#ml chloe

[yhwcomeback]

Queen bee

[treshchotka]

Top miraculous ladybug character I hate the least, so I think they deserve to get redesigns. Yes, Kim is my fave. Yes, Alix has a snake miraculous. Yes, Luka is in the burrow, i dont care about him. Yes, Chloe and Nate don't have superheroes versions here, sorry, I was lazy plus their suits are already peak

I haven't watched season 6 yet. Every coincidence with canon is accidental (or not), I will draw more background characters later, they are more interesting for me than adrianette anyway

Part 2

Commission open

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[chillthingswarmcoffee]

The Chloe Bourgeois Problem

(Warning: I talk about season 6 but I don’t think this spoils the episode that much)

I genuinely think “Queen of the Dreadzone” perfectly exposes one of the biggest problems with how Miraculous has handled Chloé Bourgeois for years now: the show no longer treats her like a real character. She’s a caricature.

Not a person with motivations, contradictions, emotional damage, or even coherent villainy. Just a walking billboard screaming “THIS GIRL IS IRREDEEMABLE BTW.” And the episode repeats it over and over and over again like the writers are terrified the audience might still have sympathy for her.

What makes it frustrating is that the episode itself accidentally highlights why people *do* still care about Chloé. Because underneath all the exaggerated evil nonsense, the actual situation she’s in is deeply sad. Her mother and this weird new older brother figure are both adults who are blatantly exploiting this CHILD for attention, influence, and power. Audrey literally treats her own daughter like an object whose only value is finally being “useful.” Chloé is a child being emotionally manipulated by every adult around her, yet the framing of the episode expects us to hate her instead of recognizing how horrific that dynamic actually is.

The episode constantly pauses to remind viewers that Chloé is hated, unwanted, pathetic, stupid, irredeemable, alone. It’s excessive to the point where it becomes uncomfortable because it stops feeling organic. We already understood her downfall seasons ago. Why does the show keep insisting on humiliating her?

Especially because Miraculous already made its decision about Chloé back in season 5. They made her a political caricature, turned her into an absurd dictator figure, and completely burned down any realistic path toward redemption. Fine. That ship has sailed. But if the writers were going to commit to making her a villain permanently, why strip away every interesting part of her character in the process?

That’s the thing that bothers me most: Chloé is not allowed complexity anymore.

Early Chloé worked because she was cruel *and* insecure. Entitled *and* desperate for affection. She was emotionally stunted, deeply lonely, obsessed with validation, and constantly trying to imitate the toxic behavior modeled by Audrey. None of this excused her actions, but it made her understandable. Her dynamic with Ladybug, her desperate need to feel special, and her moments of genuine vulnerability gave the audience something compelling to latch onto. Even people who didn’t want a redemption arc could still acknowledge that there was an actual person there.

Now she’s written like a parody of herself.

Every scene in “Queen of the Dreadzone” goes out of its way to make her not just evil, but ridiculous. She can’t simply be manipulative or dangerous; she also has to be stupid, loud, incompetent, emotionally flat, and constantly mocked by the narrative itself. Compare that to someone like Lila, who the show treats with actual narrative respect. Lila gets to be calculating, composed, intimidating, and intelligent. Chloé, meanwhile, is reduced to comic relief evil. The writers seem determined to erase the possibility that she was ever nuanced in the first place.

And honestly? That’s a way less interesting direction.

A failed redemption arc could have been fascinating if the show had actually committed to exploring the complexity of that. Imagine if Chloé becoming someone genuinely dangerous and important to the overarching narrative after her failed redemption arc. That would have been tragic. That would have preserved the emotional themes tied to her character while still allowing her to become a villain.

Instead, the show treats her like a joke.

What makes it worse is how every adult in her life contributes to her destruction while escaping accountability themselves. Audrey emotionally abuses and humiliates her daughter for years. André consistently fails to parent her, enables her behavior, then eventually abandons her emotionally and publicly denounces her. And somehow he still gets framed as sympathetic because he redirects all his care and emotional stability toward Zoé, a child who essentially functions as a narrative replacement for the daughter he gave up on.

That dynamic is honestly one of the bleakest parts of Chloé’s storyline.

The show keeps insisting Chloé was “born bad,” but almost every aspect of her behavior can be traced back to neglect, emotional abandonment, toxic role models, and conditional love. Again, that doesn’t excuse what she’s done. But the series refusing to engage with that reality while simultaneously showcasing it onscreen creates this bizarre disconnect where the narrative wants us to condemn her without actually thinking critically about how she became this way.

And that’s why episodes like “Queen of the Dreadzone” feel so frustrating for a lot of fans. Not because people desperately need Chloé redeemed, but because the show itself refuses to treat her with narrative honesty anymore. She isn’t written like a human being allowed to fail. She’s written like a target.

