#and he hasn’t completely unearned his bad reputation

[daydreamerdrew]

The Incredible Hulk (1968) #253

[sweetcloverheart]

Clover Rants Miraculously: Painting With The Same Brush

You know, I think the most saddest (and kind of funny in an ironic way) things about “Derision” and other episodes/scenes like it is that in the writers attempts to get Chloe to seem “irredeemably evil” to the audience, all they’ve done is make the rest of the cast look bad. Like those scenes don’t effect my view of her because the show already told us Chloe was a brat and bully from the get-go, so learning about the date prank and her forcing Marinette to stay home and the entire plot of “Collusion” and “Confrontation” just come off as learning nothing new. Complete net-zero information. Meanwhile...

Bustier (and by extension Damocles and Mendeleiev) looks like an even worse teacher for ignoring her misbehavior and constantly putting the onus on Marinette to solve the issue if things were this bad already, especially when “Revelation” shows she’s so oblivious to the things going on in class that she's actually genuinely shocked Chloe hasn’t been doing her own homework for the entirety of her middle school career and then some. Like I know the fandom likes to joke that she’s a kindergarten teacher at the wrong school and “haha public education sucks because teachers bad” but DAMN woman, are you telling me you never side-eyed how similar Sabrina and “Chloe” homework tended to be even once (or maybe Sabrina’s just that good at forging handwriting like I often headcanon)? Just how little is FD’s overall funding that no one ever tried double checking this stuff?! No wonder Chloe treats y’all like a joke!

The class comes off as pretty fairweather/uncaring as Marinette was being bullied by Chloe for years (especially since it was stated in canon that Marinette had no friends until “Origins”) but only are only now seem to care about it. Even with the potential excuse of “Well Marinette grew a backbone/they’re less scared of Chloe now”, “Derision” showed the kids cared less about Chloe’s opinion than they do now and were willing to comfort Marinette after the prank, so what was stopping them from openly helping her out up until “Origins”?

The school faculty, despite Chloe having a reputation for exaggerating things and being purposely petty when demanding “punishments” when she feels slighted, constantly not only immediately believing her when she’s clearly making stuff up, but also still refusing to put their foots down (waiting until the grand coincidence of an Akumatized!Bustier forcing Andre to step down as opposed to, IDK, showing solidarity and care for their students by choosing to refuse Chloe’s demands and meeting her threats head on?). Again, what is the school paying you for?

Kim looks like a complete jerk now seeing as how he doesn’t seem to see anything wrong with that he did to Marinette in “Derision” and gives a rather poor apology afterwards - one he had to be shamed into rather than realizing and giving it on his own. Heck the only reason he even gets Akumatized over it is because everyone else was riding him on how messed up it was and he got fed up with it. It also kind of puts into question why Marinette is so friendly with him/still gave him a Miraculous if he participated in what was such a traumatic event for her. And that’s not even getting into poor Ondine having to hear her own boyfriend call another girl (whom is established as a huge jerk) “The prettiest girl in the world” Kim bby I’m so sorry the writers are doing you so dirty

Sabrina’s upgrade to Miraculous holder/her redemption feels even more unearned now because like above, she shows no remorse for her actions in “Derision” or the bullying she’s been (willingly in some parts) participating in for the last four seasons and before then, and only ends up leaving Chloe because Lila takes her spot as Chloe’s bestie and she hated having to share (and because their latest scheme in “Collusion” potentially involved jail time for her if they got caught) instead of genuine disgust at Chloe’s growing nastiness or her own mistreatment because of it. All those years of waiting and fics about Sabrina finally breaking free and realizing she could be better - rewarded with her instead abandoning Chloe to save her own skin and hopping onto the SS.Marinette because it benefited her more (and again, doesn’t involve jail time) rather than genuine regret of her actions. So inspiring

Andre basically allowed Chloe to get away with using his position as mayor to mistreat her classmates+the citizens and flaunt her status as his daughter for years, and only starts caring/putting his foot down when she starts doing it to Zoe and only for Zoe (the “good” non-blood daughter that the original script had him state he “liked better”) before he immediately abandons her to Audrey the first chance he gets, despite understanding what a terrible and abusive person his wife is - And let’s not forget him calling his 14 year old daughter that he raised “heartless” and terrible (to the man who frequently overrides his own child’s freewill with magic mind you). What’s worse is that the show plays this off like it’s his reward for having “suffered” under Chloe’s demands and that it’s all her fault he’s a terrible mayor (like he hadn’t often willingly broken laws or abused his position on his own with no prompting from her for his personal benefit). I’m sure all the neglectful dads who replace affection towards their children with gifts and indulgences watching feel totally respected and represented now.

Poor Sabine and Tom already get a bad enough rep as it is thanks to some of the story decisions made *COUGH*A//doration*COUGH*Ladybug*COUGHCOUGH*, but now we’ve been basically informed that they knew Marinette was being bullied to the point of actually pretending to be sick and...did nothing. And not even in a “We want to help but we’re limited thanks to school bureaucracy and/or our own financial situation” way but at “Yeah we know you’re terrified of your classmate tormenting you again and that this constant slew of harassment from all sides is slowly destroying your mental health but we’re just gonna tell you to buck up”. Yeah, they gave her Socqueline keeping an eye out but that ultimately ended up doing nothing to really protect her in the end

Zoe, for all her goodness and being portrayed as a “better redeemed!Chloe” as her claim to fame, does nothing to make good on her promise to love Chloe no matter what in “Queen Banana” and watches her half-sister being abandoned by her entire immediate family while reaping all the benefits from it (Not to say that’s her fault or she’s required to, just that it’s...well, not a good look for her tbh). While Zoe isn’t obligated to put up with Chloe’s mistreatment (and she isn’t), it def makes her look super hypocritical to claim to love Chloe “even if the whole world hates [her]” and then do/say nothing as her stepdad basically leaves her half sister to suffer from the same fate she escaped from in New York.

Adrien, despite having a front row seat to how awful and nasty Chloe can be to people who aren’t him and watching her torment his classmates for the past 9 months in canon, only now ends their friendship - and over an event that happened a year ago when he wasn’t there that she isn’t sorry for, when she’s been doing worse since he arrived with no remorse then either, with his only response back then being to chuckle and go “Chloe will never change” like a wistful friend. After 5 whole seasons of handwaving his handwaving of Chloe’s bullying, they only now have him care, with the catalyst being that Marinette won’t give him happy-smoochy-times because of whatever happened - and then make it worst by having him try to kill Kim for it, after having him have a near mental breakdown over accidentally giving the terrorist responsible for every one of his current life issues a death sentence with the same method (and also trying to do it to another akuma victim). My sincerest condolences Adrien please join Kim in the “You got screwed badly by the episode narrative” corner

Like, I genuinely have to wonder how they wrote out those episodes and thought anyone involved looked good afterwards. Peoples opinions on Chloe can’t sink any lower than they already are (and if they can, that’s mostly because they already disliked her), but you aren’t making her look worse by slinging mud on everyone else, even unintentionally.