Episode Re-Review: Marks for Effort (And Important Update!) · 4:56pm May 25th
Before we get into the re-review, I have some important and unfortunate news to share with you all. Don't worry, I'm not leaving this site or deactivating my account if that's what you're thinking. Despite not having any new pony content to indulge on given that "Tell Your Tale" seems to have no interest in building on anything from "Make Your Mark" (Allura and Twitch have done nothing of substance, and Comet has not appeared or been referenced at all) or has any interest in maintaining consistency, I'm sticking around for the time being. And you may have noticed that I've had more time to spend on the site these past few months. Well, that's because that part time job I got last year that I was hoping I could parlay into something better turned out to be a dead end, and I was let go in March of this year. So I'm back to working just one part time job. That wouldn't be a problem if not for the fact that my father, who's been the sole income provider for my family for over two decades now has said he's going to quit his job. He is hoping to find work elsewhere, but given my inability to find more suitable part time work in my interests, I'm not holding my breath. So I'm going to be establishing either a PayPal or a Patron account so that I can officially charge for commissions. I'll set up a separate acount specifically for those commissions, and I'll let you all know when it's up and running so you can see what the rules are. I wanted to avoid doing this if it at all possible because I wanted to write for fun, not to make money. But circumstances have forced my hand. This account will still be used for the fics I write for fun, and you can still make unpaid requests as you want here. And now that we have that out of the way, we can get into the re-review proper.
So after the complete disaster that was "Non-Compete Clause", Season 8 opted for an episode not at all focused on the School of Friendship that tried to be "Slice of Life" for secondary characters, but ended up using the annoyingly overdone trope of misunderstandings due to out of context situations. From there, it finally got back on the right track to an extent with "Molt Down" that saw Spike sprout wings, and opted to fix the mistakes of both "Secret of My Excess" and "Dragon Quest" in regard to world building. But even that episode was a far cry from the quality of episodes like "Surf and/or Turf" and "Horse Play". And now we were focusing on the School of Friendship directly again, this time with the Cutie Mark Crusaders, who really stepped up in Season 7. Nicole Dubac was on tap to write this episode. She had previously worked with Michael Vogel under a shared pen name to write the "Ponyville Mysteries" chapter books that focused on the CMC, and worked with Michael Vogel and Josh Haber directly for "Shadow Play", which many said it was the 2017 movie should've been. So by all accounts, Nicole should've been well suited for this episode. But many regard this as Nicole's first true misstep, one she would never fully recover from. And it's one that served to introduce what would be a controversial villain. Is it possible that this episode isn't as bad as people make it out to be, especially given all the other missteps Season 8 committed? Well, let's find out.
The episode begins with the Cutie Mark Crusaders observing the School of Friendship in action, most notably Pinkie Pie teaching a class on compliments (shouldn't that be Fluttershy teaching that, though?) and Rainbow Dash serving as more or less the gym teacher. It's sad that this is the first real sign we've seen of any of the mane six being at all good in the role of teachers, and it really doesn't do enough to make up for all the times before hand that we saw how being teachers was either messing up their personal lives, or that they were outright bad at being teachers. Much like with the expansion of the map, it feels like they're trying to put the school front and center in the hopes that it'll make people more interested in it. This also serves to mention that the CMC are not allowed to attend the school despite the fact that they're children too (it's not clear if they're older or younger than the student/young six). Twilight even flat out tells them they're not going to be admitted, regardless of how much they plead with her. At least we saw back in "Twilight Time" that Twilight could say no to cute faces.
Interestingly, the CMC interrupt Twilight during one of her classes, specifically called "Friendship Through the Ages".
And we get a funny gag where Spike, in the brief amount of time Twilight was gone, turned her class into a secret club. It's actually a reference to Dead Poets Society, with them reciting a phrase from the famous poem "Oh Captain, My Captain".
But does Twilight tell the CMC at all why they're not allowed to attend her school? Nope. She refuses to tell them, apparently expecting them to understand. But of course they don't, they want to go to the school because... potatoes. They do claim it's more fun than the schoolhouse they're attending, but the real reason is just because the plot says so. And the CMC proceed to do really annoying things to try to get admitted. They start slacking off on their chores, tell embarrassing secrets they promised not to share, and even outright beg their big sisters to be allowed to attend. We do get a good ad-lib line from Rarity when she calls Sweetie Belle "Repeatie Belle", but this doesn't paint the Crusaders in a good light at all.
Then the plot decides to shift gears as the CMC overhear crying outside their clubhouse. The crying is coming from Cozy Glow, a pegasus filly with a rook chess piece for a cutie mark. Design wise, she's intended to be a reference to the famous child actor Shirley Temple.
