Marceline's Diary: Marceline's Biography

Marceline
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Marceline, the Vampire Queen [Full Name: Marceline Abadeer] is one of the main characters in Adventure Time. She is a 1,000+ year old vampire. She knows many other people of Ooo, and among those are her close friends Finn and Jake. Many places of residence are known to belong to her.

Background

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Marceline is over a thousand years old. In "Memory of a Memory," one of Marceline's memories shows her as a young girl playing near the burning ruins of a city, presumably the aftermath of the Mushroom War.
When Marceline was a teenager, her father ate her fries in the ruins of a diner, as Finn witnessed in her memory. This incident damages Marceline's relationship with her father, which she later sings about in her "Fry Song." At a later point in her history, she moved into the Tree Fort (that would later become Finn and Jake's home) with her boyfriend Ash. She would later dump him for selling her prized possession Hambo, a teddy bear that she carried close to her throughout the years of her life, and for being an all-around jerk. Marceline has also mentioned her mother, but no in depth information has been given about her or their relationship yet.
Pendleton Ward also stated that while Marceline is the Vampire Queen, there is no Vampire King because she killed him.
It's unknown exactly when or how Marceline became a vampire, although she did not have a bite mark on her neck when she was younger.
For more on Marceline's possible origins, see Marceline/Analysis of Marceline's origin.
Personality
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Hambo; Marceline's Teddy Bear

Marceline is described as a wild rocker girl. Centuries of wandering the Land of Ooo have made her a fearless daredevil. She is a lover of all things exotic and still travels the land often. She has a mischievous personality and is not intimidated by anything. Despite seeming evil at first, Marceline is a trickster at heart, and her "evil plans" often turn out to be nothing more than elaborate jokes. She is described by Finn as "a radical dame who likes to play games." She loves to play pranks on Finn. She seems to have a strained relationship with her father and might sometimes have violent outbursts, as shown in "It Came from the Nightosphere."
She can also be sentimental. She was very emotionally attached to her teddy bear Hambo; after Ash sold it to a witch, she was furious and broke up with him.
Marceline seems to be a little emotional, for example in "What Was Missing," she seemed to be more "aggressive" towards Princess Bubblegum than she usually is. In "It Came from the Nightosphere," she swung her axe-bass at Finn for annoying her a bit, then says "...That was emotionally exhausting." She is also very independent, and in early episodes would often act without concern for Finn or his friends. She is known to pick her nose as seen in "Memory of a Memory" and "Marceline's Closet." It is easier for Marceline to express her feelings through music, as seen with "The Fry Song" and "I'm Just Your Problem." She keeps a diary that she uses for inspiration for songs as seen in "Marceline's Closet."

Apperance
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Marceline has light blue-gray skin and long, midnight black hair that reaches to her feet. She also sports two marks on her neck which could be the bite mark that turned her into a vampire. Marceline had a forked tongue in "Go With Me", but in "Memory of a Memory", her tongue is round. Despite being over a thousand years old, her appearance and personality is that of a late teenager. In the episode "Go With Me", her hair is shaved into an undercut, which reveals that she has pointy ears. She is very thin and is said to be thinner than Princess Bubblegum by Natasha, who claims she has a smaller butt.^[6] However, Adam Muto stated that it depends who is drawing her. In "Evicted!", the singer of the "House Hunting Song" refers to Marceline as a "sexy vampire lady." She is usually floating in the air but when she stands next to the other characters she is taller than them. In some episodes she appears more voluptuous than in others because she can change her form at will.
Marceline wears different outfits in most of her appearances. According to Pen Ward, her clothing changes from episode to episode because "girls own more than one outfit."She wears blue jeans, red boots, and a light gray tank top in her first appearance. In the episode, "Henchman", she is seen wearing a short, dark gray dress, with a ripped top and a dark pink band. It is noted that this dress is made of Why-Wolf hide. Underneath the dress she wore purple and gray striped stockings and reddish-purple heels.
In the episode "It Came from the Nightosphere", Marceline wears her hair in a long ponytail that is tied with a white-purplish band. She wears a red and dark gray striped long-sleeve shirt, gray-blue jeans that are ripped at the knees, and dark blue flip-flops.
In the episode "Go With Me", she has shaved half of her head into an undercut and cut it to waist length. In this episode she wears a gray dress, black jeans, and burgundy boots. In "Video Makers" she wears an open plaid, button-up shirt with a T-shirt underneath, blue pants, sneakers, and sports a gray cap adorned with a picture of a horse breathing fire. She styles her hair in a bun. In "Heat Signature" she wears a dark red tank top with dark brown, ripped pants and a pair of black high heel short boots.
In "Memory of a Memory", she wears something similar to a nurse's outfit with light maroon nurse shoes. In one of her memories she wera a purple shirt with a tank top underneath, gray pants, big red boots and pigtails. She also wears a blue tank top with small dark blue stripes on it brown pants dark blue boots. Her hair is messy and cut to the waist. She appears to have bangs (in her flashbacks as well).
In "What Was Missing," she is seen wearing a red tanktop, blue jean high waist pants, and boots with bow ties on the backs. She wears elbow length gloves and a wide-brimmed hat to protect her from the sun.
In "Holly Jolly Secrets Part II," she wears a big red sweater and a red scarf with thin light green stripes.
In "Marceline's Closet," she wears a pink sweater, gray-blue jean short shorts, red boots, with her hair tied in a ponytail. After she changes she has her hair down and she has light blue pajama pants and the tank top from "Evicted!"
On the Issue 1 limited edition cover she wears the same outfit from "Evicted!" other than the boots which are now black. In another issue she has her hair in a side ponytail and wears a red tank top, blue shorts and sun glasses.

