Miraculous Ladybug

It also brings into question the addition of her Hidden Depths and sympathetic backstory

They're rather superfluous if she really is 100% unredeemable

Could we get some links to where Astruc said that Chloe wasn't redeemable? I'd like to be sure that he actually said that and that it isn't a case fans misinterpreting things or making up stuff.

This is the most famous example, a now-deleted tweet.◊

However, even the tweets he still has up are saying the same. Just look here.

It also brings into question the addition of her Hidden Depths and sympathetic backstory. They're rather superfluous if she really is 100% unredeemable

Astruc appears to be saying that the point is that she could have been redeemable if she so chose, which is why the Hidden Depths and sympathetic backstory exist, to show that there is a legitimate chance for redemption...and then she ends up irredeemable solely by her own willful choices, her own insistence on sticking to her ways. It's basically a subversion of the "Hidden Depths + sympathetic backstory = Redemption" formula. Sometimes bad people stay bad.

Wait, really? Then what was the point of Lila? The two of them occupy the exact same character slot.

Not really. Chloe is the all-purpose Alpha Bitch who can be openly antagonistic, while Lila's more of a one-trick pony (lies) and is a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing / Villain with Good Publicity.

Edited by Isaac_Heller on Apr 8th 2020 at 5:32:11 AM

I actually kinda like that, since the first episode explaining her sympathetic backstory also had it where people had to force her to act nice, not with any real self reflection. I don't think there was one moment where her doing good deeds wasn't in part because she wanted something.

I think Zombizou a bit at the end, but that might be it.

The first tweet outlines, I think, what we see in the show. They were going to redeem Chloe, or at least make her a better person, and then changed their minds.

Those are good descriptions, but they're not different narrative niches.

Having different slants on the same concept, different reasons or different personality quirks is all well and good, but the character still collide with each other in terms of what they actually do for the plot.

Lila's niche was, at first: "what if Chloe was eviller and more competent," probably in response to them no longer really being able to have Marinette's character be bothered by Chloe the way she was at the series' open: hence, a school antagonist that could upset Marinette, could actively be aligned with Hawkmoth and could be openly obstructive. These are all things that Chloe does, but accidentally and increasingly formulaic returns, hence the changeup.

This also resulted Chloe being slowly shifted over to a new role, hence the Queen Bee stuff and the sympathetic backstory and the episode (Zombizou) that outright lampshades her usual role in the series and directs her to change.

But then plans changed. They decided they preferred Chloe to stay the same after all. And you can see that in the last season finale, where Chloe gets a plot and conclusion you would more expect Lila to get.

This results in a very noticeably problem that Lila, a character designed to occupy a harsher version of Chloe's niche, is rendered obsolete if Chloe goes back to that role again. Most likely, we're going to see Lila change to be a somewhat different character going forward as well to avoid overlapping: either a different kind of villain, or something else. Either that, or she'll just be phased out.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2020 at 6:44:17 AM

I think thats exactly the problem many people have with it.

In real life people change their minds all the time, but when the whole story seems to go into one direction and then retracs... it's jarring.

I can totally believe that chloe was taking steps foward and then decided "why bother". I can even accept a store where characters who can chose not to be redeemed. But I can't take a story where a character is encouraged to get better, the story celebrates it; but once they revert back, nobody seems surprised.

The whole point of chloe being a lesson for those who think everybody can change, falls flat; when you consider that the only people who tried to make her better were her buttler, Ms. Bustier and Marinette (for a while). And in the end nobody felt hurt that she decided to go full villian.

She hurt people, but nobody was sad or dissapointed about the fact it was she especifically who did it.

Also, Chloe also protected Sabrina from an akuma during the sentibug episode. She also refused the Ladybug power from Miraculer; and while she probably did it cause she wanted to fight alongside the heroes, that was still better than what se did during Miracle Queen...

You know what, I can't totally see Chloe becoming evil, I just wish it was a change that actually mattered and hope she doesn't just come back to being a simple alpha bitch.

Just out of curiosity, do you think the next season will be shown with a more coherent order or...?

I just watched Startrain. There was some nice lore in this episode. We learned that a) there is a distance limit on the akuma, b) Hawkmoth can de-transform while the akuma is still going, and c) the akuma can still akumatize people even without a connection to Hawkmoth. I would not have expected that.

Also this episode was obviously meant to go before Party Crasher and Feast. I still can't believe they screwed up the episode order that badly. It's like this are basically happening at random at this point.

Timetagger: Well speaking of things being out of order...