And why is Cozy crying? Because she's about to flunk out of the School of Friendship, apparently not knowing anything at all about friendship. The CMC decide to help her out of the kindness of their own hearts, and Cozy reveals that she was more or less given a homework assignment where she has to do nice things for three ponies. It's not clear whether they were assigned to her, or if she was allowed to choose who she'd help. This is actually a very practical way of teaching friendship. Friendship is something that you can't necessarily teach in a classroom with a lecture. And not all students learn best through such lectures anyway. Practical experience is always good. So we get a montage of sorts of the CMC helping Cozy Glow. The first pony she helps is Bon Bon, who buys a cactus, but has problems with it poking out of the bag and pricking at her. But even though we saw Rarity's hoof turn red when she jabbed herself with a sewing needle, Bon Bon doesn't bleed or even have scratch marks from carrying the cactus.
Fortunately, Cozy quickly comes up with the solution: Using Scootaloo's helmet to protect Bon Bon. Kind of makes you wonder why the seller didn't include that for earth ponies and pegasi. From there, we have Sweetie Belle helping Cozy Glow organize Mrs. Cake's sprinkle shakers while she (Mrs. Cake) is on break. But Mrs. Cake ends up nullifying the hard work when she decides to make rainbow sprinkles, leaving Cozy visibly frustrated.
Finally, Apple Bloom helps Cozy Glow clear the orchard so Big Mac can spend more time with Sugar Belle. As a result of the CMC's help, Cozy Glow gets high marks on her homework, and asks them for more help with other assignments. During this montage, we see the CMC and Cozy Glow cleaning up Fluttershy's cottage, even down to Cozy trying to sweep dust under the rug.
They also help her to study for an upcoming friendship test. And they "foreshadow" Cozy's later villanous reveal by having her state that friendship is "control".
When the CMC check in with Cozy Glow after the test, however, Cozy says that she failed it and runs away. The CMC are quite confused abou this, and before they can process what's happened, Twilight calls them into her office. There, she reveals that Cozy Glow gave really bad answers on her test, even down to saying the princess of friendship is "your mom".
So how did Twilight find out about the CMC helping Cozy Glow? Well, she pressed Cozy Glow for an explanation about why she did so bad on the test, and Cozy told Twilight about the CMC helping her. The CMC are naturally shocked to learn that Cozy Glow could do bad despite all they taught her. And what does Twilight do? Rather than give the Crusaders a chance to explain themselves, rather than call Cozy Glow back in to try to get more information, rather than conduct any sort of investigation, she decides to outright ban the CMC from even coming near her school. Yes, that's right, Twilight thinks that the CMC delibertly sabotaged Cozy Glow out of spite for not being allowed to attend her school. Nevermind the fact that she tutorted them personally back in "Twilight Time", so she should clearly know them enough to know they would never intentionally do bad things to her. And what's even worse is that Twilight has been on the receiving end of being accused and having no one believe her when she professes her innocence. She has zero right to inflict the same thing onto the CMC and isolate them, especially not without proof or without giving them a chance to defend themselves.
Then Cozy Glow apparently realizes she messed up. So she goes to see Starlight in her counselor's office and confesses to her "crime". She delibertly did bad on the test, hoping that if she mentioned the CMC teaching her, Twilight would think they were bad at friendship and thus would benefit from attending her school. And Starlight, after briefly being "surprised" at how devious Cozy's plan was, reveals that the CMC weren't allowed to attend because they were already so well knowledged about friendship. And yet apparently, neither she, Twilight, or any of the CMC's big sisters ever once conveyed this. Not even after witnessing them fake a painfully obvious fight that of course didn't work. And does Twilight ever apologize for withholding this information from the CMC, or for accusing them without proof? Nope. She doesn't have to apologize. She just summons the CMC back in and gives them honorary friendship diplomas, as well as giving them the chance to serve as friendship tutors for her school even though they're still children themselves. Yes, I know colleges have student tutors and student helpers, but that's not the same thing. And this is nothing more than Twilight trying to save face. She never once shows any signs that she's sorry for anything she said or did to the CMC at any point.
And apparently, none of the other mane six see anything wrong with this. Nevermind the fact that Fluttershy saw the CMC helping Cozy Glow and could've easily vouched for them. It's not like she's been afraid to stand up to her friends before, she's told off Discord multiple times.
Heck, the CMC's big sisters should've had a word with Twilight about falsely accusing their little sisters. But no, all it takes is an "explanation" that should've been given sooner and some friendship diplomas, and all is forgiven.
Supposedly, there's speculation that Cozy Glow's "lie" was malicious in its intent, and she's just claiming she wanted to get the into the School of Friendship just to keep ponies in the dark. But assuming she was trying to sabotage the CMC, why would she confess after Twilight banned them from ever coming near the school? No one suspected anything. She got what she supposedly should've wanted, the CMC showed no signs they were about to turn on her or blow up at her for sabotaging them. As far as they knew, Cozy was sincere about wanting to help them, and there's no way she could've known Twilight would react the way she did. If anything, Cozy would probably be right to think that Twilight would be more suprised than upset, and wouldn't resort to accusing the CMC without proof. Assuming this was meant to be more foreshadowing of Cozy's evil plans, they ended up undoing what they wanted to do, and for no reason other than because I guess they couldn't think of how to get a happy ending without Cozy confessing.