Abillities
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Strengths
Marceline's abilities have been shown to go beyond that of a traditional vampire, as she has been shown to possess the powers of levitation, pyrokinesis, telekinesis, invisibility, and necromancy, near instantaneous self-healing, the spooky vampire walk, as well as the ability to shape shift into numerous monstrous forms, including a bat, a wolf, a reptilian creature, or a tentacled monster. Her shape-shifting powers might be an ability inherited from her father, as he demonstrated he could transform into demonic creatures as well. Also unlike traditional vampires, Marceline is capable of sustaining herself on "shades of red," such as the color in strawberries, and is not limited to surviving on blood. Marceline additionally seems to have control of how her long hair moves (However, in almost every episode she has been in, she has brushed a lock of it out of her face, though this could simply be a habit).
According to the note she left on her door in "Marceline's Closet" she gets lucid dreams when she eats tomatoes.

As the Lady of Evil, she gains the ability to shoot green lasers which either vaporize or transform whatever they hit. She can also create or transform into a large cloud of bloodmist with the ability to shoot green lasers as well. In addition to these things, she also gains the ability to devour souls. Weaknesses
Marceline is vulnerable to sunlight, as is common in vampire lore. The nuance to this in the Adventure Time world is that vampires are specifically vulnerable to direct sunlight. Marceline is capable of unrestricted movement on a bright sunny day provided that she shields herself, which she usually accomplishes with a combination of a parasol and a large sunhat, sometimes with the addition of full-length gloves to cover her arms. According to Marceline moving around on a bright day still hurts mildly, comparable to scraping her knee, but she can bear it. Exposure to direct sunlight will cause Marceline to painfully melt into a pile of goo, though if she retreats into cover she can heal back to normal within moments. It is not clear if prolonged exposure to direct sunlight will eventually kill Marceline outright.

Marceline: Wolf Form

Marceline: Tentacled Monster Form

Marceline: Bat Monster Form

Also like typical vampires, Marceline can't see her own reflection in a mirror, however she does show up on film as seen in "Return to the Nightosphere." It also isn't known if she will suffer any adverse effects if she isn't able to feed on "shades of red" for prolonged periods of time, either starving to death or surviving but being greatly weakened. In "Heat Signature," Marceline explains to Finn and Jake that vampires can't defeat ghosts: "It's like a rock-paper-scissors thing." It is unknown if Marceline is negatively affected by garlic because her only known exposure to it happened when Jake pelted her in the head with large cloves of it, so the pain she experienced may have come from the impact and not the exposure. It is also unknown if Marceline can be slayed with a wooden stake since Marceline hid when Jake attempted to do so.

Music & Instruments
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Marceline's Axe Base

Marceline is a very talented musician and songwriter. She has an incredible singing voice and is proficient at playing her basses. Because she is ambidextrous like Finn, she is capable of playing her basses with either hand, and may even be able to employ double handed tapping which would allow her to combine simple rhythm progressions with lead parts. As seen in "It Came from the Nightosphere," Marceline is familiar with the production of chords, which is a technique not normally employed by bass players.
Marceline has three bass guitars, one seen in "Evicted!", a Butterfly Bass seen in "Heat Signature," and her Axe-Bass in "Henchman" and "It Came from the Nightosphere." She seems to be most attached to and protective of her Axe-Bass. The Axe-Bass is supposedly a family heirloom as mentioned by her father in "It Came from the Nightosphere," and it was originally a weapon before Marceline modified it. It is shown in "Daddy's Little Monster" that she also plays and has a banjolele, or banjo ukelele. Though she has amplifiers, she doesn't usually need to plug her instruments into them.

