Are There Any Filler Episodes In Miraculous Ladybug?

For me, Miraculous Ladybug is 80% filler. Yes, that sounds bad. But, actually, it’s not. So much of the show relies on the same old formula of an akuma attacking, a silly villain for the Ladybug and Cat Noir to fight, a series of puns, and then the solution of the Ladybug’s Lucky Charm. But even though it’s all a bit of comfort food, there are some wonderful moments of fillers, like ‘Santa Claws’ and ‘Animan’. We get to see more of the side characters like Alya and Nino, and we get some wonderful, completely ridiculous, scenarios such as Adrien being turned into a literal golden statue in ‘Gorizilla’. The plot-centric episodes are so much more affecting because we have these ‘breather’ episodes. If every episode were to delve deeper into the Miraculous lore or explore the strains of the love square between Ladybug, Cat Noir, Marinette and Adrien, then I feel that the show would be exhausted very, very quickly. No. Sometimes I just want to watch Ladybug and Cat Noir fight a giant baby.

I'm in the minority here, but the episodes where they go and stop an akumatized person in a really comedic way (Pixelator, Gigantitan, etc) don’t add to the major plot of the story, but they are great filler episodes for the series. It gives us the opportunity to really see the development of the main characters. You can really see Marinette’s awkward side in a lot of these episodes, and we even get to see Adrien’s dorky side too. We really get to see a lot of the supporting characters too, and even some of the minor ones. They really make the world feel real and like we’re just getting to experience these events in the miraculous world.

However, the lighter episodes can also be a drawback to watching the episodes in sequence. When you’re binge watching to get to the bottom of plots like Marinette’s feelings towards Adrien, or what other akumas Hawkmoth has planned, it can be frustrating to have to watch what feels like “filler” in between. But for me the “filler” is also so much of the charm of the show. These episodes are light and often very funny and allow for the exploration of the humor and heart of the characters in the situation of their normal daily lives as superheroes, which can be very chaotic and tense as it is.

I wouldn’t say Miraculous Ladybug has filler, although the stakes are sometimes lower in certain episodes. Even the most “throwaway” villain fight can reveal more about the characters than about the plot. For example, Frightningale contains a lot of character development between Marinette and Adrien in the musical number, while Zombizou contains foreshadowing of future akuma powers and how they might be used. (Of course, the Princess Fragrance and Dark Cupid episodes from season 1 are also mostly lore, but they lay out the rules for how the universe works and how characters will behave in certain situations. They’re not really skippable if one is only interested in the lore of the show, but they’re not really “filler” either.)

What I find quite impressive about this writing is how later seasons refer back to those seemingly inconsequential scenes from the filler episodes. For example, in a completely random episode, there was a mime villain. And guess what? The power mechanics of that mime villain are used in a huge battle two seasons later. So yes, even the fluffiest of episodes are part of the bigger tapestry of this show. It’s like a big mosaic made of many individual tiles. They may seem insignificant on their own, but when you take a step back, you can see the big picture.