I Mean, Irony Is One Way To Put It…

I FORGOT I MADE THESE😭😭😭😭ILOVE ARCANE😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Timebomb haters are actually just not literate at all “Ekko would never love Jinx!!!” DID WE WATCH THE SAME SHOW??? ARE YOU BLIND??? YOU CANT BE FR RN

“I ship him with Powder but not Jinx” THEYRE THE SAME FUCKING PERSON THAT WAS THE ENTIRE POINT OF EPISODE 7. IT WAS ABOUT HIM REALIZING THAT HE STILL LOVES JINX (and that he gave up on her too soon) BECAUSE THEYRE THE SAME FUCKING PERSON. JINX IS POWDER BUT WITH 10x MORE TRAUMA AND NO SUPPORT SYSTEM. You people take the whole Powder/Jinx thing too literally when it’s just about how your experiences shape who you are, she’s THE SAME PERSON EITHER WAY.

“Jinx isn’t mentally well enough to be in a relationship” Stop treating mentally ill characters like they cannot be loved or love others. THEY CAN. This hurts my soul as someone who has family members with schizophrenia and hallucinations and plenty of mental illness myself. Ekko wants her to be better, and it’s obvious she loves him too. THE SHOW SHOULDNT NEED TO SPELL IT OUT THE SUBTEXT IS THERE.

“Oh but Lux-” I will shove Ekko’s staff up your ass if you don’t stfu about Lux who isn’t even in Arcane. Idc if you ship them BUT LEAVE TIMEBOMB OUT OF THIS

KMS.

Sobs, anyways, work I finished for a convention a bit ago!!

AND ANOTHER THING ABOUT THAT is that--what gets me about the Miles and Margo flirting vs not flirting debate is that I really think people are underestimating how annoyed Miles is with Gwen in this scene.

Bear with me. I'm not saying anyone's a horrible person, I'm saying this is a fun thing about his character.

Miles is annoyed with Gwen on the Spider Society tour.

And he has good reason to be! She's been brushing him and his questions off. Back in Mumbattan she said she should've "never come to see him." And he's finding out that she lied to him--for instance, about the "small elite strike force" actually being a huge society.

I feel like a lot of people don't notice it because he's not letting it show too obviously. I think he's trying to brush off his annoyance and keep a positive attitude, but it still shows in his actions. And in the script:

And, of course, the most obvious:

And I wanna pause before I get to the whole Miles-Margo flirting thing to take a step back: the reason why this is important to me is because Miles isn't stupid and Miles isn't an always-positive ray of sunshine. It's clear that at this point, he's clocked that Gwen is lying to him. And he realizes that she's treating him badly. He's not oblivious, he's just choosing to not pick a fight with her about it right then and there. Even then, he's not just rolling over and taking the bad treatment, he's just reacting to it in a more subtle way.

...Which brings me to the flirting.

Now, the LAST thing I want to imply is that Margo is a tool for Miles and Gwen to use. Those that know my blog know I love Margo. I think she's a great character in her own right, and she doesn't just exist as a plot point to further ghostflower's agenda--it's clear metatextually that this moment served at least partially to introduce her as a character that will be important next movie, as a member of the Spider-Band.

Even beyond that, I don't think Miles was faking his interest in her. I mean, we all saw his spider-sense go off, and I don't think it's just because "they're all spider-man." I believe they were both genuinely interested in each other and sparked a connection there.

That said.

I also believe Miles noticed how Gwen reacted to it. And maybe dug his heels in further than he would've otherwise, to get more of a reaction out of her.

I mean, we all know Miles is down bad for Gwen. If he hadn't been annoyed with her at the moment, I think he would've been a lot more receptive to "keeping moving" like she wanted to, simply because he's usually really attentive to her being upset. He tries to make her feel better. But this time, he doesn't. In the movie proper, he ignores her to keep talking with Margo. In the script, he literally physically follows Margo:

You guys see what I mean, right? It's the same as acting super invested in the anomalies right after Gwen claimed they weren't interesting. It's resisting Gwen and what she wants. Something he usually never does.

This! Is! Important! To! Me! Because I think it shows that Miles has a higher awareness and independence than people give him credit for in these scenes! He's not just running around enthusiastically, not knowing about the lion's den he's walking into. He knows something is up. He knows he's being treated unfairly. And he's not just forgiving it and letting it go--he's addressing it, in his own subtle way.

Anyway, I think that on the Gwen side of things, he's mostly annoyed at her because he feels she's devaluing their close relationship with the way she's acting (because she is). So flirting with Margo is kind of rubbing that exact same behavior back in Gwen's face.

And it works, because he gets a reaction out of Gwen that reinforces that she cares about their relationship--he annoys her. She literally yanks him away from Margo. And based on the way he reacts to that, I think he's pretty happy with that reaction. Because he forced Gwen to acknowledge that she cares about him and values their relationship like he does.

(most pixelated screenshot known to man but you get my point. anyway)

Lala: "I hate Chaos! I swear, he is the most monstrous person alive! I will never trust this guy!"

Evangeline, Tella and Scarlett: *flashbacks*

Evangeline: "It's a canon event"

Scarlett: "We cannot interrupt"

Tella: "Denial is a river in Egypt"

This people can't be real

Valerie: "Oh, how much i hate ghosts! Especially, that stupid devilish Danny Phantom! I want to kill him, bring him back to life and kill him again!

*phone rings*

Valerie: Aww, it's my sweet lovely dovey boyfriend, Danny Fenton! Aww, i love him so much!