Relationship
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Finn
Though they were initially enemies, Finn and Marceline soon befriend one another. Marceline acts as a bully in her debut episode "Evicted!," she is impressed by Finn's brave aggression and defiance and chooses to kiss him on the cheek after they fight. Both Marceline and Finn share the same spark for adventure and love of danger and excitement. Marceline is very good friends with Finn and seems to trust him and be very comfortable with him.
One of the reasons Finn and Marceline befriend each other is that Finn saved Marceline's life in "Henchman" when Jake exposed her to the sunlight and threw garlic at her in a misguided attempt to help his friend Finn. However, though they are now friends, Marceline still seems to care about her Axe-Bass more than him, as seen in "It Came from the Nightosphere." In "Go With Me," Marceline makes it clear she does not want to date Finn, but Finn explains that he didn't want to date her either. They go to the movies together, but only as friends. Recently, Marceline has expressed that she does indeed care for Finn's well being. This is exemplified in "Heat Signature," where she becomes more protective of Finn when her ghost friends prank him and Jake too far on what started to be a harmless "vampire initiation."
It is revealed in "Marceline's Closet" that Marceline sometimes still hides out in Finn and Jake's Tree Fort. In the same episode, Finn sees Marceline naked as she is about to take a shower, resulting in Finn being very flustered.
In the episode "Daddy's Little Monster" Marceline's father states that he thinks that her friends, meaning Finn and Jake, are ok. After she finds this out she jests to Finn that she doesn't want to hang out with him anymore.

Jake

Marceline Scaring Jake in her Wolf Form

An avid trickster, Marceline cannot avoid scaring Jake when their two paths meet. Seeing his completely rational fear of vampires, Marceline often teases Jake and intentionally horrifies him when the chance is given. This perpetual bullying comes back to haunt Marceline, however, when Jake refuses to believe in her generally wholesome ways and almost fatally wounds her in "Henchman." Since then the two have seemed to intentionally avoid one another: Jake hides in Finn's pocket when he's with Marceline in "It Came From the Nightosphere." However, later in season two, Jake gets over his fear, and he is often seen hanging out with Finn and Marceline as friends. He might even be fully considered a friend as evidenced in the beginning of "Memory of a Memory," when after the Rag Wizard (Ash in disguise) informs Finn and Jake that Marceline is the one in trouble, he begins running faster, and later in the episode, when they run into the young Marceline and she asks who they are, Finn says "We're Finn and Jake!" then Jake says "We're your friends. "Also, in "Go With Me," he called her "babe." It is still notable, however, that Jake still holds some level of fear for Marceline, as seen on "Marceline's Closet," where he was noticeably scared of what she would do to them upon the realization that he and Finn broke into her house and hid in her closet.

Hunson Abadeer

Marceline holds a grudge against her father because he ate her fries, as described in Marceline's Fry song. She also said that she didn't think that her father cared about her or loved her, which was probably more hurtful than the fry stealing. (This was made more explicit in Rebecca Sugar's original draft of the song, widely available on the Internet.) When he steals her Axe-Bass, her hatred of him grows. After learning how she really feels through her song, Marceline's father tells her he loves her, and she says she loves him too. They appear to have reconciled for the time being. However, she still prefers that her father remains in his prison in the Nightosphere, because it is too "emotionally exhausting" when he is around. They have a classic teenage-daughter-to-father relationship. In "Daddy's Little Monster", on Jake's video phone, Marceline asks Finn and Jake if they want to party in the Nightosphere. Finn is reluctant because he still thinks her father is crazy, but she assures that he is "cool", perhaps meaning that they are on better terms. Later in the episode after Finn and Jake free Marceline from the Nightosphere amulet's control, she is shocked that her dad fooled her into wearing it. Marceline's father confesses that he only wanted to be proud of her, and Marceline tells her dad that she wants him to be proud of her as she is. He says he is proud of her, and smiles, so they may have worked out their issues.