Which is ironic, because the harder the show tries to convince the audience that Chloé is nothing more than an evil caricature, the more obvious it becomes that there was once a genuinely compelling character underneath all of this.

With all of this said, please writers if you’re not gonna do anything interesting with Chloe, just let her go 💀

[dumblr-account]

Chloe Bourgeois and the Lovable Jerk Archetype

So I just watched a video analysis about how to write a lovable jerk, y’know, as you do, and as the person broke down the different components of how this archetype is created, it grew more apparent to me how Astruc accidentally created this type of character in Chloe, and how the story decisions with her in seasons four and five actually only exacerbated this unintentional portrayal of her character (and maybe even potentially why many people find Marinette so difficult to like or even tolerate). Let me explain through the criteria given in this video!

credit to squampopulous for the analysis video

Step 1: Distance

The first step listed is the idea of creating distance between the character and the audience, pretty much the opposite of what you would do with an empathetic or relatable character. This often means the character moves so far from what the audience would expect from the real world, whether it be logic or morality, to make the jerkiness as absurd and over-the-top as possible that the audience ends up amused rather than disgusted. This is a large part how villains like Disney’s Hades or Dreamworks’ Big Jack Horner become so entertaining, or why audiences become so enthralled by Kuzco. This is something Chloe has done since her very first episode! The ways she bullies and hurts the characters in the show are so far removed from how actual bullies and privileged rich kids work that no one can (or at least, no one should) take her seriously!

In fact, on a side note, I can see this is how Marinette has become so unlikable for many people! Aside from the fact that she is intended to be a protagonist, which inherently closes at least some distance, she is also meant to be empathized with, which puts the audience in close proximity to her as a character! If you’re the type of person to relate to her struggles and insecurities, then this close proximity works perfectly, but if an audience member doesn’t have such a quality, it all falls apart! This is a major factor in why viewers might be harsher with her actions than characters like Chloe or Lila: because we have closer distance, we grow higher standards for her!

Another disadvantage Marinette has to Chloe in this category is when her actions reach familiarity. While most of Chloe’s actions feel far too absurd to ever occur in any real scenario, such as becoming a dictator mayor as a teenager, many of the actions of Marinette’s get uncomfortably close to immoralities we see in life, such as sabotaging your crush’s other love interests for the sole purpose of becoming that person’s only option. And to make matters worse, the recent seasons have continued to draw more attention to these actions rather than exaggerating them, as seen in episodes like Derision or Sublimation! By narrowing the distance between us and our protagonist’s actions in how familiar we are with such immoralities in the real world, it gives significantly less leeway for suspension of disbelief! So it’s not hypocrisy that leads to more permissible parameters for Chloe than Marinette, it’s just the basic rules of storytelling.

Step 2: Authenticity

The second step mentioned is this idea of the lovable jerk shamelessly owning up to their jerk actions and in fact pushing forward on their behaviors and actions! This was demonstrated in the video by comparing the storyboard version of Woody throwing Buzz out the window versus how Kuzco got the old man thrown out his window. While storyboard!Woody tried to deny his actions which in turn horrified the executives the scene was pitched to, Kuzco’s refusal to back down or deny his actions made his scene much more comedic to watch! This is yet another aspect Chloe nails perfectly! Even when she tries to pretend she already got Adrien a birthday present in the Bubbler, the fact that she used an annoyance for workers struggling to carry it adds a level of shameless jerkiness that turns into amusement rather than appall for the audience, not all that different from how the video described Kuzco’s sincerity about his insincerity when he lied to Pacha.

This is also another aspect that demonstrates how Marinette fails as a dubious protagonist! Because the characters and herself are so in denial of her having any potential to be a bad person, this makes any and every bad action she performs stick out like a sore thumb! So every time Astruc or a Maripologist spews another excuse or justification for this character, it only makes those who notice the corruptness of her actions more bitter and horrified!

Step 3: Time Limit

Technically, this step doesn’t really apply for Miraculous Ladybug, or at least it shouldn’t. The fact that this show is written to be pretty much never ending means that we shouldn’t really have expectations for any limited time with this show. Furthermore, considering how the first season or so of this show was written to be comedic and episodic, no time limit should be established. Take Candace from Phineas and Ferb as an example. Although she does get small moments of development throughout the show, and she does acknowledge the passage of time and repetition in the episodic formula, she never really moves beyond her role as the control freak sister who wants to bust her brothers, and the audience loves her for it!

So, if this show was indeed written to be an episodic cartoon with wacky hijinxes and silly kids lessons, then characters like Chloe or Marinette would not be characters we expect to develop beyond the roles they were placed in from the very first episode! Marinette would be the insecure yet well meaning protagonist who learns a life lesson each episode, and Chloe would be the jerk bully/rival who exists for the sole purpose of antagonizing our protagonist and getting in the way of her goals!

