Gabriel to reassess his tactics and aesthetics and become more dangerous. He even lampshades it to the people of Paris upon debuting his new look, pointing out how they made him aware of what he was doing wrong.
  • After Nathalie suggests it, Gabriel spends some time with Adrien to see if he has any ideas. From Adrien's perspective, it's just his father deciding to make time for him for a change, but their talk and the anime they binge together gives him a lot of ideas for new Akumas.
• Visual Pun: Invoked, Shipmaster is an Akuma based on Shipping who also has a naval theme (as in, actual ships). Chat Noir specifically notes that Hawk Moth is ripping off KanColle.

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