And that's the story, so what do I think of the episode? Well, up until the third act, it honeslty wasn't that bad. Aside from the CMC's sudden interest in the School of Friendship and Twilight refusing to tell them why they weren't allowed to attend it, there was nothing offensively wrong with the episode. The Crusaders helping Cozy Glow feels like a natural evolution of their characters, though it does also feel a bit like their montages from Season 1, except now they're not trying to get cutie marks, they're just trying to be helpful. Had that been all there was to this episode, it would've been passable, probably even forgettable. But when the third act came along, it opted to go the route of "Rainbow Falls" and completely destroy a character just to shoe-horn in a climax. Twilight is completely out of character there, to the point where you might as well have had her be replaced by an evil clone. And she never apologizes once, even after realizing that she was wrong. Again, her giving the CMC diplomas doesn't make up for her falsely accusing them and having a kneejerk reaction. And she never gets called out for it by anyone: Not by the CMC themselves, not by Spike, not by the CMC's big sisters or Fluttershy, not even by Starlight who was previously the one pony who could apparently talk sense into Twilight when she was too wrapped up in her own beliefs.
Assuming all of this is supposed to be part of a cleverly engineered plot on Cozy Glow's part, there is no way she could've known things would turn out the way they did. And even if she did somehow know, why would she confess to her role in it? Why undo her carefully crafted sabotage if no one ever suspected anything about her? Wouldn't trying to save face end up drawing more attention to her? Honestly, it just further demonstrates how little effort went into Cozy Glow beyond the painfully obvious twist about the "cute and innocent" type. And as I've said many times before, if they expect me to believe that a child could be an iredeemable monster on par with Queen Chrysalis, Lord Tirek, and King Sombra, they need to do a lot more to convince me than to just say she's evil and leave it at that.
It's not even like they needed to get the CMC involved with the School of Friendship, because they ended up being defeatly uncerimoniously by Cozy Glow and accomplishing nothing during "School Raze". And that means Cozy Glow could've been introduced in any episode prior to this one without anything being scarificed. Maybe this was the first episode they wrote after settling on the idea of Cozy Glow, but if so why did they not go back and change their plans for Chancellor Neighsay if he wasn't going to be the big bad of Season 8 after all?
Despite all of that, I can't give this episode an F or F-. It was really only that badly written climax in the third act that made this episode so bad. And that means it gets an E. It can't get any lower than that because it's clear that the climax was just tossed in last minute with no thought given to it. This strikes me as yet another first draft that desperately needed revising, and for whatever reason was not granted that opportunity. Surely, Haber or Vogel could've spared a little time to help Nicole out, especially since they kept her on the writing staff for Season 9, and especially considering she abruptly left "Sounds of Silence" after writing the song for it with no explanation as to her abrupt leave of absence. If they couldn't because the School of Friendship was proving to be a difficult concept, they should've put their foot down and told Hasbro that they couldn't do it, that adding more characters so close to the end of the show was not possible without badly altering the quality. And then they could've just gone back to some of their shelved ideas to use instead. I don't know what happened to Nicole when she was writing this episode, but her first solo writing endevor turned out to be a bust. She's on the same level as Corey Powell, good at writing child characters like the CMC, but not good at writing anyone else for whatever reason. I kind of feel sorry for how much of a raw deal she got, since I assume she was friends with Haber and Vogel (because why else would she get so much special treatment in Seasons 8 and 9?), and yet they couldn't help her out when she needed it most. Nicole really should've just been confined to collabs, having only one episode where she was a good solo writer really doesn't paint her in a good light.
And somehow, Season 8 would only get worse from here. Next up we have "The Mean Six", Queen Chrysalis' return in which she clones the mane six (but not Starlight), only for the mane six to have no idea she's there and her own creations end up defeating her, effectively turning her into Opaline Arcana.
all the best
Honestly, while this is one of the weaker episodes of Season 8, I still think Nicole Dubac's next writing credit A Matter of Principals is much worse. I mean, say what you will about Twilight. At least here, she wasn't treated as sympathetic or in the right for her bad actions, she was only mean-spirited towards three fillies instead of an entire school, she didn't put any of their lives in danger, and she actually made an effort to fix her mistake. In fact, Nicole Dubac herself posted on Twitter that Twilight apologized with her actions. Click here if you don't believe me. Also, as this episode's TV Tropes page pointed out, there was a moment where Twilight had a regretful expression on her face when the CMC were leaving her office, which implies that she had some remorse for being too hard on them. It may have been small, but it was still more than Discord showed throughout the entirety of AMOP.
Overall, even though Twilight wasn't at her best in this episode, I think most people would agree that she was a saint compared to Discord in AMOP.
I really love this episode.
The "Your mom" joke was so unexpected it kinda makes it amazing on its own
And the "I see" face is just so memetastic, it elevates the episode more
From the reviews I've seen - yours and someone else's - I feel like I should stop at Season...7/the movie.
5782876 Eh, there are still some good episodes in Season 8, and Season 9 at least to me is an improvement, third best season overall.
5782884
Well, that gives me hope.