Unfortunately, this is not what the show decided to do! Because they made the mistake of having Chloe want to be a superhero and even idolize Ladybug. This was the aspect that ultimately determined whether she was perceived as a Jack Horner or a Kuzco. Let me explain. If they truly wanted us to believe Chloe was a villainous character with no capacity for good or heroism, the writers could have portrayed her as skewing her perception of Ladybug to align more with her predeterminate selfish and bratty ideals, or have her be motivated to be a hero for the sole purpose of fame or attention!

Instead, from the moment they introduce her being a fan of Ladybug, they make it clear that she admires Ladybug’s heroism! And because she is established as a sincere and shameless character, with the plot never giving sufficient evidence to the contrary, this intrigues the audience into believing there is more to her! Not to mention, in the two-parter of Queen’s Battle, instead of going the Jack Horner route of leaning further into Chloe’s jerkiness and literally any selfish motives she might have, the story instead portrayed Chloe’s primary motivation and driving force behind her actions as approval, whether it be from her mother or Ladybug! This was only made worse in Maledictator by conveying her genuine insecurity of being useless. And these qualities continued to persist throughout the rest of Season 2 and the entirety of Season 3 every time she brought Queen Bee up. By giving her a deeper and less jerk-like motivation, coupled by moments of sincere selflessness, this gave the audience the impression that she had a genuine capacity for change. So when the Miracle Queen finale and seasons after tried to back out and insist she is just evil, it’s far too late. The audience already saw her vulnerability and sincerity, and the writers didn’t take the proper steps to portray or reveal her as insincere for these moments!

Now let’s look at Marinette. Instead of preserving her initial role as the flawed yet well meaning protagonist, or portraying any growth into a righteous and upstanding hero, the episodes and plot progression shows her choosing her own self interests over others time and time again! How are we supposed to see Miracle Queen as a testament to Chloe’s irredeemability when the very thing that catalyzed this event was Marinette’s desire to get in between Adrien and Kagami’s romance, while Chloe was motivated by saving her parents? By repeatedly portraying Marinette in self serving ways that get rewarded, this leads to her jerkiness outweighing any likability she might have had in her first episode!

And that’s it for this analysis! I dunno if this is actually any good, and if you disagree with anything I said, that’s perfectly valid! You are not a terrible person if you do relate to Marinette, or you genuinely despise Chloe with every fiber of your being! This analysis was made with the sole purpose of examining fiction through the general parameters of storytelling that are used to influence the audience’s perception of said characters. But hey, if anything I referenced or talked about does interest you, you can watch the original video below! It most certainly explains these elements of a lovable jerk far better than I could ever attempt to! If you did in fact read through this longass post word for word, thank you so much for sparing me so much of your time in your average scrolling and skimming of posts, I appreciate it! Have a fantastic day!

[same-name-supremacy]

I’ve been watching Miraculous Ladybug and I have some problems with it so being totally original and made my own version!

Hope you like my designs! (I hate this show but I can’t stop watching it)

[rusik-usik-art]

Noe, Zoe, Chloe :3

[scrivello-10]

is this a safe space to say that I don’t think Chloé was ever getting a redemption, and that the fans collectively agreed she would, and got mad that it didn’t happen

like her behavior is easily identifiable; her bullying stems from her wanting Audrey to notice and love her, and the good she did do came from admiration of Ladybug

she looked up to Ladybug, so its understandable that she would want to appear as good in her eyes

it even could’ve been chalked up to that she hated Hawk Moth more than she did everyone else

but she never really changed as a person outside of her hero work; she had her moments where her “bully-ness” seeped into her hero work, and moments where her hero-side seeped into her personal life

her losing her miraculous stemmed from her revealing her identity publicly, which was an attempt to gain admiration from the people she didn’t receive it from

I personally feel like Chloé’s rise and fall was well written; one of the few good things in her life was being Queen Bee, but due to circumstances she created, that was taken from her

when Hawk Moth then later approached her with the miraculous, she chose to accept it (like she’s 14, so her doing this is plausible imo; teens aren’t always making the best choices)

considering that Zoé’s transformation for Vesperia was storyboarded during S2, it wasn’t some random decision to take the miraculous away from Chloé; they most likely plotted Chloé’s arc and Zoé’s introduction prior to S2 even releasing

with that all being said, they HEAVILY butchered Chloé’s character in S4 and S5

I can understand where the upset surrounding Chloé comes from, but bottom line is that

1. it’s Astruc’s show. he wrote it intentionally, so Chloé not living up to the fandom’s expectations is the fandom’s problem, not Astruc or any of the other writers

2. there is always a possibility that Chloé does change in the future, but the more people complain about it, the less likely that’ll happen

[kitty-bugaboo]

This is very scary