Schwabl

Marceline has a pet zombie poodle named Schwabl. Seen briefly in her house in the episode "It Came from the Nightosphere," Schwabl was lying in the living room when Finn and Marceline were doing a song. It walked up and went to another room once Finn started beat-boxing. Pendleton Ward has confirmed that Schwabl was based on his friend Marie's dog Schwabble. Schwabble is a white male poodle that has recently passed away, and is seen on the show as Marceline's dog that roams around her house. There is a small dog door for it in the kitchen.
In "Marceline's Closet," there is a doggy door in the front that Jake uses to get into Marceline's house while Finn and Jake were playing "Cloud Hunt" (AKA Hide n' Seek)

Princess Bubblegum

According to the original series pitch document, Marceline and Princess Bubblegum have a 'friendly rivalry' (AKA frenemy relationship).

Marceline and PB arguing in "What was Missing"

PB shows discomfort around Marceline and appears to disapprove of her creepy ways, while Marceline simply responds to this disapproval with mock affability, even teasing her with Bubblegum's first name of "Bonnibel" and inability to show someone a good time like her
The two can clash easily, as-seen in "What Was Missing", when Marceline sang "I'm Just Your Problem" directed towards Princess Bubblegum, and spat on her jacket in the midst of a heated and highly emotional argument. In the same episode, it is revealed that Princess Bubblegum's stolen item is a t-shirt Marceline gave to her some time ago. The princess says she sleeps in the shirt as pajamas, causing Marceline to blush, something she only does when feeling very emotional, which is visible in a few episodes. This resulted in much fan speculation about the nature of their relationship, which was later boosted by the controversial web video by Mathematical!. Princess Bubblegum and Marceline's past relationship will be further explored in the comic, Adventure Time: Marceline and the Scream Queens, where they form a band.

Ash

Ash and Marceline

Ash is Marceline's ex-boyfriend. They lived in Finn and Jake's Tree Fort together before they moved in. Ash performed spells to impress Marceline and called her "Mar-Mar." Eventually Ash sold Hambo, a teddy bear, Marceline's beloved childhood toy, resulting in her becoming enraged and dumping him. In "Memory of a Memory," Ash poses as the Rag Wizard and pretends Marceline is under a sleep spell in order to trick Finn and Jake into removing the memory of the breakup. She then falls back in love with him, but once Finn shows and explains the situation, she becomes enraged again and kicks Ash in the groin, followed by a heavy pummeling by her and Finn, and later Jake. He does not respect her at all, as he only wants to use her to make him dinner and do other chores. They seem to share a punk-like style.

BMO

It seems that Marceline and BMO have a fairly friendly relationship, she is seen playing it in "Evicted!" and comments on how she thinks it's cute. Also in the episode "What Was Missing" Marceline assists BMO and proceeds to call it "baby."

Ice King

Though Marceline and Ice King seem to have no relationship and have never interacted with each other on-screen In "Holly Jolly Secrets Part II," he was heard singing Marceline's Fry Song. Also, Marceline has a gender-swapped character (Marshall Lee) in "Adventure Time with Fionna and Cake", which means that Ice King knows Marceline. It seems as though Marceline does not know him, but the Ice King may have heard of her, possibly from Finn and Jake.

Episodes featured

Major appearances

Minor appearances

Marceline's songs

Trivia

Marceline did not appear in the Animated Short with all the other main characters, although she is still considered one.
Pen Ward stated that Marceline is his favorite character because she is very mysterious.^[13]
Marceline plays the bass guitar with her left hand. However, she is ambidextrous, like Finn.
Marceline's name is based on Pendleton Ward's friend, Marie, whose middle name is Marceline. Pen described Marie as someone who likes the horror movie Psycho and dark clothing.^[14]
In "Heat Signature," she states that vampires cannot beat ghosts because, "It's like a rock, paper, scissors thing."
It is revealed in "What Was Missing" that Marceline may heal rapidly. When she was exposed to the sunlight in this episode, she quickly evaded and the wounds healed.
In Marceline's Journal Song Marceline states she does not have friends, even though Finn and Jake are her friends; though, the journal covers five hundred years of her life and may be referring to an earlier time.
In "The Duke," you can see that Marceline is seated along with the other royals at the Grand Meeting of Ooo Royalty showing that her status as vampire queen is recognized by the kingdoms of Ooo.
She is the most difficult character to work with for Jesse Moynihan.^[15]
In the intro, Marceline has blunt teeth before she opens her mouth but Marshall Lee doesn't.

Appearances in other media

Marceline has an exosuit in the gameProject Exonaut.
Marceline is the final boss in the game Righteous Quest 2.
In the game Legends of Ooo, she appears to have a coat, an undead gardener, and also an undead cleaner.
Her age was the answer to one of Gaia Online's ten trivia contests to answer to try to win a first season DVD set.

Marceline's Diary

Sunday, September 30, 2012

Marceline's Biography