Chameleon (Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir)

"Chameleon" is the first episode and the season premiere of Season 3 of Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir. Its US premiere was on August 1, 2019, on Netflix and June 1, 2020, on Disney Channel.

"Chameleon (Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir)"
Behold, the episode that started the downfall of the series and flanderization of Lila.
Series: Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir Part of Season: 3 Episode Number: 1 Air Date: August 1, 2019 (Netflix) June 1, 2020 (Disney Channel) Writer: Thomas Astruc Mélanie Duval Fred Lenoir Sébastien Thibaudeau Director: Wilfried Pain Jun Violet Previous episode: Mayura: Heroes' Day Next episode: Animaestro

Plot

Marinette and Adrien confront Lila with her lies, so she asks Hawk Moth to akumatize her into Chameleon, a new villain determined to destroy Ladybug.

Why It Sucks

1. Lila is at her absolute worst in this episode, as she threatened to abandon Marinette, get her to have no friends left, and steal Adrien from her. While being akumatized by Hawk Moth into the titular villain, she impersonated Adrien, stuffed him in his locker, and went to insult Nino and steal his cap from him.
   • Lila is also a hypocrite in this episode as she wants to be loved by Adrien as his girlfriend, yet she impersonated Adrien and tried to make him look bad in front of his friends, including Nino.
2. The entire episode is a complete override of the previous season 2 finale episode, "Mayura" where the classmates called Marinette their "everyday Ladybug" for all her good deeds, meanwhile, Marinette was made an outcast in this episode.
3. The entire class except Marinette and Adrien had their intelligence level dropped for plot convenience, including Alya, Marinette's closest friends, Rose and Juleka, two of the nicest students in the class, and even Max, the class genius!
   • Speaking about Max, Lila grabs a napkin Marinette threw at her, and when the latter points out that she was lying about her injured wrist, Lila covers herself by pretending to be hurt and claiming that she was trying to save Max since she once saw in India a man who got his eye gouged out with a napkin, and Max thanks her for "saving" him despite that he has glasses. Really?
4. On top of that, the episode events could have been prevented if the students had asked for Marinette's input on whether she wanted to sit in the back, that could have prevented Marinette's anger and Hawk Moth would be unable to use an Akuma on her.
   • Or maybe Miss Bustier could have asked Lila for a doctor's note for her "hearing issue".
5. Somehow, Marinette's portrayed as in the wrong for trying to expose Lila in the episode, when she was doing what was right.
6. Lila gets little-to-no punishment for her actions in the episode, and she continues threatening Marinette at the end.
   • To makes things worse, this episode marks the start of her flanderization.
7. Overall, this episode was a mean-spirited way to start season 3 and started the downfall of the series.

Redeeming Qualities

1. Marinette and Adrien are the only likable characters.
2. Even though Lila didn't get a real punishment, she did get comeuppance by ending up at the back of the room without Adrien close to her.

Trivia

• After this episode was released, a massive number of fanfictions flooded Fanfiction.net, many of them calling out all parties involved in torturing Marinette and presenting how such a situation would happen in real life. Most of these fics involve Alya turning on Marinette and becoming a bully, Adrien losing his powers, Miss Bustier and the principal being taken to task for being so Blaise towards bullying, Chloe stepping up and calling out Lila, and in a few cases, Marinette even gets akumatized.

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