I'm not quite sure what happened in this episode. I also have expected Pigeon Guy to find a butterfly at the end, implying he would be Future Hawkmoth.

P.S. The scene with Lila at the end seems like it might be setting up a season finale story arc, but with the way the episode order this season was completely scrambled, who knows?

Edit: We already knew that akumas work even after Hawkmoth de-transforms due to The Collector. I forgot about that.

Edited by storyyeller on Apr 8th 2020 at 12:21:02 PM

Maybe you should watch the episodes in order.

Good luck, I think they're out of order even on Netflix.

I'm watching the episodes on Netflix, so I'm limited to whatever the official order is. It's not my fault that someone decided to stick Party Crasher in the first half of season 3.

Damnit. You can't skip around manually?

Well given that the first half of season 3 was released before the second half of season 3, no.

You can of course watch episodes within a half-season in any order, but there's no indication of what the "intended" order of the episodes was. The people who decided on the episode order clearly screwed it up for no reason, and there's not much we viewers can do about it.

Update: I've now finished season 3. Time to start waiting for season 4!

Edited by storyyeller on Apr 11th 2020 at 1:01:06 PM

This show is weird for me. I mean it has such incredible fan content, especially art, and its ideas are pretty interesting, but when I actually watch an episode, I am for the most part turned off. Even Chat Blanc, an episode I have heard so much praise about, didn't do much for me. And yet, when I watch the PV or another video in which the developers talk about the show, and there is concept art and early animation, I am mezmorized. Ehhh maybe Season 4 will catch my full attention, what with Marinette being the guardian and all.

Which speech from Hawk Moth do y'all like the most?

Whichever one it was he did from the bathroom.

Was that the one where he was on the train?

I think so.

Now that I gotta see. XD

In other news, I have now finished the second season. :)

Edited by Demetrios on Apr 17th 2020 at 11:05:23 AM

Thinking about it, the way Paris looks like Chat Blanc gives me Evangelion 3.0 vibes.

So I had to go on a clean-up spree around pages because the character of Lila was constantly linked to The Sociopath, and there are three big problems with that: first is this is Alternative Character Interpretation - Implied at best, second is that the show is not over yet and we may get new information about her that debunks her being a sociopath which would make it really embarrassing to have that link everywhere her name is mentioned, and third is that it reads like it was done by the many fans perpetually butt-hurt over that goddamn "Chameleon" episode, which is nothing new as far as cartoon plots go and yet somehow everyone lost their shit over it. I also had to ax entries saying Lila was Eviler than Thou to Hawk Moth just because she's totally selfish and he at least wants to "save" his wife, ignoring that Lila hasn't come close to inflicting or even attempting the kind of damage Hawk Moth has and that his goal is not altruistic at all considering how many lives it would screw over just so one guy can cheat at life and get his wife back.

Lila, like Chloe, is awful, but the occasional team-ups with Hawk Moth aside, they're just teenage mean girls. People need to get some perspective and stop blowing things out of proportion. I've come across many others who feel the same way, so I added a Critical Backlash entry about it.

Edited by Isaac_Heller on May 2nd 2020 at 8:40:55 AM

I would've brought that up on the series' discussion page or here on the forum before going through all the trouble. Given that your approach towards the tropes involved is finnicky in some places, that's liable to get undone eventually.

The most obvious of which being that unless the plot actually notes or establishes that them being teenagers impedes their moral compass, how old the characters are is irrelevant to how evil they are. Hence the existence of tropes like Enfant Terrible.

Not to mention that if you're going to go around erasing examples of The Sociopath based on characters simply being cruely and lacking in empathy rather than full on established sociopathy, you're going to have a lot of work ahead of you behind this one show - as that's the way the trope is generally used on our site. Especially if you're just doing so under the perception that people who added it are "butthurt."

Edited by KnownUnknown on May 2nd 2020 at 9:22:02 AM

To be honest, I'm not sure why generically evil characters need to be potholed to The Sociopath to begin with. Luckily, I haven't seen any of that first hand.

I never made those entries, but I would say that Lila certainly acts like the sociopath, while Gabriel, well, doesn't. Neither that, nor Eviler than Thou about amount of damage you do, but about attitude. Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds is a sympathetic trope that is rather incompatible with Eviler than Thou, but extremely destructive, after all.

You say that the show could reveal new information, and yes, it could. But that would not change the fact that she's been portrayed a certain way until now. I mean, Gabriel could theoretically be revealed to have been mind controlled this entire time and to have a completely different personality, but that would not mean people were wrong to trope him